A/N:
Obviously my writing speed has slowed. This is due to some rather severe lower back pain. I'm going to be going the doctor Tuesday, possibly just for MRI but possibly for minor surgery - I'll know more Monday.
This is a Shepard Chapter. There's at least a few more chapters in Arc I before the things really start moving. I've been bad about responding to reviews and PM's (due to the pain - there are times I can only write for fifteen minutes before needing to lay back down) and I apologize for that.
Reviews are always welcome.
'Whoever it is can use singularities and the blade - possibly a renegade priestess of Athame? Need more information'
- Agent Decann, STG Forward Observer on Korlus at one the first sightings of the Butcher
Shepard found her personal quarters very comfortable, but more than a little bit disturbing in some ways.
The amount of personal attention to detail was creepy at times. She had a desk, with the flat-top console setup just the way she'd had it on the Kazan, the same bookmarked extranet sites, and even haptic image frames of the same pictures she had on her desk. She had an entire closet full of clothing, most of it loose, long-sleeved, and in black and gray – much like the clothing she'd bought herself on Intei'sai – all of it styled in a fashion that allowed her to carry a concealed weapon.
She determined that the omni-foundry unit in her rooms here must have been looted somehow from the Kazan, because a few custom designs not in her notebook were already loaded into it. She had a nice coffee-maker, the same model as the one Anderson had, in the small dining area, along with the few kinds of food she liked to eat.
Someone had loaded her music up from the player she'd bought on Intei'sai to the music system in her rooms, as well as her favorite shows and movies.
It all drove home to her how much of a project she was to Cerberus. On the one hand, she could understand why they did it – anything to make her comfortable might help her not freak out. On the other hand, it still spoke volumes about how much they clearly knew about her.
She didn't think she was impossible to manipulate – only that most people made lots of stupid assumptions about how she thought, felt, and acted. Clearly, the Illusive Man wasn't going to make that mistake. If they had painstakingly researched her likes and dislikes, they probably also knew why she'd acted how she had – and the best ways to spin things.
It was a disturbing thought she tried to banish by learning what had gone on while she was dead.
She sat in a comfortable chair in front of her desk, reviewing news feeds from the past two years, smoking cigarettes and sipping on Vindrasian scotch. As she suspected from the bits of news the Illusive Man and Trellani had already told her, the galaxy had been gulping down idiotball tea by the gallon since she died.
The main points – that the expansion of the Council had pretty much rearranged the power-blocs a bit but that the asari and salarians were still the top dogs – failed to surprise her much. Nor did the idea that the turian Hierarchy was in an economic crunch due to the volus pretty much pulling all the way out of the Hierarchy. The salarians had been rocked with scandal after one of their big-shot scientists had been caught experimenting on asari and ended up being executed, and that had made asari and salarian interactions a lot more frosty.
The geth war had become a clusterfuck of monumental proportions, while the quarians had finally settled down on a couple of worlds, but now were undergoing lots of issues with those who still wanted to take back Rannoch clashing with those who wanted to just settle down. Most people felt they were being played hard by the salarians in economic terms, but they didn't have a lot of options.
What she didn't see were preparations for the Reapers. She'd known they'd keep it quiet, and Chambers and Harper had both mentioned the Broker had been downplaying the threat – but she'd expected something – conspiracy theorists, disaffected politicos, something. Instead she found barely a handful of terms, most related to outrageous claims put forth by a turian who'd died a day after making them.
She wondered if the Broker had a hand in that, too.
The Alliance, at least, was being somewhat smart. They'd pulled back from trying to found new official colonies, spending more money on colony defenses, weapons, and building out more ships of all classes. But they'd also spent more and more money on building up industrial capacity outside of the Sol system – and, she saw with amusement, turning Neo Berlin into a damned fortress, going so far as to base the new Sixth Fleet out of the system.
Unfortunately, the current political parties in power were not exactly the best choices. Terra Firma had grown immensely since Saracino shot himself and the party had been taken over by Amul Shastri, one of the big-shot CEO's of Westerlund News. Shastri had re-tooled the Terra Firma image, casting them in a more benign light – not so much anti-alien as anti-Citadel. He'd cleverly introduced some of the more radical, bitter asari of Watson to the party – those who'd been hounded or oppressed by the Thirty – and constantly called for the Alliance to look after 'Alliance interests first'.
Shastri didn't run things himself – he had a Prime Minister named Adaren Addison, a disgustingly handsome type who pushed all the right buttons for the voting electorate. Addison pretty much hated all the aliens except possibly the quarians, and yet was so eloquent and charismatic that he'd managed to somehow avoid negative commentary about himself.
Huerta was still president, although his chances of re-election looked rocky indeed. The party that backed him, Alliance Blue, was splintering over debates on whether the Navy should be expanded to found new colonies, or if the Alliance should fortify it's own holdings. Many were bitter the Alliance didn't act to take a slice of batarian territory in the fall of the Hegemony.
"Huh. Have to read up on that."
The New Democratic Party had been rocked by scandals, and Shepard was sad to see that President Windsor had basically fallen to pieces. It looked like some of his relatives may have been tied up with bits of the disgusting crap she'd learned about from Kyle, and in the investigation all sorts of things came out. Windsor had multiple affairs – with both men and women, it seemed – and Eliza may or may not have been his only illegitimate child. The family had been disgraced by his actions, while the news implied he may have used his position to steer lucrative military contracts to allies of his House.
He'd resigned not long after Eliza had died, a broken man by all descriptions, and ended up in a sort of exile from the family on Dirth, of all places.
The rest of the news about the Alliance was less good. The economy was struggling in some areas, and there was a lot of unrest in the Class I colonies over lack of defenses. Sirta had collapsed in the wake of yet more allegations of connections to terrorists, this time the mysterious Hades Group.
Hades had come out of nowhere about four months after her death, picking up the most extreme aspects of Cerberus and mixing it with Terra Firma alien-racism and a fine patina of pro-corporate panderings. The group had blown up alien trade ships, assassinated several human government officials who were pro-alien, and defaced the Unity Monument, where the asari had built a statue on Earth claiming the humans as their cousins. On the wildcat colonies, and even some Class I colonies, they were wildly popular, as they had won the loyalties of many Corsair captains and were a scourge to the pirates in a few areas.
