SIX

Admiral Anderson was dressed in full alliance dress blues adorned with his many campaign ribbons and medals . The admiral made his was to the Alliance Court room where the tribunal for his protege ,Commander Shepard was about to begin. The court room was filled to capacity with high ranking military personnel including the Secretary of interplanetary defense and even the President of the earth systems alliance himself Wilson Huerta. The event was even being broad cast across all systems allinace planets and event to the Batarian Hegemony Parliament. Admiral Anderson was lead by a young private to a seat beside a Fleet admiral Steven Hackett they both had been removed from these proceedings due to a conflict of interest. Commander Shepard sat at a table beside Major Maya Lee-chan while Counselor Kerent'Halat sat at a separate table directly beside them.

Admiral Monica Morales a stout woman of Latin descent and a qualified Juror sat in the judge's chair behind a large elevated table at the front of the room facing Shepard, Maya and Kerent the Batarian Counselor and the jury that consisted of twelve other admirals as they repeated their affirmation to begin to hearing.

"We affirm that as members of the earth systems alliance we will duly administer justice according to the law" they said in unison.

I will now hear the opening arguments from the starting with the prosecution and then defense.

Counselor Kerent'Halat stood up and walked to the area in front of her desk

" Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury, your honor, Today we seek Justice for a brazen terrorist attack carried out under the delusions that a race of Sentient machines are waiting in dark space and will soon invade and destroy us all. Three hundred thousand Batarian lives lost in an instant by this terrorist working for Cerberus, an organization with a more than shady past. I will fight for the mothers, Fathers and Children who lost their lives that day, thank you." She said returning to her chair

Major Maya lee chan then then stood up

"Good Morning Ladies and Gentlemen of the systems alliance Members of the jury and a special hello the the Hegemony joining us in today's proceedings. Today marks a new day, co operation between the Batarian Hegemony and the Earth systems Alliance it's a pity we did not get this after the events of asteroid x57 an attack stopped by Commander Shepard. The events of the Arathot incident was tragic Commander Shepard destroyed a Relay to delay an advancing army of Sentient machines called "Reapers" by the Protheans, the space faring race that dominated the Galaxy before disappearing in a strange mass extinction, this action caused the death of three hundred thousand a sacrifice not taken lightly. If we recall one of these Reapers attacked the citadel three years earlier and it took the entire Citadel fleet and the Human Fifth fleet to take it down. We know little of the enemy but many would like to blame the Geth and the actions of a Rouge SPECTRE but the truth is much more sinister, they were both being manipulated by the Reaper responsible for the attack "Sovereign". I will attempt to establish a link between the Reapers and the Collectors proving that they are far older that any Geth or even Quarian civilization, they are agents of the Reapers and more importantly we will prove that the Research of Dr. Amamda Kenson who was unfortunately manipulated by these Reapers proved an inevitable invasion. Thank you

"Thank you Counselors we will now invite the first Character witness a Dr. Karin Chakwas" said Admiral Monica Morales.

a Middle aged Caucasian with silvering hair made her way to the witness stand she repeated the oath and took a seat.

"Please state your name and Rank for the Record" said Admiral Monica Morales.

"Doctor Karin Chakwas Resident General Medical officer aboard the SSV Normandy"

" Thank you Doctor, Counselor Kerent'Halat you may begin"

"I have looked over the mission logs that were declassified from the collector mission, Did the Commander actually take all the Elite soldiers and operatives via the ship's shuttle on a mission this was right before you and the remaining crew were either killed or captured by the collectors is this the actions of a commander of sound mind"

"That is correct counselor, however like the alliance Cerberus operatives are all combat ready it is a requirement anyone serving on their ships can pass a minimum combat effectiveness, it was also probably for the best as if any of our elite team had been captured then our effectiveness in stopping the collectors might have been greatly diminished" replied the doctor

" It is my understanding that the commander was gravely injured during the destruction of the first Normandy Cerberus scientists and medical personnel brought the commander back to fighting shape in your professional opinion has Cerberus interfered with the Commander in any way"

"The stated goal of the Lazarus project was to bring the original Commander back to peak conditions no clone or tampering was to be done, I am not a psychologist or neurologist but qualified alliance personnel have done extensive tests on the Commander during incarceration to determine mental health and have found nothing unusual, but as a close friend of the Commander I can state that Cerberus did not compromise the commander in any way, some cybernetics were used in the healing process but nothing was done to affect the mind." Doctor Chakwas said calmly

"Thank you for your time doctor no further questions" said the Batarian counselor

"Does the defense have any questions" asked admiral Morales looking over to Major Msys lee. The major stood up to begin her cross examination.

