"See anything yet?" asked a grey-armoured turian.
	"Nah," said his equally-grey compatriot, "nothing.  I hate this planet."
	"We all do, it's the only place we could set something up without any suspici-"
	"Don't give me the lecture I know why we're here, doesn't mean I have to like it."
The two turians sat waiting at the front gate of the large abandoned radar base, the size of a spaceport and big enough to house all of their small fleet within.  A satellite dish, huge and resplendent above them had been lovingly restored to its former glory.  The base was easily half the size of a city block, well-suited for any dangerous experiments as the dust storms swirled and ebbed around the murky grey walls.  Other turians walked back and forth, checking up on each other with routes and correspondents for certain locations.  Eventually, one of them looked up at a star much more brightly shining than the rest.
	"Hey look at that, which one's that?"
	"I dunno," said his friend, "I didn't memorise every star out there."
	"REALLY?  You can name every single person on Fleet and Flotilla but you can't name what system we're in!"
	"I never said that!"
	"Prove it, name every one in the Hanlae vas Torna family."
	"Uhhhh there's Sheum, Kanher, Hierum he's adopted, Gehdon, Anver, Ullnar and Dinah."
	"And what system are we in?"
	"Uh...WOAH LOOK!"
	"Don't fucking distract me, you're not fooling me this time!"
	"NO SHIT REALLY LOOK!"
	"Vieran!  VIERAN DON'T YOU RUN AWAY FROM ME I KNEW IT!  I KNEW IT YOU FUCKING NERD YOU COULD AT LEAST ADMIT THAT YOU DON'T KNOW SHI-"
Unfortunately he was unable to finish his curse when a violent white light obliterated his post, turning him and his small barrier into a mouldy crater, his cohort running towards the front entrance of the base for cover before screaming:
	"WE'RE UNDER ATTACK, AERIAL ASSAULT I REPEAT, SOMETHING FIRING ON US FROM ORBIT!"
	"GET YOURSELVES IN POSITION!" roared a tannoy from above.  "ALL GUARDS ABLE GET YOURSELVES INTO POSITION FIVE-C, I REPEAT, POSITION FIVE-C WE'RE UNDER ATTACK!"
	"GET THOSE SHIPS FLYING, WE'LL SHOOT THOSE FUCKERS DOWN!  BIETAN JARRAI!"

All hell broke loose around the Facinus research base, ships flying off all parked in a row behind the radar station as crews began mounting up the ramp, ready for action and armed to the teeth.  Scanners went wide-beam, rifles pointed down towards all directions able for any ships to come flying in as reports came thick and fast.  The dust storm steadied itself at a mild ebb just enough to obscure the horizon.
	"Where's the enemy?!"
	"I dunno we've got them in orbit!"
	"SIR, it's a geth ship, dreadnought class!"
	"WHAT!?"
	"Scan's coming in, it's sending out fighters, we're gonna be swarmed!"
	"What are they crazy?!  EVERYONE, FLY YOUR SHIPS OUT, WE'RE SITTING TARGETS DOWN HERE!"
	"WHAT ABOUT THE ANOMALY!?"
	"They won't come down here to fight, they know why!  Commander Tanus told us so, they won't risk getting corrupted!"
	"But-"
	"LISTEN, I'M NOT SITTING HERE LETTING THEM TAKE SHOTS AT US FROM SPACE, FUCK THAT!  GET YOUR SHIPS OUT AND TAKE THE FIGHT TO THEM!  BIETAN JARRAI!"
	"BIETAN JARRAI!"
With a roar of fury in their hearts the Facinus crew members began flying off towards space, the turian vessels painted a variety of colours but all having a consistent theme and emblem of their terrorist faction.  They knew also that the geth were unable to come down with their ground troops, giving them equal reassurance to leave a skeleton guard behind in the form of the most minimum defence possible required for their research hideout.  Unfortunately, they did not anticipate the geth having some other assistance on foot.
The dreadnought hung above the planet Daratar like an angel of death, strange and terrifying in its superfluent form of undulating contours and bulbous proportions.  All around the ship there came the swarm of a geth fighter squadron, a few dozen or more ship that zipped by too fast to be counted.  Like giant metallic hornets hovering through space, their strange insectoid shape was disturbing enough to notice when screaming silently past the oncoming horde of Facinus' ships.
While the dreadnought itself was nowhere near mobile enough to evade them, the fighter squadron gladly began antagonising them, dodging turian cruisers and vessels whilst firing back with hot white beams across the hulls.  The turian ships, shaped more like birds with peeled-back wings and long slender noses, readied themselves for a fight shooting down every single ship that wasn't theirs.  On the ground however, it was a much different fight as one other bird-shaped ship landed itself a fair distance away from the base.
	"You ready?" asked James.
	"Oh yeah," said Jax behind him, "we're good to go, you got your water?"
	"Sure do, thanks for telling me about the electrolyte stuff you got."
	"Yeah well, don't wanna have your nanos runnin' out durin' THIS fight.  You guys ready?"
	"We got this," said Lirem, "just remember your positions."
	"I'm all set here," said Areh.  "You sure you can fly that thing James?"
	"I should be okay," said FG, "the geth said they made this thing easier for me especially...I'm starting to feel like an idiot."
	"That's new?"
	"Shut up."
	"Heheheh...well I'm ready to roll."
	"So are we," said Norem, "initiating Plan Anti-Shift in three...two...one."

