Dead Effect

Announcement: No offense, but no i don't need to proofread the story, not for Shepard's name anyway. The name of MY Shepard in Mass Effect is Melina Shepard. So yeah that's accurate. Not sure who Melinda is however...

Thanks for the review :D

I'm disappointed with this chapter. It came out a heck of a lot shorter then i planned :( But I'm suffering mild writers block at the moment with this fan-fic . Oh well, i managed to work something out, so hope it's a good read either way.

Dead Effect

Chapter Three
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Shepard had long lost her sense of direction as she jogged through the poorly lit corridors. By some miracle she hadn't run into any more of the mutated human like creatures. Though at the same time she hadn't run into the tentacle thing that had dragged Tali off into the darkness either.

All attempts to contact the qurian had failed, shouting her name, or even using the comms, she was either dead or her radio wasn't working. Or she was unconscious, though Shepard didn't hold much hope for that considering the monstrous thing that had grabbed her, capture just didn't seem like an option for it.

Regardless, she'd refused to give up and was still running, even with her leg aching with each step, she refused to stop and simply kept moving.

"Tali, come one damn it say something!" She demanded, her finger pressed tightly against the side of her helmet as she activated her comm. again.

"It's no good commander, she's not picking up." Jack muttered behind her, though she was ignored, much to her annoyance.

"We can't keep running around blindly like this…There's to many corridors." They'd halted before a split, left and right were options but which way had Tali been taken? And in turn had they even come this way?

A long sigh escaped her as the commander turned and pressed her back to the wall. "Everyone, keep you're eyes open. Garrus and his squad aren't responding, and Tali's MIA as well, dragged off by something, I don't know what. Be careful and try to find them."

She received a string of confirmations from the remaining squad members, before nodding slightly to Jack. "Were going to try and find the bridge. Or at least a map." Pushing off from the wall, she checked the clip on her rifle before setting off down the right path; she only hoped it was right in more ways then one.

Tali, having been separated from the squad, simply fired her shotgun into the tentacle like creature that was sill firmly wrapped around her leg. Each shot seemed to go unnoticed however, and after only a few the damned thing suddenly whipped around and either slammed her painfully into a wall, or yanked her further down the corridor and towards wherever it came from.

Unable to do much else, she simply continued shooting until her weapon clicked empty, then fought to pry it off her leg to no avail.

Next she resorted to her pistol, though that yielded the same result, each shot seemingly doing nothing but annoying the creature further.

Finally, she knew there was nothing else that could be done, glancing past the tentacle she could see a sizeable hole in the wall, and where the thing had apparently come from originally. That was where it was slowly pulling her towards.

Reloading her pistol, she resumed firing, there was no other option but to try and hold on till the last moment. Again the gun clicked empty, and she was forced to discard it as she was slammed into the deck a third time.

Wincing in pain, she focused instead on trying to find something to grab onto, everything she did get a hold of however, she was forced to let go of when it suddenly ripped her away from the hand hold.

Just when she'd given up hope. A loud boom, almost like a shotgun filled the corridor, and the creature suddenly shuddered, a second boom followed, and it let go of the struggling qurian.

A third and final shot and a loud shriek of pain from somewhere far below assaulted Tali's ears, then everything was silent, the tentacle having retreated into the hole without its prize.

Panting quietly, the engineer lifted her head slightly, only to gasp when she found herself being stared down by the same weapon that had saved her not moments before.

Tilting her head very slightly, she examined the figure holding it, it looked human, though it wore armour unlike any she'd seen before. Instead of the power armour most human soldiers wore, this suit was a dull brown; ridges lined its surface with only slight gaps between each to offer strangely contrasting and uneven plating.

Angling further up, she noted the helmet was different as well, instead of the see through visor like Shepard wore, or even a partly see-through one like her own, the helmet for this person was completely sealed, only a series of teal lines flowing from left to right gave any indication of whoever was inside being able to see out, if they needed to at all.

Something about the armour made her think of a human like geth rather then a person. The design of the armour appearing more robotic then like actual armour, though something about the way the head tilted and angled slightly as it examined her, and the way the hand flexed on the weapon almost nervously told her otherwise.

Finally, a distinctly male voice broke the silence, he sounded human as well, though the speaker that filtered his voice added a slight crackle of static. "Strange…You don't look like one of the crew." He questioned, his pistol not lowering as he studied Tali.

