Ok guys, I went through and rewrote the first chapter. I hope you guys like it a little bit more. The first round always felt stilted to me and was in desperate need of a rewrite. I hope to ever the next couple of weeks get another round of rewrites done and continue with the story. As always Constructive criticism is welcome, and I appreciate it. I am still in need of a BETA if you want to be one.
Chapter 1: The Meeting
Arcturus Station
January 11, 2183
SPECTRE candidate meeting
The meeting had taken several hours already and Donnel Udina was getting a headache. The decision to choose humanities first SPECTRE was an important one, the next step to securing the future of the human race. It meant that humanity was almost ready for a council seat, a seat that Donnel Udina had spent his adult life attempting to win for humanity. It was an important choice, everyone knew that, which was why the decision might as well have been left to monkeys. Everyone in the room knew who the humans first SPECTRE should be. 'Well, almost everyone.' He thought as he cast a disproving glance at certain aids around the room. Apart from the aids though, everyone knew who needed to be the next SPECTRE. It didn't mean they had to like it. Udina didn't like it. But Udina wasn't going to look over their options for the 20th time that day because he didn't like his options. He did that earlier.
The aids weren't the cause of Udina's headache, though they weren't helping either. They were just the fuel to a raging trashcan fire. The problem was one of politics, the ideal candidate for SPECTRE would be someone who was competent, publicly appealing, and wouldn't have emotional baggage to bring with them. Unfortunately, none of the candidates had those qualifications, and only one came close. Which of course was why her husband had shown up, to ensure that everyone knew they had to pick her. 'And most likely to see how many stress related medical problems he can give me in the course of a day.' Udina thought dryly.
"Who would you suggest Admiral? We all know who the only acceptable candidate is, and so does He." Udina's tired voice rang out interrupting Admiral Zhou. Udina's finger pointing at the man in the corner, next to Admiral Hackett. The man's presence was disgusting to Udina. He was in many ways the cause of Udina's headache, the reason the obvious candidate wasn't also the politically correct one, the reason that Sarah Shepard hadn't already gotten the job. The reason that Udina was wondering why all the men he normally respected were turning into slightly civilized monkeys politely screaming about the end of the world.
The Butcher of Torfan stood and addressed the assembled men and women. His voice stank of amusement. His smile was a little bloodthirsty, playing to his reputation. The tall man stood large, looming over the table, daring anyone to challenge him. A metaphorical squall line over prairie. "Indeed Udina? And who is the 'only acceptable candidate' that you speak of?"
Udina sighed out loud. "Your wife." He said reluctantly and with some distaste.
The amused voice of Luke Shepard grew serious and the bloodthirsty grin morphed to a more stone-faced expression as Luke straightened his posture. "Exactly. Sarah is the only option you have and you know it. I'm just here to make sure you know it, and that nobody does anything stupid, like suggest Delacour as candidate." Luke spat the name Delacour out like it was diseased, not that Udina disagreed. Udina didn't like Luke, but at least he was useful, occasionally.
An aid stood up and Udina groaned internally. This was the problem with the Butcher. If he hadn't shown up this meeting would have been over an hour ago and Sarah Shepard would have been the candidate already. But the man had to say his piece, and inevitably some idiot would have to say his, and so the cycle continued.
The aid, who Udina was sure would soon become the Ex-aid with superiority he neither had nor should ever have said. "And what if we were to choose Delacour? What would you do about it? He has the same training you and Shepard do. He has the same experience you and Shepard do. He is just as valid a candidate as Shepard is." The aid glared at the Butcher who was entirely unaffected by the anger in the gaze.
The Butcher simply raised an eyebrow and looked at Udina. Udina growled. He knew the game Luke was playing, now he was actually openly agreeing with the Butcher. Udina hated every second of it. "Delacour, is barely fit to tie his own shoelaces, much less serve as a SPECTRE. Let alone humanities' first." Udina sat back down and volunteered no more information. Normally he would be a little more diplomatic, but frankly he was tired of this meeting, the Butcher was irritating his sensibilities, and he had a headache.
Captain Anderson stood up next to Luke and began speaking in a polite but firm tone. "What Ambassador Udina is trying to say is that Delacour is merely competent. Yes, he is in charge of the Corsair teams, but they are mostly independent anyway. This competence tied with his constant stream of scandals, questionable political affiliations, and blatant xenophobia means that he is unfit for the position." Udina was grateful to the man. Anderson was friend and despite his military background was more of a diplomat sometimes than Udina could be.