The Centurion Eagle's docking bay opened, as Areh came roaring out on the Varan mako straight off towards the base, speeding across the rock desert as he kept a layout of the land on his screen.  The schematics from Thrassil were vital to his navigation, allowing him to move around the various canyons and gulches in order to traverse closer to the base undetected.  It was perfect.  Their entire armada was so focused on the geth dreadnought taking gigantic pot shots at them from space that they would never notice the one tank slipping through.
But of course it was not safe to hedge all their bets on one tank, so they also had both the Centurion Eagle with its somewhat-shabby new weapons as well as a geth fighter.  Unlike the other geth fighters in space however, this one was not suspect to being corrupted by the anomaly because it wasn't being controlled by the geth.  Instead it was being controlled by a krogan and a raptor, wielding a much simpler lit-up console that made him feel incredibly patronised to, tapping the occasional "fly up" or "move fast" button.  But it worked nevertheless, especially when he chose to shoot at the ground forces.
	"The FUCK!?"
	"ONE OF THE GETH GOT THROUGH, FIRE FIRE!"
	"HOW DID IT GET THROUGH, CALL THE COMMANDER!"
	"COMMANDER, ONE OF THE FIGHTERS IS-AAAGH!  S-SEND OUT THE CODE, DO IT!"
The turian soldiers fired up towards the dizzyingly fast geth fighter, the raptor veering left and right as if he were riding a motorcycle down the highway.  He was slowly slipping back into his element, high-speed action with a small fighter ship and modified visual ports to help him see more clearly.  Normally Geth did not need windows of any sort but again this was  a ship they had especially designed for FG for when the time would come.  Jax was laughing with pride at seeing the raptor pilot obliterate the ground forces, pummelling through their barricades and cutting down troopers.
	"HAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAA!  AREH THIS SHIT IS THE BEST, WHERE YOU AT?!"
	"I'm almost there!" replied Areh.  "Leave some for me alright!?"
	"OKAY!  James you better leave some fer-"
	"I HEARD HIM!" cried FG.  "Fuck YOU!  Fuck YOU!  And ESPECIALLY FUUUCK YOU!"
Said fuck you was emphasised towards a small platoon of rocket-wielding troopers ready to take him down until he spotted them, a few tracing shots stopping them as they began to disperse.  None of them could even hit the fighter ship, roaring around the base in a continuous circle without any sort of consistency.  Areh was soon charging up towards the outskirts of the radar's scope, his motions tracked soon but no one came to greet him.  The only first inclination they had of backup was a blasting cannon shot towards one of the watchtowers, a former ruin remnant.

Even more ruined it now became as the two lookouts went screaming down amongst a pile of rubble, or explosive force if the ruined monument outlasted even that force of reckoning.  The quarian giggled to himself as he felt victory close at hand, his own cockiness shining through as he too was in his own element.  Somehow driving a tank pumping his aggression out unto the terrorist group was turning incredibly cathartic for him, roaring as he crushed, shot and blasted his way through the small barricades around the outer rim of the base defences.
And even that wasn't all that Facinus had to deal with, the Centurion Eagle was causing problems in turn as it began skirting round the perimeter, firing upon any larger factions with its own outdated weaponry.  The laser cannons were old scrap but they still worked and were cheap to maintain, and if anything provided an impressive volley of cutting shots that dug deep into the ground.  Whatever was in the way of it was going to be cut down to atoms, barring any actual vehicles or ruined structures strong enough to withstand it.  Organics however did not survive.
With a three-pronged assault as well as most of their firepower trying to focus on the dreadnought, which rained down destruction upon the ruined husk of a planet, Facinus were finding it more and more difficult to deal with such a sudden force.  Caught by surprise, their forces started contemplating retreat into the bunkered headquarters itself, the research base acting like a stronghold very clearly for their most important work.  Amidst the constant chaos and screaming noises of cannon fire and planet-shattering explosions from the stars above, a small turian group began panicking.
	"WE GOTTA PULL BACK!"
	"WHAT NO!"
	"WE NEED TO REGROUP, WE CAN'T JUST SIT OUT HERE LETTING THREE THINGS FUCK US UP ALL AT ONCE!  WE GOTTA FOCUS ON ONE!"
	"WHICH ONE!?"
	"I DUNNO, WE CAN'T GO FOR THE SHIPS SO...WAIT, I GOT A PLAN, I KNOW WHO CAN HANDLE THIS!"
As a small group of turians began running off towards a side area of the base, the Centurion Eagle and its geth fighter cohort kept firing down upon the rest of the meandering terrorist forces with gusto.  Areh was taking care of the now-pointless barricade defences on the outer rim just to spite them, as well as taking out their infantry more and more.  The skeleton guard now left behind was getting slowly more crippled as the quarian raced through a small gulch, ducking beneath the land as he burned rubber like never before, as he spoke through the comms:
	"I'm on my way to the front of the base, be there in about ten minutes!"
	"GOT IT!" roared Jax.  "We're cuttin' these bastards down easy, I dunno how they even handled shit before we showed up!"
	"Me either, I just got one last gulch to pass through and up towards the dried-out lake.  Bit of an uphill climb but the canyon was too big to jump."
	"Hope you knock on their door with that cannon of yours pal."
	"Oh don't worry, I-...what the-KEELAH FUCK ROLL!"

As he cleared up the gulch riverbed driving up towards the original lake's location, he found himself suddenly underneath a dark shadow of a tank roaring from above him.  He barely dodged in time with a sudden rolling turn, the tank clipping him hard at the side and knocking his mako aside.  Areh turned slowly towards his new enemy, another huge Mako tank that looked somewhat like his own.  But this one had been painted with long green stripes along both sides.
	"WEEEELLLL WELL WEEELLLL!  LOOK WHO FINALLY SHOWED UP!"
	"Wha-who the fuck are you?!"
	"Remember ME?!"
The tank blasted its cannon before Areh could dodge, striking hard on the front to cause a blasting crack through his shield briefly, shuddering throughout the tank.  He soon found himself staring into the monitor over local communications showing the face of a sneering turian, cocky with light-coloured chalk face and two vertical purple streaks on each side of his face.  Areh recognised him almost immediately, staring at each other across the space of the dried-up lake, walls all around them.
	"...Vamire Squaron, right?"
	"Oh, so you CAN remember names can you?!"
	"I had to look it up, I don't care about bosh'tets like you."
	"Well you're gonna care a lot about me you spastic suit rat."
	"What?!"
	"Hehehe...I looked you up too.  Areh'Narohl nar Qwib-Qwib...I never forget a freak, especially one that got away from me."
	"Who you calling a freak, terrorist prick!?"
	"Least my brain's all working enough to know how to use it.  You got a real interesting bunch of fans out there yanno, didn't take that long for me to figure out who you really were you little nar tasi-"
	"SHUT UP!  DON'T EVER CALL ME THAT YOU MOUTHFLAPPING FUCKFACE!"
	"Hhhhaaaaaa ha ha ha ha...yeaaaaah I knew it.  I knew you were."
	"Areh what's wrong?!" called Jax through the comms.
	"S-something's come up, just a bit of resistance, I got this!"
	"But we could-"
	"I GOT THIS JAX, LEMME FUCKING DEAL WITH IT  JUST DO YOUR PART ALRIGHT?!"
	"A-alright alright, just...be careful alright?!  I don't want you getting hurt out there!"
	"I won't, now lemme handle this will ya?!"
The comms turned off and it went back towards Vamire Squaron, chuckling at the quarian.
	"Nice friend you got there...krogan right?"
	"None of your business, you gonna fight me or you just a poser?"
	"You keep a krogan around so you feel smarter than him?  That it?  Like some fucking pet?"
	"That's not true shut up!"
	"Your fans seem to think so...a lot of them do.  You ever read your own fan forums?"
	"There's...a few of them, so what?!"
	"You ever read what they all think about you?"
	"...I don't care."
	"I do.  I read up everything about you.  They got a lot of theories about you two.  Maybe you're lovers, maybe you're best friends...or maybe you keep him around just because you can't stand the thought of being the dumbest little bitch in this ragtag group of jokers you call a band."
	"SHUT UP!"
The quarian blasted his tank cannon towards Squaron, who dodged expertly with a rolling hydraulic jet but did not counter back.
	"JUST SHUT UP!  HE'S MY FRIEND!  He's my friend and that's it, he's waiting for me and I am NOT gonna be late so get the FUCK OUT MY WAY!"
	"Hell no," replied Vamire, "I'm gonna teach you a lesson about knowing your place you little fuck you know who I am?!  I'm Vamire Squaron, the Reckless, the master of destruction only I control, when I obliterate the SHIT out of the Turian Hierarchy!  You know what the difference between me and you is?!  When I'm crippled, I always heal!  But for YOU, you'll always be a cripple since the day you were BORN!"

