Disclaimer: If it doesn't belong to bioware its mine.
The Elder Shepard.
The Necropolis has many nickname's, including The Ark of Oblivion, The City of the Dead, the End of the Line and many other equally poetic, but still very fitting names, as the Necropolis is the final destination of all who enter. The Necropolis is one of three prison ships operated by the Turian Hierarchy, the others being the Inferno and the Purgatory. The purgatory was sold a few years ago to the Blue Suns, because of Budget cuts. The Necropolis houses the lifers, the murderers, the traitors and all others whom the Hierarchy doesn't want to see again. Three months after the battle of the citadel, an anonymous shuttle, containing one of the most unlikely of guests arrived.
In the shuttle Miranda Lawson were preparing for the liberation of one of humanity's forgotten heroes. Miranda paced back and forth in the passenger compartment of the shuttle arguing with her omni-tool, or more precisely a voice through her omni-tool. "Tell me again, why do you want me to free this man? If what you say is true, he should have easily been able to escape." The she stated with an annoyed look on her face.
In the other end of the galaxy The Illusive Man sighed and shook his head. "We have hired mercenaries to recover Shepard's corpse, we have even been able to convince Dr. T'soni, but they are not human, they are not Cerberus, and we need an ace in the hole, we need one who would tear the galaxy apart to recover the commander. He is a man that would do exactly that, and he is one of the few people would actually be able to pull it off."
Miranda activated her omni-tool and brought up the classified file of the inmate. "It has been twenty-six years since he was captured, how do you even know, that he can fight like he used to, or that…" She paused for a moment, accepting that her boss did indeed have a point, yet she still wasn't entirely convinced. "You know what happens to people after years of imprisonment, they become lethargic and…"
The Illusive man cut her off and elaborated: "If he has become lethargic, then prove to him that the Shepard family didn't die at Shanxi, and if that does not work…" He paused for a moment. "Inform him of the death of Commander Shepard, I can guarantee you that that information will awaken the major, no matter what his mental condition might be."
Miranda was about to argue, but she was interrupted by the pilot, and a shudder going through the vessel: "Mam, we have docked with Necropolis, you can board now." With a grunt she left the shuttle and entered the Necropolis.
As she entered the ship she was greeted by armed guards, and a female turian with an arrogant aura around her that rivaled that of her own. The turian stepped forward and addressed Miranda: "Welcome to the Necropolis, as you have been informed, you will have to relinquish any weapons before you can enter the prison proper." The turian pointed to a locker on the side of the room. With a grimace, Miranda complied. "Now follow me to my office, we have business to attend to." The turian made a gesture for Miranda to follow and left the entry hall, with Miranda not far behind. During the walk towards the office through the catwalks overlooking the common areas of the prison, she noticed one strange thing about the prison, practically no human prisoners, there were plenty of batarians, asari, turians and salarians, but she only saw one human. The common area was a quite large rectangular area with round tables spread around evenly in the room. In either end of the room were corridors leading to the different cellblocks. She looked down upon him and he looked up, for the first time in twenty six years, he saw another human, for the first time in years, he smiled.
Mass Effect Mass Effect Mass Effect
"… And when we get out of here we will assemble a force that will make the blitz look like a mere gang of vorcha." A very angry batarian stood on a table yelling anti-human rants at the batarian crowd below, until he was interrupted.
"Balak will you shut up, you got tricked by a girl, live with it." Came a stern voice from the other end of the room. The figure walked towards the batarians and continued. "I have been here longer than everyone, I have seen plenty of escape attempts, and I have seen them all fail."
Balak jumped down from the table and with a furious glare and a clenched fist he walked to meet him. "So human, since you seem to know all there is to know about this place, why don't you enlighten us with you brilliant insight in escaping the ship?"
With a completely uninterested look on his face the human said: "I don't know what they teach you at that pathetic excuse of a totalitarian state that you call a government, but in the alliance we are taught that you should never divulge your battle plan to the enemy. But out of pity I will give you this, don't use the air ducts, there is turrets on the other end."
That insult to his home was the final straw for Balak, he drew his fist back and attempted to strike at the human. Yet halfway through the punch something strange happened, Balak felt the human grab his wrist and shortly after he was struck in the face by the human's elbow. Not willing to give Balak any time to recover, the human quickly followed his attack with a knee in the batarian's gut and an uppercut, resulting in Balak lying beaten and dumbfounded on the cold floor. The human just shook his head and walked back to his table, while the entire prison laughed at Balak's misfortune.
