I'm still reeling over the fact that I got three reviews in the day after I published that first chapter. I'm touched. Really, I am.

A thanks to those of you who favourited this, and to the semi-anonymous review Invader jrek; It's explained in Crysis 2 that the Ceph originate from Earth, but their ship in the first likely indicates that they'd have at the least reached space flight. So chances are they'd have colonies like the other races too right? I've been toying with the idea of placing some of their colonies in some lesser known areas of the universe (hell, maybe even close to dark space), so as to your question: will there be Ceph? I see no reason why not. It won't be soon though, setting is still being established and questions regarding Director Dunn and Co. need to be answered.

This chapter will see the introduction of Hannah Shepard (for those of you not in touch with ME as others, Hannah Shepard is Commander Shepard's mother if you choose the Spacer option in Character Creation). Hopefully you guys like the way I've chosen to portray her. The Shepard I've chosen for this fic will be default fem-Shep appearance-wise, Soldier class, and Spacer and Sole Survivor background.

With that said, as they say: 'On with the show':

A Razor's Edge

Chapter Two: The Mission

To his immense pride, despite their new surroundings and the news that they'd been effectively asleep for more than a century, Daniel Cutting's soldiers exited the chamber and secured their hallway unarmed in the time it took to blink. That being said, they'd be fish in a barrel if anyone with any sort of firearm entered, and while he was fully aware of his men and women's hand-to-hand capabilities, he couldn't be sure whether the raiders were human or not. For instance, Master Sergeant Kuruvilla had the left entrance, but the person who entered could potentially be an alien that towered well above him, multi-limbed and with enough raw power to snap Aakash's bones like mere twigs. Of course it could work the opposite way as well; the alien to enter could be barely half his height and as fragile as glass, however this didn't tend to be much of a trend even with human bandits (and he'd encountered plenty during the Ceph War in city ruins).

As luck had it, nothing entered from that side, and the team was clear to go, a dull thud resounded in the distant corners of the facility, signalling that more explosives had been detonated. Lab personnel rushed seemingly in all directions; a great many were human but there were several non-humans present too, a couple of the same species as Kryik, a slim, amphibian alien which reminded Daniel very much of frogs or toads, and a couple that loomed over the rest in dull red armour, wielding enormous guns with large, bony plates over their heads, they looked like bipedal rhinos to Daniel – only lacking horns. The 'rhinos' seemed like they were headed towards the sounds of explosions – probably security or mercenaries.

The lab personnel – while generally panicked – managed to point Razor team in the direction of their suits in Sector 3 of the eastern wing, which had not been stowed away on the escape vessels yet. The story was that the eastern wing was one of the first to be hit by the raiders, and that contact was limited to a couple of security teams that happened to be checking the suits out themselves when the attack began. They reported to be holding fast for the moment, but they'd begun bringing up something called 'krogan' and 'biotics'. The worried tone in which those two terms had been said prompted Razor to make all due haste, though Daniel's muscles protested viciously to sudden movement, and he still had to be supported by Corporal Ratajczyk.

They'd just entered the eastern wing, into the mess hall when they met the first raider; it was about human-sized, with a helmet, though something was off about it. For starters, its head – even with the helmet – seemed abnormally large, Daniel assumed it to be alien and therefore for his team to observe before attempting to engage – not that they would. For starters, it was leaning against a table in open space, and a smooth, slightly battered rifle of some sort lay across its lap. It was clearly waiting for someone – or something, judging by the way it shifted its head from side to side occasionally. A minute passed and it was clear that the raider wasn't going to budge – if Razor simply tried rushing it, the raider would just have to bring its rifle up, and it'd be in a rather comfortable position to gun down half of the squad, they were fast, but – despite what other soldiers had joked – nanosuit warriors were far from invincible, especially outside of the suits that gave them such a reputation.