Vamire revved up his tank and violently charged towards Areh, the quarian rolling his tank easily using hydraulics before desperately blasting a shot at Squaron's side.  The shot misfired and hit mostly the back wheel, but it was enough to sideswipe him hard enough to go screeching backwards as the battle began.
	"YOU GOT LUCKY THE FIRST TIME WE MET, BUT I!  WILL NOT!  FUCKING LOSE TO A BITCH LIKE YOU!"
Squaron's tank charged once again, as Areh played defensive at first in order to get a good scope on the enemy tank's abilities.  The moment Squaron hit against a wall, he turned hard and revved upon it sideways with an insane torque, grinding viciously upon the ancient lakeside before blasting off of it.  His tank came hurtling with a surprising precision straight on top of where Areh had once been, the quarian hastily dodging away with a hydraulic flip-roll to one side as the dust settled once more.  But not before he blasted a cannon shot straight at Vamire's side.
	"AAARGH!"
	"Stop bothering me, I got a mission to do!"
	"SO DO I, AND THAT MEANS KILLING YOU!"
The turian revved up once again, a much stronger engine than Areh's tank noticeably so, almost like it was designed for drag racing as it slalomed towards him.  Again Areh dodged it with a side-flip, spinning briefly before spreadfiring with the machine gun turret all across Vamire's side.  Pinging off the inbuilt shield, it did some minor damage but nothing worth noting, the turian terrorist screeching his tires underneath him before a vicious charge.  Just when Areh was about to dodgeroll once again however, Vamire did the same, slamming into him like a corkscrew.
	"AAAAGH!"
Areh slammed hard against the wall, jolted in his seat as the impact shook through his body.  Vamire pulled back and readied for another charge, grinning fiercely to himself as he peppered the Varan with machine gun fire, but Areh was not concerned as he waited.  The charge soon came, and the quarian readied a different sort of move.
	"MOTHRA LEO BOOST ROLL!"
Slamming on the jets, he hopped straight above Squaron's tank as the turian crashed into the wall, slamming into his console hard with a burning face as the quarian spun briefly in the air above him.  he was less like a butterfly and more like a clumsy UFO, whirling as he boosted his jets one way to dismount onto the ground, turning straight towards the turian opponent who replied:
	"NNNGH!  You SHIT, you think you can dodge me forever?!"
	"I dodged worse than you!" said Areh.  "What makes you any different?!"
	"Because I'M SMARTER THAN YOU!  I didn't walk away from every crash I ever made without a scratch by being STUPID you little FUCK!"
	"Yanno crashing everything you ever drove is KIND of a sign you are stupid."
	"SHUT UP YOU PUNKASS BITCH!  TAKE THIS!"

The turian blasted a thick cannon shot, the quarian barely dodgerolling out of the way before he suddenly saw the sight of the other mako pummelling down towards him.  In his panic, he boosted upwards but was unable to recover the boost fast enough after rolling and ended up clipping hard against Vamire's top part of the tank, flipping Areh forwards into a bad roll that left him straight on his back.  Squaron cackled as he saw the quarian tank start to roll like a turtle upside down before Areh cried out:
	"ANGUIRUS ROLL!"
A ball-shaped field suddenly formed around the tank, causing it to roll softly back onto its front through inertia as the antimaterial force surrounding it soon stopped.  The quarian was back on his feet, shaking his head a little as Vamire revved up once again.  Instead of racing towards Areh however, he went straight onto the lakewall itself, going at a 45-degree angle that most vehicles would find absurd.  But not the mako, almost vertical as he screamed his way around Areh, circling him like a vulture.
The quarian tried to fire back with a machinegun spread, but all it did was annoy the turian under the constant sound of pinging gunfire across the hull of his tank.  Soon he readily boosted himself off the wall, spinning through the air twice before ready to land on Areh's tank with the aim of crushing him.  Areh had other plans, firing up his cannon straight towards him and rerouting some of his own shield's power towards the shot.
	"ATOMIC SHOT!"
	"G-GAAA-A-A-AAARGH!"
Vamire Squaron was suddenly blasted by a violent explosive shot, a beam of pure blue light that burned like fire throughout his tank as he was shot straight backwards.  He rolled several times hard, bruised all over and wincing from the sudden inertia as he spat blood from his cracked mouth from the second time he hit his head on the console.  His tank's defences had been shot down to about 60%, snarling viciously towards Areh who hoped he could outlast the rest of the fight.  His own tank was handling itself around 40% after using some of his shield power.
	"NOW YOU DONE IT, NOW YOU PISSED ME OFF!"
	"What is your DEAL you bosh'tet fuck?!" called out Areh.
	"YOU MADE AN ASS OF ME BACK ON EPHO, YOU KNOW WHAT THAT DID TO ME?!  I got slammed down, I lost the respect of my own commander who FUCKING PRAISED ME BEFORE!  The fact that a spastic little suit rat like YOU took that away from me, THAT'S FUCKING INEXCUSABLE!  NOBODY MAKES A FOOL OUT OF ME!  NOBODYYYY!"
	"...heh," replied Areh smugly, "looks like I am smarter than you."
	"RRRAAAAAAARGH!"
Readying himself for another charge, Areh turned and ran up against the wall and lured Squaron in like a bull about to be slain, the turian gripping his knuckles tight around the console as Areh readied himself to boost.  He had his own ideas for a new move he had been wanting to practice, his cockiness firing up as the turian slammed into the wall.  Just before he could hit Areh, the quarian revved hard and forced the mako's torque to push until he was perfectly vertical.  The hard tap from Squaron behind him sent him upwards, boosting himself higher as the tank hovered briefly over Squaron.
Areh pointed his mako cannon in preparation, firing up a specialised shot he called:
	"Lemme show you a Ghidorah special you bosh'tet-WHA-NOOO!"