Mass Effect Mass Effect Mass Effect
The office of the ship was surprisingly clean and orderly, compared to the rest of the ship, art dotted the walls and tables. The turian directed Miranda to a chair in front of a very classy desk, while she herself sat down behind it. The turian folded her hands and stared at Miranda for about thirty seconds before she began. "So what brings an alliance representative to this end of the galaxy? The message I received from the embassy was very vague about the subject of this meeting, and I don't like being held in the dark."
Miranda quickly realized that this would be a battle of wills, one she intended to win. She folded her hands and began: "The alliance has received Intel that you have an alliance officer in your custody, we want him released."
The turian looked at her puzzled and said: "We only have one human in custody, and according to our files he has been here for the last twenty six years, this is the first we have heard from the alliance regarding the prisoner."
Miranda glared at the turian and explained: "The Alliance has only recently learned of his survival, and we want him released, immediately." She leaned back into her chair and fell into her usual arrogant facial expression.
"No" Miranda was quite taken aback the frankness of the answer. "No we will not release him, I am under orders to keep him detained, indefinitely." Her mandibles vibrated furiously. "His actions resulted in the destruction of both the Verkos and the entire colony of Morran. He is never leaving this ship."
Miranda sensing that this was a sensitive spot for the turian, pressed the issue. "And how exactly did he do that?"
The turian responded with barely contained fury: "He commandeered a dreadnought and crashed it into the colony killing everyone, an act of terror on such a scale warrants nothing less than lifelong imprisonment."
"First off the attack on the Verkos was a legitimate act of war, and secondly I want to hear his side of the story, I want to know if you have any basis for your accusations. And are you aware by detaining him for the last 26 years and by denying me access to him you are breaking no less than four citadel conventions, that crime would land right on the other side of the bars in this prison." She hoped that she had annoyed the turian enough to want her out of the turians face, but not enough to make her throw Miranda out of the airlock.
"Fine, if it gets you off my ship." She sighed, probably wondering why she had even agreed to letting Miranda talk to the prisoner. "A guard will escort you to an interrogation room, there you can have a chat with your "Major"."
Miranda left the room with a smirk on her face, things were going exactly as planned. True to her word, a guard did lead her to an interrogation room. The room contained nothing more than two chairs and a table, the prisoner sat on one chair while chained to the table. She walked into the room and sat down in front of him. The prisoner had both long hair and a very large beard, neither had seen a scissor or razor in a very long time. His face was scarred and pale, and his eyes totally without emotion, like someone who had lost everything a long time ago. She activated her omni-tool and asked quietly: "What is your name and rank soldier?"
He looked up and what appeared to be a glimmer of hope returned to his eyes: "Major Gabriel Shepard, mam."
Miranda placed a recording device on the table and slid it over to the Gabriel. "Tell me how you here soldier."
He picked it up and began: "Twenty six years ago, Shanxi, Blackwater base, Systems Alliance colonial headquarters." His facial expression turned distant as he relived past memories.
Mass Effect Mass Effect Mass Effect
Twenty six years earlier.
Gabriel sat on the bunk in his quarters staring at an old picture. The picture was of his wife and daughter, Hannah and Jane Shepard. Both had recently perished at the hands of the aliens when the refugee ship they were on was destroyed. He was entirely lost within the picture, at some point a soldier barged into his quarters. The soldier was panting, he looked like he had been running errands in the base for quite some time and was obviously tired. He saluted and with a pleading look on his face handed Shepard a data pad. Shepard put away the picture, took the data pad and waved the soldier away with a: "You're dismissed, go get some rest boy." The data pad contained scans and tactical data of a dreadnought, heavy shielding, lots of guns and a crew of thousands, Shepard had been in enough suicide missions to recognize one in the making. The basic plans for a counterattack began to form in his head, he wondered if it was even possible. To get the job done he would need dreadnought class firepower, every single N7 on the planet, over a ton of explosives and a shitload of luck, yes definitely a suicide mission. He removed the image of his family from the frame of the picture, folded it and put it in his pocket. He grabbed the data pad, turned to leave the room and muttered: "To think that two months ago I intended to retire and become a high school teacher, crazy how much an alien invasion can fuck up your plans."
