"Okay from what we can tell from the scans, the station is mostly intact." Analyzed Miranda as she studied the hologram in the middle of the war room as everyone but joker and Mordin listened to her talk.
"Now it appears that after touching down on the planet it skidded and landing standing upright leaning against a large mountain at an angle of 15 degrees."
"What about hostiles?" Questioned Garrus.
"Everyone on the station was killed in the mech attack now if the mechs survived is still to be seen. The scans indicate that there is still power on the station but the reactor is heavily damaged and is most likely leaking radiation so we will have to go down in our suits, besides the fact its negative 100 degrees on the planets surface."
"Alright Miranda and Liara you're with me, everyone else dismissed." Ordered Kaidan.
The ride down the elevator with everyone in armor was always cramped and uncomfortable and Kaidan was thankful when the doors opened to the shuttle bay. The group climbed into the shuttle with Miranda as the pilot. The shuttle's engines roared to life as the shuttle doors opened and the shuttle flew through towards the planet.
As on any hostile planet the winds were always hurricane strength, which led to a very bumpy ride. The shuttle soon entered a large wound on the side of the downed station and then put down as the wine of the powering down engines replaced the sound of the wind outside.
"Okay everyone we don't know what's in there so keep your eyes up and your sights clear. Miranda your on lead since you know the station lets get in grab the disk and get out." Kaidan then hit the door release as everyone nodded.
As the doors opened the group were greeted with a long hall that obviously once had been on fire as soot covered every square inch.
"Must have been from re-entry I doubt we will find anything around here" Liara said from behind them.
They crept through the ruined station and turned the down the hall which was still lit, the floor was covered with glass from a statered observation window along with metal panels from the ceiling. Miranda ducted under some exposed wires "Careful the wires are still live."
"Great… Cerberus really builds things to last don't they?" Kaidan complained.
"This facility was built for an extremely important purpose Cerberus didn't want to take any chances with Shepard."
Kaidan pushed a open a damaged door only to reveal two mechs that instantly began firing at the group. Kaidans barriers were gone in a flash and he managed to take cover before they got a clear shot at him.
"Liara!" Kaidan screamed just as the Commander had done so many times before.
Liara knew exactly what that meant and put a singularity between the two mechs lifting them off their feet.
Kaidan threw a blast of biotic energy at the singularity causeing it to detonate destroying the mechs in a shock wave of pure energy.
"It looks like they were salvaging pieces of the station I wonder why…" Miranda said.
"I don't care why lets just get the disk, where are we?" Kaidan said as his barriers came back up.
Miranda looked through a shattered window, "Actually this is where we brought back Shepard, he was on that table."
Kaidan looked and tried to picture his lover on the table, the thought sent chills down his spine and made his hairs stand on end. Kaidan was shocked back to life as he felt a hand on his ankle, he looked down and there was a mech blown in half malfunctioning and twitching. It left a trail of leaking oils.
"K-K-K-Kill M-M-Me" stammered the mech. Kaidan didn't hesitate he brought his pistol to the front display and watched as the eyes on the mech closed in anticipation. Kaidan fired and a mix of oil and smoking computer hardware was left where the mechs head had been, the arm released and it died.
"What the hell was that?" Kadain said through wide eyes and clenched teeth.
"It would appear that these mech have become sentient much as EDI did, explains why they were salvaging spare parts they must be trying to get off world." Liara said as she looked at the smoldering remains.
The group leaped over the shattered window that led to where Shepard was brought back to life Miranda then entered a room. Soon after she returned with a large data disk.
"It is too large to be read with an omni-tool so we wont know if it is intact till we return to the Normandy." Miranda said.
Suddenly a computerized woman's voice came over the intercom WARNING MAIN REACTOR CORE SET TO GO CRITICAL IN TWO MINUTES ALL PERSONEL MUST EVACUATE IMMEADIATELY.
