CHAPTER 1
Her whole world consisted of these four walls. As far as she knew she had never been outside of them. If there even was an outside. It's hard to miss what you don't know right?
Her 'world' was a 10 by 10 feet room dressed in pure white. There was a single bed tucked in one corner with crisp hospital sheets. Opposite this was a white desk with a data pad where 'Manon' the VI would give her daily lessons.
A free-standing toilet, sink, and the tub was clustered together to the right of the desk. In between these, sunken into the wall were the food box and laundry/garbage chutes.
Renée was a little 10-year-old child completely oblivious to anything and everything outside of her room. She was oblivious to the fact that she was the product of illegal multi-cross species genetic experimentation at the hands of the Salarian geneticist Maelon Heplorn and Human Blood Pack Geneticist Layla Ouellet. Layla was an older woman who started her carrier with Cerberus. She had worked with her husband and fellow scientist at the Cerberus Teltin Facility on Pragia performing experiments on human children with Biotic potential.
When the test subjects rebled and escaped, they attacked the staff and killed her husband. Layla survived but was abandoned by Cerberus after the failure at the Teltin Facility. Layla had been 6 months pregnant when the facility fell. She suffered an abdominal injury which resulted in the death of her unborn child and also left her barren.
The total destruction of her life left her mentally unbalanced. Where she once revered Cerberus and its goals for humanity, she now harbored a deep hatred for the organization and her species as a whole.
Drifting through the galaxy she eventually came across the blood pack on Omega.
Years later she finds herself working with Maelon in an underground facility in Tuchunka working to cure the genophage. She had only agreed to work with the Salarian on this project if he agreed to help her fund her own project. She had felt the loss of her child and the possibility of a family with her deceased husband over the years and she planned to circumvent her own infertility and bring back what she had once had and grow her baby in a test tube.
With her deep hatred for humanity, she didn't want her baby to be cursed with the sins of her species, so she worked with Maelon to bring her precious girl Renée into to the world with eggs removed from her own ovaries. One of these eggs was successfully genetically manipulated to include selected Alien DNA which Layla claimed would 'free' her child from 'humanities shackles'. So yes, the women while brilliant was quite mad.
Once Renée, subject 022 was successfully grown in the tank to the age of five, she woke up in her little world of the 10 by 10 room where she has always been for the past five years. Leyla was raising her in complete isolation to 'protect' her from the evils of the world. She was teaching and manipulating Renée through the AI programmed in the room called 'Manon.'
Renée herself was completely unaware of her mother Layla or. As far as the young girl was aware the only other 'being' in existence was the AI Manon on the speakers and the data pad on her desk.
Renée woke up at 0600 hours like she did every day to Manon's soft chimes. Today though was special. It was her birthday and she was excited. Every single day was usually an exact replica of the one before.
-Get up, Bath and perform morning ablutions.
-Dress in a clean plain white dress.
-Do the morning stretches and calisthenics.
-Retrieve and eat the flavorless food packet dropped in the food box and throw out the remaining packaging.
-Do many hours of learning and testing at the desk for the rest of the day with short breaks.
-clean the desk and retrieve the super hour food packet from the food box which was dropped.
-free time to play interactive educational games on the tablet or chat with Manon about whatever comes to mind.
-lights out and bedtime 1900 hours.
Repeat.
On her birthday and the rare special occasion, there is always a slight deviation in her schedule. CAKE! Rather the flavorless packages of nutritional goop the food box delivers real food during breakfast and dinner, but her favorite had to be the piece of cake delivered with her meatloaf and rice at the dinner hour.
After breakfast, she was dutifully studying at her desk when the underground facility was infiltrated by Shepard and his team. Garrus and Dr. Solus were with him on what they expect to be a recuse mission. Shepard was here on behalf of Dr. Solus to rescue his former student Maelon who was supposedly being held captive here by the blood pack.
The three of them made it about halfway to the main laboratory before being detected. Once they were spotted, they were set up by large packs of Krogan blood pack mercenaries who functioned as both test subjects and security for the facility.
During the ensuing battle, Garrus became separated from Shepard when a doorway they were crossing through shut in his face. Layla had initiated lockdown procedures. Garrus was trying to hack the door back open when he was set upon by more security.
Injured and outnumbered he had to momentarily flee and find cover in order to re-group. Ironically in his effort to get away the doorway, he came across was Renée's.