In the mix, though, the ugly reality was that even Hades couldn't stop piracy. Reports about missing colonies had been written off as attacks from the hordes of pirates created by the collapse of most of the Batarian Hegemony, mainly due to several well documented and savage attacks by pirates on colonies.
Shepard read about the fall of the Hegemony with a mix of glee and disgust. The Emperor had executed all of the Hegemon class, and basically carved back his own domain to less than twenty worlds. His ambassador-priests had claimed the rest of the Hegemony was on it's own, and immediately powerful high-caste admirals and lords ended up in civil war.
In the aftermath, about two-thirds of the old Hegemony – the parts closest to the Hierarchy – had ended up annexed by the turians, with the batarians as a client race. The other third had ended up joining up with Aria, much to the chagrin of the Council, when the Alliance declined to take over the region. As a result, piracy was up, and Aria's empire had grown stronger in some ways – although it was still wracked with chaos from the events on Omega itself.
The rest of the galaxy – a mess. But technology was moving on in surprising ways.
The Salarian Union had been experimenting with new computer technologies, and along with human companies, come up with new lines of mechs, some of which Shepard had seen in her own base. The LOKI was a replacement for the AESIR, with heavier armor, better sensors, and capable of downloading skill packages to improve its utility.
The military version of the LOKI, the RAMPART, boasted even heavier armor and shield generators, omni-armor, and various weapon packages from close-in assault to sniping. The Alliance had deployed hundreds of thousands of such mechs, supposedly overseen by a series of VI's and human operators known as the Enhanced Defense Initiative. When Shepard read that it had been something developed at Pinnacle Station by Admiral Ahern, she wondered if that was the adaptive VI system she'd faced in her mirror match.
The old JOTUN mech had been split. The new heavy mech, the MJOLNIR, was heavier, better armed, armored and faster. But the Alliance and Salarians had also combined technology to create what they called a 'siege mech' – the FENRIR. Details were still sketchy, but these mechs were the best attempt the Alliance had at matching the large geth Colossi platforms.
The Salarians had also expanded their fleet, mostly in unique ways, investing in a new sort of hybrid magnetic-kinetic shielding designed to deflect 'heavier munitions'. Notes from her analysts had marked this story for review, suggesting the shielding would be better suited to deflect the sort of firepower Nazara had used. Cerberus agents were attempting to obtain this technology.
Shepard didn't bother reading up on the turians, asari or elcor much – it was mostly boring stuff – instead focusing on the volus, who'd apparently lost their minds at some point. The latest stunt of the VDF had been to establish six colonies of vorcha inside volus space, expending a great deal of time and effort to breed up what could only be called assault troops.
Vorcha could handle g-forces even better than humans, and the volus had traded missile technology and vast sums of money to the Alliance for carrier plans and fighter technologies. Vorcha-volus fighters used packs of mini-missiles and lots of speed to overwhelm targets, and were deployed from hybrid carrier-cargo ships that escorted non-military volus trade ships.
A lot of people hadn't expected the thing to work out, but it had, surprisingly enough. While there was a lot of criticism on how the vorcha were raised and conditioned, there was an underlying current, among some commentators, of seemed like admiration.
Shepard snorted. That figured – the volus only got respect when they started acting as fucked up as everyone else in space.
Some new technology had come out. Many personnel weapons were now equipped with disposable heat-sinks, in conjunction with improved friction-less rails and better heat-sinks in the weapons themselves. This allowed a weapon to fire far longer before the disposable heat-sink overloaded and ejected, and it could either be replaced with another heat-sink or rely on the weapon's own cooling. The increase in heat dispersion allowed for larger, more powerful weapons and heavier plasma or ion blasts, but had also kick-started new standards in armor and shielding technology.
Most armor now included self-sealing omnigel layers and at least a few segments of omni-field generated armor, to break up and buffer incoming impacts. The quarians had introduced simple and efficient eezo-driven powered supports for armor, allowing much heavier suits to be worn, and the elcor had pioneered overlapping shielding generators that could fit into such suits of armor, meaning that the high-end armor suits were even better at stopping low-end weapons.
She'd have to re-tool her ODIN – that much was clear. Her old weapons wouldn't make a dent in some of these new heavy armors.
The main new technology was the so-called Thanix MHG – Shepard instantly recognized it as the same kind of weapon Nazara used. It fired small streams or bursts of super-heated omnislurry, magnetically charged to overload ship systems, and even the small-scale systems the turians had prototyped so far were far beyond even a dreadnought main gun in sheer damage.
Shepard was so engrossed in thinking of the possibilities of such technology when applied to personal weapons – which no one, amazingly, had thought of – that she missed the first chime of her door. The second one got her attention, and she rose from the chair with a frown.
"Come in."
The door slid open, revealing Miranda Lawson. "I wanted to see if you were doing alright, Shepard – and if you need to talk."
Shepard stared at her a long moment before gesturing to the leather sectional couch next to the desk. "Have a seat. Talking...I don't know. Never been a big point of mine. Nine times out of ten, talking about things doesn't change anything."
Miranda sat, nodding slowly. "Perhaps. It does help some people, however. And since we are going to be working together for the foreseeable future, it would help if I could learn how you were doing, handling events – without wondering if you were depressed or just fine. In your past you were rarely demonstrative of your mental state except when pressed. If you don't mind the company."
She trailed off, a bit uncertainly, and Shepard nodded. "I'm not gonna tell you to get the hell out, Lawson. I may not … like … the fact that I'm alive again – but Chambers was right, sort of. I'd be a pretty ungrateful bitch if I took out the things I'm having to face now onto you."
Miranda nodded, and she glanced around the room. "That's fair. I'll start with the basics – I am guessing you have everything you need for your personal comfort? Is there anything else you can think of you'd need right now?"
Shepard sat back at her desk, leaning back, and picked up her cigarette. "No, I'm good. More than good, actually. Then again, I'm not much for luxury. I need grub, coffee, cigs, and a drink every-now and then, and I can keep going."