"Yes, your honor, Good morning Dr. Chakwas could you recall the events after Eden prime when shepard encountered the Prothean Beacon warning of the coming threat"

"Well, we were on the shakedown run for the first Normandy SR1 according the the mission report after the commander had disabled three bombs planet side a squad mate approached the beacon, activating it, the commander pushed the squad mate out of the way then the beacon exploded but not before transferring a warning of the incoming Reapers directly to the Commander's mind" said the doctor.

"Thank you Doctor no further questions, Ladies and Gentlemen, Alliance Scientists and Engineers have been able to create an interface for reading an intact Prothean beacon which was recovered by an alliance patrol, I present exhibit sixteen a warning sent by the Protheans, the same one the Commander has seen". Said Maya lee-chan

A second monitor lit up in the courtroom showing a destructive war being waged between synthetics and an organic race bearing a resemblance to the insect like the Collectors the images had a bright orange glow as if to represent fire, the scene then cut to a entire planets on fire and finally an image of a large synthetic resembling the one that attacked the Citadel three years prior. The Jury look at the vivid images awestruck.

"Thank you counselors, we will now invite Mr. Victor" said Admiral Morales

Thomas an investigator from the Naval Criminal investigative services. A Caucasian man in his late twenties approached the witness stand, repeated his oath and took a seat.

"Please state your name and rank for the record"

"My name is Victor Thomas medical examiner for the Vancouver, Naval Criminal Investigative Services, Also the leader of Project Spotlight an initiative launched to gather hard scientific evidence on the Reapers and Collectors."

"The defense may begin questioning the witness." Said admiral Monica

"Good morning Mr. Thomas could you give us a summary of your findings so far" asked Major Maya.

" Yes Counselor, After the events of the collector Attack on Horizon we were able to recover some of the Collector corpses we ascertained that like husks, the Collector strike teams were modified from their original state"

The medical technician then activated the monitor in the room and picture resembling a mechanical protein cell appeared.

"This is one of the nano scale robots we found it is able to tap into the body's Limbic system to siphon electrical power"

Victor tapped his omni tool once and the display changed to a metallic structure resembling a blood cell.

"This machine is responsible for the conversion process it rewrites the body's pituitary glands forcing it to grow and change in an unnatural manner. They are the same found in the modified humans called husks that Commander Shepard encountered Eden prime and by many of soldiers on patrol on uncharted worlds, that leads us to the fact that this technology was not created by the Geth as dating methods put the collector technology that have been found at over six thousand years old long before the creation of any Geth"

"Thank you Mr. Thomas, as I am to understand Dr. Amanda Kenson was also a part of Project Spotlight she led a classified field team that uncovered the Reaper device titled 'Object RHO' found on an asteroid in the Bahak system and passed some data from her project over secure channels. Batarian law enforcement however arrested her for purchasing suspicious items, Commander Shepard was tasked with rescuing Her, she explained that the object provided proof of an incoming invasion can you tell us about that project and why the proof was substantial ?"

" Yes counselor , Dr. Kenson's team at first used what's called spectral analysis to determine the chemical make up of the metals in the device it matched the metals that make up the star ship "Sovriegn" and was of similar construction to devices found across many uncharted worlds usually husk creatures are present in close proximity to these devices. Her team also discovered that device emitted a signal of infrasound and we have determined that this signal has the ability to affect and manipulate organic minds by a process called Indoctrination, Reports and helmet cam video footage from Commander Shepard confirm that Dr. Kenson was indeed affected by these sounds. However she was able to determine that the device was also emitting a repeating enegry pulse, she was able to differentiate a formula for the rate of change, based on the intervals between each pulse and found the exact time the reapers would arrive their plans were to use the Alpha Relay's enhanced travel distance to invade the Galaxy".