He studied the environment, looking for options. Going around was out of the question what with all the rubble blocking the hallway, and he knew full well that they had neither the equipment or the time to dig through it. The only way forward was through this mess hall, and there was precious little cover available on their side – probably why the raider had chosen to sit at the opposite end of the hall, all it'd need to do was duck and roll and he'd have overturned or broken dinner tables between him and anything that meant him harm. They needed a plan to oust him, maybe if they convinced him that they were raiders themselves... Daniel shook his head. That'd never work; for starters, their clothing alone would give them away, secondly –

Claire shot by him, dodging past the open doorway and stopping at the other side, the alien turned its head sharply, catching the movement. It brought up the rifle and watched the doorway for a few moments before cautiously creeping towards it, crouched a little lower with its shoulders hunched in case it needed to take evasive manoeuvres. Much as he wanted to slap her on the head for her impulsiveness he had to hand it to the Lieutenant for her thinking: in her present garb; there wasn't much chance she or anyone in Razor would be taken for anything more than another facility worker – and therefore, not much of a threat. He turned to Aakash and Eoin, signalling for them to prepare to take down the approaching target. It was probably overkill but until he knew more about the different intelligent species populating the universe, he'd rather play it safe.

The alien was barely the quarter of a metre from the doorway when Razor struck. Aakash spun round from the corner crouched low; Eoin followed just a step behind. The alien couldn't bring its gun down in time and Aakash delivered a vicious one-two jab to its torso. The alien doubled up and clutched its chest with its free hand, the arm with the rifle hanging limp, where Eoin took hold of said limb and twisted sharply. The alien released a guttural cry of pain and swung its empty hand blindly, Aakash managed to block the clumsy attack and – without thinking – gave it a quick uppercut to the chin of the alien's helmet, which succeeded in both stunning the alien and damaging Aakash's own hand. Eoin got behind the still reeling alien, grabbed it and hoisted it into the air, slamming it head-first into the ground. A sickening crack echoed throughout the mess hall and the alien moved no more. Razor gathered around the body, and Daniel – overcome by curiosity – removed its helmet.

The thing was startlingly ugly, with a large head, two pairs of eyes and generally scrunched-up features; its skin was an unpleasant brown tone. Blood leaked from the left corner of its mouth, and began to pool on the floor. Eoin tapped his chin thoughtfully.

"You know, that thing was surprisingly light." He said, still observing the corpse, though his gaze seemed to have glazed over slightly, as though he was looking through it, not at it.

Indeed, were it not for the size of its head and the face, it could almost be mistaken for a human. Daniel thought back on things he heard as a child regarding aliens – how many argued that any life outside earth could not possibly be bipedal or humanoid in appearance because it would contradict some laws of evolution or something. Evidently these people must have been surprised when they'd encountered the aliens of the 'Citadel', Daniel reflected.

A distant explosion brought Razor back into reality.

"Carroll, take that weapon and see what else you can find on him, we'll move out as soon as you're done." Daniel commanded. He sent Aakash and Claire to the entrances of the mess hall just in case any raider came looking for their friend. It took less than a minute for Eoin to scour the corpse of anything that seemed useful, the inventory consisted of the rifle, a pistol, several clip things that seemed to fit into the weapons and a couple of strange disk devices. Claire took the pistol, Aakash took the disks and was about to begin fiddling with them until Daniel told him to stop – for all they knew the things might be several-megaton bombs or something.

Razor continued on through the eastern wing, which had evidently taken the brunt of the attack if all the debris and the numerous corpses were any indication. They had yet to encounter any significant number of raiders as of yet, the few they'd come across Razor had been able to avoid contact with – Daniel reasoned that there was no need for them to figure they were headed into enemy territory, else they might catch on that something valuable was still in there. They'd passed the bodies of security and raider alike, and as such, all of Razor was now armed with a rifle or shotgun of some sort with the exception of Daniel who still couldn't move on his own much and Aleska who still had to support him, though she now carried a rather large pistol taken from the body of one of the 'rhino' aliens.

Finally, after what seemed like an age of hiding, sneaking and looting bodies, Razor came across Sector 3, and already they could hear the telltale cracks and pops of gunfire resounding from deep within the area. Daniel ordered Razor to advance in a loose formation down the halls, moving as quickly as possible while also trying simultaneously to be as quiet as possible. The gunfire grew louder as the men and women of Razor passed debris, pock-marked walls where dozens of rounds had been fired, and corpse-strewn rooms and corridors. The place was almost entirely white on the inside, and Aakash remarked glumly that he'd never been through a more soulless place.

