Chapter 10
Final Destination Approaching
"...too late...unable to..." the static was loud and overriding; he didn't want to hear it but the words, the words were... "invading fleets...no escape..."
The words, fifty thousand years dormant, were not what he had wanted to hear. The ruins weren't disconcerting because they were ancient, nor because of the alien design to their architecture. Even the multitudinous swathes of Geth did not truly make him feel uneasy. It was the silence, the heavy silence that covered everything here, blanketing the long corridors and the large, empty rooms, the rampant foliage and floating, delicate spores which had taken over most of the facility, the half working technology which barely worked enough to let them progress. It reminded Kaidan of things he'd rather not dwell on, it reminded him of Onterom. The dead facility, filled with half written notes, letters, words left in eternity, cut short by a savage extermination. Had the same thing happened here? Had the Protheans even seen the Reapers coming until they were at their doors?
The voice they found in the ancient recording did not sit well. Their words only reinforced his fears.
"Well that's just great," Shepard's voice was harsh, despite the frivolity of his words, as they all continued to listen to the garbled message, "I can make out some of the words but it's mainly broken up, doesn't tell us anything."
"You can understand that?" Tali said as she kept her eyes and her rifle trained on the doorway they had just passed through.
"You can't?" Kaidan asked in surprise; ok, admittedly it would be more than a coincidence if a recording found deep in an ancient Prothean ruin had turned out to be in English, Kaidan thought.
"Of course not," Liara said as she stepped towards the swirling hologram, her eyes alight with both worry and wonder, "it's in Prothean. By the Goddess this recording must have been made millennia ago. It is unbelievable that even these few words remain," Kaidan felt a little taken aback when he found himself her next object of scrutiny, "it is amazing! You and the Commander's ability to understand this, it must be the Cipher, there's no other explanation! It must have given you both the ability to comprehend the Prothean language, an internal translator if you will."
"That's all well and good Liara," Shepard said, as if the thought of being able to comprehend Prothean wasn't that big a deal, "but if the message isn't worth understanding then that doesn't mean much right now. Do you think it's broken? Can you look at it?"
"I am flattered by your faith in my abilities, Commander," Liara said, looking a little regretful, "but I'm afraid I am no Prothean engineer. If I had a schematic for the machine I might be able to translate some things for you but, further than that, I cannot make it work."
So far their daring chase had been full of such setbacks. If they weren't being slowed down fighting the Geth at every corner then they were finding barriers in ancient door panels that wouldn't open or had been destroyed, bridges that would not extend and now an ancient message that was of no use other than to worry him with its content.
"...act of desperation..." the recording continued, now in a different voice, the tone manic and fraught; Kaidan could tell Shepard was still listening, even as he talked to Tali, from the way his eyes hardened, "...the Conduit...all is lost..."
"If we can't fix it is there any way to turn it off?" Kaidan asked, trying for Shepard's light-heartedness but unable to truly pull it off, "It's not exactly helping my calm."
"Don't freak out on me, Alenko," Shepard said with a tight smile as pointed his index finger at the ceiling and moved it in a circle, ordering a regroup, "if there's nothing it can tell us then we're done here. We can't waste anymore time."
Back to the Mako, back to the driver's seat, back to the vast, empty hallways and their ellusive target. Kaidan couldn't help but look around him as he drove through the gloom, fast as he would allow himself considering he didn't know the route. The low hallway opened out after a few minutes, becoming a vast, echoing ravine displaying a large and complex network of machinery on the walls, glowing slightly but mainly dark.
"What are those things on the walls?" he asked, not sure if he could expect an answer.
"Some sort of containers, maybe?" Shepard offered, his sharp eyes surveying their surroundings.
"I think they might be stasis pods," Tali spoke up from behind him, her voice betraying her wonder, "There are heat vents and recycling tubes linked up to them, for waste you see? Maybe...maybe the Protheans thought they could preserve themselves through cryogenic freezing. Only..."
Kaidan didn't have to hear her say it. He knew just by looking that, if she was right, these pods had stopped operating long ago.
"...something must have gone wrong," Tali said softly, "these pods are no longer functioning."