" I see, can you tell us about the project to destroy the Relay many thought such a feat impossible"

"Right, so all relays use what's called quantum shielding the ability to switch between intangibility and tangibility much like a Sci-fi character this is why relays can survive things like supernovas, the computers contained on star ships however send a signal to make the Relay tangible allowing them to pass through However built in safety devices prevent ships from colliding with a relay. Dr. Kenson used this as an exploit and constructed a Ship like interface in the asteroid allowing it to collide with the tangible mass relay"

"Thank you Mr Thomas no further questions" said Maya Lee-chan

"The Prosecution may now begin questioning" said Admiral Morales

"Good Morning Mr. Thomas, this is all interesting but where is the evidence of an invasion currently taking place, a Reaper fleet should have made easy work of all the small colonies after all a single ship held it's own against the citadel fleet they should have arrived at Kar'shan by now but we haven't seen the fleet."

"Indeed Ms. Halat but has there been communication from these colonies? The Hegemony reports that comm bouy's at these colonies are malfunctioning and the populace is not to worry, that at least warrants suspicion"

" WAIT WHAT IS HAPPENING" Said the Batarian Counselor her expression changing to one of terror and pointing at the Monitor showing the Leaders of the Hegemony who had been quietly listening to the proceeding until now. The entire court room audience was now in shock. A large squad of Husks and what looked like modified Batarians swarmed the Batarian Parliament grabbing some of the leaders and dragging them out of the room screaming then gunning down the rest the event was quick and brutal. Fleet Admiral Hackett quickly moved from the back of the room unplugging the live broadcast being made to the rest Galaxy before any of the event taking place on the monitor showing the Batarain Hegemony could be brought into the frame of the broadcast cameras. "What the hell man ! people need to know" said the camera operator.

"This will do nothing but cause panic and chaos, You and your production crew signed an open non disclosure agreement we reserve the right to censure any piece of this footage breathe a word of this and we will, see you in court" said Hackett in a calm voice. The camera operator shrank back into his chair and kept quiet.

The window in the Hegemony parliament was now in plain view on the monitor large metal legs that dwarfed the skyscrapers in the Horizon marched through the streets outside shooting red lasers at unseen targets. The courtroom now had scattered and panicked talking as many of the ranking personnel were veterans of the battle of the citadel they realized shape of leg it was exactly the same as Sovereign and they remember the challenge it was to bring it down.

"ORDER IN THE COURT" said Judge Morales rapping her small gavel on the podium

"Due to new developments we will have to call a recess to these proceedings Commander Shepard will be placed on indefinite house arrest until then"

As the Commander was led out of the courtroom, Admiral Anderson made his way out of the courtroom and to to the nearby intelligence office. Analysts were collating data from multiple sources and collating them into a useful intelligence the room where missions to deploy troops against slaver rings or religious and national extremists were decided.

The admiral drew up a chair beside a young analyst that had been astutely combing through intercepted communications between know terrorist cells and collating them into well organized information.

"Stop all other intelligence operations immediately, I want you all to comb all accessible communications and every byte of data you can get out of Kar'shan and surrounding Batarian colonies." said Admiral Anderson. The Batarian hegemony had encrypted their communications coming out of Kar'shan heavily, luckily the Alliance crypto analysts had broken it a few months before.

"We are not getting a live response from the comm bouys around Kar'shan but some data remains on nearby nodes." said one of the technicians.

The images were gruesome, the tightly controlled government social network on Kar'shan was filled with videos and images of Batarians being attacked in the streets by husks and other modified Batarians. "Oh my God, guys you got to see this" said the analyst putting the live feed on a large monitor . A thick silence enveloped the room, even though Humans and Batarians had been at odds for decades, a feeling of remorse hit the analysts gathering as they viewed photos and videos of the invasion.

"Sir this is off topic but the small colony world of Cyrene has been attacked and the population missing there are signs of battle at the prison and bomb fragments at the power station the attackers even destroyed the comm bouys in the system." said another analyst as he looked on at the incomming images and videos.

"Maybe a new slaver group they are quite organized from the looks of this and these developments with the Reapers are enough already, we will have to increase pirate and slaver suppression in the area" said admiral Anderson as he hoped the Alliance could prepare for the inevitable invasion.