Miranda made a face. "I doubt that will suffice in the long term, if you don't mind me saying so. We are not exactly certain how some aspects of your new form will perform or react under the stress of combat, and it is likely you will experience a wide array of side effects – including pain. The things like a omnigel foam mattress and the hydro-spa probably seem like useless luxury, but you may need them later on down the line."
Shepard puffed on the cigarette. "Well, from what Trellani was saying, it's pretty likely I won't live very long anyway. Cancer, or organ failure, or cascading...whatever she called it."
Miranda scowled. "Cascading immune system misidentification. A common symptom of heavy cybernetic conversion. We can treat or alleviate most of those things, Shepard. While I have no way of determining how long you will live like this, you aren't going to suddenly die in the next five or six years."
Shepard pinched the bridge of her nose. "Then what kind of side-effects are you talking about?"
Miranda leaned back. "Nerve discomfort. Fevers or chills. Mental fatigue. Bone pain. Possible disorientation, nausea. Internal bleeding. Headaches. Your muscles, for the most part, are now artificial, so they won't get tired, but the portions of you that are not cybernetic will accrue fatigue at a much faster rate. You have less tolerance for the sort of bodily toxins produced by just living, and we have to monitor such things very carefully."
Shepard winced, and Miranda sighed. "To be blunt, none of your systems have been … well, tested. In the field. Some of the things we introduced are beyond experimental – we literally have no idea what will happen when you use them the first time. And we didn't want to take the chance of trying to do testing when you were unconscious, as lack of feedback from you on what you felt might have lead us to assume things. At the very least, some of the more extreme things you can do in a physical sense will cause you a great deal of pain."
Shepard blew out smoke, shrugging. "Old DI in the Penal Legions said there was a price for everything. I didn't expect to cheat death and get away without any sort of penalty. If the drawbacks aren't bad enough to stop me from fighting, then I can deal. Pain hasn't stopped me before."
Miranda nodded. "Still. While I'm not doubting your ability to endure, we want you to be as comfortable as possible when you have the opportunity to do so. Hence the 'luxury', as you put it."
Shepard snorted. "Yeah. I'm not much for luxury...but I don't mind it, either. I'm not some weirdo who demands to live in a leaky shack, eschewing technology. From the clothing and the music, and the layout of the place, you guys did a good job figuring out my likes and dislikes, didn't you?"
Miranda nodded again, more slowly this time. "We made the best attempt we could. To suggest that anyone can understand what you've gone through is arrogance, Shepard. But in the process of restoring your memories, we were able to see some pieces of your older memories – what you suffered in your youth. That was enough to horrify even a hardened .. person... like Matriarch Trellani. The least we could do is try to fit your personal desires as best as possible."
Shepard shrugged. "One thing I've slowly come to terms with is that Rachel was right. There's no such thing as closure." She exhaled. "A lot of what I've done over the years was stupid. A lot of it was me not bothering to try to get over things – some of that was because I didn't know how, and some of it was because I was being a hateful, resentful little bitch."
She smiled, puffing on the cigarette in her hand. "But most of what I've gone through in the past … year or so – "she broke off. "Ah, the last year of my life would be a better way to say it, I guess … has allowed me to realize that the shit I went through isn't a justification for anything. I'm not going to say that living through it didn't suck. But having people tiptoe around my past or feel sorry for me won't do a goddamned thing to make me feel better, so I don't see the point."
Miranda nodded. "I see. I didn't mean to pry."
Shepard waved a hand. "It's not prying, Lawson. It's just that I've heard those words a lot, and they never seem to mean much. Everyone says I'm not crazy but they looked at me like I was. Everyone says they understand it must have been hard growing up, then turn around and say they don't understand what it could have been like. At the end of the day? If I spent all my time going on about how much my early life sucked, I'd be right back where I was before I met Liara."
A flicker of pain crossed her features, and Shepard took a breath. "And I won't do that." She looked down at her feet for several seconds, and Miranda sighed.
"I … well. I won't make the mistake you've alluded to and claim I understand, Shepard – but I can easily grasp why talking about it isn't something you want to keep going over. We all have bad memories we'd rather just put behind us."
Shepard nodded, then bit her lip. "Speaking of bad memories...the Alliance doctors told me my brains had been given such a good stir by the Beacon I'd need Liara in my life to stop the damage from driving me crazy. How do you guys plan to get around that when my nightmares start up again? Trellani said it was 'dealt with', but I got no details."
Miranda folded her arms. "I'm afraid I don't know the details. Matriarch Trellani engaged in some form of asari mental alteration … or perhaps therapy. The asari had a method to deal with those who had been injured by Dark Beacons, but the skill and knowledge was limited to those within the Temple of Athame. From what she told us, you will not have any issues with the Beacon and its images in the near future. Perhaps in ten or fifteen years you may – she was not forthcoming with details."
Shepard rubbed her eyes, then took a drink. "Shit. I get a lot of that." She put the drink down, and leaned back. "So why are you really here, Lawson? I figured the shrink would be down to pick my brains and all that. You don't strike me as the kind of person who chit-chats for the sake of chit-chat."
Lawson smiled. "She admitted to some concern about you getting drunk and tearing up your quarters, which I don't think is something you would do. But I just wanted to talk. I know this transition is not something you can simply come to grips with quickly."
Shepard shrugged. "You mean being dead?"
Miranda nodded. "Not to put too fine a point on it, but yes. I spent the past two years working to bring you back to life. Not to go on about my own achievements, or that of the team – but it was a remarkable undertaking. But on further reflection, there was too little time expended on determining how this act would affect you – mentally, emotionally. Psychologically."
Miranda's face twisted. "I suppose the addition of Chambers, in that regard, was a good idea – but I still would like to hear what you feel."
She picked up her drink again, sipping the scotch, and smiled. "The funny thing is that it doesn't bother me as much as it should. Maybe it hasn't hit me yet. Maybe the past year of my life before I died was so much different than everything before it that I'm adjusting better."
She paused. "You ask me what I feel? I feel alone, Lawson. That sounds … cheap, and what Admiral Ahern would call 'emo shitfaced crying', but that's what I feel. The fact that I died doesn't make me feel anything at all compared to the missing spot in my head where Liara should be."