Renée had been startled when the lights in her room went out due to the emergency procedures. It made no sense to her because that only happened at 1900 hours and it was currently mid-day. Renée called out to the AI that raised her with no response.
"Manon, que s'est-il passé? ... Manon? Êtes-vous là? ... MANON!" (Eng: Manon, what happened?... Manon? Are you there?... MANON!)
Then, for the first time ever in her short little life, she heard sounds outside of her room which she couldn't identify. Scared, Renée went to her bed and crawled under her sheets to hide. This was turning into a terrible 10th birthday.
Not long after the only bare wall in the room swooshed open and in entered the first-person Renée has ever met. Wide-eyed, Renée watched as Garrus quickly shuffled into the room, one hand holding a terrible gunshot wound on his left side. Once he entered the small room he turned around and quickly sealed the door with his own inscription code so that there was no risk of one of the mercs hacking the door open to finish him off.
Now that he was safely locked in, he turned to face to the room and slid down the door to the floor. It took some effort, but he pulled off the upper half of his armor and took stock of the damage done to him. Thankfully it was nothing too life-threatening, he used some Medi-gel to seal the holes in his natural plating, so he didn't bleed out on the floor.
Next, he opened his Omni-tool and tried to disrupt the signal jammers which automatically went up when the lockdown started. It was imperative he get back in touch with Shepard and the Normandy.
As he worked, he became aware of a curious Turian sounding trill subharmonic which didn't originate from him.
Whipping up his rifle he turned on the flashlight from his Omni-tool and did a visual sweep of the space. He looked over to the bed and saw the top of a silver head of hair and a pair of Gold and Silver heterochromia iridium eyes looking at him from beneath the bed sheets.
One of the more prom prominent species spliced into her genome was Turian DNA. This gave her the two voice boxes which made the distinctive duel sounding voice which Turian are known for. She also has Turian feet and Turian claws at the ends of her five-fingered hand.
During the first five years of her life in the tank all these features and others were noted by Layla but what the good doctor failed to notice was that Renée also inherited Turian instinctive impulses. Having never met another living person till now, Renée never imprinted on anyone paternally.
Seeing that it was what he thought to be a small human child, Garrus lowered his gun and moved to look as non-threatening as possible. With a soft calming subharmonic purr, Garrus tried to encourage her out from under the blanket. "It's ok. Don't be scared. I won't hurt you. Did they lock you in here? What's your name little one?"
Though she couldn't understand what he was saying because she didn't have a translator, she was still greatly attracted to the signals he was emitting Renée. Without hesitation Renée crawled out of the bed and settled herself between Garrus's knees, snuggling close to his chest.
Surprised by her lack of fear. Garrus froze for a moment but then slowly and gently began to pet her long, thick and soft hair. Having never been near a newborn Turian baby before, Garrus didn't realize the two of them fell into a sort of trance as they embraced. There subharmonic purrs and trills changed to match each other, and the sound reverberated into each others chest.
Garrus scented the top of her head before he rubbed his face in her hair marking her with his own scent. He tucked her tight against his cowl under as he rested chin and she snuggled even closer. The two stayed like this for a long time in a trance and it was how Shepard and Dr. Solus had found them.
Usually, new Turian parents tuck their newborn babies in their cowls around there neck and hideaway for the first 48 hours in a primitive trance bonding with there children and in this time the babies imprint on their parents. It is extremely unwise and dangerous for anyone to approach the families before the first 48 hours are over because everyone is perceived as a threat and it is impossible for the parents to communicate logically with the outside world in this time.
Having been locked in Renée's room for a few hours you can just imagine how violently Garrus reacted to Solus and Shepard. Consciously Garrus didn't recognize the pair of them as anything but a threat to Renée and he responded accordingly.
Luckily for everyone, Dr. Solus quickly deduced what was wrong with him when he spotted Renée and heard he panicked chips which should have been impossible for a human child.
With some quick movements, Solus went into the nearby med-bay in the Facility and procured enough sedative to drop a rhino.
When both Renée and Garrus were subdued Shepard radioed the Normandy for a medical evac and the two of them were transported to Dr. Chakwas. When she learned what happened, Karin, the resident doctor on the ship had the storeroom at the back of the med-bay turned into a temporary bedroom for the pair. They were laid out on a cot and Solus made sure the mysterious child was laid out on the same cot right against Garrus. Once they were comfortably settled everyone left the storage room and Karin locked the door. She ordered EDI to keep a close eye on the pair and to notify her of any changes.