"Then this must have been some sort of last resort," Shepard said, "a way to hide from the invasion and hope to wait it out. At least their sacrifice wasn't for nothing," Kaidan took a second to glance at his Commander as Shepard stared out into the dim light, "now we know that hiding isn't an option."
"And here I thought we could just build ourselves a bunker, get some beers in and sit this all out," Kaidan said with a shrug.
"You know Alenko, that sense of humour really does have a fascinating way of coming out at the wrong moments," Shepard said with a shake of his head.
"Look!" Liara's voice pulled his eyes back to the hallway before him, "There's a light up ahead."
The light did not turn out to be what he had hoped for. A huge, shimmering barrier blocked their path, forcing Kaidan to slow to a complete stop.
"Dammit," he said under his breath.
"Back up, Lieutenant," Shepard ordered, "we'll see if there were any branching walkways we can take, or maybe a control panel for this force-field."
"I can't," Kaidan said tightly as he pulled up the rear view on his HUD, "there's another barrier behind us. Saren must have set an ambush!"
"I'm not sure about that," Liara said as she went for the door, "I don't think Saren would know how to operate this technology any better than we can. This feels like...something else."
"I'll take that into consideration, Doctor," Shepard said as he too bundled out of his seat and headed for the exit, "but keep your eyes open people. I don't want any surprises."
The only way out led to an elevator which they took mainly because there was no other option. We don't have time for this, Kaidan couldn't help but think as he stood, all nerves and nervous energy. The others didn't look any better, Liara looking around her with sad eyes and Shepard staring resolutely forwards. Tali looked alert and yet she sounded more curious than wary when she spoke.
"If this was just an automated trap, why didn't Saren trigger it when he came through?" she asked.
"We haven't been following the wrong trail, have we?" Liara asked worriedly.
"Can't have been," Kaidan argued, "there wasn't any other trail to take, or not one that was open to us."
"Let's get all the facts before we jump to conclusions," Shepard said commandingly, "stay alert."
The Prothean recording which they had found before, jumbled and worrying as it had been, was something he didn't think he would ever have experienced. Kaidan would never have believed that something even more incredible had been, essentially, waiting for them.
"When the Citadel relay is opened, the Reapers will pour through and all you know will be destroyed."
The VI, Vigil, had been as a prophet, speaking to the unknowing children at his feet. Kaidan felt as he had when Sovereign had addressed them, only there was no malice in Vigil's words, only a want to help save those in the present through the doomed knowledge of the past. Yet its words spoke of a dark future, of dark space, a place beyond their reckoning, where the harbingers of their destruction lurked, enshrined in a prolonged hibernation, waiting for millennia until their prey was of a sufficient level to necessitate culling. The information was bizarre and difficult to comprehend. The Citadel, a mass relay? The Citadel, the core of their crisis? The Citadel, a tool which had been used throughout eons by the Reapers to ensure their success? Vigil spoke of the downfall of the Protheans as if it were reading from a morbid history book. First the Citadel was seized and the seat of their civilisation, their leaders and the hub upon which they had built their empire, was crippled in the Reaper's initial surprise attack. Each system in the galaxy isolated, no way to communicate the threat. They had been easy pickings, despite the decades it apparently took for the Reapers to enact their mass genocide.
"Some worlds were utterly destroyed, other were conquered, their inhabitants indoctrinated and used as sleeper agents. Taken in by other Protheans, they ultimately betrayed our resistance to the machines."
"Indoctrination?" Shepard asked, turning to them as he put the pieces together, "They brainwashed them? Then that explains a lot. Benezia, the Geth, even Saren. They could all have been indoctrinated by the Reapers to ensure a definite seat of power in the Citadel, to ensure that no one would suspect them until it was too late."
"But I don't understand," Liara asked urgently, "where did the Reapers go once they had conquered your people?"
"Our worlds were stripped bare," Vigil said calmly, making Kaidan shy away from the horrific thought, "harvested by indoctrinated slaves. Everything of value, all resources and technology, was taken. Once they were certain that the galaxy had been purged of all sentient organic life, the Reapers retreated back through the Citadel mass relay into dark space, sealing it behind them."