Shepard exhaled sharply. "But focusing on that … just makes me want to drink more. You were asking about how I dealt with knowing I was dead."
She shrugged. "When I woke up, it was like every other time I'd caught too much fire in a mission and gone down. I didn't have any visions of heaven or hell, or any awareness that any time had passed." She frowned. "I guess when I think about it now? I know it happened. I know two years have passed. But it's going to be a while until what that means fits into my head in a way where I can express it."
Miranda nodded. "You are at least not, as Chambers put it, 'freaking out'."
Shepard gave a thin smile. "I never found that freaking out improved a situation. Life gives you what you have to work with. I can fucking cry about it, or I can be a big girl and move the fuck on. Given the amount of my life I wasted on bitching about my circumstances..."
She trailed off. "...besides. I've been thinking about what I am now." Shepard tapped her console, bringing up a word definition site on the extranet. "I looked up what 'revenant' meant. Lots of negative meanings. Something brought back from the dead to gain revenge on those who wronged them."
Her gaze met Lawson's, cold and flat. "I can get behind that kind of thinking. Although the name's a little obscure."
Miranda frowned and glanced at the screen. "I believe the Illusive Man derived the name after watching High Plains Drifter. I disagreed with the name myself – I would have preferred Lazarus."
Shepard laughed quietly. "I can't really see TIM watching old westerns, but I can't see him big into the Bible either." She glanced at her cigarette and saw it had gone out, so lit another. "He's not quite what I expected."
Miranda smiled. "He once said his greatest delight is people thinking they know or understand him getting so much about him wrong."
Shepard glanced at her drink, before shrugging and taking another sip. "Maybe. I think he likes the whole 'man in the shadows' bullshit a bit too much for my taste. But as long as he doesn't think he can play me, I can go along with this … " She waved a hand around her "... for now."
She glanced at Lawson. "Anyway. Not really interested in him. Since you say you're here to talk...tell me about you." She puffed on her cigarette again, gazing at the woman across from her through the smoke.
Miranda looked a bit surprised. "Me?"
Shepard nodded. "Harper says you're going to be my XO. The last XO I had was just about perfect in everything he did professionally, but his personal life seemed like a mess. Since you know everything about me and I know almost nothing about you, it seems a fair way to start."
Miranda nodded slowly. "Alright. You are familiar with NOVENSILES, from what I have been told?"
Shepard's expression darkened. "Yeah. I am."
Miranda exhaled. "Then you may or may not like what I have to tell you about myself. I was … created, for lack of a better word. Crafted, by my 'father', Henry Lawson, to serve as a prototype baseline for the NOVENSILES project. They needed a template from which to base the genetic modifications off of, one that came as close to human perfection as possible."
Miranda gave a self-deprecating smile at Shepard's expression and continued. "So I was genetically modified even in utero. Adjustments were made by a team of specialists. I'll live longer than a normal human. I need less sleep, less food. I'm stronger and faster. My memory was augmented by certain drell protein chains and mimicking drell DNA patterns, and so I have photographic memory and a very high learning capability. My biotics were also engineered, making me stronger than most human biotics."
She grimaced. "In order to give me biotics, they had to deliberately expose a woman to eezo...they implanted my modified embryo into her, dosed her with enough eezo to ensure I would be biotic, let me develop...then removed me pre-birth to continue their modifications."
Shepard shook her head in disgust. Miranda continued speaking as she shrugged. "My physical attributes were also … handcrafted. Henry Lawson wanted me to resemble his own dead wife, I believe. After I was born, every minute of my day was planned and controlled. I was raised more by tutors and scientists than in any sort of family environment, and shown off to certain high Alliance officials and members of the High Lords of Sol as an example."
Her voice became bitter. "However, he wasn't pleased with the final result. The genetic modifications they'd performed did not mesh well with the initial planned 'upgrades'. And the process they used in creating me meant I was effectively sterile."
Shepard winced, and Miranda continued, her tone still mostly even. "As such, I was deemed a worthless expenditure of money. A 'sister' was created, Oriana, with various improvements I lacked, while I was mostly used as an experimental test subject. She was more acceptable than I was – more submissive, less independent."
She pushed back her hair. "Eventually when I was nine years old, Jack Harper expressed an interest in my abilities, and I was … sold to him by my 'father'. Since then, Mr. Harper has trained me, encouraged me to find my own path and pursue my own goals and dreams, and had me lead and coordinate his most critical projects."
Shepard nodded slowly. "How old are you, Miranda?"
The woman looked slightly defensive before speaking. "I'm twenty three."
Shepard shook her head, puffing on her cigarette. "Jesus. So...this NOVENSILES crap. It made you, literally. We'll get back to you in a minute – I want to know what's your take on this bullshit?"
Miranda's eyes narrowed. "It is essentially monstrous. I understand, in a purely logical manner, why certain parties feel a need to 'improve' humanity. The salarians are smarter and faster. Turians are stronger and tougher. Asari have longer lives, much stronger biotics, and more robust immune systems. Batarians lack organs that allow for instant kills, krogan regenerate, drell have perfect memories..."
She sighed. "The idea that humanity is 'weaker' than these aliens has bothered some ever since the First Contact War. Appropriating such … advantages would make humanity more prepared to defend itself if things went badly. In the days in which NOVENSILES was first proposed, that may have been a real concern."
Miranda pushed her hair back. "But what it has become – the thought monitoring, the complete destruction of anything approaching human baselines in the pursuit of power, the disgusting grayboxes – is merely a power grab, in my opinion. And a stupid one – the other races will see this sort of egregious gene-modding as a threat and act against us as they did with the rachni. And if details were to leak to the public, even the Commissariat couldn't suppress the rioting. The Lords of Sol would lose their privilege and be destroyed. I find it hard to believe no one sees this is what would happen."
Shepard smiled thinly."I've found people in offices far from the front line rarely if ever bother to think about long-term consequences."
Miranda gave a small smile. "Perhaps. As how I view NOVENSILES in regards to my own existence...it is complicated. It made me what I am – and yet it denied me any chance to be a mother, or to take pride in any of my achievements."
