"The Project is going ahead on schedule, sir," the accented female voice said, though there was no video associated with it. The man listening mused about where the voice's holder came from: Australia, probably. He scoffed and opened up a holographic dossier to remind him while she reported to him. "Our greatest issue is that the muscle tissue is taking a very long time to revitalize. It's very brittle after the burns he suffered. Organs are easy; if we have to we can just fish for good transplants on the black market. I'm sure the batarians would help, they've got a healthy supply of human slaves."
"No replacements," the man said. "I want him to be in one piece. It's got to be the same body, the same mind."
"That's totally impractical," the voice replied. "It'll take months to get the implants and the necessary tools to repair this much damage, if it can be repaired at all—"
"Miss Lawson, all I ask is that you try. If you try and fail, then we can get replacement organs. First, though, we try it the hard way," the Illusive Man said, reclining in his chair and drawing on his cigarette.
"That's a million-plus credit decision," Lawson replied. "We can get the black market organs for a tenth as much, a twentieth, even. Batarians don't value humans that highly."
"Just try," the Illusive Man replied, allowing a hint of anger to break into his voice.
"Okay," Lawson answered after a second, sufficiently cowed for now. The connection was terminated, and the Illusive Man shifted his gaze to another window he had opened on his free-floating holographic screen. This one showed a massive purple ship hovering outside of the Citadel. It was conversing with them, even.
That disturbed him. He'd seen the results of the raw destructive power of these aliens, and while they had just been introduced to the Citadel—the seat of all galactic power—the Citadel races, most importantly humanity, knew nothing about them.
Disappearing colonies had been the threat that prompted the recovery of Commander Shepard's body and the initiation of the Lazarus Project, but now the emergence of the Covenant had pushed Cerberus to accelerate the Lazarus Project. Humanity needed its Spectre, because someone with the skill to infiltrate the Covenant needed to collect intelligence, to perform sabotage when necessary, and perhaps even to make an assassination or two. Shepard knew the score, what had to be done for the security of humankind.
The trouble came in how Shepard had become… incapacitated. Not only had he asphyxiated, which would be far easier to repair, but his body had been exposed to a vacuum as it was burning up in Alchera's atmosphere. The burning had almost damaged the body beyond repair, and certainly damaged it beyond recognition. The first months of the Project had been spent separating Shepard from his hard suit. Now they were revitalizing the organs and working to repair the damage done to the brain.
He opened a window with the leaked agreement between the Citadel and Covenant before him. It stunk of the Council's fear, and the agreement heavily favored the Covenant. The three main points were that both sides would cease to fight each other, that an exchange of navigational data would occur within the next five years, and that the Covenant had a standing open invitation to open an embassy on the Citadel. The only point the Citadel stood fast on was a promise from the Covenant for reparations offered to the families of the casualties on Noveria and the corporations whose property was damage. That the Covenant offered a "We'll consider it" to, though the method of their reparations would be interesting to see, since the Covenant wasn't integrated into the Council's monetary system.
The Illusive Man chuckled as he read this, shaking his head from side to side. The Council had once again failed to do anything of use, even with a human sitting on it. He was going to have to accelerate the Lazarus Project. He checked over his accounts to see how much money Cerberus had left, and sent every credit of income not already earmarked for another cell to Lazarus, as well as a note for the project lead, Miss Miranda Lawson.
Use the replacement organs. There is not enough time.
Cerberus had to act.
"FLEETSCOM, this is SUV Maeti. Unidentified marks are appearing on the far side of Pax, coming toward Noveria, over," the chief communications officer of the Maeti, a salarian dreadnought, reported to FLEETSCOM on Sur'Kesh. The information would be passed from FLEETSCOM headquarters to every ship in the Navy tasked to guarding the relay from the Hourglass Nebula to their home star in the Annos Basin that wasn't a part of the Third Fleet, which was currently deployed around Noveria.
Covenant units had held position over the planet for two months now, since the cease-fire took place. Their flagship had departed, but they still had enough firepower to wipe out the turians if they got the inclination.
Until now, the radiation blooms on the scopes denoted the arrival of several dozen Covenant ships, and LADAR had painted them as screaming toward Noveria at speeds the Salarian Union Navy could only dream of achieving in the next twenty years.