Vamire however was smarter than that, revving up hard against the wall to follow Areh and boosting even harder against him, cracking against the tank in mid-air before the quarian could stop himself.  Not only was he slammed into by an equally brutal force, but when he went down first onto his side, Squaron came down hard on top of him, crushing his tank violently as the metal creaked viciously all around him.  Areh screamed as the front of his tank was brutally crunched, his body thrown against the tighter walls around him with severe bruises now showing.
The sight of his mask with the tiniest sliver in front of his right eye made him panic, shivering as he got up and back to the console groaning, wounds unseen beneath his suit as nothing appeared to be cut yet.  But his focus was now wavering, the crack he could clearly see on his mask or perhaps something else making him worry more and more.  It was this that would turn the tide of the battle as Vamire roared up his engine, charging towards Areh whilst shooting at the same time.  The cannon shot drove him back, forcing Areh to rev backwards in panic.
But that only made it worse when the turian slammed into him, driving against him.  He would have dodged but he found there was another problem.  His boosts were now out of alignment, crushed inwards by Vamire Squaron's bodyslam from above.  He had no evasive abilities other than to turn and drive, soon forcing himself against the Facinus tank and driving away desperately to try and escape the lakebed.  But Squaron wasn't letting him get away this time, blasting him in the rear with a precise cannon shot that crippled his back end.
Areh shrieked as the force shot him forwards, throwing up his hands to protect his face as his elbow cracked from the force before he fell screaming.  Wincing as tears welled up in his eyes, he didn't pay attention enough to veer out of the way as Squaron backed up, seeing the mako Varan start slowing down.  He revved up one last brutal tactice as he rammed violently into the back of Areh's tank, forcing him up against the lakebed as he drove upwards hard enough that he went flying above the lakebed briefly.  It only took a cannon shot to finish it.
	"Fuck you."
The cannon blasted Areh's turret hard enough to break it through, crippling his offensive capabilities to near-uselessness as he suddenly flung forwards from the blast, landing suddenly on the plateau outside of the dry lake.  He couldn't focus, wincing as his elbow throbbed and ached with broken pain clutching it tightly, shivering to himself.  Shivering as he thought the crack in his helmet turned larger with every breath.  He wasn't sure if it did, but it was enough to barely distract him from the fact his mako was now slowly smouldering to itself.

His shield was now gone, and his hull integrity was failing from the overbearing damage now done to him.  The tank was still salvageable enough to drive, but a simple push of a few buttons showed he had no way of fighting, and he had no way of evading.  This only made him fearful at hearing the voice on his monitor:
	"Oh look...a crippled tank, driven by a cripple."
	"Sh-sh-SHUT UP!  WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!  WHY ARE YOU SUCH A DICK?!"
	"I want you dead...and I want all your friends to leave or be dead like you.  I would let them leave even...but not you.  Oh no...I wanna make you hurt for what you did to me."
	"I...I just-AAAGH!"
The ramming from the back threw him forwards and hurt his elbow more, crying out as he definitely felt his arm crack whilst sobbing.  The turian smiled cruelly.
	"Look at you, you're pathetic.  A real warrior, a real driver of a mako would never cry at a few bruises.  What are you even doing here kid?  You've got no reason to be here."
	"I-i...I'm here to stop you...you terrorist bastards."
	"Stop us?  You?!  You couldn't even stop a cloud from moving the way you drived you little bitch!"
	"And you're a bully!  THAT'S ALL YOU ARE!  A FUCKING BULLY WHO BECAME A TERRORIST!  This make you feel better about yourself?!  Picking on me because I beat you last time, because I humiliated you?!  You broke my tank, you broke my arm, you happy now?!  ARE YOU!?"
	"No."
Ramming once again with a boosting force, Squaron came from the side and slammed brutally against Areh, causing him to fall to the floor and whimper from being unable to escape.  The turian revved up to crush against him once more.
	"I want you to know how fucking beneath me you are.  You beating me last time, you beating us ANY time, that was just a fucking fluke, just us never expecting someone like you to come walking on by and taking a shot at us.  And I'm not the only one who thinks you're a fluke.  Look at this."
He sent over a file of various pieces of forum quotes, articles and sublistings specifically about Areh.  Most of them were just theories and suppositions, but they all rung out with some note of truth, something that he understood exactly what they were about.  In his struggling heaves he looked over each and every one of them, wincing at each comment that was about him.
	"I went scouring for every little thing I found about you...looking around for every little weakness that you've got.  Boy you have plenty of them, they sure love you, that's for sure.  But they all pity you so much more don't they?  A little quarian guy, rejected by his own fleet, bullied and used like a crappy tool...that's all you are.  A tool.  You can't think for yourself, just because you can write songs or whatever, I mean how much of that is actually you?  How much of this stuff do you actually write?  I bet your keyboard's got an option for that to just make up a dance track or two.  I bet even it's smarter than you."
	"Sh-shut up...you know nothing, y-you're a fucking terrorist, you're nothing but a bully with a gun, you're just a bosh'tet."
	"What are you gonna do about it?  I beat you little suit rat, I beat you harder than the first time someone did when they knocked your brain out of your fucking skull.  You're nothing.  And the only reason I'm telling you this...is because I...won.  And now...I'm gonna let your friends know all about it personally, and how much you failed to do anything about saving them...or anything to do with them, personally.  They never even needed you, I mean what is this, a tank?  They got two ships, did they REALLY need you with this fucking toy?"
	"I...I-i-i-"
	"Save it.  Don't waste your air inside that thing, already starved your brain out for oxygen and look where it got you.  Don't worry...I'll post on your band's forums about your last moments, Areh'Narohl vas Nedas, oh wait...heh...my mistake, you didn't even finish your pilgrimage you little shit.  I'm not even gonna kill you, don't wanna waste anymore of my output on what little air you got left in there now.  Have fun...Areh nar Tasi."