The aid blustered for a moment before being ordered to sit down by an admiral. Admiral Hackett continued speaking where Anderson left off, gesturing calmly for Luke to sit down. His aging but still fit frame came to a parade rest as he addressed the rest of the admiralty "Shepard is correct. We don't have many options. In fact in my view we have no options. If there are no disagreements I'll run us through the serious candidates and show why."
The Admirals' steady but tired voice was greeted with nods by the admiralty and politicians in attendance. He nodded and continued. "Let's begin with Luke Shepard since he is here." At this Luke looked a little startled, he obviously hadn't even realized that he had been considered. "He has the training, the name power, the service record, and he is loyal to the Alliance. He achieved both N7 and I7 designations, and is a registered Medical Doctor. He has Top Secret security clearance, and he has shown little to no bias against aliens, with the only exception being Batarians. However, he sends a bad message. His name sends a message of fear, not a great start for someone who is meant to send a message of cooperation and respect. He also is retired."
The aid who spoke up previously decided to put his foot in his mouth again. "And he is not particularly stable." Admiral Kahoku grabbed the back of the man's shirt and forced him to sit down. Udina almost hoped the man would open his mouth again, if he did Udina might get to see how much boot could go up one man's ass.
Admiral Hackett glared at the aid, and continued. "Delacour isn't an option for the reasons we already mentioned and so we will skip him. Next is Lt. Commander Adam Houser. He survived on Akuze, and his service record is spotless. He fits everything we need except for one thing." At this Hackett sighed pausing for a moment before continuing. "After Akuze, so many people dying around him, he's a mess. He suffers from PTSD and schizophrenia. The only reason he is still in the military is so PR teams can still use his name for recruitment." Hackett's voice grew melancholy near the end of the summary.
Udina grew pensive for a moment. He never met Houser personally, but Udina cared about war veterans. His grandfather had been one, and with a similar story to Houser. Udina remembered the nightmares, the horror, the madness that his grandfather had wrestled with for as long as Udina had known him.
With a sigh, Hackett continued and Udina focused his attention again. "Lastly we have Commander Sarah Shepard. N7 graduate and the Lion of Elysium. Married to Luke Shepard. Spotless service record. Only history that is concerning is she lived on Mindoir during the raids. She saw her family get killed. She has spent the past five years under my command and has served above and beyond. She is without a doubt, the best soldier I have ever seen. The problem is she is married to Luke. This close association has tainted the views of those around her in my opinion."
Udina shifted in his seat as the admiral spoke. He hated having to agree, but frankly humanity didn't have a lot of good options. Even a few bad ones had been put out there earlier in the meeting. 'Oh yes, let's just remove the most wanted status from Kai Leng and invite him back here to make him SPECTRE. Oh, let's somehow revive Ethan Hunt. He did a good job on Thresca, surely if we BRING HIM BACK FROM THE DEAD, he can do it again. Idiots the lot of them.' To be fair though it was a politician that brought up the idea.
Udina brought his attention back to Hackett as he finished his summary. "As you can see Sarah Shepard is our only option. I'm putting her name forward. Ambassador?" Hackett passed it off to him.
"Seconded. Shepard is the most likely to pass both the SPECTRE selection and make humanity look good while doing it. That's all I have to say on the matter." The matter passed around the table, taking longer than Udina liked. His back ached, his head hurt, and he wished he were drunk, but Sarah Shepard was officially going to be the SPECTRE Candidate.
The meeting closed down without incident and people filed out of the room. They left slowly but finally only Udina, Hackett, the male Shepard, and Anderson were in the room. Udina glared balefully at Luke's back as the younger man stared out the window before finally speaking. "So, how did you get permission be part of the selection process? Blackmail? Bribery?"
Hackett interrupted. "I invited him."
"You, what." Udina hissed. Luke simply looked out the window of the conference room as Udina sputtered with rage. "Hackett, Luke is no longer part of the command structure. You cannot invite him to top secret meetings. He should never have known about it in the first place because he was a Fucking candidate." Hackett for his part just leaned back in his chair, and let Udina rage.
"Ambassador," Captain Anderson interrupted after a few minutes of diatribe. "We have more important things to deal with than your grudge match with Luke."