Elsewhere in the base general Williams opened up the intercom and said: "All N7 personnel, and pilots report to the Hangar in 60 minutes, Major Shepard report to my office immediately." Shepard stared at one of the loudspeakers for a few seconds before complying with his superiors' orders.
Mass Effect Mass Effect Mass Effect
Gabriel walked into the generals' office, the general sat behind his desk clutching an empty glass in one hand and a bottle of scotch in the other. Shepard walked over to him and took the bottle from the general sat down in front of him: "Sir, the men need you thinking clearly, not fighting hangovers." The general acknowledged Shepard's presence with an annoyed grunt. He collected himself, put away the glass and said: "We are in a grade A shitstorm here old friend, if the blockade isn't broken soon we are going to have no other options but to surrender." He sighed and continued. "I've managed to get communications through to Acturus, they are on their way, but they will need a distraction, unfortunately that is where we come in. The techs have repaired the big guns, we are to use them on that dreadnought the aliens have brought into low orbit. We can only fire a few volleys before the aliens can make a counterattack, you will have to board the ship, because there is no way we can bring the ship down with the big guns before they can make a counterattack."
"So this is it, the last charge of the light brigade." Shepard got up and left the room.
"Hopefully not." The general replied, his eyes followed Shepard as he left.
Mass Effect Mass Effect Mass Effect
The base chaplain was an old retired soldier turned clergyman, he had been through more combat than most of the soldiers at the base combined and had earned the Purple Heart more times than anyone cared to remember. Everyone respected him, no matter their religious views. He walked into the base chapel to prepare for the evening sermons, when he reached the altar he saw a lone figure sitting on the front bench with his face in his hands, it was the major. The chaplain sat down next to him and said: "Hello major, I don't think I have seen you in here before."
"It is because you haven't." The major replied. "I have never been much of a believer, but now, with all that's happened, I just don't know."
"Let me be frank with you major, I have never cared much for the personal spiritual beliefs of the soldiers, to me my duty is to provide guidance to those who need it." He paused for a moment and put a hand on Gabriel's shoulder. "And right now, I think that it is you who need it."
Shepard sighed and said: "To be honest I don't even know why I came in here." He turned his head and was met by the stern gaze of the chaplain.
"Oh I think you do know, I think you came here hoping that I would tell you what god wants you to do, to stand up for Jesus and fight the good fight, I won't do that." He paused for a moment, allowing Gabriel to soak up what he had said before he continued. "I don't even think that it's God you should be fighting for, there are others you should be fighting for. When you go out there today, don't think of God or Jesus, think of your daughter, think of your wife, fight for them."
Gabriel was about to say something, but was interrupted by the intercom: "All N7 and support personnel report to the hangar immediately."
Gabriel got up, and just when he was about to leave the chapel the chaplain spoke up. "You never told me, are you a Christian son?"
Shepard replied with a smile: "I am tonight." The chaplain simply smiled back.
Mass Effect Mass Effect Mass Effect
A few minutes later Shepard joined up with his troops in the hangar. Two hundred N7 commandoes along with pilots, medics and engineers were under his command, he wondered if it would be enough. He stepped onto a crate in the middle of the hangar and yelled to his men: "Everyone listen up. The general has just received word from Acturus, the fleets are coming, but we got to hold ET's attention until they get here."Everyone present stared at Shepard in disbelief and he continued with a confident smile: "Our target is a dreadnought that they have recently brought into low orbit, our job is to bring it all the way down. The techs have brought the big guns back online, when we give the signal they will cripple the target and we will move in for the kill. We split up in teams of ten and move through the ship planting bombs at everything looks important." After 15 minutes of going through battle plans with his men the loud wail of the klaxon rang through the base. Everyone sprang to attention and Shepard yelled: "Everyone get to your stations, we are moving out." Everyone loaded up on the ships and within minutes the strike force was airborne.
Gabriel stood in the hold of the lead transporter with the rest of his troops, he looked around at his troops with a sense of pride, each of them had worked hard to be the best soldiers Earth had to offer and all of them were eager to prove themselves, now they certainly had the chance. He walked up to the cockpit, his gaze meeting each of the soldiers in turn. Three of them stood out above the rest, Jester, Mossad and Taliban, he always thought it strange how the best soldiers somehow always got the worst nicknames. He positioned himself behind the pilot and said: "Jester, ETA to the target?"