She stood, stretching her legs as she paced slowly. "In the process of bringing you back to life, I researched your life, Shepard. You always pushed yourself to learn everything you could, that you found useful. You cross-trained into fields that almost all other biotics and Vanguards ignored, even when that resulted in you having to study on your own time."
Miranda gestured towards Shepard. "You achieved the highest possible score in your N7 qualifications, studied an obscure form of the biotic charge with the asari and mastered it, and went on to be awarded some of the highest honors a human can receive."
Shepard snorted. "Yeah, and look where that got me."
Miranda shrugged, turning around to face Shepard. "Yes, but that isn't the point. You started with nothing. You had nothing. Everything you achieved was with your own hard work – you had no natural advantages."
Miranda smiled sardonically. "For me, things were … never the same. How hard is it to learn everything you put your mind to when you have photographic memories and were manufactured to have higher intelligence? When you had no choices in whether or not to study hard or push yourself, but were forced into it? When you have no options in life but to study and master whatever is thrown at you – or worry that, once again, you'll be seen as flawed, insufficient, and thrown away?"
Shepard folded her arms. "That's how you see yourself? Flawed?"
Miranda sighed. "The Illusive Man has been a part of my life for a long time, and he's shown me a great deal of care and concern. And while I have no love for my 'father', I will not deny he put a great deal of money, time and energy in to ensuring I had every advantage in my early life."
She exhaled. "But at the same time, in the end I have always been judged on what I have the capability to do, not what I actually have done. It is very hard to take pride in my achievements compared to yours, because I do not feel I earned most of them – and because ultimately, I wasn't good enough. Not for my father, and in some ways, not enough for Mr. Harper."
Her voice was bitter, and Shepard raised both eyebrows. "Not quite sure what to say to that. On the one hand, Lawson – who gives a shit? The only person you should be trying to prove anything to is yourself. The only difference between your dad and mine is in details – we both got sold off. Worrying about that won't get you anywhere. I did it for a long time...and I could have done other shit, things to make me happier. It was only when I finally let go of it that I realized it doesn't matter."
Lawson gave her a look, and Shepard sighed. "I guess the closest thing I had to a father figure was David Anderson. The closest thing I had to a mother was Rachel Florez. I wanted to impress them both. I wanted to prove they were right for believing in me. But the thing I remember about both of them is that they never sat down and told me 'you must do this or that or we will be through with you'. I excelled at what I studied because I wanted to be the best – and yeah, I thought at the time if I was the best people would care."
Miranda nodded, and Shepard shook her head. "But that was me missing the whole fucking point. In the long run, Rachel turned out to be a piece of shit. In the long run, I found out that being the best at everything I tried didn't make me any fucking happier at all. It just made me a better tool for the Alliance to use. You gotta find your own reasons to value yourself, or you'll never be happy with anything."
Shepard sat back, puffing on her cigarette. "As for the shit about coming from everything and me coming from nothing..." She shrugged. "That's true of a lot of people. President Windsor once basically told me the same thing when I said I wasn't comfy with being on the same social level as he was. I don't judge people by where they came from – only by what they can do. Liara came from the highest levels of asari society and it didn't do her a damned bit of good. She had a miserable childhood – less physical abuse than mine, but what can be more fucked up to a kid than being made to feel like she's trash by her own family?"
Shepard puffed on her cigarette again before putting it out. "The fact that some slimy fucker bred you up in a lab to be 'perfect' doesn't matter much to me. You are making your own choices now. If that means you can perform higher than most humans can, then I'll expect more out of you than the rest of whoever I bring into this mess."
Shepard met Miranda's eyes. "But at the end of the day, who you make yourself into – and what you want outta life – is always gonna be more important than where the fuck you come from. If that wasn't true I'd still be slinging red sand with the Reds. No one gives a shit about how hard you had it, or I had it – they just want results."
Miranda tilted her head. "An interesting viewpoint. The Illusive Man said I should value my talents and special abilities and use them to the fullest. That a part of my … unique value was the very things that make me question how much recognition I deserve for what I have accomplished."
Shepard leaned back. "Well, what have you accomplished?"
Miranda blinked. "Aside from pulling together and leading the Revenant Cell and your resurrection? I was in charge of the fire-team that recovered your body from Omega. Prior to that, I organized the recovery of various Cerberus assets in the aftermath of the destruction of Cerberus HQ and worked with Jacob Taylor to derail a terrorist threat."
The dark-haired Cerberus operative folded her arms. "Up until that point, I mostly worked with various cells as a floating resource, aiding in gathering information, coordinating operations, and on occasion engaging in infiltration and surveillance through … alternative methods."
Shepard arched an eyebrow. "So, strong on organizational stuff, information gathering, all that kinda thing? Like an AIS agent?"
Miranda gave that concept a few seconds of thought before nodding. "That is a good way to characterize it, I suppose. While I don't have the level of combat experience that as AIS agent does, of course, I can hold my own in combat – pistols, submachine guns, and assault rifles, plus info-war and biotics. I heal faster and tire more slowly than baseline humans, and my reflexes are augmented."
Shepard looked at the package of cigarettes, but decided not to chain smoke a third. "Sounds to me like you could be nasty in a fight. But that's not all an XO has to do. The hardest part of leadership for me was letting other people do the job. Some of it was, for a long time, that I was … not trained right. No one taught me how to lead the right way."
Shepard stretched. "But a lot of it was that I knew I was better and more likely to get the job done than anyone else. I didn't like my people getting hurt."
Lawson nodded. "Hence why you so often lead from the front." She tilted her head. "I do not know how much use as an executive officer I will be. A good deal of my time, I expect, would be spent on correlating intelligence information from the base when we are out on patrol or on assignment, and assisting Doctor Sedanya with the cybernetic aspects of your needs. I always thought an XO would have most of their day expended on maintenance of the crew."
Shepard waggled a hand. "I've been a line XO for a division, and – very briefly, mind you – for a ship. One thing stays the same, you try to filter bullshit from reaching the CO. Pressly was...great at that. He was always thinking two steps of ahead – of what you'd need, of what you forgot about. I was more details oriented in just making sure shit didn't blow up. There's no 'guide' how to be a good XO, anymore than there's a valid guide on how to 'lead'."
