1. Lazarus
"Shepard… Shepard…"
The voice connects with his consciousness only gradually, piercing a haze of deep sleep, and the self-realisation builds up even more slowly.
Shepard.
"Commander, you must wake up! Now!"
Finally, he becomes aware of the persisting comm.
Comm. Some emergency.
'Yeah', he mutters but no sound issues and his lips feel stiff. As he moves his head, he becomes aware of pain in his cheeks: sore, raw skin. Confused, he raises his hand to touch the spot: a clumsy gesture of the limb feeling heavy like lead.
The hand touches something on the temple that is not supposed to be there: a piece of plastic, and a wire.
He abruptly opens his eyes. The hazy shapes swirl nauseatingly before they sharpen and focus.
Some kind of medlab – hightech, if he's ever seen one, stuffed with devices and apparatuses he's never seen, either, and the function of which he can't even guess.
He can guess, however, the function of the tubes hanging from a panel just above him: the hoarse feeling in his throat only confirms that. There would also be some down there, I suppose. What the hell…
Raising his head, he can see a multitude of sensors stuck to his chest, and feels some more on his temples and forehead; as his heart starts racing, a monitor on his right issues a warning signal.
"Shepard! Can you hear me?"
A female voice, vaguely familiar.
"Yes," he manages to creak. He turns his head to the comm, wondering how long he must have been out, feeling so weak and stiff and intubed all over. "What's going on? What happened?"
What happened to me?
"There's no time for this! Listen, Shepard. The facility's under attack. Someone's hacked the security mechs and they're massacring the crew. I've blocked the entrance so they won't get to you but you must get out on your own. I know you are not fully healed yet but you must get out of the bed! Now!"
It doesn't make much sense to him but the urgency in her voice sounds convincing. He sits up: the effort has him sweating but he is feeling better by every second: have I been given stimulants? "Who are you?" he asks the woman as he removes the sensors from his head and chest. "What is this place?"
"I'm Miranda Lawson," she replies with a hint of irritation, "Shepard, you must hurry, we don't have much time!"
"Give me a sec, I can't run about with a cannula in my vein," he grumbles, realizing there is a thick needle, with multiple ducts, in his left wrist.
"Just pull it out and apply pressure for a while," she instructs him impatiently while in the background, he can now hear the distinct sound of the short rounds of a shotgun. "Be glad that you don't have to deal with the catheter on your own."
Oh, thanks for reminding me.
The needle slides out of the vein and he quickly presses his thumb on the spot, noticing several similar punctures on the wrist, some fresh, other already scarring.
Scarring…
The bed suddenly as if bounces under him.
Still pressing the vein, he turns his hand with its back up, staring in disbelief at the unmarred, unscarred complexion. Following up along the arm, still the same sight: the extensive scarring after he had been burnt with thresher acid on Akuze, is gone.
All of his scars are gone.
Alarmed, he runs his hands over his face: the left temple, the cheek, neck… no scars…
Do I even look the way I did?
What…
"Shepard!"
"Yeah, I'm going," he mutters, examining his palms, elbows, knees, heels… all just smooth, soft skin, like a baby's, without callusing.
What's this supposed to mean?
"Get to the locker next to the door, there's an armour and a gun for you. I'll tell you the code."
He nearly topples as he gets off the bed: stimulants or not, his body feels as if unaccustomed to moving.
Great. From bed right into a fight while feeling like shit.
But why…
Looking at the bed, he realizes it is a unique piece, like a blend between a hospital bed and a gym machine, apparently designed to easily change shape and position, while the patient is strapped –
Strapped?
His stomach churns in a fit of sudden anguish.
"Shepard!"
The woman, Miranda, has to repeat the code twice before he manages to open the locker; the sounds of fight are now audible from somewhere outside, quite close. Irritated, Shepard struggles with the hardsuit: the old routine feels strangely distanced, and the armour has several gadgets he hasn't seen before.
