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The remaining infection forms avoided the flames and went for the ones further back. The carrier form that was shot burst it's back releasing seven infection forms and flood mucus. The burning combat forms leapt and tackled the Vorcha burning him in the process. It soon died bu others leapt forward fighting. Across the facility several patches of survivors screamed as they became infected and three small frigates were being layed with flood biomass and combat forms went in to prepare the ships for flight.

Grub threw the dead combat form off, soon blowing flames onto the others. By now his natural adaptation had made him more resistent to burns than other Vorcha may be, and he could easily shrug off 3rd degree burns by now. The twins both atcivated their Tech armor and opened fire on the on coming flood infection forms. "I think we shoud leave now."The male of the twins said.

The flood in that area were quickly finished off. The flood through out the station began to detect the new comers as a whole hive mind. With bio mass in the control rooms of some frigates and small freighters used for carrying ores and minerals. The gravemind could see through the eyes and sensors of the infected and pure flood. This let the gravemind control how the flood acted easily. But realizing he would need a stronger presence when the ships went through the mass relay he began to have proto griveminds formed. They would not be self conscious but act as nodes or relays to transfer and spread the gravemind's influence to the flood. The proto graveminds were several corpses compiled into one mass and held together by flood biomass. This formed a sickening ball of corpses with one main corpse. The body of a male Turian was kept only half infected. He was merged with the pile of corpses but still alive. He would be used to feed the proto gravemind of it's living tissue till it found a larger place to live and grow into a non sentient weed like creature like the gravemind but with no head and technically being part of him.

Once the flood were dealt with the crew of the Cromwell soon fell back to their ship. "Get the engines ready, we're leaving."Banshee said walking onto the ship. Soon Alice arrived. "What's wrong?"She asked. "There's some kind of alien parasite on the planet, we're not sticking around, we're leaving. Now."Banshee said. "What?"Alice asked. "What do you mean 'parasite'?"She asked walking over tot he cockpit and looking out the view shield, quickly noticing the flood that were exiting the colony, heading towards them and the Polyanthus. "Holy.... how did they get out here?"She asked herself. "Take off and contact the citadel! Tell them to send in reapers."Alice ordered, receiving a nod from the pilot opening a comm request to the citadel. "Let's get to the Comm room"Alice said, heading to said room.

At the hangers three transport frigates filled with most of the combat, infection and carrier forms began to take off. Only a small potion would remain on the planet but they would multiply rapidly. The frigates were slow transport ones with no military capabilities. They did have strong enough engines to get them to the mass relay in a matter of minutes though. Meanwhile the Salvation had arrived at the mass relay. With coordinates already entered the relay began to read them and prepared to send them off. After the gravemind went over the ships systems and the captains mind it determined the best planet to had to was the Asari world of Illium. With a massive population in large complex cities the flood would thrive. But the ship would need to jump through another relay after this one to reach the world. It could take the ship up to three days to reach the world. But no one could guess where it would go. Once it went through the relay being shot across space it came out in a blank void. Not a planet for a while it would keep moving on the direction to the next relay. The frigates that were captured however had other plans. Seeing as how they were weaker and not prone for conflict or warp jumps they would be used to get the flood on surrounding in inhabited planets. There was a station near the mass relay. It was a scanning station taking scans of the area for maps. It would have been put there only a few weeks ago so it was rather new. With a population of only three hundred it was a light Salarian and Quarian station. with air locks for three medium sized cruisers to dock and being divided into three sections. One on top, the middle and the bottom. The bottom parts was mainly storage and server rooms the middle was main living areas and the top was main scanning and communications gear. It would be the size of a large cruiser with in built parks and greenery similar to the citadel but enclosed and much smaller. This station would be the target for one ship while the other two would try and reach the mass relay to escape. But with their speed a quick and heavy assault could destroy them. Their back up plan was to crash on near by planets and infect them.

"And you claim these parasites have the ability to infect and mutate a host?"The Asari Councilor said. The enitre Council was currently in the communications room, over hologram, Harbinger included. "Yes, they are incredibly dangerous. This world MUST be quarantined until these parasites can be wiped out."Alice said. "And what evidence do you have of these parasites?"The Turian councilor asked. "Well... no, but if we brought physical evidence on board chances are it would try and kill us."Alice responded. "Well, without proper evidence to these creatures we cannot simply blockade a pla-"The Turian Councilor said before being cut of by Harbinger. "Beings such as the one you are describing have been encountered before in past cycles. Only one has risen to sentience, and its allowed spreading devastated the galaxy of that cycle. The possible threat these beings could pose if sapient is exponential. I will send a few Destroyers, and two Capital ships to investigate the planet you are currently on."Harbinger said. "Thank you."Alice said. "I'll make sure Swarm sends you the proper information you need to look for these beings."Alice said before the call was cut out. Swarm, the Geth mentioned by Alice, was in the room as well. "The necessary information has been sent to the old machine. I would assume that with the Old Machines' more advanced technology that once it receives the information would be spread to the proper ressipients immediately."Swarm said. "Alright. Start searching for the signatures of these things in space."Alice said. "If we have the fire power shoot them down. We can't let them get out of the system."Alice added.