Shepard picked up the Vindrasian and poured more into her glass. "But someone as details oriented as you should do fine. You don't drink?"
Miranda gave a faint smile. "Not often. One drawback of my metabolism is that it tends to affect me more strongly – and quickly – than others. You, on the other hand, have a large number of filters and other systems that will stop you from becoming drunk … quickly, at least."
Shepard snorted. "The advantages of a fake liver?"
Miranda shrugged. "It's cloned. But it has cybernetic supports, for filtering purposes and to maintain stability. You still should not drink anything outre...such as krogan ryncol."
Shepard nodded, sipping the scotch slowly. "What do I have to do tomorrow?"
Miranda clicked her omni-tool, bringing up a small scrolling screen. "Fitting and testing of the bio-amp, installation of the bio-amp software links to both your omni-tool and your onboard cybernetics. Then tuning the cybernetic devices to the proper resonance, and checking to make sure everything works."
Miranda smiled. "After that, some armor fitting and options on how you want that set up. We'll probably need to work on your weapons as well – Jacob retrofitted your Sunfire pistol with modern thermal technology and a higher-powered MA rail, but you may want to make modifications yourself. And you will want to determine your own weapons loadouts. We also need to demonstrate some of the features of your new form and … well, as I mentioned, testing."
Shepard nodded. "And after that?"
Miranda folded her arms. "Reviewing ship and base personnel for your selection, and waiting for a signal from one of the wildcat colonies suggesting it is trouble. To be honest, Shepard, what happens is entirely up to you – you have the dossiers on possible useful recruits, the ship is ready to go at a moment's notice once we get it fully staffed, and if you chose to do something unrecommended, such as make contact with the Alliance or Council, I would provide you with various options to ensure that didn't end badly."
Shepard inhaled sharply, before taking another drink. "I'll think about it." She smiled. "I don't mind you coming around to talk, but tell Chambers if she pulls any psych shit on me she'd better be a bit more civil with it in the future."
Miranda smiled wider. "I'll be more than happy to convey that to her."
O-TWCD-O
Making her biotics work again – properly – was a trial that took up most of the next day.
Shepard had to endure an hour of 'electronervous adjustments' – which sounded like a fancy way of being electrocuted – to tune her cybernetics to the same voltages as her own remaining nervous system. Most of her spine was still intact, if supported by cyberware, and nerves had been threaded through her body, ending in nerve interface caps for most of her cyberware and a thin network of pressure and temperature receptors for the skin.
She could still feel pain – especially on the areas of her body not converted entirely to cyberware – but one of the first tricks Miranda demonstrated to her was something called a pain editor, which could selectively shut down parts of her nervous system that reported pain in the first place.
"It's not entirely safe to use, Shepard – after all, pain is the body's method for warning you something is wrong that needs attention – but if pain becomes a distraction you can certainly cut it off."
Channeling biotics through cyberware felt strange and disconnected, which she supposed made sense. At the same time, her biotics – once they got everything working right – had a lot more snap and speed to them, and the tingling burn she often felt after even a few warps was gone entirely.
From there, they moved onto testing her biotics, in a specially constructed facility in the medical wing.
Her power was also a lot more than she remembered. The best warp she'd ever thrown before her death in biotic testing had burned through two inches of steel in thirty-five seconds, and that was with total concentration on a tightly focused area. It had given her shakes and a headache for two hours and pain down all the nerves in her arm for a day.
She literally turned a three inch segment of hardened battle steel to slag in half that time and didn't even feel the effort when it came time for her to test her power, under the watchful eyes of Miranda and Sedanya. Her lift and throw capacity were not much stronger than before, but her pull was. Her barrier was much stronger, and her kanquess was even faster, and the nova it generated buckled the reinforced walls of the testing area in medical when she flared it.
When she was done testing, Trellani had shown up, dressed in a black dress with orange highlights, and spent several hours patiently teaching her a few more biotic skills she'd never known. According to Trellani, most of them were limited to the Temple of Athame, and rarely taught even to non-temple Asari, much less aliens.
The nastiest of them was the blade of force she'd seen Liara and Benezia use so handily and could never master. Her own blade was thinner and weaker, but it could still gash a heavy steel plate down to a depth of three inches.
Shepard had asked about that technique, as she'd seen Balak pull it off as well. Trellani's response was that the batarians had captured several lower-ranking priestesses in the past and probably tortured the details out of them, although based on what Shepard remembered of his use of it, he wasn't much better than Shepard herself. Trellani demonstrated the ability to slice through a foot-thick chunk of metal with the blades of force, although it appeared to fatigue her slightly.
Trellani also taught her more about the singularity, and although Shepard's remained weak and unstable, both Miranda and Sedanya were highly impressed. "Very few non-asari can generate even a weak singularity effect and hold it for any amount of time, Shepard."
She shrugged. "Well, I certainly couldn't before you crammed me full of extras, so I don't see it as a big accomplishment on my part. This will come in handy for flushing people out of cover."
Trellani's teaching method was strange and somewhat uncomfortable, as she could somehow use a shallow link to 'push' memories – shorn of any personal viewpoints – into Shepard's head to demonstrate a technique. There was never even a hint of the matriarch's emotions or memories in such connections, and Shepard had asked, when she was resting, how much skill that took.
Trellani's features twisted into an amused smile. "It took me two hundred years of meditation and practice as an under-priestess to master the ways of the Shallow Waters. Most of the Clans rarely rose high in the Temple, and in those days my goal was to be the first not of the Thirty" – she paused, clenching her teeth for a moment, then continuing – "...to become Solarch."
Shepard nodded. "You ended up the third-highest priestess, though. And you were connected to Benezia."
Trellani sighed, an expression of pain crossing her features. "Lady Benezia was my … there is no good human word for it, but a combination of mentor and patron would fit best into your language. When she encouraged me to explore the Writings of the Temple, I did so eagerly. I suspect it was my own mastery of ancient asari language – a skill most in the Temple disdain to pursue – that lead to my own undoing. I discovered truths about the Temple that broke not only my faith in Athame, but in the Thirty."
Shepard arched an eyebrow as she waited for Lawson to finish running the results of the last tests. "And what was that?"