"Eta, two minutes."
"Good, transmit the following to Blackwater, Operation command code Hammerfall, initiate operation Clear the way."
"Yes sir." Jester replied and made some inputs on his terminal. Moments later the big guns of Blackwater opened fire blasting away at the cruiser. When the aliens finally realized what had happened their shields were down and the guns had been drawn back into cover. Stage two of the operation had begun.
With their shields down, the ships hangar bay was wide open to a boarding action, just as Gabriel had hoped "Major, the enemy hangar bay is wide open,"
Gabriel activated his comm and spoke to his troops: "We board the enemy vessel momentarily get ready." He ran up to Jester and said: "Monitor the comms, hail me when the fleet arrives and tell them that we're here, I don't want em to be shooting at this boat when were still inside." Jester simply nodded.
The transports flew into the hangar guns blazing and shooting everything that moved. The commandoes were dropped off, and within minutes they had taken control of the hangar. Gabriel was the first soldier off the transport. As his men disembarked he shouted commands at the: "Jester you are mission control, get a perimeter set up and hold the fort until we come back. Alpha team you are with me, everybody you have your orders, now move out:" shouts of "sir yes sir "and the heavy footsteps of more than two hundred men vibrated through the halls of the hangar. The men ran in different directions each seeking their designated target. Gabriel led his men towards the bridge.
Mass Effect Mass Effect Mass Effect
At first things went fine, but about halfway into the operation, things began to go wrong. As they were fighting the ship began to rumble and shake, and Gabriel knew, that was always a bad sign. Gabriel brought up his comm and shouted: "Jester tell me that that was an alliance ship that caused that shaking."
Jester replied in a very worried voice: "Sorry sir, the dreadnought has just gone FTL, and no word from the alliance."
Gabriel slammed his fist into a wall and yelled: "Dammit, ok men we need to get to the bridge and stop them from fleeing any further."
The Major and his man fought their way through the ship, yet he and had his men had to pay for each inch in blood. When Gabriel reached the bridge about half of his men had fallen, and the fighting were growing more and more desperate by the minute. As they got to the door that led to the bridge, he instructed his men to plant breaching charges on the door. He opened up his comm. and contacted the team that was assaulting the drive core. "Status report." He said in a very no-nonsense tone of voice.
There was a great amount of static on the line, and Gabriel could barely hear the voice on the other end. "Sir we are pinned down, we have planted and armed the explosives, but we can't move anywhere." The soldier on the other end replied with just a hint of desperation in his voice.
"I care how you do it, but get the hell out of there, that is an order soldier."
"Yes sir."
He closed the comm. and hailed Jester: "Jester we have reached the bridge, we are breaching in 2 minutes. Have everyone retreat to the breach and prepare for evac. Now get the wounded stabilized and loaded up and be ready to leave when we get back."
"Sir you need to hurry, we have lost 64 men and multiple teams are trapped throughout the ship. We are going to need time to get them out of there, sir please hurry´..." His voice trailed off and quickly became frantic: "They are dropping off from the Zero-mass corridor, the deceleration will set off the charges!"
Gabriel cut him off and opened his comm. for all of his men and shouted: "Everybody back to the shuttles, the ship is about to blow." He had barely finished uttering his sentence before the ship shook again, this time followed by a massive explosion that threw everyone off their feet. He got back up as quickly as he could, and tried hailing whomever he could. "Jester, Beta team, Gamma, is anyone listening?" There was no response. And to make matters worse, the hallway they had entered by, had collapsed, there were only one way out, forward to the bridge.
He sighed, trying to get a hold of the situation. The way back to the transports was blocked, most of his men were likely dead and their only way forward was straight through the most heavily guarded part of the ship. This truly was the last charge of the N7 brigade. He looked at his men lying dazed on the floor and said: "Anyone who isn't dead make a sound." The groaning of his men was answer enough for him.
Mossad was the first man on his feet, and the first thing he did was to check on the explosives on the door. He looked back on the others and said: "The explosives are still intact, we can still breach the door."