"Like what?" Udina growled, almost going into another rage. This time Luke interrupted him before he got started. "The Thanix cannon plans have been stolen."
Silence filled the room as a look of horror crossed Udina's face. "What?" Udina whispered. He suddenly understood why they were meeting after the meeting as it were. It was a disaster of the highest proportions.
"The Thanix cannon plans were stolen from my office. It was hard copies only. No trace of whoever took them. They don't have everything. We can still outfit the Alliance with the backups we have kept in the company vaults. And my company will still do it for free." Here Luke sighed before continuing. "But we need to find whoever took those plans. My gut feeling says the Salarians did it, but it also doesn't feel right. None of the other races have cancelled their contracts with me, and I only work with governments. To make absolutely sure of that though, I need SPECTRE level access, thus today."
Udina took all this in. His blood pressure was going to skyrocket over the coming weeks, he could already tell. "Who else do you have tagged under the suspicious column, and why do you suspect the Salarians?" Udina sighed out.
Anderson responded. "Currently we suspect any of the other governments, Aria, Cerberus, the Shadow Broker, and the Andromeda Initiative. It possible that Eclipse could do it. They have the resources to so something like this, but frankly we aren't sure that they could make it this clean. There were no traces left. Everything was exactly like it should have been. Exactly like the Salarian STG teams operate."
Udina leaned back in his chair. "Is there any possibility that it was the Batarians? Or some as yet unknown group?"
"No, they are the one government that we can safely discount. Batarians would have made it messy. SIU isn't known for its restraint. As for other groups? It's possible. It always is, but it isn't likely as far as we can tell." Anderson finished.
"Damn." Udina uttered. It was a sentiment shared by everyone else at the table.
Luke spoke up. "There is some good news, while they did grab the cannon designs, they didn't grab the plans for the new power supplies, so they can build the cannons, but unless they have access to a battleship they won't be able to fire anything."
Admiral Hackett cut in. "Unless they already have something better. We can't make any assumptions." Luke nodded to concede the point.
Udina hummed to himself for a moment holding his anger in check until he could get to his rooms and a bottle of scotch. "Why did you invite me into this mess, Admiral?"
Hackett sighed and said "Ambassador, we need you to keep an eye on our allies at the citadel. If they know something about the Thanix Cannons, we need to know. Needless to say, that this is top secret. I trust you not to let political games get in the way?"
Udina growled to himself again. He knew an order when he heard one. Hackett technically didn't have the authority to order him, but this was military jurisdiction and Udina didn't care to find out how much trouble that aging Admiral could cause him. "Fine. But I will only give you information. Not the Butcher. You can give it to him if you want, but he stays out of my way."
"That's fine." Hackett said. "Good. Then I'm leaving." Udina said, and he walked out the door.
"He's going to be trouble Hackett." Luke observed after Udina walked out.
"No, he won't. I'll keep him in line. What you need to be worrying about is the investigation on your end, and failing that how you are going to explain to your wife that you need to use her SPECTRE clearance for business purposes." The last sentence was said with much amusement.
"That is not what the clearance is being used for!" Luke sputtered as the two older military officers chuckled at his expense before settling down. Luke glared half-heartedly at them for a moment before the conversation turned serious again.
"Is Sarah really ready for this?" Anderson asked. Luke sighed. "I think so. Honestly, I would rather her just retire. She has been run ragged since I retired. First the PR and celebrity soldier stuff, then later the constant missions. Honestly, being a Spectre might make her less busy."
Anderson nodded. "She misses you by the way. I talked to her last week. Just came out of the Terminus. It's her last mission before Normandy."
Hackett cut in. "She will be on Earth for the next 3 months on leave while the last kinks in the Normandy are worked out, so you can spend a very late Christmas with her. Then 1 month of tests, and hopefully she passes whatever tests the Spectre wants her to complete."
Luke nodded tears in his eyes. It had been almost a year since he had seen his wife. It was true what the aid had said in the earlier meeting. Luke had never been the most stable human being, and Sarah was his support. "Thanks Admiral, Captain. It'll be good to see her."
The rest of the time the three men spent catching up, then Hackett had to leave. A few minutes later Anderson followed and Luke was left alone, staring out the window looking at empty space. "I hope I'm right." he whispered. "I hope you are ready, but if you aren't, I'll be there for you." And Luke Shepard turned and walked out of the room.