Miranda nagging him to hurry doesn't exactly help, either.
You'll have to do quite some explaining when we're done here, woman.
He takes a deep breath. Finally, the inner membrane of the hardsuit adheres to his body like a second skin. Armed and armoured, he feels much more confident than just a while ago. His movements become more coordinated, his reflexes start kicking in.
He checks the gun one last time – again, a model he is unfamiliar with but close enough to the one he used previously.
The shooting outside has ceased but it is impossible to establish who has won. Taking cover behind the doorframe, Shepard says: "I'm ready. Unseal the door, Miranda."
The door slides into the wall, obscuring the symbol of a slim hexagon, enhanced on both sides with another line. Behind the door, there is a makeshift barricade and a hall, its floor strewn with bodies, humans and mechs alike: both bear the identical mark, yellow on black, of the hexagon like an eye of darkness.
The bullet stops on his shield in a whirl of blue just before his face and Shepard quickly dives for the cover again.
Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy.
Forcing his hands to calm down, he takes another chance at a shot: it takes him three to bring a single mech down.
Damn, Shepard, you're badly out of shape.
Whatever it is that has been pumped into his system to keep him going, he can tell from the unmistakable signs that he is even worse off than he had expected. His reaction times are terribly slow, the usual precision requires way more concentration, and very fast movements bring about instants of sudden dizziness.
Dammit, this is going to be tough.
A five mechs' concentrated attack follows and its outcome is much closer than he would have liked. His vision blurring, he slides against a crate to take a brief rest. Dammit. Angrily, he slaps into the armour plating on his thigh. Pull yourself together, Shepard. You've been through worse.
Have I?
He actually cannot be sure: one moment, there are flames and explosions of the Normandy's agony, the darkness of the open space as he is rotating helplessly, trying to seal the rupture in his hardsuit, his lungs painfully lacking air – the next one, the white lab, sensors and tubes.
Not quite, he realizes. There was something in between – half-waking in pain and confusion. A man and a woman leaning over him, hands holding him down. 'Don't try to move, Shepard.' Female voice, with an already familiar diction.
Miranda. That must have been her. Very pretty, if I recall correctly.
Her voice on the comm now guides him relentlessly through the corridors, until it is suddenly cut off in the static.
Great. Which way now?
He passes several doors, leading into empty living quarters. One is blocked by a body in the doorway: a woman, her face frozen in an expression of horror, and on her shoulder, a yellow hexagon on black.
Where have I seen it? Is it some corporation logo?
And why am I in a private facility instead of Alliance?
In the room, the screensaver on a console displays the same sign, slowly rotating.
Shepard hesitates. For the time being, there is no shooting nearby, no movement… and he is tired of not knowing.
Crossing the body, he brings the console to life.
The next moment he wishes he hadn't, staring at the date at the bottom of the screen. He leans closer, then withdraws with a snort of refusal.
Two…years? How could this be possible?
Automatically checking for sounds from the outside, he displays the recent documents. 11/2/2185, 11/1/2185, 10/27/2185, 10/26/2185, 10/26/2185, 10/22/2185… all the way back, year 2184, 2183…
No older entries.
Could I have been out for two fucking years? Or is someone trying to fool me around? Why?
He scans through the document titles: most refer to some Lazarus project, with various medicinal specifications… and quite a few sport his name.
Was I subject to some specific treatment? How bad off was I after I got spaced?
Shaking his head, he is about to leave when a title catches his eye: Related Cerberus Projects.
His mouth goes completely dry.
Cerberus.
His memories race like mad: the death trap on Edolus, Kahoku's body and the sick experiments on Binthu, the paramilitary base on Nepheron…
That's where I saw that sign.
Engraved on several caches, not in colour; that's why he didn't recognize it immediately.
Cerberus.
Jerry Toombs' half-mad eyes and trembling voice, and the blazing sun of Akuze.