"SUV Maeti, observe situation and keep us advised, over," FLEETSCOM came back after a few minutes.
"FLEETSCOM, are there any changes to ROE? Over," Maeti queried as the LADAR officer read the decreasing range to the new ships at a frightfully fast rate.
"Negative, Maeti, fire only if fired upon," FLEETSCOM replied. The ship's captain shook his head. Standing around waiting to get shot was the mantra of the humans, or the turians. Why the salarians had to abandon their doctrine like this was beyond everyone that wasn't at the top level of the Navy.
"Admiral, we've got Covenant ships transmitting a high amount of traffic between each other," the communications station called out from the far end of the ovular bridge. Each station was arrayed around the oval, and the ship's CO had a station in the middle.
"Very well. Keep scanning their weapons. Alert me if they power up," Admiral Kriik said, looking at the most updated LADAR scans on a holo tank behind his station. Salarian code breakers had been frustrated repeatedly as they attempted to crack the Covenant's code. STG had never been stymied like this before, and as an institution they were upset about it.
The amount of communications traffic between the ships was massive, unprecedented in their two months of uneasy coexistence. Something of great import was under discussion between the new arrivals and the old guard. The new ships numbered at 44, all over one kilometer in length. The old guard had been steadily decreasing in number over the weeks and now only numbered 62. The prospect of their fleet doubling in size was daunting for the salarians, who were doomed either way if the Covenant attacked.
Suddenly, a contact disappeared. There was an unusual radiation bloom as well as the appearance of a lot of heat.
"Admiral, something's happened," LADAR reported. "I'm detecting unusual heat signatures on contact CB-21."
The Admiral tapped at his console and brought up CB-21, one of the numerous one-kilometer ships that seemed to form the backbone of the Covenant fleet. He saw only what appeared to be a debris field, as though its propulsion system went wrong and blew the ship in two.
"Enemy ships powering up weapons and shields! CB-18, CB-60, and CB-41 have also dropped off the charts," LADAR interjected, standing. "They're preparing to attack!"
"Bring up the fleet's kinetic barriers and weapons, prepare FTL vectors for each ship's escape if they keep coming after the initial volley, and get a message sent to FLEETSCOM," Admiral Kriik ordered, moving into motion rapidly, even for a salarian.
He slowed, however, and even came to a stop as he looked at the LADAR readouts. With each new scan fewer ships appeared, and the new arrivals mingled with the old guard. This had all the signs of a naval battle.
"Cancel out the last order, comms," Kriik said slowly. "Send a new one instead: 'Enemy ships attacking one another.'"
"I am the hand of the Prophets," the Arbiter explained. "I retain nothing of my former self while in their service."
"You just do what they say," Hackett extrapolated. "Without question." The aging Admiral rubbed his chin contemplatively. These aliens were like turians without all the spikes.
"Admirable," General Septimus Oraka said, sitting across from the two of them in the kodiak streaking toward the Faith and Glorious Redemption. The old turian had rejoined the service after Shepard had paid him a visit and cleaned him up. He tagged along as the most senior turian available, and they'd both been joined by a salarian representative from Special Tasks Group, Colonel Molo Lil, and a representative of the Asari Republics, Lana Teyasi.
The trip to the Citadel had been a great success for the Covenant and for the Citadel, with a formal peace treaty hammered out and signed, and reparations for the attack on Noveria in the works. As a show of good faith, the Covenant had offered a tour of their massive ship, and each of the Council races had selected a military officer to go along with the tour, save for the asari. They'd selected a representative of their intelligence agencies, which were not run by their military.
"Is it as admirable when it is something required of you?" the Arbiter asked the turian.
"Yes, I would say so," Oraka replied quickly. The general was sharp; Hackett had to hand him that much.
"An interesting viewpoint, turian," the Arbiter responded, looking around the shuttle. "Blind obedience is the norm for your species, then?"
Oraka laughed. "No, it's not about blind obedience." The old turian leaned forward. "We value… service to the state over all. You're free to disagree, but you'll find yourself in a bad way very quickly, not even at the hands of the state. Other turians will administer that justice."