The turian rode off leaving his wounded prey, the quarian inside shivering and clutching himself tight with both fear and sorrow, pain riding through his body as his right arm was made practically useless on its own.  The smell of burning from the tank's slowly wilting hull integrity made him struggle to breathe, shaking as he rocked back and forth with rising panic inside of him.  His left hand slapped out on the console, struggling to do something, screaming and bashing before punching the side of his head feebly in small fits of desperation.
He looked over the file that Vamire had sent him.  He recognised a lot of them, various comments about the band, some of mild praise carefully selected no doubt by the turian cutting away the actual praise from them.  But there were still comments that were the worst of the worst, and without any of the good it was turning harder to remember them.  Ranging from technicalities and observations of how certain songs could be better or different, to the more hateful aspersions cast upon certain members.  But all the ones Areh could see on the file, were about himself.
Various small incidents people remembered, little freakouts, pokings, calling him a drama queen, a spazzfest, a number of other things in alien languages that he couldn't directly translate.  But he knew what it meant all the same, the small things that people remembered, things that shouldn't matter in the grander scheme of things.  All the little fuckups, all the times he hit a key slightly off or made a mis-step too far, the edits, corrections, moments where he said the wrong thing or looked out of place.  He could remember every single one of the small mistakes he made.
And while most people would just simply forget it and move on, Areh couldn't.  Areh never could forget.  They were minor, they were mistakes and they were worth nothing to nobody, but every little mistake hurt him much deeper than any wound ever could.  Cutting him.  Crippling him.  His body was starting to turn warm, the hull integrity cracking down on him as he knew that the mako would not last.  Yet he couldn't bring himself to leave, his face looking towards the crack he knew that he saw on his masked helmet, his arm deadening as he placed it on the console.  His legs were bruised and wounded, as he felt a fire burning in his heart.

It was not a physical pain that hurt his heart, but another sort of hurt.  A deep burning hatred that turned inwards towards himself, clutching his left hand on the console as it shook with tearful frenzy.  He could only think of that, he thought of nothing else as he saw something beep.  A button that was hidden within a small lock now opening.  A small reminder to himself, of thickest clearlight blue with a glowing crimson red centre.
	"Areh?!"
A voice came through the monitor, one of the few things that still worked inside the mako as Jax's voice started breaking through.
	"Areh whut happened, are you alright?!"
	"...heh."
	"Dammit Areh we need help, some shithead's out here with sum tanks an' they're finally organising themselves takin' shots at us!  Now where the fuck are you Areh?!  AREH!"
He raised his head towards the horizon as he saw off in the distance the lights of battle.  He asked the krogan one thing.
	"Is there a tank with green stripes?"
	"Whut?!  Yeah, there is, looks like the ringleader, I thought you had this Areh!"
	"...I thought I did too.  But I didn't...heh...it looks like...we paid for it at the end."
	"Paid?  For whut?!"
	"All of it.  All of man's stupid use of nuclear energy."
He slammed his left hand on the glowing button, as the sound of something dreadful began activating.  A tremulous groaning noise that began shaking throughout the hull of the tank, the slow sound of a beating tick channelling through the console.  Jax slowly began to shake with fear amidst the sudden turns of the geth fighter he was in, the quarian smiling underneath his mask as he stared towards the screen, watching the krogan start to breathe funny.  He asked him softly:
	"Areh...wh-whut's going on?  Wh-why you sayin' that, whut's that beeping noise?!"
	"You know.  What that means.  It means that when this number here...reaches twelve-hundred degrees...heh...I'm kidding.  There is no number.  It's about twelve-hundred seconds.  That's twenty minutes unless I crash hard enough."
	"Whut!?  Whut thuh hell are you saying?"
	"...I was quoting something.  Don't you remember?"
	"......no...n-no, you didn't...you didn't."
	"I did."
	"...n-no...no...N-NO!  NO YOU CAN'T BE SERIOUS!  AREH, THE FUCK'S WRONG WITH YOU?!"
	"Everything.  Is wrong with me."