The team had entered what looked like a loading bay, and suddenly the din of gunfire became just that, a few stray bullets struck the wall to the left of the doorway and Razor scrambled for cover. Claire peeked her head from behind a shelf full of crates and ducked back quickly.

"Looks like this is the place Cap. There's two groups up ahead exchanging fire, I'd bet it's these raiders and Security. Doesn't look like they've noticed us yet, if we get a bit closer, we can gun them down without them knowing the first thing about it." She spoke clearly but quietly and Daniel nodded, then, giving a series of shaky hand-signals, ordered Razor to advance and take up optimal firing positions and gave Claire temporary command. He ordered Aleska to go too despite her protests that Daniel still needed her to get around, to which he reluctantly pulled rank (in spite of the fact that he wasn't entirely sure if he still held the rank of Captain) to force the Corporal to move. Daniel managed to force himself into a hole in one of the crate storage shelves so as not to be seen by any possible reinforcements and waited for the shooting to stop.

It took less than two minutes.

"Seriously though Cap, those arseholes didn't even know we had the drop on 'em til our guns wouldn't fire anymore, and by that time we'd taken out more than half." Claire boasted, her Australian accent more prominent than ever as she propped herself on top of the corpses of a dead krogan. The alien almost turned the table on the Lieutenant – surprising her when it quite literally charged at her, Aakash had managed to take out a kneecap (or what Daniel assumed was a kneecap), which had stumbled it, allowing Claire to finish the thing with a burst of fire.

The rest of the fighting from there had been cleanup, with the previously pressured Security teams advancing forward and mopping up the raiders who found themselves surrounded by two dedicated fighting forces. The leader of the Security team, another krogan by the name of Jurdon Wrill, gave the humans a curt greeting and had one of his counterparts lead Razor to their nanosuits while he in his own words 'searched for more victims', Daniel had a feeling that they'd see him later on, though on which side he wasn't sure. The krogan seemed an unnaturally aggressive species, and the way they fought reminded him eerily of the Ceph Devastators; hulking, brutal, and destructive without equal. Daniel learned from the krogan assigned to them that Wrill was a member of a mercenary group known as the Blood Pack, and that they'd been hired fairly recently in response to some increased pirate activity.

'Space Pirates. Who'd have thought?' Daniel chuckled to himself.

"Hm? Something up sir?" Aleska asked him curiously. Daniel had become so used to her help that he'd almost forgotten that she was still lugging him around.

"No, nothing, just a little thought that amused me." Daniel shook his head as they continued towards their suits.

"In there humans. We found a technician huddling in there when we were attacked who'll probably help you into those suits of yours. Can't see what all the fuss is about though; looks even flimsier than your normal armour." The krogan grunted and left them to rejoin the rest of Security back in the loading bay.

The fitting took the better part of ten minutes, and through regular thirty second intervals nervous Security personnel entered the chamber to inquire whether or not they were ready to leave. The technician was growing steadily more impatient than anything else by the time the ninth minute had ended and was happy to finally be free of the annoyance, though Daniel suspected that the prospect of having a fair number of well-armed soldiers and mercenaries accompanying him to safety had some part in his temperament as well.

Daniel stepped down and stumbled almost immediately, he cursed as Claire and Eoin barred his fall, and Claire hoisted his arm over her shoulder.

"I think I'm gonna need a bit more time." Daniel muttered darkly. Claire just nodded her head, though behind her visor he could feel her grinning. Daniel made a mental note to remember her attitude towards her CO's disability for future situations, though he knew that all she'd need to do was flash him that brilliant smile and it'd –

Okay that wasn't too professional. For starters she was always smiling, so unless she found a way to surgically alter her face (and he was all but certain that there were methods in this crazy universe to achieve such a procedure) he doubted that her features could get any flashier. He was about to consider another unrelated thought when gunfire sparked ahead, evidently more raiders had come looking for their friends.

"Cloak engaged" the voice rang in his skull. He sat himself gently down, knowing that even with his suit on, at present he'd be in no condition to fight, so he sat back, kept an eye on his suit's heads-up display and energy readings and watched his squad go to work.