Stepping away from the console, he realizes that his hands are trembling. Those... What have they been doing with me? For two years?
He nearly trips over a chair and then staggers again as he swirls too quickly in response to a glimpse of movement, which turns out to be his own image in the mirror on the wall.
The shock of it all makes him almost physically sick. Sinking into the chair, he hastily struggles with the helmet and then gulps the free air, even though he is aware that the difference is merely psychological.
Looking up, he meets the eyes of his image: dark and strangely hard in a pale face, marked with unhealed rectangular scars. The shaved – or rather, depilated – head only highlights the feeling of estrangement.
My eyes…
There is something weird about his eyes.
You got spaced, reason tells him. Eyes and vacuum don't go well together.
But I survived. I can't have been exposed too long.
His mouth is so dry that he cannot swallow.
But if I was recovered soon afterwards, what am I doing here?
You won't find out if you don't get moving, idiot. You survived then, you have to survive now. Get out from here, wherever that might be, and worry later. Your eyes work, and that is what matters.
Easier said than done, though: his hands tremble so badly that he can't set the helmet right.
Quit panicking, Shepard. Get your ass moving. Now. Suck it up, Commander, and go…
Which way?
Follow the gunfire, idiot.
Where there's shooting, there are survivors – and possibly also answers.
Survivors and answers.
Not so much later, he has both, and had he not been through the initial shock already, in his weakened state, he might have collapsed then and there.
'You were dead as dead can be… the first time I saw you, you were just meat and tubes.'
Now, that's the one thing I didn't really need to know right now.
Another wave of hacked mechs is coming and Shepard steadies his hand against the handrail.
'We reconstructed you.'
Reconstructed.
That much for the supposedly short exposure.
He takes out the leading mech while Jacob Taylor uses his biotics to get another flying.
Why are you wearing the Cerberus symbol, Taylor, if you've been Alliance? And when do you intend to show me your true colours at all, huh?
"You first," he nods at Taylor when they're done with the mechs, "I'm the new guy here."
"Of course, Commander," the black man responds, and if he suspects the true reason, he doesn't let it show.
Actually, if he didn't know that Taylor is Cerberus, he might be inclined to trust him a bit more; the man does show traits that Shepard has learned to trace and assess among his men during his years of service – traits indicating honesty.
Yet, he is Cerberus, and he's not telling everything.
To give Taylor the credit, he is well trained: the two of them slice through the mechs in the service tunnels without any substantial problems, operating like a coordinated team.
One more mech fight on their way to pick up a survivor who called them from the security centre, though, and Shepard's suspicions are further fuelled. The doctor who claims his deal on Shepard's revival has evasive eyes, and Taylor apparently doesn't like him much, either. "Why do you even have security clearance to access the system?" he asks, frowning.
And why did you claim that the service tunnels were safe? If you can access the system, you must have seen they weren't, or not?
"I was trying to help!" Wilson retorts, offended. "I got hurt, remember?"
A very convenient leg wound. Who do you suggest was the one who hacked the system, by the way?
The doctor's answer is so predictable that Shepard almost laughs, even without Taylor's dismissal. If it was Miranda, she would be royally stupid to risk the life of her oh-so-precious test subject when all she needed was to program the mechs to leave me alone.
Or was she so confident that I wouldn't get killed?
This is Cerberus you are dealing with. They don't play nice, and they don't play fair. Never forget that, Shepard.
I'm not having either of you guys on my six.
Which immediately turns out an issue, as the doctor apparently intends to tail behind the two of them.
A moment of truth. "I'm not letting you behind my back. I don't trust you – either of you."
"Come on, Shepard! We need to get moving, to the shuttles –"
Taylor cuts off the doctor with a gesture. He steps forward, his posture signalling that he has made a decision. Shepard's hand on the gun tenses.
"Commander," the man says slowly, "we need to work together to get out of this alive. Will you trust us more if I tell you who we work for?"
"That will depend on what you tell me." More than you know. "Go ahead, Taylor."