The matriarch's gaze met hers heavily. "Is not your soul occluded enough with the crimes of your own people, that you would hear of the failings of mine? Suffice it to say it was vile enough that I sought to flee – and the price I paid for the knowledge was the obliteration of my loved ones, family, and followers."
Shepard bit her lip. "And you ended up with Cerberus? That seems a stretch. Trusting an organization that hates aliens...doesn't seem like the best move."
Trellani's expression eased. "There are choices we all make when we are swept far out of sight of the shore, Shepard. Mine are not what matters at the current moment. I will say this – few can understand Jack as well as I do, and I even I do not know everything about him. I joined him because he offered me a way to achieve my own goals – as he has done with you."
She gestured to the facility around her. "All of this is, to him, a gamble. A gamble that you will serve the needs he has put you to. Make no mistake, human – in the long run, it does not matter whether you decide to join Cerberus or flee from it. Just by once more drawing breath and agreeing that the Collectors are a threat, you do his bidding – and allow him to focus on other plans."
Shepard frowned, and turned back to the testing now that Miranda was finished, but the words stuck with her. She knew that Harper had researched her, down to the point they knew which scars to keep and get rid of, what music and clothes she like, even just how to pitch their little offer in a way to make her likely to accept.
Did she actually have any choices in this? The anger in her head over losing Liara, the wondering about just how fucked up the Alliance was, the worry over the Reapers – and the idea that hundreds of thousands of people might be Reaper slaves already – all added up to one direction. She'd have to work with Cerberus.
But that flew in the face of what she should be doing, didn't it? She flung more warpfire, testing her endurance, as her thoughts raced.
She didn't stand for law, or the concept of law. The law hadn't done her any good, hadn't saved her. It hadn't protected her. She hated criminals because they hurt those like she had been, not because they broke the law.
Cerberus had hurt people who were weak. Even if Harper had cleaned out the ones who thought mass experimentation on aliens was nifty, she doubted he had gone entirely clean. There was a bit too much effort on giving her no real connection to Cerberus. Miranda's little history of her own activities was so clean-cut that it was clear the nasty stuff was probably handled by others. Like that hard-ass security guy, Ezno, or Trellani.
Still, opposing Cerberus – especially if what they wanted from her lined up with her own goals – just because they had done bad shit in the past wasn't a logical thing to do. She had done bad shit in the past and changed. She didn't think the same was true of Harper, but he had owned up to the responsibility of what Cerberus had done, even if he'd added a lot of bullshit caveats.
She moved through the kanquess as requested, as Miranda did more scans of her body, and considered. The easiest thing to do was go along with everything for now, and keep an open eye out for things she didn't agree with. Maybe she could talk to Vigil about finding out what Cerberus was really up to, or even Tali.
If they were mostly on the up and up … then she was willing to let bygones be bygones, and if she ran across Richard Williams she would crush his fucking skull and call that payment completed. If Harper was trying to hustle her, well, she'd figure out how to deal with him after she'd polished off the Broker and figured out about these Collector things.
"That's it, Shepard. We have enough data for final adjustments, now."
She nodded, and then frowned. Usually after hours of biotic exertion her nerves would be screaming with pain and she'd feel like she was starving. She wasn't even sweating now, and only felt faintly hungry. "I must have a lot more biotic reserves than I used to."
Miranda nodded, coming out of the small room off to one side of the testing chamber where she'd been running the scans and observing results. The smell of burned metal and ozone hung in the air along with wafts of smoke, and she wrinkled her nose as she walked up to Shepard. "Yes. Your node system was augmented, but the blueware means you channel your biotic energy much more efficiently."
Shepard arched an eyebrow."If the shit is that good, why doesn't every biotic use it?"
Miranda sighed. "Blueware cybernetics is often … disruptive to the body. It causes a great deal of extraneous neural and nervous feedback that must be compensated for, long term nerve degeneration that has to be repaired constantly by expensive nanotherapy, and requires a large amount of eezo. I'd say a third of the cost of bringing you back to life was merely the blueware components alone – and keep in mind that because of the blueware, you are also extremely vulnerable to things like EMP explosions and certain magnetic attacks."
Shepard nodded. "But the advantages?"
Miranda smiled. "Less use of the body's bio-electrical field, higher discrimination in biotic effects, and much greater reserves by dint of the software in your bio-amp being able to manage the field effects at all stages – generation, propagation and discharge – rather than just the last. You won't go through your reserves as quickly and will suffer much less nerve pain or feedback effects."
Miranda held up a finger. "But be aware you still need more food than normal. Your hunger may feel muted now, but we don't have a good understanding of the mechanisms behind what drives hunger sensations in high-conversion cybernetic people. If you feel hungry at ALL, consider that the equivalent of nearly starving."
Shepard nodded. "Guess it's time for a burger, then."
O-TWCD-O
Fiddling with armor and guns after lunch was more interesting for Shepard.
The base armor they'd built for her was, as she'd already seen, a bone-white set of Spectre armor, with slightly different outlines and no cape. They chose the color as it was one-eighty away from the colors that Shepard normally wore, as a way to blur her identity.
The armor was modular, and had sections that could be added or removed for various types of missions – extra shield generators, stealth packages, and the like. It was more advanced in other ways – it linked to her cybernetics, interfaced with her weapons via smart-linked wireless sensors, and had built in omni-armor generators that could cover the torso, back, shoulders and shins.
Both arms could generate omni-shields and omni-blades, and each forearm contained a powerful short-range plasma flamethrower. The suit was designed especially for her body and fit like a glove, and the HUD was actually interfaced with her cybernetic eyes.
The helmet was different – white armor framework with a mirrored faceplate shaped like a stylized skull, with a slightly longer back section. Miranda said that was to confuse observers into thinking she might be asari instead of human.
The armor worked well, although Shepard opted for heavier shielding given Miranda's earlier warnings about taking damage. The fact that someone had developed a kinetic barrier that could work with instead of disrupt a biotic's barrier power was a big shock for Shepard, but one she definitely approved of. Not having to maintain a barrier all the time would give her more power to use her biotics for other things.