"Your species is quite similar to mine," the Arbiter observed. "We have guardians of the faith; they serve to keep other sangheili in line. You can rest assured that sangheili keep our own in line without special guardians assigned to the task."
"I wasn't worried," Oraka said. "Your people run a tight ship from what I've seen."
"You haven't seen any of our ships yet," the Arbiter said, cocking his head to the side inquisitively.
"'Running a tight ship' is a human idiom," Hackett broke in. "It means your people perform their duties well."
"Ah, well in that case, thank you," the Arbiter replied, turning back to Oraka. He looked up at the view screen on the wall behind Colonel Lil. "We have arrived."
The small kodiak shuttle darted toward the twenty-eight kilometer long super carrier as it drifted about several kilometers away from the Citadel.
They were admitted to a cavernous hangar bay, and dazzled by the blues and purples that made up most of the colors within the ship. It all seemed so… alien. The door popped open and the Arbiter led them from the shuttle and into the surreal interior of the ship.
They were met by one of the 'san 'shyuum', or the ruling species of the Covenant. "Welcome aboard the Faith and Glorious Redemption, most esteemed guests," it said, its voice light and flowing, almost entrancing despite the heavy accent to its English. It was easy to see why they were in charge. "I am the Minister of Concert, charged with your care until you leave the ship."
"Thank you for your hospitality," Hackett said, bowing slightly. The other three guests did the same, each in their own species' respective manner.
"You see around you one of the many cargo bays of a CSO-class supercarrier," Concert said, leading them through the cargo bay away from the kodiak. "Above you, suspended from the ceiling, are our Type-31 exoatmospheric fighters, our primary weapon against opposing fighters in space and the best design we've ever had for the role. The Type-31 has been in service for several decades at this point, by your calendar. Two Ages by ours."
The ships the Minister pointed to were shaped like teardrops, though the end where they tapered off, where they were latched to a rig in the ceiling was split so it had two tails to help it maneuver. They were larger than the trident, humanity's main fighter, by far.
Before they left the hangar Hackett noticed two different species of aliens. The sangheili he recognized, but the shorter reptilian ones he did not. "Excuse me, Minister, but what species are those aliens working with the sangheili?"
The Minister turned to face Hackett and looked where he had pointed to. "Ah, those are unggoy, the most numerous of our castes. Unggoy are the newest addition to our Covenant, and they take the brunt of the hard labor required by our efforts."
Hackett thanked the Minister and they proceeded deeper into the ship, now enclosed in a long hallway colored a deep purple color and lit by white strips of light every few meters. Hackett watched as the others peered through the doors they passed.
Small groups of unggoy passed them, lead by a singular sangheili most often. Hackett noted that and watched as a sangheili came bounding toward the Minister and said something in their language. The Minister responded angrily, slamming a fist on his gravity throne.
Slowly the Minister turned to face his guests, saying, "It seems we've encountered an… internal issue. We must return to the system you refer to as Pax. I will escort you back to your shuttle."
"Minister, if you would have us, we would love to stay and see your vessel in operation as it traveled through what do you call it… slipspace," Lana Teyasi offered politely.
"I'm afraid that we can not risk your harm," the Minister of Concert said, ushering them toward the hangar bay.
"Honestly, Minister, we don't mind," Teyasi objected. "Nothing could hurt this ship."
"If you would absolve us of any injury that may occur, you may stay. We can not have a diplomatic incident occur as a result of our… internal affairs," the Minister of Concert said, after thinking.
"We'll send a message to the Council," Teyasi said, looking at the other three, who nodded agreement.
"Very well," the Minister replied, clicking some kind of communications device on his chair and saying something in his language.
Hackett composed a short message to the Alliance embassy informing them of his intention to ride along with the Covenant ship to see it in action. Before he could see the response he saw the Minister turning to face them.
"Come along, I shall lead you to the bridge," he said, leading them back up the hall toward what appeared to be an open plaza with a blue light shining in the back.
As they drew nearer Hackett noticed the light wasn't just shining. It appeared to be drifting visibly toward the ceiling, almost shimmering upward. He watched as the Minister floated into it and shot… up.
"Spirits! What just happened?" Oraka nearly shouted. The turian walked forward to peer up and himself got taken by the lift, going up behind the Minister.