Gabriel picked up his assault rifle from the floor and said: "Grab your guns people, we are getting out of here. Mossad you work the charges, the rest of you take cover." They did as ordered, Mossad activated the countdown, the charges blew and the door fell. Gabriel and his team rushed through the breach and opened fire upon the already confused aliens. At this point the commandos really didn't care how many aliens they had to kill, they just wanted to get the hell off of the ship. The dazed and confused crew was in no position to fight back and was quickly gunned down, all except for one. In the rear of the bridge was a raised platform, with a very angry looking alien standing on top. The alien grabbed an assault rifle and opened fire at the commandoes, killing one. Before the alien could move on to another target everyone was knocked to their feet by another explosion. The alien fell over the side of the platform he stood on, Gabriel saw an opening, and took it. He didn't even bother to get up, while still lying on the ground he grabbed his pistol and fired until it overheated, the alien died. He got up and walked over to the alien and made sure he was dead.
He looked back at his men and yelled: "Look for escape pods, I don't know about you, but I don't want to be here when this ship blows." He was distracted by a flashing light on the alien's platform, he walked up to it, and realized that it was still active. He started fiddling with it, and to his surprise it was strikingly similar to what they were using at the alliance.
Taliban walked up behind him and asked: "Sir do you know how to use that thing?"
Gabriel shook his head and said: "No, but it seems to be based on the same technology… uh oh."
Taliban looked at Gabriel in disbelief: "Can you actually understand any of this?"
Gabriel's facial expression turned dire and he said: "No, but I can recognize a Decaying orbit alert when I see one." He grabbed his weapon, vaulted over the platform and yelled: "Times up people, where's that escape pod I ordered?"
Mossad came running in from an adjacent corridor and yelled: "Found 'em sir, follow me."
Two minutes later Gabriel had escaped with the few men he had left. Through the window in the pod they could see the dreadnought crash into an alien colony, the resulting blast formed a mushroom cloud. It took a moment for Gabriel to realize what had happened. The aliens had had nukes onboard. Tragically he forgot a side effect of the detonation of a nuclear device, EMP. As the blast wave from the explosion slammed into the pod, it was also bombarded by electromagnetic radiation which fried all the circuitry in the pod. The strangely beautiful sight of an atomic mushroom cloud was the last thing Gabriel could remember before he awoke wounded and in the process of being dug out of a wrecked escape pod by aliens.
Mass Effect Mass Effect Mass Effect
Present day.
Miranda snapped her fingers in front of Gabriel's face and said: "Are you ok major? You seem distracted by something."
Gabriel shook his head and said: "Sorry, the general wanted me to bring an alien dreadnought down, I did so, killed a shitload of aliens and lost every single soldier under my command, no wonder you abandoned me."
Miranda suppressed a snort, she was not impressed with the man in front of her, according to the men who had served under him, he had an iron will and was ridiculously tough. The man in front of her looked broken, he looked like he had given up hope, in the future, the alliance and himself. Miranda looked confused at Gabriel and said: "Your assessment of mission objectives, results and enemy casualties seems to be accurate, but according to reports by a Jonathan Moreau there were 65 survivors, not including you." She paused for a moment before she continued: "We did not abandon you, until now we thought you had died."
When he heard the name Moreau his eyes lit up and he whispered: "Jester survived?"
A slight smile crept over Miranda's lips, she knew that she had his attention, time to bring out the heavy artillery. "Yes he did, he retired some years ago, but his son is serving with your daughter in the military." She lied, Joker had left the alliance the week after commander Shepard died.
Gabriel snarled at Miranda, he hated when people lied to him, and he could easily tell if you were, but the lie he caught was not the one he thought: "Don't bullshit me bitch, my daughter died along with her mother, trying to flee Shanxi."
Miranda almost felt sorry for turians considering what she was about to do… almost. She pulled two datapads up from a bag, and gave them to Gabriel. "These contain your wife and daughter's files, service records everything." With a sly smile on her face she said: "I have to leave now, I hope I'll see you again… Major." She picked her recorder and left the room, hoping that the elder Sheppard was as good as his daughter.
Gabriel's muscles tensed with barely contained rage, he had spent twenty six years in a turian prison for no reason, he had given up. Now he understood why she had come, she had dared him to escape, and he was not going to disappoint.
R/R please.
Plus I fixed some typos I missed the first time round.