His face lit up in a glowing orange upon his screen, eyes burning with silent fury beneath his mask.  The mako began to scream with a violent rage, grinding its wheels underneath as it ramped itself out of the pit, charging towards the trail of Squaron's dirt tracks heading back towards the base.  Jax desperately roared through the communicator, trying to shake his friend out of it.  He continued to adjust his tank's calibrations with twitching hands whilst driving straight on.
	"AREH!  ANSWER ME!  WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?!"
	"WHAT'S GOING ON!?" cried out James.  "WHAT THE HELL'S HE DOING?!"
	"I...I'm useless."
	"H-huh?!"
	"That's what they all think is it?  Areh nar Tasi, Areh'Narohl vas Nedas, that's what they all call me don't they?  Just because I can't even understand half the things you NORMAL people can, you all think I'm just some weak little spastic shit?!  HUH!?"
The tank slowly turned towards the stronghold as he drove onwards, his mask cracked slightly but not breaking just yet as he murmured:
	"They all know my real name...I'm no one's kid, no one's crew...I'm just a worthless little von who shouldn't have been born, they said...well guess what...I'm gonna show them how much of a mistake I am...when I burn."
	"AREH STOP!  Just stop, we got this, I-"
	"NO!  YOU DON'T GOT THIS JAX!  THIS ONE IS MINE AND THEN YOU'LL SEE!  I'LL SHOW YOU, I'LL SHOW YOU HOW FUCKING USELESS I AM!  YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENS WHEN SOMETHING DOESN'T WORK ANYMORE?!  ...it has to combust...detonate...burning...I'm not gonna die like some useless bosh'tet, not before I do one last thing.  You know what that is?"
	"...don't...please, Areh don't, AREH NOOO!"
The communications cut off, as Jax turned with panic towards James roaring:
	"WE GOTTA STOP 'IM!"
	"What's going on!?" cried out FG.
	"HE'S GONNA CHARGE THE ENEMY, HE SET THE MAKO OFF TO BLOW!"
	"WHAT!?  He's gonna get killed, the fuck is he doing?!  WHY DID HE SET IT TO BLOW?!"
	"I DON'T KNOW JUST HELP ME SAVE 'IM NOW COME ON!"
Hovering towards his last known location, they veered fast away from the several mako tanks now screaming in a circle around one barricade trying to take pot shots at the geth fighter, hurtling back towards the dry lake.  It was not long before they caught sight of a burning hot mako, its hull tearing off at the seams to reveal a red raw interior made of fire and melting steel.  The hull was breaking up, pieces flying off one after the other as it slowly drove back and forth.  Areh smirked with a deathly stare to himself as he did so, saying:
	"Huh...axle still fixed...glad you didn't break when I needed you."
The fighter up above chased after him, red dust trails behind him as he streaked across the flat plains towards the base entrance.  Jax constantly tried to raise him by comms, but there was no reply as James tried to hover in close.  The closer they got, the more smoke started blocking his vision briefly as he hovered back up.  Areh saw the ship briefly and hard-turned towards another area, his true destination as Jax screamed out:
	"STOP HIM HE'S GONNA KILL HIMSELF!"
	"I DON'T KNOW HOW!" roared FG.  "WHAT, you want me to shoot him?!"
	"DON'T DAMMIT HE DOESN'T KNOW WHUT HE'S DOING!"
	"You got a better idea?!"
	"I-...can you get close?!"
	"The smoke keeps fucking up my senses I can't get down there!"
	"DAMMIT!"
	"Why's he doing this, why the fuck is he doing a suicide charge?!"
	"That stupid bastard's got this suicide mode in his mako, said if he ever had to dump it out and let it blow as a last resort."
	"Why would ANYONE want that in their tank?!"
	"IT WUZ JUST A STUPID IDEA!  I made it up after sum movie we watched, just sum kinda joke like sumthin' crazy, I didn't think he'd actually DO it!"
	"Do what?!"
	"Like put sum kinda explosive device like a heart inside the mako, so it'd all just blow up fer no reason, IT WUZ STUPID IT WUZ JUST A MOVIE!"
	"...wait...you mean like...some kind of, IED?"
	"YEAH!"

All of a sudden, James wished he had paid far greater attention than he ever had before, as his eyes immediately turned wide with horror and realisation.  Then came the slow turn of regret as he tightened his fists, beating the console in front of him.
	"DAMMIT!  FUCKING DAMMIT I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN, I SHOULD HAVE LISTENED GOD DAMMIT!"
	"WHUT?!"
	"Listen, I'm gonna fly ahead, maybe I can block him!  Call the ship, maybe we can get them here to help us!"
	"GOT IT!  GUYS WE NEED HELP!"
	"What's wrong?!" said Norem over comms.
	"It's Areh, he's gone fucking crazy, his mako's about to burn up an' he's gonna charge a-a-at the base!  He's gonna get himself killed, YOU GOTTA HELP HIM!"
	"WHAT!?  WHY!?"
	"I DON'T KNOW PLEASE SOMEONE HELP HIM!"
	"NO ONE IS HELPING MEEE!"
Areh's own signal roared through the comms as Norem struggled to talk sense into him, the quarian struggling to keep breathing as his wounds became more apparent.
	"I do NOT deserve help."
	"What are you DOING Areh?!" cried out Leiah.  "What's gotten into you?!"
	"SHUT UP!  GO BACK TO THE MIGRANT FLEET LIKE YOU WANTED TO, I'LL DIE OUT HERE ALONE, LIKE ALL YOUR PEOPLE WANTED!"
	"AREH STOP IT!" cried Jax.  "YER SCARIN' ME, COME ON WE CAN TAKE 'EM OUT TOGETHER!"
	"No...I'll just fuck up again...somehow I'll fuck up, I always fuck up...I've always known I would but he...he laid it all out for me."
	"Who?!"
	"That turian...that fucker in the tank, that bully...well, maybe I am a mistake."
	"NO!  YER NOT A MISTAKE DAMMIT DON'T DO THIS AREH!"
	"Get out of my WAY!"

James tried to land the fighter in front of him, but Areh swerved round hard using the rocky layout of the land to his advantage.  As he snaked round the ship, he cracked the rear of the tank against a rocky pillar, setting him back on course without any need to turn hard, the swingback of his stern allowing him to drift right past the fighter and chase straight after Vamire Squaron.  He could see the tanks start coming towards him, the one in green stripes clearly marked out in front.  James panicked and struggled to set the geth fighter back up in the air, but was slow on the uptake.
	"WHUT ARE YOU DOING?!" roared Jax.
	"I'M TRYING!" cried James.
	"DO SUMTHIN' THEY'RE GONNA KILL HIM!"
The quarian raced with burning tears in his eyes, as well as the fires starting to grow hotter from all around him inside the hull.  The enemy was coming up the front, as Vamire Squaron opened channels through his comms one last time to see him.
	"I didn't think I'd have to tell you twice."
	"You didn't," murmured Areh.
	"You that stupid that you wanna waste all that power trying to fight me?!  You're practically burning to death you dumb shit, well FINE, go on, hit me!  HIT ME YOU LITTLE BITCH!"
	"I'll hit you alright...I'm gonna hit you so hard."
	"HAH, I bet you can't even break through me with that pile of shit you're driving!"
	"You said I was a mistake right?  You know what else was a mistake?"
	"What?!"
	"...you made a mistake ever fighting me because you know what?  I know I'm worthless...but I'm the one driving a tank with an IED inside of it...because my friends are worth more than me."
	"Wait, WHAT!?  The fuck you say?!"
	"My friends...are worth more than I ever will be.  And I will make you learn that...the last thing you'll ever learn you fucking terrorist BOSH'TET!"
Closing off his comms for the last time, he kept racing towards the green-striped mako.  Vamire tried to take one shot at firing straight for the burning mako but it did nothing to him.  It broke the hull off even more but it did nothing to slow him down, screaming forth a burning violent rage that shone brighter than the sun, the other tanks panicking as they started to disperse against all better reasoning, except one or two that stayed behind and tried to ram towards him.  One went spinning hard by superior torque, slalomed blindly into by burning flames before the second one soon joined it.
Squaron was struggling to reload his shot, but the cannon was too slow and by the time he fired a second time, it was cutting too close to call as he turned hard back the way he came.  The Varan's face had now been torn off, revealing partly both the driver and the interior smouldering like an oven.  The mako was set to blow, and even Squaron knew that he did not want to be here, blindly racing towards the base entrance in a desperate attempt to flee.  It wasn't particularly far, of which he was thankful for but the quarian would hunt him down.
He saw his face behind him in the rear viewer of the mako's systems, a silent mask of fury that somehow terrified him a little more than he ever would be.  Not as much as the assassin had been able to, but somewhere close as he tried to fire again.  The quarian simply veered one way or the other, smoothly dodging the cannon fire that blew craters back behind them.