As with the other recording, Kaidan was sure that he had heard enough even as Vigil continued to talk. Of millions of slaves, mindless husks, left to die of starvation or exposure. The slow and brutal death of an entire civilisation. The fate that awaited them, were they to fail. When Shepard finally spoke once more, Kaidan found himself clinging to the hope his Commander's resolute tone brought him.
"You said you brought me here for a reason," Shepard said, "tell me what I need to do."
"Before my people were destroyed, we were on the cusp of unlocking the secrets of mass relay technology," Vigil explained, "this facility was a top secret instillation where our engineers worked to build a small scale version of a mass relay which would link to the Citadel, the hub of the mass relay network. We called it the Conduit."
"Then the Conduit isn't a weapon," Kaidan said urgently, "it's a backdoor onto the Citadel!"
"And that means that Saren is headed there right now," Tali added anxiously, "to open the Citadel relay for the Reapers!"
"The engineers I managed to sustain through their cryo sleep were able to alter the remote signal between the Reapers and the Keepers on the Citadel," Vigil explained, "thus this Sovereign you speak of would not have been able to remotely trigger the Citadel mass relay. This one you call Saren will undoubtedly be seeking to undo the Citadel's defences and bypass our engineers work by transferring control of the Citadel over to Sovereign directly."
"Then is there any way to stop them?" Shepard asked, his tone belaying his desperation.
"There is a file in my database, take a copy with you when you leave," Vigil replied, "it contains an override command for the Citadel's security system and will temporarily give you a chance to wrest control from Sovereign."
"Then that's all I need," Shepard said defiantly, "Saren's already got enough of a head start. Alenko, grab that data file and let's move!"
"The one you call Saren has not yet found the Conduit," Vigil's words followed them as they ran back towards the elevator, "there is still time, if you hurry."
The ramp wasn't steep enough but Kaidan couldn't have stopped if he wanted to, with the heavy canon fire all around him and the rumble and crack of the Mako as the vehicle struggled, and Shepard's shouted orders, "Keep going Alenko! Don't stop!". Then they were airborne and then gone, a flash of light seen only for an instant as they passed into the void between reality and unreality, passing through the galaxy as a photon travels through stars and planets and people alike. Kaidan had been worried that experiencing the mass relay jump without a sealed space cruiser surrounding them would perhaps have an uncertain outcome. It turned out that the outcome was, in fact, very certain. One moment they were under fire and the next they were weightless, barrelling through the air with the engine revving and the wheels spinning against nothingness as the Presidium exploded into view and they crashed into the ground with enough force to throw them over completely. Kaidan felt himself hauled down into his full body seatbelt, leaving him hanging suspended as the Mako screeched to a halt and, finally, lay silent.
"Is everyone alright?" he heard Shepard shout; Kaidan looked his left at the sound of a thump and watched as Shepard dropped from his seat into the ruined dashboard and the broken windscreen, having disengaged his harness.
"I'm good, Commander," Kaidan said as he pulled himself together, reaching up to follow Shepard's example.
"We're good back here Shepard," Tali called out.
"A bit shaken, but we're good," Liara confirmed as Kaidan and Shepard crouched down to hurry through the wreckage; unsurprisingly the door was stuck but that turned out not to be a problem. Kaidan used two quick, consecutive blasts in order to force it open and allow them to scramble out into the chaos.
The elevator juddered to a halt. He reached out to steady Liara and looked to Shepard, standing before the glass, staring at something outside that Kaidan couldn't see.
"It's Saren, he's blocked the elevator," Shepard said as he quickly tapped a few controls on his omni-tool and sealed his suit, the mask flipping up to attach to his visor and the hiss of pressurisation as the seals were made final. Kaidan didn't need to be told, he followed suit even before Shepard said, "suit up, we're headed outside."
Everything had been going too smoothly, Kaidan thought, it made sense that they would be stopped just before they reached their destination. They had been able to find a barely working Elvina VI on the Presidium which told them everything they needed to know; Saren Arterius was headed up the Citadel tower to the Council Chambers. They hadn't wasted any time in rushing to meet him, only now they were so close and yet so very far from stopping this once and for all. Shepard's solution was, as ever, parctical and yet, at the same time, incredibly dangerous. It didn't stop Kaidan from following him, however, it didn't stop Kaidan from trusting him.