"Shit! Let go!" Kaidan said as he grabbed the data disk and started running back to the shuttle, He would be damned if he lost the Commander again. As they ran down the hall main components and gas pipes began to explode around them as they could feel more explosions through out the station.
WARNING MAIN REACTOR CORE SET TO GO CRITICAL IN ONE MINUTE ALL PERSONEL MUST EVACUATE IMMEADIATELY.
They turned a hall and saw the shuttle, a couple ceiling panels had fallen on it but other wise it was undamaged.
"Come on we need to get aboard now!" Kaiden yelled over a violent explosion near by as he hit the door release.
Kaidan shut the door after Liara had gotten in and he sat the data disk next to him, Miranda raced to the controls and the shuttle came to life, It turned and the crew felt a large kick as Miranda punched it and the shuttle rocked away. The explosion was enormous it swallowed the entire station and about two miles around it in a white sphere that erupted into flames and smoke. The shock wave shook the shuttle hard; Kaidan grabbed the data disk and held it to his chest protectively. "Where almost there Shepard." Kaidan whispered to himself.
"You guys make it out alright?" Joker said over the coms worriedly.
"We made it out, but just barely." Liara said knowing Kaidan was unable to answer.
The shuttle docked with the Normandy and Kaidan's shoulders began to unlock.
"What. Was. That?" Kaidan asked out of breath.
"It was a failsafe I had implanted into the system that if people other than Cerberus staff were present inside the rebuilding chamber that the station would self destruct." Miranda said with a frown as she came out of the cockpit knowing just how close they had been to dying.
"Jesus Miranda isn't that something you tell us in the mission brief or I don't know when we get on to the station?" Kaidan screamed as he ripped his helmet off his sweaty hair clung to his forehead.
"I had forgoten about it until the alarms started going off and at that point I was worried about making it out alive not telling you that I had made a mistake" Miranda said as she glared.
Kaidan's fists clenched, damn did he want to knock her lights out but instead he punched the door release hard and stormed out. He didn't care if she hated him and he sure as hell didn't care what she had to say. He headed up to the med bay and hoped silently as he held the data drive that it still stored his lover inside.
The doors in the med bay hissed open and instantly Kaidan saw that what used to be where EDI's hardware was. Was now replaced with a large clear glass tank that had a blue glow to it from the lighting, the tube was hooked up to a plethora of computers, wires, other smaller tanks filled with different colored liquids, and a monitoring
Mordin and Dr. Chakwas stood at the main console in front of the tank as Kaidan walked towards them.
"Good found disk! Now to see if it still works." Mordin said as he took the disk from kaidan with a few light tugs.
Mordin put the disk into the drive slot "Ah requires password no matter will hack past the security." They all turned when they heard the familiar sound of Miranda's heels on the steel floor
"You don't want to do that." Miranda said cockily as Liara came in behind her.
"What do you mean?" Kaidan said with a scowl.
"A personal security measure on my part, if you try to hack the disk it will erase itself." She said as she pushed past Mordin and began typing on the keyboard.
"There, its everything, his personality, his upbringing, and his memories."
"That's it?" Kaidan said looking at the screen, which had cascading codes falling down it.
"It had to be encoded and shrunk otherwise it would take 100 of these disks to fit it all." Miranda said stepping away from the console.
"Disk and memories intact, DNA ready. It is time to make the choice." Mordin said as he looked at Kaidan, the holo-keyboard changed to two buttons one said Go and the other Return.
Liara came up from behind Kaidan and put her hand on his shoulder, Kaidan looked at her with uncertain and watery eyes, Liara nodded her head and smiled sweetly. The entire room was quite and it seemed as if everyone was holding their breath.
Kaidan reached out with a shakey hand and pressed the Go button. The machines started to whirl to life and started injecting the main tube with the different fluids that slowly began to coalesce in the center as the monitoring V.I came on "Commander John Shepard Cloning cycle beginning."
Kaidan grabed Liara's hand and held it as everyone stared in awe at the spectacle beginning in front of them.