The first raider fell to a shot from the krogan who'd led Razor to their suits, the next casualty was one of those four-eyed aliens who took a slug at point blank range when Aakash materialised in front of it and unsympathetically unloaded into the raider. He retreated when fire turned on him, the Sergeant switching to Armour mode, and steadily falling back while continuing to fire as bullets bounced off his suit's hardened outer layer. Aleska engaged her suit's power mode and grabbed two large crates, tossing them at the raiders, the first missed entirely but the other slammed into a human raider, crushing his ribcage and killing him as the bones splintered and were forced into his soft inner organs. She dived into cover when several guns turned on her following the Corporal's performance.

Eoin stood stoically above the Security team like a hero of old, letting the incoming fire rebound off his suit's armour while he unloaded his rifle into anything that showed its face. He hit far less often than he missed, but the psychological value of his action cowed some raiders into uncertainty, while simultaneously bolstering the Security team's resolve. Wrill suddenly stood up alongside Eoin, roared at one of his subordinates and violently backhanded him across the face, shattering the krogan's lower jaw.

"These humans fight better than you filthy varren do! The Void take all of you cowardly wretches, I'll finish this myself and find some better fighters." With that said, he charged, shotgun flaring and reaping a life whenever it barked.

The krogan of his pack – even the one with the broken jaw still streaming blood to Daniel's amazement – leapt from cover and followed their battlemaster, in the space of a minute it was over, and the raiders were little more than broken, bloody corpses. He'd seen the krogan in action not fifteen minutes ago but their martial prowess still stunned Daniel, and he wondered briefly if the nanosuit's power mode could match their raw strength.

The attack was not without losses though, two krogan from Wrill's pack had died, so had three of the human security officers and the technician who'd fitted Razor's suits – a bullet had ricocheted twice and struck him in the temple, splattering the crate he was hiding behind with gore. The surviving security officers pieced themselves together to fight their way to the shuttle, with the krogan stopping to briefly take check of their weapons and ammunition before leading the way. Daniel was about to try to pick himself up off the floor when the suit chimed in:

"Threat detected."

The doorway to the loading bay opened again, more raiders and another alien appeared – this one female, with blue skin, strange appendages on the back of its head and a strangely alluring physique. Unfortunately its beauty was marred by the twisted visage of seething fury that occupied its face.

The alien roared and erupted into an unearthly blue glow, and then Daniel's world erupted. The krogan were lifted into the air by the glowing alien while its comrades took pot shots at the flailing mercenaries, three were killed almost instantly as their shields failed them and bullets ruptured their armour and shredded their bodies. The blue-skinned alien pulled its arms back and in another display of this strange power, pushed forward. The krogan flew, some landing among the crates, others skidding across the floor, some pushed themselves onto their feet, but others did not.

Aakash cloaked and re-materialised to the alien's left but she caught the movement and flung her arm towards him. The Master Sergeant was surrounded by that blue glow and was propelled off his feet, slamming into a storage shelf where he lay still, his vitals displayed that he was still alive but unconscious. Aleska fired two shots from her heavy pistol, her shields seemed to fail but the alien remained unharmed, some sort of back-up force field protected her from further harm, or it was another element of that power she displayed. The alien rounded on Aleska and fired two glowing orbs at the Corporal from her hands, the swirling spheres seemed to home in on her and she jumped, managing to leap over the closest, the next however, followed her, struck her, Aleska fell to the floor, crying out in agony, her vital signs became suddenly erratic before stabilising as the pain overwhelmed her and she joined Aakash in slumber. Eoin was lifted into the air much akin to the krogan, until the alien began dashing him against the ground repeatedly before flinging him across the room like a ragdoll, it seemed as though luck was on his side though; his vitals were the worst so far, but he was still alive.