The glass looked frozen as it cracked and splintered into hundreds of tiny shards, spinning out into the zero gravity environment as if held by invisible wires. There was a rush of air, he was jolted forwards and then nothing. Sound crashed down to complete silence but for his comrades' voices over the comm. link. Kaidan watched Shepard take a step over the edge and disappear. He took a breath, refusing to look down, considering there technically now was no down, and took the step. Suddenly he was sucked against the metal of the Citadel tower by his boots, sticking to the surface and disorienting him with the change in horizon. He turned and watched as Tali was next, followed by Liara. He looked back to find Shepard giving them all an 'a-ok'.
"Let's go people," he said.
It wasn't just an arduous fight, it felt like a never-ending battle. Every corner they turned only revealed more Geth, waiting in ambush or a simple retaliation on discovering the enemy. Every step was a struggle, fighting to claim every scrap of progress that they could gain. Kaidan had never enjoyed fighting in a vacuum; no noise, no ability to hear the enemy and gauge their position. Instead he relied on his scanner and his innate abilities, using kinetic bursts to force the Geth out from behind cover, causing overloads in their circuitry and doing his best to shield those around him from the punishment they were receiving. He was more than aware that he stuck to his Commander's side the entire way to the top, unless specifically ordered to flank. Despite the knowledge he stalwartly refused to allow his CO to be injured while he still had the power within him to prevent it. It seemed like an eternity before they found themselves beside a long, wide opening which, when Kaidan tried to imagine it vertical, he realised was the long runnels in the Citadel tower which sat parallel to the Council Chambers.
"Come on, we're almost there," Shepard said over the comm., "there has to be an access panel around here somewhere!"
They found the panel, behind a slew of Geth force-fields. Liara distorted them with a quick wave of interference and they hurried through, climbing down onto what soon became a wall. They quickly adjusted themselves against the wall as the door closed behind them and the room pressurised itself. Soon they found themselves lying safely on the floor, righting themselves as gravity once more restored itself.
"This is it," Shepard said as he kept his suit sealed, "the Council Chambers should be through here. Tali, Liara, follow me. Alenko, you have our six."
The doors opened and they were assaulted by sound and heat. Everything was aflame, the delicate trees burned and blackened, the walkway before them littered with dead leaves. The wailing of the alarm echoed as they ran, accentuated by the rumble and creak of the chamber itself as it was battered and broken. Kaidan watched their backs as they ran, gunning down a few Geth who appeared to have been left on guard duty. Only two? Kaidan thought warily as they took the steps two at a time, rushing towards the seat of power in the Citadel, towards the one person they had been searching for all this time, their goal, their target.
And Saren was there, glimpsed only as a pale shadow which jumped from the edge below Shepard's marksman shot which, if the Turian had not moved, would surely have taken him clean through the head. Kaidan cursed as Saren disappeared from view and moved closer to Shepard, keeping his rifle drawn. I have the data disk, Kaidan thought as he eyed the bright orange holo-console they had briefly seen Saren meddling with, if I could just get to that console then...
He had stepped forwards cautiously onto the walkway before he realised his mistake. It was only when he heard the telltale whine of machinery that Kaidan knew he was too close. Saren rose up before them on a small hover-board, his face the picture of cold superiority, and threw the grenade straight at him without hesitation. In the first second he tried to back away and in the next, thankfully, he realised his mistake and brought up his biotic shields to cover himself and those closest to him. Unfortunately, in spreading his barrier thin to cover his comrades, it wasn't enough.
Kaidan felt the mainstay of the blast that seeped through his barrier reach out and hit him forcefully enough to send him off his feet and tumbling backwards down the stairs about ten feet; "Kaidan!" he was sure he heard Shepard shout through the fuzzy disorientation of the explosion and the harsh sound of his own breathing inside his helmet. His ears rang and his mind went fuzzy around the edges as the pain in his chest and legs flashed to the forefront. He let out a choked cough and tried his best to sit up. Suddenly there was someone there, hands on his shoulders helping him. He looked up to find Shepard there and, behind him, Saren floated a few feet from the ground menacingly. Tali and Liara were hidden just out of sight to his left, weapons ready but seemingly unwilling to fire when the Commander and Lieutenant were in such a vulnerable position.