The weapon as well seemed strange, what little she could see of the handle looked like a normal pistol, though the actual barrel of the weapon was far to large for a normal pistol however, and a trio of laser sights stared back at her.

As she studied the gun however, the barrel suddenly shifted sideways and the laser sights lined up with her neck, causing her to tense in fear. Whoever they were, they seemed less then friendly.

Focusing back on the, person, she noted his posture shift slightly, as he seemed to relax, his shoulders slumping just a little, before he lowered the weapon to his side. "Doesn't look human…But if the necromorphs want you dead... Who are you? You don't look like one of the crew."

After a moment, Tali managed to stammer a response. "I'm Tali'Zorah vas Neema. I'm part of Normandy's crew, we came to help. We received a distress signal." She briefly considered asking what the hell a, necromorph was, but considering he was the one with the gun, she wasn't keen on asking to many questions.

"Tali'Zorah…" He shifted slightly, his weight transferring from one foot to the other as he contemplated the words. "Strange name. But you're not trying to kill me, and that's enough for me." Finally he extended a hand to help her stand and once she was upright he took a few steps back, obviously not willing to be within arms reach of the qurian.

"You're part of the crew?" Tali asked as she collected her pistol, she kept the movements slow, noting how the soldier tensed and lifted his own weapon slightly in response. Though she took care to simply reload it and keep it at her side, he relaxed upon seeing she wasn't planning to use it.

The figure shook his head. "I was part of a repair team, sent to fix a problem with the ship…Little we know the place was, infested with these things."

She frowned for a moment, before sparing a glance over her shoulder in the direction she'd come from. That thing must have dragged her pretty far; otherwise Shepard would have caught up by now. Turning back she sighed heavily, she was on her own, save for whoever this was, and she wasn't even sure she could trust him.

"Do you know what's happening? My team encountered some form of…Monster earlier, just before that thing dragged me off." She made a slight nod towards the hole the tentacle had come out of. The figure shook his head slightly in response.

"I don't know much either. Those things have been after me since we arrived ourselves…Little I do know though…Seems their what's left of the crew." Tali recoiled slightly at the news. That, thing had been a crew member?

"Keelah…What could have done such a thing?"

Again he shook his head. "You're guess is as good as mine. Though their beyond saving, the few, normal crew I've seen killed themselves seconds later."

The qurian simply shuddered slightly. "For both our sakes, it might be better if we stick together…I don't believe I caught you're name?"

He hesitated for a moment, and she briefly thought he wouldn't answer. Finally he shrugged slightly again and responded. "Names, Isaac."

Shepard paused for a moment as she checked her Omni-tool. It had been an hour since Garrus had stopped responding, thirty five minutes since they'd lost Tali. And aside from a few empty rooms and the occasional corpse, they'd found nothing else, even the strange mutant creatures hadn't made their presence known since the initial attack.

Just when she was on the verge of giving up, a final door presented an, interesting sight. As she carefully advanced into the room, which turned out to be far larger then first appeared, Melina discovered they'd ended up on a platform, and a train of all things was waiting at the station. "What the hell?"

She spared a glance towards Jack, who shrugged slightly. Still, considering the size of the ship she supposed they would need a means of transport. And a tram system, she guessed that would work.

Approaching it, she noted the interior wasn't much different form what they'd encountered in the corridors, the lack of blood was noticeable, but whatever contents had been within had been scattered about the compartment.

Keeping her rifle ready, Shepard slowly advanced into the tram. Luckily there was nothing inside, save a computer terminal that lit up as she approached and displayed a schematic of the ship.

"Looks like we've found a tram or something. Guess this is how they get around." She alerted the rest of her squad, before carefully touching the screen, as soon as her finger brushed across the screen; it lit up and displayed the various sectors they could go.

"Guess this is our ticket to the bridge." Melina commented, before checking to ensure Jack was aboard, that done she tapped the icon for the bridge, and breathed a sigh of relief when the door closed and the tram suddenly jolted into motion.
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Decided to try something different this time. Namely telling part of the story from the point of view of another character (Tali) Rather then focusing entirely on just one character's point of view. Can't say i'm excited by how it turned out, and it didn't help that i had to make up Issac from scratch essentially (Considering his personality isn't that heavily explored in Dead Space) Hopefully i did a good job though. /fingers crossed