The last of the raiders fell to one of the security officers, who now began to focus their fire on the blue-skinned alien who'd singlehandedly decimated more than half of Razor team and not an inconsiderable number of Blood Pack mercenaries. She reeled, the strange barrier flaring into life, but didn't fall, and instead lashed out with another two energy spheres which impacted with two human officers who fell to the floor in a spray of blood as they were ripped apart at the molecular level by the unnatural energies. Daniel saw Claire cloak and hop onto a shelf to gain a better vantage point as the alien continued unleashing sphere after sphere. Aiming her rifle at the alien's head, she uncloaked, squeezed the trigger and didn't stop until the weapon ceased firing.

The alien didn't even flinch.

Instead, it seemed to reach up towards her and pulled the crate she hid behind down to the floor with her powers, and then lifted her into the air, pulling Claire towards her and suspending her half a metre away. The alien grabbed Claire's head and tilted it to the side, studying her and the suit, curiosity lining its graceful features before it decided that it had seen enough. It pushed Claire back and made two grabbing motions, the blue glow appeared on Claire's arms, and the alien began to pull to the side, Claire gasped and began groaning in agony – the alien was trying to rip her arms from their very sockets! Daniel looked around desperately for a weapon, finally settling on a pistol much like the one Aleska had lying by one of the dead krogan mercenaries. He ignored his aching limbs as he reached for the weapon, raised it, aimed it at the alien and fired just as his energy levels bled dry and he reappeared in view, prone on the ground. The first shot bounced off of its barrier, the next followed suit. The third shot pierced the alien through the hip, the fourth merely grazed its leg, he only got two more shots before the gun clicked and wouldn't fire again. The alien gasped at the sudden attack and dropped Claire, who fell to the floor groaning and trying weakly to move her arms.

The alien rounded on Daniel with vengeance ablaze in its eyes, clutching its bleeding hip with one hand, the alien pulled Daniel off the ground towards it like it had done with Claire. It reached for a holster and drew a sidearm, pushing it directly against Daniel's left thigh, Daniel knew what was coming next, and activated Armour mode with a thought just as the alien squeezed the trigger. The round deflected off of the suit's outer layer and – with nowhere else to go – exploded through the barrel of the pistol, ruining the firearm. The alien recoiled in surprise and Daniel dropped a foot before the alien regained control and lifted him back into the air, narrowing its eyes at Daniel and glancing at the suit again, it smirked to itself and let go of its wound to lift Claire with its other hand which was now slick with its strange purple blood. It held both of them an equal distance apart from each other and closed its fists, and Daniel instantly felt an overwhelming, agonising pressure. He gasped, taking several rapid breaths as the alien began slowly clenching its fists, enjoying the show of the two strangely-armoured humans suffering.

Just as Daniel felt he was about to burst like an overripe melon, a deafening bark echoed throughout the room and the alien's head exploded in a shower of visceral gore. Its corpse fell limply to the floor, and Daniel and Claire dropped too, winding themselves upon landing, still aching but still alive. Daniel craned his head from his curled position to where he thought the shot had come from and found Jurdon Wrill holding his shotgun in one hand. To say the krogan battlemaster was a mess would be an understatement, his left side was almost entirely gone, blood flowed from the gaping hole in the alien and dozens of other smaller wounds, the shock alone would surely have taken even the hardiest human out of the fight permanently – to continue fighting like that...

'These krogan sure are terrifying creatures... Sure hope we don't have to fight any of them on our way out.' Daniel thought to himself with a grimace just as Wrill dropped to the floor, bleeding, torn and very dead.

"He caught three of those warp attacks from that damned asari." One of his officers stated to the humans when the survivors had regrouped and Razor had come to.

"Tore him up worse than anything I've seen, but old Wrill was never one to walk away from a battlefield while an enemy still drew breath... Taking down a battle-hardened asari matriarch... Yes it was a glorious death; his name shall be inscribed on our vessel's wall of honour." The hefty alien intoned loudly, its surviving comrades murmured their approval. Daniel cocked his head.

"Your vessel? Aren't you leaving with us?" he asked.

"We were paid to protect this facility, and by extension you and those suits you wear." The krogan answered, not looking at him "I still don't see what all the fuss is about, but you fought better than those saplings." the newly promoted battlemaster pointed to the surviving human security guards – less than six were still alive, barely a quarter of their original number.