The flood threat had been identified and reapers would go and attempt to contain it. On the Polyanthus Flare was sitting and thinking while they headed to the planet. "They don't under stand what they could do. The citadel is open. It would be the perfect place to enter." Flare thought this in his head not out loud. He would look like he was in deep thought floating in place. Flying up to Riisart he was wondering what took them so long. "Why have we not arrived at the planet yet? With those mass relays I would of expected us to be there by this time."

The Salvation was through the mass relay. Being on the other end of the galaxy they were however in a dead space. With no planets nearby and only Basic engine function it would take more then three days to reach a planet. Taking almost five days before a planet would be reached the flood went into a hibernation like state. The Frigates leaving the colony flew just out of range of the atmosphere and began to move from the planet to escape.

"I'm not entirely sure what's taking us so long. I had assumed we just landed here to get fuel."Riisart replied. "Riisart, we need you in the comm room."Naal said entering Riisart's lab. "And unfortunately we may need that light bulb too."He added with distaste, before leaving. "Hmmm. What would they need us for?"Riisart asked heading out the door, motioning for Flare to follow.

Soon the Cromwell lifted off the ground heading up, following after the Frigates. Thankfully both it and the Polyanthus could take on Frigates. Soon it opened fire, damaging one of the escaping frigates before it got too far off the ground. "I need those other Frigates being tracked. We can't let them get to the mass relay."Alice ordered.

Flare followed the group into the communications room. "What is it you would require me for?" Flare asks hovering around the heads of the group and looking at the communications table with the hologram section. Flare was curious about the situation and began to remotely hack into the communications network remaining undetected to see whats going on.

The frigate that was shot at had it's engines blown out and without means of lift fell to the ground. The ships fuel ignited and it blew up into a fiery ball. Most of the flood died leaving a few burning stragglers. The other frigates left the planets orbit and began to plummet towards the mass relay in maximum speed. They would be easy targets but with their trajectory if they weren't shot and destroyed they may crash into the relay.

"We need you to tell us the easiest way to kill and stop these things, or atleast slow them down til the reapers get here."Banshee's hologram said. "From my understanding you're the only one here who knows about the flood in depth."He added.

Flare studied the news he just received. "The flood cannot be simply destroyed. Containing the flood is very difficult. As those who where on my shield world had seen. The flood are impossible to contain without fully operation systems with specially designed security." Flare knew the flood would be unable to be contained as Banshee would like. "Your only hope of containing them would be to destroy every ship and anything else leaving the planet. Then you should burn the entire planet. Leaving a single spore alive could re grow into a massive infestation very quickly. This is one reason why we needed to use the halo array. We had to destroy all biological life in the galaxy with them to guarantee if any spores survived they would simply starve."

"Is this the only world with the flood on it right now?"Banshee asked. "Banshee, we're getting another transmission. "This Commander Garrus Vakarian of the Archangel. You are currently in quarantined space, I highly advise you turn around and leave."Garrus said to to crew of the Cromwell. "Yeah we know. Weird alien parasiets infecting people. We've contacted the citadel and Harbinger's sending some reapers."Banshee said.

"Garrus?" Flare asks himself trying to recall the name. "Wait he was one of them. My my." He whispers. "Well I can now confirm how the flood have gotten to your universe." Flare says getting in the middle of the group. "I tried to have the flood destroyed at my installation but after interference from your people the purge failed. These flood were highly likely on board the ship Normandy and when it returned here the flood must have been thrown to somewhere within this sector and after a few years it grew into the infestation you see today."

"Look, I don't care how these things got here. I want them destroyed."Banshee replied. "Commander, what class of ship are you in?"Banshee asked. "Cruiser. Why?"Garrus responded. "Some ships got infected and took off. I think they're headed to the mass relay. I'm gonna need you to shoot them down. I think their just frigates, so there shouldn't be any trouble for a cruiser."Banshee said. "Alright. I can handle that."Garrus said.