James tried to fire upon the green-striped mako, but it too was panicking hard in both dodgerolling and swerve-streaking back towards the base, the other few makos that the terrorists had now trying to pincer Areh.  James was able to blast one of them out of commission for travelling in a straight line, whilst the other got simply plowed through and spun hard by Areh's bullrush of relentless fury.  Squaron almost crashed into the base, panicking as he ran for the tank's exit.  By the time James was able to catch up, they could only watch as Jax cried out desperately:
	"AREH!  AREH STOP IT!  DON'T DO IT PLEASE!  AREH NOOOOO!"
But Areh could not hear him, for the moment that a sickening crunch was heard resonating throughout the entire field, as Squaron's green-striped mako crushed brutally against the base building.  A small explosion suddenly went off from inside one of the makos, washing both vehicles with fire.
	"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!  AAAAAAREEEEEEEEEEEH!"
James tried desperately to land as forces came out to investigate, the krogan forcing open his cockpit as he fell to his feet, landing hard upon the dead soil before rushing forwards with shotgun out and ready.  Whatever turian was now in front of him was soon dead within seconds, blasted upfront with a shot to the head pulverising their face.  The krogan took hits from all sides, gunfire suddenly upon him as he roared with an intense rage dwelling up in him.  His lips shook with potent fury as he grabbed one turian's throat, crushing his neck within one second of bone-splintering snap.
	"LEAVE HIM ALOOOONE!  AREEEEEEEEH!"
One ground troop tried to fire his assault rifle into the krogan's back, before receiving a brutal explosion by his inbuilt Carnage launcher within the shotgun that sent incendiary shots straight through his armour.  The turian didn't stand a chance, one burst of potent flames from inside his heart as the most agonising scream of two seconds he ever made was all he said before falling backwards.  Half of his body was abscessed cavities charred and smoking.  Jax was set upon from all sides by rifle fire tearing through his armour, blasting through his knee as he roared and stumbled.
Two more turians however were soon obliterated with widened abscessed stomachs or heads, limply falling over to their side before a third was beaten brutally to death by Jax's shotgun handle, wielding it like a club as he kicked the turian down and swung the shotgun above his head.  The only reason he did so was because it now overloaded and needed a new clip, but he was too incensed with fear and fury to even care as he clubbed his sixth swing into the ground trooper's head, tears rippling across the air from the krogan's face with each swing he took.

He didn't stop until the rock his enemy's head laid on broke through completely, crumbling through with silt and broken bone shards mixing together into a trickling blue stream.  With the bodies of a platoon now all around him, Jax stumbled towards Areh's tank with his front covered in blue blood, glistening beneath a hot sun with a bloodied broken knee forced outwards by gunfire.  The Varan was now crushed fiercely against Vamire Squaron's mako, the front completely caved in and starting to overwhelm with burning flames.
James rushed out to try and help, but he had no method available on dealing with a fire of this magnitude.  He also worried that any of his powers would only serve to feed it more greatly.  But Jax did not care.  Standing up on the debris between them, he began tearing open the weakest point of the hull searing with heat as he pushed his way in, desperately trying to find the quarian.  The interior was badly crushed, but Areh was still in one piece mostly.
He tried to pull him out at first but realised that he was stuck.  Some of the debris had trapped his legs, the krogan carefully trying to pull it off making sure that it wasn't crushing him.  Once he was certain his legs weren't crushed, he forced back the debris with all of his strength, muscles rippling underneath his armour as he screamed with might.
The fires were already burning harder, the flames starting to lick across Krungut's face as he felt the stinging pain of his flesh start to singe and twist from the crackling heat.  He gritted his teeth furiously as his second time pulling the debris managed to work, ripping the weakened steel off from Areh's legs as he slowly picked him up out of the burning wreckage.  His face and hands were now covered in second-degree burns, ripening the flesh towards a tearing open wound cauterising upon his hard skin, but he didn't care.
It hurt enough for him to wince, but he simply bit his tongue as he cradled Areh in his arms.  The quarian's right arm was broken, his legs bruised heavily from the green of his suit to a charring purple as his helmet cracked threateningly over his left eye.  The sounds of tiny beeps warning of contamination came from inside his suit, portions of it sealing off desperately to keep him safe from infection.  The krogan stifled his heaving sobs as he spoke to him softly.
	"...Areh...s-say something."
	"H-hhhh...n-no..."
	"You...you alright?"
	"G-gkh...hhhh...wh-wha...why...why didn't-"
	"No no, don't...just...j-just don't."
	"...but...it...it didn't go off."
	"Huh?"
	"Burning...that burning didn't go off...should have gone off when...when I hit it.  That fucking geth must have...disabled it...-"
	"You...you really did...put something in that, didn't you?"
	"...I'm useless.  I couldn't even check over my own mako enough...h-had...had it all planned out but...didn't even go off."
	"Whut didn't go off?"
	"The...g-goh...hhoh...z-zil...threshold."
	"...oh no.  Nooo nooo you didn't...I wuz joking, I wuz joking Areh, you didn't!  You did put sumthin' stupid inside the tank."
	"I wanted to...ever since that...movie, I thought...that it was a cool idea, like maybe...If I ever wanted to just...blow it all up and...s-save my friends then maybe...like a big shrapnel bomb and just obliterate everything and say fuck this...like on a mission real bad I could...escape and...I had the threshold...j-just like...f-fighting...Destoro...des...h-h-hhhhh...hhheh."