"With this attack and the evacuation – and I'm willing to bet my quad that they'll level this entire place once they're sure everyone's out – there is no facility, therefore there is no job left for... my pack... We'll see you to your shuttle, but we will part ways once that is done. There are bigger battles out there somewhere and someone will be willing to pay for us to fight them." With that, the krogan stood and commanded his surviving warriors to follow him.

The journey to the escape shuttle was far more peaceful than the journey, with not a single encounter – much to the krogan's disapproval. Once Razor and the surviving guards boarded, the krogan battlemaster bade them farewell and wondered if one day they might clash with Razor, Daniel didn't give a reply, secretly hoping that such an event would never occur.

The shuttle boarded a human military vessel not ten minutes before a lengthy bombardment of the facility begun, wiping it from the universe permanently. Razor was on the bridge of the ship five minutes later.

Daniel couldn't stop himself from staring in wonder at the sight; it amazed him to think how far humanity had come since the Ceph War. The bridge was bright and bustling, but the numerous personnel moved around in an organised – almost choreographed manner, ensuring that no collisions were had and that everyone got to where they needed to be. At the centre of the bridge, standing over a holographic map of the galaxy stood a middle-aged woman with her brown hair done in a neat, tidy bun with an odd streak of grey. She would barely come up to Daniel's chest but there was an aura of authority about her that seemed to command absolute, unwavering obedience and respect. Director Dunn was at her side, as was Kryik, it was clear that there was some tension between the two, though the woman – who Daniel now assumed was the Captain or Commander of the human vessel – seemed unhappier than Dunn did, who was at least trying to smile. The Commander turned her unblinking hazel eyes on Razor team, casting a curious glance at Daniel, who was still being supported by Aleska before surveying the rest of his team.

"This is them I take it?" she asked, though it didn't sound like she was asking a question.

"Yes Hannah this is –" Dunn started before he was interrupted sharply by Commander 'Hannah'.

"Don't call me that. Especially not on my own damn vessel, I came here because the brass ordered me to. If it had been up to me, I'd have left you on that rock and laughed as it had gone up in flames." She seethed quietly.

"I see you're still upset." Dunn said, matter-of-factly. Commander Hannah glared at him.

"Your damn faulty intel cost me good men and women, one of whom was a damn good friend of mine. Until I see you do some serious grovelling, it'll be a long time before I even consider forgiving you." The Commander growled at him. Daniel shifted uncomfortably; there was obviously bad blood between the two.

"Oh come now Hannah I've stated time and time again that if I had known about the Thresher I would gladly have reverted the transmission and tried my hardest to have found another method of cracking that pirate cove. Besides it wasn't all bad – you met Liam didn't you?" the Commander rounded on him and for a moment, Daniel was convinced that she was about to strike him. She didn't. Instead, she glared so fiercely at Director Dunn that Daniel could almost feel the venom her gaze held himself.

"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear you mention his name Dunn. The next time I do I swear to God I won't hesitate to throw you myself out the nearest airlock." The words were laced with poison, whatever had occurred with the pirates and this 'Thresher' thing, it was bad. Really bad.

"Yes I don't doubt you would. Tell me Hannah, how much can you bench press? Because the last time I saw it was something around hundred and ninety pounds – not that anyone was really paying attention to that though I can hardly blame them. If you don't mind me saying you were a ravishingly good looking young woman –" Dunn barely finished before Commander Hannah slugged him. Kryik sighed and shook his head before offering a hand to his friend, who graciously accepted.

"Okay, I know what I said there and I apologise, that was well out of place for me." He said in a much more business-like tone "I'd also like to –" he was cut off when Hannah decked him again.

"Apology accepted." She grunted to him.

"Alright... Alright I deserved that. Now if you're done venting can you let us talk business? I don't think our guests appreciate us talking history." Dunn said, wiping the blood from his jaw.

"You were the only one talking history Dunn." She replied evenly before turning back to Razor "my apologies troopers. I've heard from Mr. Kryik – and Mr. Dunn" she glanced back at him "that you had a bit of a rough awakening. Mr Dunn's company develops and researches quite a significant amount of our tech, so Alliance sent me here to come pick up his experiment." She glanced over Razor team once more "Though I have to say, I'd assumed we'd be picking up something more... inanimate than you" She turned back to Director Dunn and Kryik.