"It appears you are still as weak as I found you on Virmire, Shepard," Saren said, his voice a deep and slightly distorted rumble, his piercing, luminous eyes watching them both dispassionately, "I can tell you now that you will not find me so. I have been significantly...upgraded since our last encounter."
Last encounter? Kaidan's mind raced, What the hell is he talking about? Had Shepard...had he already run into Saren on Virmire? There was nowhere else they could have come into contact with him. Had Shepard kept it to himself? Kaidan tried to get his body back under control, linking to his omni-tool and sending a command for a medi-gel. He let out a sound of relief as his suit administered the gel automatically to his wounded flesh, pumped through the suits own vascular system. He pulled his legs back towards him, ignoring the latent sting, and tried to get himself into a better position beside Shepard who had been hunkered down beside him. Saren was there, before them, Saren who they had chased through the galaxy tirelessly, who had instigated the massacre on Eden Prime, on countless worlds, who had led to force Ash's death on Kaidan's conscience...
...and yet Kaidan found that he could not hate the Turian, as he finally laid eyes on what was left of the man, even as wished beyond everything that he could. Saren was nothing but a puppet, a hapless slave to be pitied. He was now nothing but a barrier between them and the console which glowed feebly in the background.
"You let Sovereign implant you?" Shepard spat out incredulously as he stood, keeping a strategic position between Saren and Kaidan, "Are you insane?"
"It was a sufficient cure," Saren said as he lowered himself to the ground and stepped from his hover-board, standing just close enough to ensure that any shot he made wouldn't miss, but not close enough to be disarmed, "for the doubts which had begun to grow in my mind. I suppose I should thank you Shepard, for what you said to me that day. If not for that, Sovereign may never have deemed me worthy for such enhancements. Now I am the best of both organic and synthetic, the strengths of both and the weaknesses of neither."
"You're wrong Saren, you've never understood," Shepard continued even while he stared down the barrel of Saren's pistol, "Sovereign doesn't care about you, or the Geth, or any of us! Sovereign and its kind want nothing more than to wipe us all clean off the face of the galaxy, nothing more. It's controlling you through your implants, can't you see that?"
"It is you who is blind, Shepard!" Saren said back fervently; Kaidan watched as Tali tried to get into position for a shot but, as if he had eyes in the back of his head, Saren turned faster than Kaidan could follow and launched another grenade at the two women, causing both Tali and Liara to leap to safety over one of the small walls at the top of the stairs. The device exploded and Shepard reached for his pistol, still holstered, but Saren beat him too it. Shepard raised his hands as Saren once more took aim, straight at Shepard's visor, "you do not understand the symbiosis I have achieved, the symbiosis we will all achieve once the Reapers return. This galaxy will be cleansed and rebuilt anew. You should not throw away this measly life you currently hold. Join us Shepard and you will have your place at Sovereign's side, you will be more than you ever dreamed you could accomplish."
Kaidan had managed to get himself onto one knee,his other leg bent with his foot firmly on the ground, when Shepard did the last thing Kaidan would have expected. He lowered his hands and stared straight at Saren, letting out a short, derisory laugh. Saren just looked back, confusion evident on what was left of his mainly impassive face.
"You know, Nihilus told me about you once," Shepard said as the fires grew around them and station shook, as Turians, Asari, Salarians and Humans alike died outside in the cold vacuum of space, as Saren held his gun menacingly and tightened his finger on the trigger, making Kaidan's mind race, "wasn't one to talk but he did tell me that you saved his life once, on Juntauma. He never showed any emotion but he seemed proud, when he talked about you," Kaidan watched every detail, his breath stuck in his throat as Saren continued to simply stare, "proud when he talked about the man who shot him in the back, like a coward."