The last two infected ships moved at rapid speed towards the relay. Garrus and his ship quickly approached and the flood on board began to run in a frenzy. Like with the Salvation the flood filled the escape pods. With the gravemind in control they were able to plan. They would wait until Garrus's ship got closer and with a final idea release the pods. Aiming them at the ship they would hopefully get aboard.

Flare was annoyed with Banshee's response. "You wish for the flood to be destroyed and I am your best bet. Yet you continue to treat all my information like it is unimportant. It is that arrogance that has caused this in the first place." Flares resentment for all of these people was growing. But he was patient. When the time came he would make sure to take out his anger on them. In some ways he was worse then the flood. He was smart, had the technological capabilities and he had a personal agenda for revenge.

"Look lightbulb, If I wanted to know what weapons your makers had I'd ask. If I wanted t know how these parasites got here, I'd ask. I want them contained and destroyed."Banshee said. "I don't know and I don't care what gadgets your makers used to kill these things. From my understanding your not from this galaxy, and thus any technological advantages your makers had are useless since said tech isn't actually here and is completely useless to us. Given the information you've been granted figure out a way to destroy these things with our tech. Once you've figured that out we can go our separate ways and never have to speak to each other again."Banshee said.


"Alright, once we're in range, fire. Deploy fighters to take out any escape pods that get launched out. I don't know if these things know how to use escape pods or not but we can't risk letting any leave."Garrus said, receiving a nod from the pilot. Once in firing range the Archangel's weapons opened fire. It wasn't long before the frigates were in critical condition from the cruiser's fire power.

"Very well. I will need schematics and full weapons systems of reapers. They would be the best bet next to blowing up the planet. If you give me full access to the reapers I should be able to devise a way to terminate them. But without the specifically designed equipment it won't be easy. But you don't have a choice do you." Flare moves into the hologram and scans the ships systems already devising a plan. "I will also need all information on this crucible you made."

As the frigates were shot up the escape pods left in a fury. Most of them were shot down but one crashed into and landed on the archangel. Broken into a hanger the flood poured out. The flaming wreckage of the main ship was being knocked out by the explosions from the ships cannon fire. One large chunk of the back engine section flew towards the Archangel. It was a piece three times the size of the escape pod and would do substantial damage on contact.

Thankfully the Archangel was able to avoid the debree. Once the Escape pod landedi nto the hanger it was immediately closed off from the rest of the ship, preventing any further infestation.

The others in the room glanced between each other."There's a slight problem with that plan."Riisart said."The reapers don't have schemetics. They were programmed to know how to build each other. And we don't have access to the Crucible's information. The citadel had locked off as classified information once the reapers stopped attacking."Banshee explained.

The flood in the hanger slammed onto the doors. However they found a small maintenance shaft that was busted by the crashing escape pod. This let some infection forms move into it and get into the low thin tunnels through out the ship.

Flare was not pleased with this news. "Well I need that data. From what I have gathered those would be the only chance of stopping the flood. Could I get into direct contact with Harbinger? He would likely provide me with what information is needed to succeed with my task. This is the only way I will be able to gain this information. Contact your council to get me access to the crucible data. Or all biological life in this galaxy could be consumed into the flood network."

"I don't know if the council will be willing to give up any information on the Crucible. Not iwth out knowing what your plan is."Banshee said. "Habringerh owever might be showing up. I'm nto sure if harbinger was going himself or if it was just a few other reapers."Banshee replied.

By now the rest of the ship had gone on alert. The crew had their personal shields pwoer bumped up to a point that would prevent immediate infection upon encountering the flood, requiring some fire pwoer to take out the shielding, as well as being ordered to travel in armed groups.

Soon the Mass Relay began to activate. Out of it exited several Reapers, mostly destroyers, but there were a few Capital ships. The moment Garrus saw them he opened comms with them. "HEy, You may need to call for more back up. There's another planet infested with these things, and several ships escaped, though they didn't go to the Relay."Garrus said, as he sent the reapers the coordinates for the planet the Salvation left. "Noted. We shall call for reinforcements momentarily. The fungal parasite has been detected aboard your ship. We recommend calling as many of your crew onto the bridge as possible, we will send boaridng parties to annihilate the parasite."The reaper replied. "Alright, I'll get that taken care of."Garrus said. Garrus relayed the orders and soon the bridge was full. It was locked off, preventing entry, including the vents, which had hatches shut that were small enough to keep any intruders out, but to still supply oxygen and such. Several Harvesters, outfitted for space flight, flew into the Archangel's hangar. They landed and deployed numerous Reaper troops, including Husks, Mauraders, Cannibals, and Scions. The Canniballs, Marauders, and Scions opened fire on the flood that were currently in the hanger.