The self-sealing features of the armor were highly useful, as was the built-in medical computer and real-time link to medical displays, both on the base and her new flagship. Sedanya and Miranda could even deploy some limited repair functionality remotely, from a small reservoir of nanite agents and medical omnigel in the suit proper.
The weapons lineup needed work, and she'd ensconced herself in the armory omni-foundry with a couple of plates of food, a package of cigarettes, and her notebook. Taylor had wandered up from Security and asked to watch her work, which she had no problem with. She'd fiddled a bit with the Sunfire pistol, but Taylor had gone ahead and done a very good job of getting it up to modern spec, so after tinkering with the sights a bit set it aside.
The sniper rifle selection was impressive, but most of them were too heavy for her tastes. She ended up doing some minor modifications to a turian sniper rifle with semi-automatic fire and heavy-penetration APP rounds, mostly upgrading the TeV rating by boosting the launcher accelerator rails and adding fluidic shock balancing to it.
A good assault rifle wasn't hard to find – the Cerberus techs had built up the old Mattock rifle into a terrifying new incarnation with new technologies they called the Harrier. Choked out to twice its previous caliber, fully automatic and with self-adjusting recoil dampers, the weapon was already vicious. Shepard lengthened the barrel extensively, implanting much stronger accelerator rails, and retrofitting the ammo block loader to accept much larger sizes. She adjusted the ammo caster to throw a more dart-shaped shot from the gun and increased the rate of fire by adding an additional cycler to the rail recycling system.
Taylor whistled. "That's going to have some monstrous kick to it."
She shrugged. "I'm more concerned with accuracy – full auto is nice, but the main fire pattern will be short bursts. I want them fast and tight, though – and to hit hard enough to rip up whatever they hit. I might swap in phasic rounds at some point, but .. we'll see."
The biggest project to do was upgrade her ODIN. She'd come up with a crazy idea for a new-model ODIN style shotgun before she'd died, but the technology to make it work hadn't existed back then. It still didn't, for the most part, but she could adapt a few things.
She reconfigured the entire casting system, opting for narrower but thicker wedges of uranium hexafloride, and slapped in a thin magnetic film discharge spinneret at the barrel. The wedges would still be super-heated by the ammo-caster, but they would be sliced and dispersed. They would then be coated in a thin film of phasic magnetic iron, giving them more shield-penetrating capability.
She lengthened the barrel some, adding in a more powerful acceleration rail and a fully automatic recycler. Then on reflection, she tore that down and instead went with two separate rail systems, each linked dynamically via a small hot-swap modification to increase the rate of fire.
Taylor had blinked at that. "That's...an interesting use of the rails. I'm starting to see why your designs sell so well."
Shepard paused. "Huh?"
Taylor chuckled. "I'm guessing someone told you that your old weapons officer had started a company with the people on Intei'sai, selling a handful of your designs. I think the turians made a mod of one of your sniper rifles, and the double-action pistol you invented is now the stock sidearm of the Alliance, called the Shepard." He smiled.
She snorted at the very idea. "Well, I'm glad Colms didn't end up making a big bomb, but I wonder why he got out of the Alliance in the first place?"
Taylor shrugged. "From what I gather, his big Kyle torpedo got cut in the funding appropriations. I mean, yeah, it works – we took the idea and installed the launch system on the new Normandy, for example – but the cost of each torpedo was ruinous – and the facility to compress neutronium was an expense the SA couldn't afford long-term. The technology is still there, but for the cost of five torpedoes you could built two frigates and a wing of fighters."
Shepard nodded. "So he got fed up and left?"
Taylor shrugged. "I guess. Didn't really keep tight tabs on him, to be honest, but I used the handgun quite a bit and modded some of the innards myself."
Shepard nodded, flipping to a different page in her battered notebook. "I had a lot of time on my hands and I liked thinking of new ideas. It's about the only … creative thing I did, I guess. I'm sure most women would be focused on something else."
The black man's large shoulders shrugged as he watched her layout the rail supports for the new weapon. "I dunno. I think you gotta focus on what you're good at. You're good at this and you enjoy it, so why not do it?"
She smiled as she dropped shield-goggles over her eyes and gestured for him to step back as she began spot-welding components together. "You'd be surprised, Mr. Taylor, the stupid shit I was subjected to over the years by the media. When the ODIN fiasco blew up it just added more negativity to my image, and it pretty much fucked John Oracal over and out." She sighed. "Wonder what he's up to?"
Taylor chuckled. "He financed Colms and his little company, and he's on the board, I think. There's some other patents of yours that technically he can't produce – like the ODIN – but he got a dispensation from the Alliance about a year ago to produce a version of it for Vanguards to use."
She nodded. "Well, I haven't had much chance to glance over specifics for designs, mostly looking at various new technologies." She paused to narrow the weld on one tricky section of the rail before finishing and pulling off the goggles. "I'll say that it's more about thinking about a new way to do the same shit than just throwing bigger or stronger components or rails into a housing."
She lifted the entire assembly, moving it over to the main workbench, and Taylor leaned back against the wall. "There's something to be said for big guns, though."
Shepard smiled. "I used to think that way too, until Admiral Ahern clarified some things for me." She began slotting in segments of the rail assembly into the framework of the new ODIN shotgun. "The biggest problem is that a gun that can't hit the target is useless. I used to use a lot of big guns, and I wasn't real effective with them."
Taylor nodded. "Maybe so, but the game has changed for you now. You have the arm strength of a krogan and the targeting software to compensate for feedback and recoil."
She nodded. "True, but the big guns aren't going to be as useful to me in the situations I expect to be headed into. I doubt I'll be involved in large scale battles where I need suppressive fire." She scratched her head, and then on a lark, pulled out two more components from the cabinets under the foundry workbench.
Taylor blinked. "...you're adding an omni-bayonet to the shotgun?"
She grinned. "Sometimes you go with what a master tactician tells you. I built a custom ODIN for Ahern when I got training with him, and he wanted an omni-bayonet on it. Maybe it will come in handy for something."
Taylor shook his head, folding his arms again. "I'll withhold judgment on that, but it sounds like sticking a flamethrower on a dreadnought, ma'am."
She laughed. "That's what I said!"