Hackett looked at the salarian and the asari, neither of whom were moving, and decided to take the leap of faith. He stepped into the light and felt himself go weightless and drift upward, faster and faster as he went from no gravity to negative gravity and then back to neutral gravity as he was floated out onto another floor—a whole bank of these gravity elevators lay before them, and several dozen sangheili and unggoy moved about, joined by floating aliens that appeared much like the gas bags indigenous to Eden Prime.
"My apologies, I forgot to inform you of the use of our gravity lifts," the Minister said, moving forward to make sure Hackett was unharmed.
"It's alright," Hackett grumbled, dusting himself off. Teysari and Lil followed, both landing on their feet, unlike Oraka, who appeared to have landed face-first, given his involuntary entry into the lift.
"This way, we must make haste to reach the bridge before our departure," the Minister said, leading them through the crowds toward the correct lift, this one guarded by two sangheili. They were cleared and the Minister stepped onto the lift, shooting upward again.
Behind him, Hackett was the first to step onto it, and felt gravity get cancelled out around him. This time, though, the lift turned ninety degrees and transported them forward. He saw the Minister before him, and behind him the other three guests followed. The scene felt like it should've been accompanied by the sounds of wind blowing around his head or at least some sort of noise, but it wasn't. The air was moving at exactly the same pace with them, so there was no wind.
After several minutes of floating sideways an exit became apparent at the end of the line, and one by one the party stopped and found themselves in a massive command center, easily one hundred meters from back to front.
The center was dominated by a gargantuan holotank, currently displaying what Hackett realized to be Noveria and the ships in orbit above it. The symbols denoting the ships appeared to be engaged in some kind of maneuver, perhaps a drill… then one disappeared. Another followed it, and another after that one.
"One hour ago a fleet of vessels from the fringes of our space decided to rebel over our decision not to destroy your planet Noveria and enter into peaceful negotiations with the Citadel," the Minister explained as they made their way toward the base of the holotank. "They attempted to rectify that which they believed we stumbled on and when they informed the fleet still in orbit of their intentions, they were attacked for disobeying the Prophets' will."
"It is a splinter group, then?" Colonel Lil asked.
"We do not know," the Minister replied uneasily. "Information is in short supply thus far."
"What about the salarian fleet in the Pax system?" Lil spoke up again, a little worry making its way into his voice.
"Fear not, your fleet withdrew after some smaller vessels on its perimeter were destroyed by scouts from the heretic fleet," the Minister answered. Turning to the sangheili shipmaster, he said, "Take us to the fight."
The command center—bridge appeared to be an understatement given the size of the cavernous room—was already engaged in several different operations at once but they bent their efforts toward one goal now: taking the Faith and Glorious Redemption through the mass relay and to the Pax system. It was a relatively new operation for the Covenant's technicians, but they managed, and in seconds they were at the Pax system.
Now it was time for an operation they were well-drilled in: slipspace navigation. Hackett watched with interest as the sangheili worked diligently to plot a course through what Hackett supposed was something akin to an alternate dimension.
"Once we enter slipspace it will be a matter of a few minutes before we arrive at Noveria," the Minister stated, floating around the holotank. "Our course will take us behind the heretic vessels."
"Blocking their retreat," Oraka continued, nodding. "Well played."
"I am afraid it is not that simple," the Minister said. "Space has three dimensions, and our vessels are constructed to take full advantage of all of them. Our purpose is to destroy the heretics by appearing as close as possible and loosing all our considerable arsenal of weapons upon them."
"Right," Oraka said, feeling a little embarrassed by the looks of it.
The mood in the command center was tense as they approached Noveria, suffering from an information shortage as the ships with slipspace communications buoys deployed were engaged in combat and therefore not transmitting as frequently as possible.
Suddenly the domed ceiling and walls were illuminated by the image of Noveria, surrounded by about one hundred ships engaged in close range ship-to-ship combat. The images were so clear that Hackett assumed they were looking through a window until he was informed otherwise.
Outside, the arrival of the supercarrier changed the dynamic of the battle immensely. The heretics took their ships and drove deep into the loyalist fleet, hoping to prevent the behemoth from destroying them without the fear of friendly fire. The loyalists were transmitting on a frequency different to that of the heretics, allowing for a limited ability to discern between friend and foe, but at that close range it was impossible to tell.