Wilson looks as if he wanted to protest but then reconsiders. "Your call, your ass, Jacob."
Taylor doesn't heed him. "We're with Cerberus, Commander." His eyes never leave Shepard's but he definitely follows the gun with his peripheral vision, as well.
So does Shepard with Taylor's gun, and with Wilson, seemingly casually leaning against the wall. "And that is supposed to make me trust you?" he asks coldly. "Previously you said you were Alliance."
"I was." Still, no flinching. "I quit after Eden Prime. Humanity was under attack and the Alliance didn't do a thing, only you did… and Cerberus. That's why I joined them, and that's why we've brought you back. You are important, Commander, none of us would ever harm you."
Except the guy who hacked your system. Other than that, the confession does sway him a little. An honest man fighting for the wrong cause? Such cases do happen. "Still not trusting you, but I'll play along, for the time being. We do need to get out of here."
Taylor nods. "To the shuttle bay, then." He frowns in concern. "I hope we'll meet Miranda there."
Wilson scowls to that behind his back and Shepard wonders what might be the cause of the obvious animosity. Are you Cerberus guys always like that, at each other's throat? Perhaps I might let you sort this out between yourselves and be gone on my own.
It turns out, they are, and Wilson is dead even before his body hits the floor.
"Miranda! What are you doing?" Taylor spurts in shock.
Shepard's memory is correct, Miranda Lawson is truly beautiful… and she is also a cold-blooded killer. She doesn't even pay Wilson a second glance. "He betrayed us," she states without emotions. "He hacked the mechs… sent some more to take me out when he figured that I was helping you…" with a slight nod, she acknowledges Shepard's presence while ignoring his gun pointed at her. "Now that you're here, we can leave."
Not so quickly. "Where to, and what do you want from me?"
Already turning to leave, the woman pauses, one perfect brow slightly rising.
Taylor clears his throat. "He knows, Miranda, I told him."
"Oh, Jacob. You and your conscience." Yet, smirking as she says that, she is looking at Shepard, not Taylor.
Does she know that I messed with that console?
"Well, Commander", she replies, "now we're going to take an evac shuttle to access the transport ship, and then we're going to travel to another Cerberus facility. The Illusive Man will want to talk to you, and he will tell you all that you need to know. Are you coming, or would you prefer to rot with the mechs?"
Cerberus at its best. "What about the rest of your crew? There could still be survivors." Why do I even bother?
"If there were any, they would already be here. Besides, the only one worth saving is you, anyway."
Avoiding his eyes, Taylor follows her to one of the small shuttles. Shepard curses under his breath but has no other choice: even if he took another shuttle, where would he go? He pauses only to look at Wilson's body one last time: although his total number of kills is probably much higher than Lawson's, he never executed a man in cold blood.
Executed. Was he really a traitor, or did she kill him so that he couldn't talk?
Man, now I can certainly understand your beef with her. There's definitely something rotten under that pretty package.
Once seated in the shuttle, Shepard is feeling the symptoms of the stimulants and adrenaline wearing off: dizziness, nausea, palpitations, sweat. His stomach starts revolting.
Gosh, I think I'm going to puke…
Or worse. Faint. With two Cerberus operatives on board, out of which at least one is clearly capable of anything. Not a good prospect in the least.
Gulping for air, Shepard removes the helmet and bends his head to his knees, hoping that the increase in blood supply will keep him from fainting. And if I'm gonna paint the floor, so be it.
Of course, his condition doesn't go unnoticed.
"Shepard? Shepard!" Lawson leaves her seat and rummages through the medkit, but as she kneels down and takes hold of Shepard's hand to access the application duct of his hardsuit, he pulls it away. "No drugs. I've had enough of these." And I trust you only as far as I can throw you.
"Don't be stupid," she says with that tone of cold superiority he has already come to loathe, "your waking was far from what I had planned and it is only starting to affect you now." She reaches for his hand again. "You need to –"
Damn you, bitch.