"I think before we answer that, introductions are in order don't you think Hannah? Razor Team, this is Captain Hannah Shepard, Alliance Naval Officer and mother of the hero of the most famous human in existence. Captain Shepard, this is Razor team – we'll get you up to speed momentarily." Director Dunn said in a friendly tone, unfortunately for him, Captain Shepard was having none of it and was straight to business.

"Who are they exactly? Experiments? Biotics? Androids?" The Captain asked. Dunn tilted his head, as if considering his answer before speaking.

"They're... Not something I can so readily describe to you..." he thought for a moment "Are you familiar with the Ceph Captain Shepard?" he asked. Razor team immediately perked up at the mention of the scourge of their time. Commander Shepard raised an eyebrow – Daniel wondered whether it was the question itself or the sudden formality.

"I'm well familiar with our species' history Dunn. I'm not sure what the Ceph have to do with these men and women though." She said in a steely tone.

"Oh they have everything to do with the Ceph. You might say that they had first-hand experience..." Dunn trailed off, letting the implication hang in the air.

Captain Shepard studied Razor team for a few more moments, narrowing her eyes as if to discern some minute detail.

"By that you're telling me that they've been in direct contact with the Ceph... The Ceph haven't ventured from their colonies since the clash with the Council twenty years ago. I don't think we'd send Special Forces to investigate their colonies if we didn't think an attack was imminent... That leaves..." she paused – then, to everyone's great surprise, let loose a loud bark of laughter.

"Out of all the possibilities, I'd never have thought in my wildest dreams that something like this could happen outside a vid!" Shepard calmed down a moment before casting a more relaxed eye over Razor Team again.

"Well, alright Dunn if nothing else you certainly have my attention. So I'm guessing that you have some sort of plan for them, else you'd not have gone through all the trouble of finding them and bringing them back." Shepard deduced.

"Indeed I do Hannah, and it actually rather concerns you too." Dunn paced, hands clasped together. Shepard raised an eyebrow again and glanced at him.

"In fact, I'd say it also concerns your daughter too." That drew a sharper look from the Captain.

"Hold on now Hannah, hear me out. You remember the attack on the Citadel a couple years back right? Course you do you; kinda hard to forget the place a loved one dies isn't it? Especially on such a... notable occasion such as the Geth attack on the Citadel.

"Let me start by saying – with absolute clarity – that your daughter was onto something, something big, something so immeasurably monumentally huge that your daughter was labelled 'insane' for daring to speak about it upon her death – or her faked death, hell I don't know what it was. Now you know that massive ship of Saren's? Sovereign? We managed to get a clip of that in action, as well as a few parts from the wreckage. Now the Citadel Council wants us to believe that it was all a Geth attack; that Saren was so unbelievably charismatic that he managed to convince the Geth to overthrow the Council and take power for himself...

"The key word there my friend is 'unbelievably'. Come on don't tell me you actually bought into that, we're as much strangers to Geth as most people are but the Quarians are quite insistent, Geth do not work with Organics – though hell I've been hearing that your daughter had one fighting alongside her on Illium about five and a bit months ago, I dunno maybe it had a few screws loose or something.

"The next thing is the flagship itself, we've analysed the wreckage countless times, we cannot pinpoint a source for the stuff that thing's made of, hell we don't even know where to start cause we don't know what the crap even is! All we do know is that it is dozens – maybe even hundreds or thousands of millions of years old. That is far too old for it to be a simple Geth battleship, and get this, we have a recording of your daughter's chat with the Council once the attack was over – she mentions something about a cycle and 'agents' of these things called 'Reapers', which we're guessing is what this Sovereign ship was. Now if there are more of these things out there then by god we need to prepare and we need to prepare fast, and the start of this preparation is finding these Reaper agents and neutralising them.

"Now an ordinary team of Special Forces might get the job done but hell knows they're expensive to equip and if they get caught, all it'd take is a quick sweep of the omni-tool and bam! They'd be led straight back to us, regardless of how well the guys think they wiped the things before death, trust me I've seen it done before, and lord help you if they have a Quarian because if they do you might as well put a bullet in your head and save yourself the misery of a tribunal..." He paused, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes for a moment before opening them again.