Jax understood what he meant, slowly holding him closely to his burned face as he began sobbing deeply.  His shoulders shook and heaved with every breath he took, slowly sitting down upon the dirt as his knees started to give out.  He could only ask one thing.
	"...why?  Why would you do this?"
	"I...I just...wanted to...show I wasn't-"
	"I know.  I know yer not.  Yer not."
He pulled him against his chest, hands scarring with fingers turning black from heat as he heaved with a heavy heart, slowly dripping his tears upon the quarian's back.
	"D-dammit...you...stupid shit."
	"Hhhhh...I know...I'm sorry."
	"No no no...don't, don't ever be sorry Areh...please..."
	"If...I don't care anymore...I'm not...w-worth anything, they were right...they all called me my real name..nar Tasi-"
	"NO!  SHUT UP, j-just shut up, yer not worthless!  YER NOT!  Yer not some nobody, yer my FRIEND!  MY ONLY FRIEND IN THIS WHOLE GALAXY AND YER NOT DYING ON ME HERE!"
	"I just...make you worry all the time...I shouldn't be here, can't even fight in a tank properly...I...can't do anything right, I miss my keys, I forget stuff for you, I'm just...I'm just a waste.  My friends...they're more important than me-"
	"I don't care!  Please...you...you're the only one who cared about me, you're the only one who wuzn't scared of me!"
	"Cuz you're crying over me...see?  I'm not worth all this Jax...I just want you to be...happy without...worrying about me.  Just go...just let me go and I'll...never bother you again."
	"...Areh."
The krogan slowly pulled his head away from Areh's shoulder, his eyes moist and shining before the quarian's face.  His white eye underneath the mask flickered in painful blinks, breathing turning ragged.
	"I can never be happy...unless you're here with me.  I wuzn't happy until you came along.  You're the only friend I have who doesn't think I'm some kind of monster or a thug.  Please...I don't wanna be alone again.  I can't go back to being alone...not without you."
	"...I...h-hhh...I-i......h-help...h-help me..."
The quarian tried to grab onto his friend, wrapping his arm weakly around his hulking mass as tears streaked down from his cheek, sobbing within his mask.
	"I'm sorry...please...I'm sorry, I don't wanna be alone, I know I have problems I jus-...please, don't leave me Jax.  Please...I'm sorry for all this."
	"I won't...I promise.  I love you Areh...I don't care how bad it gets, I don't care if the whole galaxy burns up around us...I'll always be your friend."

He turned towards James as he stood up once more, cradling the quarian in his arms softly like a newborn babe.
	"I need to take him to med-bay.  Call the ship."
	"Alright," said FG, "what about the base?"
	"I don't care, I'm not losin' him."
	"Jax-"
	"No.  Get someone else to do it, cuz I am not leaving Areh."
	"I wasn't gonna ask, just...how we gonna do this now?"
	"Didn't you hear me?  I don't.  Care.  Now call them or I will beat you into fucking dirt."
	"Alright...Eagle come in."
	"What's up?" asked Lirem.
	"We got a situation here, Areh's down badly and needs help, we need to take him back on board."
	"Spirits...fucking dammit...where's Jax?"
	"He's here looking after him, we need to regroup for our plan, land in front of the base.  It's all empty here, look for the burning wreckage."
A few minutes later the Centurion Eagle came down upon them, hovering a deep breathless roar above as it soon landed safely.  The fighting had now ceased, the remains of the Facinus group having gone back inside to defend the base.  Norem came running out first along with Lirem and Leiah, all of whom gasped with fear at their friend's condition in Jax's arms.
	"Hoh keelah," gasped the quarian female, "wh-what did he do to himself?!"
	"Outta my way," said the krogan, "I need to get him to sickbay."
	"Bu-"
	"Get out of my WAY!"
Shoving Leiah to one side in her fearful dismay, he walked up into the ship with a hurried stumbling gait, clutching his quarian friend tightly to himself as he headed upwards.  James was left with only three of his friends all silent for a moment, asking softly:
	"So who wants to join me on this?"
	"What?" asked Norem.
	"We still need to attack the base...we can't let them get away with this."
	"James, but...Areh's hurt, he could be badly-"
	"Jax can take care of him right?!  I mean, he knows medical stuff, he fixed my arm."
	"No James.  We can't heal a quarian here, we need help, we need the Migrant Fleet."
	"You're gonna take him back?!" asked Leiah.
	"We have to.  We don't know how to fix him like this.  Do you?"
	"N-not...enough to call myself a doctor no."
	"Then I'm staying here.  Someone needs to fly the ship with both Jax and Areh out of commission."
	"But what about Facinus?!" cried James.
	"Do what you want with them, I care more about my friend than some fucking terrorists!  I'll call in a favour, the Migrant Fleet owe us a few things, I can get them down here to our location."
	"You can't ask them to come here," replied Leiah, "what about the geth?!"
	"...fuck...whatever I'm calling them now."
	"Hold up hold up," said Lirem taking charge, "let's think this out.  Norem, go take the ship and fly out to call the fleet.  Do not have them come here, somewhere nearby on the outer rim of the system."
	"Bu-"
	"Tell us how long it'll take for them to come here and help, that way you can tell the geth when to leave and avoid contact with them, we don't want a war breaking out in space for us to get caught in."
	"A-alright.  What about you?"
	"I'll go with James.  We've come this far and we can't stop now, I want Areh to be safe but there's nothing we can do until we call the Migrant Fleet.  That's your job bro.  Leiah, do you wanna stay with Areh or join with us?"
	"...I'll join you," she replied, "I...I'm not gonna be able to help anymore than I could, I-i don't know anything about medicine."
	"But you know how quarians work."
	"Not for...this sort of stuff, I fix machines...n-not...people."
She said this with a deep shame and avoidance, struggling to keep away from the ship as she hurried towards James' side adding:
	"But I know how to stop people, I know how to hurt.  And I wanna take down these bosh'tets for what they did."
	"Alright, that's good.  You got your grenades and stuff?"
	"Yep, I'm good."
	"Then we're ready.  James, put in the code and let's do this.  Norem...let us know what happens."
The turian in green nodded silently as he walked up the ship's ramp, closing up the docking bay as the hydrauics creaked inwards, leaving the raptor, quarian and turian in orange gear standing at the side entrance to the base.  James slowly walked up towards the console and transferred Sanerix's code into it, the door unlocking perfectly.  All three of them readied their guns, two pistols and an assault rifle.  They walked forwards into the base interior.