She finds herself looking into the muzzle of Shepard's gun, pointed at her face from the distance of several centimetres.
"Get. Your. Hands. Off. Me," he articulates with effort.
The black-haired operative winks rapidly, once, and pulls slightly away. "I haven't spent two years of my life reconstructing you to distribute you something harmful now, you know." Her perfect lips set into her characteristic smirk while her eyes remain as cold and impassive as before. "Or perhaps I was too optimistic over your brain tests, after all."
Gulping to keep his stomach under control, Shepard doesn't move the gun. "I've sprayed the walls with the brains of the likes of you a couple of times, so you must forgive that I am disinclined to trust you and your motives which you have refused to explain me."
Even before he finishes, he realizes that the fate of her fellow operatives means nothing to the woman. She shot that doctor from not even a metre, after all, and didn't even blink.
"You did," she nods as if she was commenting the results of an ancient football match. "But they were inconsequential." She gets up elegantly, ignoring the gun. "As for those motives you don't trust, you will have to wait till you meet the Illusive Man. I'll do the necessary after you pass out, and if you want to be sick meanwhile, be my guest."
"Miranda." Taylor turns in the pilot's seat, his reproachful tone changing as he addresses Shepard. "Commander… I know this must be difficult for you but believe me, we mean you no harm."
Is he genuine, or is it just a variation of the old "good and bad cop" game?
Desperately, Shepard realizes that he wants Taylor to be genuine: to have at least one human being in that vipers' nest he's currently heading into. And so he only repeats: "I won't have any drugs unless strictly necessary, and that is not now."
With a shrug, Lawson resumes her seat. "As you wish. I'd just like to point out that we reconstructed you as a human, not a cyborg. You will need to sleep, eventually."
Facing the obvious, Shepard doesn't bother answering. Taylor sighs aloud but doesn't comment, either.
The rest of the way to the transport ship goes in silence.
Lawson exits the shuttle without as much as a glance at him and Shepard hears her curb someone's questions and give out curt orders. Taylor stops on his way out and reaches his hand to help Shepard get up. He ignores it and gets up on his own, which, of course, is a stupid mistake, because he staggers and his stomach performs a dangerous somersault.
Undisturbed, Taylor sneaks his arm under Shepard's shoulder to steady him. "Lean on me, Commander. We'll walk only shortly."
The distance from the hangar to the living quarters leaves him bathing in sweat, and his heroic effort to keep his stomach in check turns out vain even before the door of the living quarters close behind them. Without a word, Taylor manoeuvres him to a chair and fetches some towels to clean the mess. "'Been sick after stimulants a couple of times myself," he remarks sympathetically. He checks the locker next to the door and nods contently. "That should settle your stomach alright," he produces a can of Coke but then hesitates. "Though, I should perhaps ask Miranda if you can already –"
Not letting him finish, Shepard snatches the can from his hand and tears away the seal. The familiar bittersweet taste overwhelms him with its intensity and for a moment, it seems that the Coke will follow whatever had occupied his stomach previously. With his eyes closed, Shepard concentrates on breathing evenly, feeling the nausea slowly recede.
Next to him, Taylor shuffles. "Miranda is not a bad person," he says softly but firmly. "She's just…"
…a cold bitch.
Had she said that my men on Akuze were inconsequential... I don't know what I might have done.
The black man clears his throat. "I'll help you out of the hardsuit, right?"
Shepard lets him even though it makes him uncomfortable. Being helped out after an action never bothered him before but such camaraderie feels out of place with someone from Cerberus. Yet, the familiar routine has a soothing effect… trust-inducing, soldier to soldier.
Which may be exactly why this Jacob is doing it.
When Taylor helps him get up from the chair, he doesn't protest.
"Bed or bathroom?" the Cerberus operative asks.
"Bathroom," Shepard replies while his body screams 'bed' inaudibly.