"Nihilus was a good soldier," Saren did not waver even though his words did not match his stance, "but he did not understand the dangers, he did not understand the weaknesses of your kind, your dominant emotions and your inability to compromise your compassion. Nihilus was a waste. I killed him because he would never have come to understand just what it takes to...evolve," Saren narrowed his eyes as he stated the last word, "as I now realise you will not, either. It is a shame Shepard, there was potential in you, but now you must..."
He remembered what it had felt like. The anger that had flowed through him like his first hit of Red Sand, straight into the bloodstream, rushing to his brain, making the decision for him before he had even realised what he had done. It was not the same this time, not the same as the ravenous panic that had driven him to kill Vyrnnus in a fit of spiteful and terrified rage. It was not a blind burst of energy that he let loose but a controlled and well calculated push which hit Shepard in the side, sending the man stumbling to the left out of harm's way. The decision was determinate but, unlike with Vyrnnus, the decision was his. Saren was dead before he hit the ground, the wires twisting his frame fizzing and popping disturbingly as his head, wrenched from the bone and metal that had held it by Kaidan's focused biotic power, hung like a loose thread against his chest. Kaidan forced his bruised and battered body to its feet as Shepard, having regained his balance, turned to look at the ruined corpse of what had been one of the most respected Spectres in the galaxy, now reduced to nothing but a mass of wires and blood.
Kaidan had expected it to be more, well, perhaps just more. Only his second kill using his biotic skills since he had first known it was even possible and yet he did not feel the same, sickening guilt as he had felt after Vyrnnus. He stared at Saren until Shepard grabbed his arm, snapping from his daze as Tali and Liara ran from behind the cover they had been using and rejoined them.
"The disk, Alenko! Hurry!"
No time left. No time to worry, to hate, to care or to love. No time for the vagaries of life or death because the consequences of their actions governed the destinies of so many individual lives that he felt his heart beat faster as he half ran, half stumbled towards the control panel, Shepard at his side holding him steady while he pulled up the data, the ancient cure from millennia before he had even been born, and tried his best to make everything right. When it worked, Kaidan almost believed it couldn't be true, that it was too simple.
"That's it, it worked!" he turned to the others, looking a little lost, "We have control of the Citadel's systems."
"Quick! Open the station's arms," Shepard ordered, "If they have a clear run the Fleet will be able to take down Sovereign before it regains contro of te Citadell. Hurry, we don't know how long we will have control!"
"Alright, I'll try," Kaidan hurried, trying his best not to screw up as his hands shook and he felt the sweat running down his neck and into his shirt, trapped inside his suit; he sent the order but it seemed that there was a time delay. Dammit, Kaidan thought harshly as he tried his best to reroute the signal, we have to hurry, "Sir, I'm opening the comms. channel now. Let them know what's coming!"
As soon as the channels were clear their comms. lit up. In the flickering gloom of the ruined Council Chamber a hissing message filtered through. Not more good news, Kaidan thought facetiously even as he optimistically hoped for a light at the end of the tunnel.
"This is...ny Ascension," the voice as desperate but clear, "Main drives offline. Kinetic barriers down forty percent. The Council is on board, repeat, the Council is on board..."
The transmission cut out only to be instantly replaced by another, far more familiar, voice. Shepard didn't waste a beat in taking the call.
"Normandy to the Citadel, Normandy to the Citadel," Joker's voice was fuzzy but steady, "Please tell me that's you Commander."
"Damn it's good to hear your voice, Joker," Shepard replied genuinely, "what's your position?"
"I'm sitting in the Andura sector with the entire Arcturus fleet," Joker said, "we caught that distress call from the Destiny Ascension,, it sounds like they're running out of time. We can save the Ascension Commander, just unlock the relays around the Citadel and we'll send the cavalry in!"
"Are you sure about this Shepard?" Tali spoke up, sounding slightly disbelieving, "Human casualties will be very high if you send in your fleet now."
"This is bigger than humanity," Kaidan argued, "Sovereign's a threat to every organic species in the galaxy! We don't have the time to be arrogant about this."
"True," Tali agreed, "That's why you can't waste reinforcements."
"But the Council is on board that ship," Liara spoke up, looking to Shepard imploringly, "I understand that humanity has not been well received by our government Shepard, I know that it has been difficult for you to gain respect from us but please, do not doom us because of our own failings. Remember what Vigil told us."