"But these guys here... They're already equipped; their suits Hannah – God I tell you it makes me wonder why the hell we didn't keep notes of that tech stored around somewhere instead of letting it get all blown up in the War. Now they'll need to be brought up to speed on the tech – how to use omni-tools effectively, heat sinks in firearms, tactics for taking down different species of aliens... And of course, I've already mentioned the suits – no one's seen the like of it in more than a century Hannah, not us, and certainly not any alien species. The way I see it, if we get these guys kitted up, we'll have a more powerful force on our hands than an entire krogan legion! Well okay maybe that's an exaggeration but it's still pretty damn powerful!

"Anyway, coming back to you – these guys, Razor team – will need a ship to get them around, a good ship with a good crew and a great commander, and naturally, when I think of those two categories I think of you and the boys and girls in the Retribution... So Captain... Whaddaya say?" Dunn asked.

Captain Shepard seemed conflicted, about what Daniel couldn't say. She cast an uncertain look at Razor, then at Dunn.

"The Alliance might not –" she started.

"The Alliance Brass already know. I told them my whole plan, Hackett sided with me and God bless his scars he has more pull than most among the Fleet – didn't take much pushing for others to fall into line alongside him. That being said most of them seem to think that this operation of ours is purely to hunt down and eliminate dangerous radical groups like Cerberus but whatever their line of thinking is – we have the go-ahead and we'll get the funding and all the tech we need from my company and any Alliance facility we happen across. All we need is a ship and a damn good crew – which is you my friend." Dunn finished, there was a hint of pleading in his tone, and a wild look in his eyes that made Daniel wonder if he actually believed that his team could make a real difference.

Captain Shepard shut her eyes, reopening them a moment later, when she spoke, it was clear, controlled, and was spoken in such a commanding tone that Daniel had to fight the urge to stand at attention and snap off a salute to her.

"Alright Dunn. I'm in. But on one condition – this is my ship. Nothing goes in or out without my knowing. You and your executive don't give me orders, you can tell me what I need to know but I have the final word. Is that crystal clear?" she asked with more steel in her tone than anyone Daniel had ever known.

To his credit, Director Dunn actually smiled warmly.

"Why Hannah my dear friend. I wouldn't have had it any other way." He turned to Razor Team and clapped his hands together.

"Right then. Let's get you fitted out and up to speed proper this time. Oh! And Hannah! I've got a list of things the Retribution might need for this mission. Don't worry about money I can pay for it all, we'll need to stop off at a shipwright of course, that should take us – hmm." Dunn began wandering off, rambling to himself while writing down notes on a holographic slate. Kryik caught Daniel's eye, the turian shrugged and followed his friend.

"Razor Team?" Daniel heard Shepard ask them. Daniel tried snapping to attention but his muscles failed him again and he winced as pain overtook his extremities.

"Don't stress yourself soldier, we got plenty of time to get you back to peak performance. Tell me, which one of you is in charge of this unit." Shepard asked, hands on her hips. Daniel managed to just raise an arm.

"I am Captain." Shepard eyed him keenly for a moment before curling her lip into a wry smile.

"Very well. As of this moment you are now an Acting Staff Lieutenant in the Systems Alliance Military. The rest of you will be considered Acting Corporals. If you'll wait here a moment, I'll find someone who can assign you quarters where you'll be billeted for the duration of this mission." She turned smartly on her heel and began to stroll towards an elevator before she stopped and turned slightly back to Razor.

"Oh, and welcome aboard the Retribution."

That was much longer than I originally intended it to be. I could go on about a bunch of other things but it's quite late and I'm pretty dog tired.

I will just say quickly that there might be a bit of confusion regarding nationalities of Razor Team, so I'll just quickly list down where each member of Razor originates from:

Daniel Cutting – United States of America

Claire Underwood – Australia

Aakash Kuruvilla – India

Eoin Carroll – Ireland (Republic)

Aleska Ratajczyk – Poland

Hope you enjoyed. Read and review would be greatly appreciated, hope you guys enjoy.

Ciao.