Once alone in the confined space, he almost shuns from the look of his own face in the mirror…if it's still my face, that is.
Leaning closer to the cold glass, he inspects those raw rectangular cuts on his cheeks: during the fight, some of them opened, leaving bloody trails on the skin. Underneath… underneath protrudes something that is not supposed to be there: some synthetic material covered with tissue. Suddenly nauseous again, Shepard jabs at it with his finger but cannot really tell how it should feel or not, the sensation overcome with the soreness of the raw skin. Then, his eyes are drawn again by the impossibly smooth, soft palm of his hand, devoid of any calluses of adult life.
Reconstructed.
His breath is beginning to hitch. My hands…
The cold eyes watch him back from the mirror.
My eyes.
Slowly, he raises his hand to his right eye. Pausing, he takes a deep breath and holds the eye lids with the fingers of his left hand – cold, trembling – and pokes the right forefinger into the orb.
Slick, hard surface. No pain.
I've poked into my eye and it's not mine.
More sick than ever before, he heaves again and again, painfully, with an empty stomach, holding to the washbasin as if it could save him from drowning. He sinks to his knees, exhausted, his eyes welling and nose running, irritated by the heaving.
A hesitant rap on the door. "Commander? You alright?"
He has to take a few breaths before his is able to produce a voice: "Just sick again. I'll get a shower."
He ignores what Taylor says to that and crawls into the cabin, as cramped and claustrophobic as those things go on a ship, but now at least it makes it easier for him to stand there. He lets the water wash away the medical smells, the blood and tears, even the taste of bile in his mouth, and ignores its stinging on the raw skin. He stays there until the water stops automatically – longer than on military ships, he notices – and sets the air drying for 'cool', afraid that warmth might make him even dizzier than he is.
When he finally exits the bathroom, shuddering, it takes Taylor a single glance to swallow whatever he meant to say and rush to support him.
Being half-carried to the nearest bunkbed, Shepard finally dares the gamble. "No more drugs, please… Don't… let her mess with me." 'Five years in the Alliance', please, let it mean a thing…
"You need to rest, Commander," he hears as if from a distance when being laid down. "You'll be OK, you just need to rest… and I'll do what I can."
When he wakes up, he is alone in the room, his head heavy and aching, his mouth parched, and he barely manages to scramble to the bathroom in time. Only when he returns to the bed he notices some drinks and tubed food on the side table, as well as a message:
– Commander Shepard:
Jacob insisted that you refused any treatment, so if you have any issues being left without hydration and catheter, sort it out with him, please. I've prepared you some nutrition that should help you recuperate, and if I may be so bold, I strongly advise against burdening your digestive tract with anything else for now. Even so, proceed slowly, unless you are still hell-bent on hurting yourself some more. If you are unable to keep it down, or should you arrive at the conclusion that medical treatment might actually be meant for your benefit, be so kind and deign to meet me in the medbay.
– M. Lawson
Shepard checks the tubes and bottles: pasted food, with a balanced content of nutrients and minerals. Little wonder, given that his guts haven't seen a piece of solid food for –
He quickly curbs the thought, unable to deal with it just yet.
First things first, Shepard. Get back in shape, find out what they want from you.
Shuddering, he involuntarily digs his fingers into his forearms.
Get over yourself. Meet Her Majesty the Ice Queen in the medbay, find out what they have done to you…
The flesh under his fingers turns pale.
First things first…
He opens one of the bottles and takes a small sip. A bland, salt-sweet taste, undoubtedly balanced just for his benefit. He gives up after a third sip.
Discouraged, he looks at the tubes.
Fight, Shepard, fight. That's the way you wanted it, right?
And don't forget to thank Jacob, even though he could have done it just to gain your trust.
He opens the tube. The taste is as horrible as he expected.
Welcome to a new life, Shepard.
Of course he is sick again and after a third unsuccessful attempt, has to go humbly to the medbay.