Unfortunately for them, the supercarrier deployed hundreds of their Type-31 XAVs out of a dozen hangar bays on either side of the ship. They expanding cloud of fighters engaged and overwhelmed those of the heretics in minutes, leaving the loyalists with control of the space between the ships—making boarding easier.
Multiple cruisers would line up and hit each other with broadside blasts from their plasma batteries, burning into each others' hulls and damaging both ships severely.
Faith and Glorious Redemption used its main central energy projector indiscriminately, gutting the smaller CCS-class battlecruisers across the gulf of space with ease. The weapon was capable of bombarding planets and rendering vast areas of them sterile glass ruins in a single shot, and that destructive power, when focused on a single vessel, destroyed it outright. It was a fast and irreversible judgment passed down on the heretics, and it broke their fleet.
It was like a silver lance, reaching out through space and smiting the opposing fleet in a very short intense shot. The power was absolutely terrifying to behold.
The remaining heretics, now numbering fewer than twenty, attempted to retreat, but found themselves trapped by their own desperate maneuver to escape the supercarrier. Several ships were reclaimed through boarding action, and the rest destroyed ship to ship. No vessel was allowed to escape.
After less than two hours, the Second Battle of Noveria had ended, but reports beamed to Faith and Glorious Redemption indicated many such skirmishes were occurring across Covenant space.
The Minister of Concert turned to his astonished guests, all attempting to put to words what power they had just witnessed.
"It should seem that the Covenant is in danger," he said after a moment. "We shall clear the debris from orbit here, but the Fleet must depart for home."
"Minister, the Citadel may be able to offer aide," Teyasi stated. "I can speak to my Councilor."
"We can all speak to our Councilors," Hackett agreed, detecting a valuable opportunity to gather invaluable intelligence on Covenant weapons and doctrine. He assumed that the representatives from STG and asari intelligence were thinking on the same page, but three out of four Councilors was more than enough to get a Council force out to Covenant space.
"Any help you would offer would be welcomed with open arms," the Minister said, spreading his arms symbolically. "I'm afraid the tour will have to be cut short, though. We shall assign an escort of 31s to transport you safely to the remaining elements of the salarian fleet."
Twenty minutes later the four representatives were transported to the hangar, where their kodiak shuttle awaited, looking angular and out of place in the ship built of flowing curves and limited straight lines.
They boarded the shuttle and took off into space, escorted by six Type 31 XAVs.
"I thought the fleet had departed," Colonel Lil said.
"They came back," Teyasi replied. "It's probable they left a stealth reconnaissance element behind to give them updates of the combat."
"Indeed," the salarian said after a moment, not at all taken aback that the asari knew standard STG operating procedures offhand. The two races had coexisted long enough that they knew what each other knew, and what the other did not know. Their intelligence services were close partners.
As the shuttle arrived in the hangar of a salarian cruiser, the intelligence specialists, Admiral, and General knew that they had their work cut out for them and plotted a course back to the Citadel to see about the raising of a Citadel Expeditionary Force to assist their newfound Covenant friends.
A/N~
The battle for the soul of the Covenant is on! This is exciting to write, battles seem to go by so quickly. Essentially the Great Schism came 300 years early, and this time the Citadel is going to be in on it. The next chapter might be a long one, or long to write, at least.
Also, to address a frequent question posted in the reviews, I have worked out a story mechanic to bring in jiralhanae, brutes, what have you. Don't expect them soon, but they will be making an appearance.
Something I'm toying with is splitting this story into two parts, also. Depending on how long the Schism lasts I might do a two-part story, with the second part taking place after the arrival of the Reapers (i.e. the Reaper War would be a separate story in this universe).
On a more personal note, school begins again next week. It may take longer to get chapters out between homework and class and my job, but I'll try to keep 'em coming.
It's been two months to the day since Divergent Pasts was published and it's garnered 20,000 views and nearly 100 reviews. Thanks for reading, reviewing, and making this story such a success!
JLake4
PS: Do you readers think this story needs a codex or some sort of information supplement?