Perhaps he hadn't been sure what Shepard would say and, for a split second, he had worried that he had once more forgotten that his Commander was an unpredictable entity. Shepard's noble spirit had spared the Rachni Queen, to what end none of them knew, yet Shepard's close sighted selfishness had also cost a man his life, no matter whether the accusations against the scientist on Onterom had been valid or not. Which was why it was a relief to hear Shepard's reply, maybe more than he could express at that moment in time when the galaxy hung by the skin of its neck above the void.
"I understand Liara," Shepard did not look to them as he spoke, instead looking up at the cracked but intact glass of the large window behind the console, watching the debris sail past as the smoke rose, "don't worry. I won't let Sovereign make the first move. I won't make the same mistake the Protheans did. Joker!"
"I'm here, Commander," Joker's voice fizzled back into being, "what are your orders?"
"I'm opening the relays now," Shepard said, his voice strong and resolute as he stood beside Kaidan and used the console, "We need to save the Ascension, no matter what the cost! The Council must survive."
"Understood Commander, on route to your location as we speak," Joker said, "eta right goddamn now."
"Fly right, Joker," Shepard said, trying his best to keep the anxiety from his voice, "I don't want to hear that you scratched my ship."
"Heaven forbid, Commander," Joker said back, carefree as a babe, "we'll be seeing you before you see us."
There they stood, on the cusp of victory, shrouded in smoke and ruin. Kaidan watched Shepard and Shepard watched the skies. Maybe I'll never know how he works, Kaidan thought as he watched the sequence finally equalise, the shuddering of the room as the massive arms of the Citadel re-opened, maybe Shepard was right. Maybe I like it that way too.
"Tali, Alenko," Kaidan focused back on Shepard's voice and found the man looking back down the walkway, down the steps, to the twisted corpse lying there, "I don't want any loose ends causing trouble. Make sure that he's dead."
"Aye, aye, sir," Kaidan replied.
The bullet Tali put into Saren's skull was an incredibly final act. Kaidan watched detachedly, knowing that somehow this was a thing he was not allowed to blame himself for. The Turian was more machine than what he had originally been, more puppet than person. Yet he had not always been such, and Kaidan had not given him the chance to redeem himself. Pointing a gun at Shepard could obviously have dire consequences, Kaidan thought as Tali lifted her hand to her helmet. I won't allow myself to fall back into that trap, he thought, I won't allow myself to feel the guilt I should not bear.
"If he wasn't dead before," Tali said, "he is now."
"Good," Shepard said over the comm., "get back up here. both of you, we can monitor the fleets progress from here. Tali, is there any way to help weaken Sovereign's defences from inside..?"
The sentence was never finished or, if it was, Kaidan did not hear it. The sudden blast of arching, red energy which exploded from behind him sent the Lieutenant careening forwards into the railing, snapping his shoulder out of its socket. He let out a restrained cry through gritted teeth before pushing up on his good arm, blinking away the dimness from his vision, shaking his head and looking up only to find there, there where a corpse had lain not moments before, stood something else. Saren twisted and screamed as the energy consumed him, his form elongating and diverging, wires reconnecting and sinew recombining. It had become something new, something hideously distorted, a mockery of the shape it had once been. Kaidan looked at it with horror, biting down on the ripping agony in his shoulder as he pushed over onto his back and pulled his pistol, aiming and firing once, twice, three times as the thing turned to look at the source of the attack.
It leapt faster than anything which had been tortured into a new form of sentience had any right to. Kaidan felt his heart skip a beat as he tried futilely to struggle out of the way, relief flooding him when Saren was suddenly hit by a kinetic warp which suspended him in the air a mere few feet from where he lay propped against the railing. Then Liara was suddenly at his side, hauling him up and dragging him back behind the cover of a small wall while Saren was still suspended in the biotic field, currently being shredded with bullets by both Tali and his Commander.
Kaidan knew, however, that a biotic warp field could only be sustained for so long before the physical parameters which allowed it to exist simply destabilised. When he looked up from behind their cover, desperate to see what was happening, it was to be greeted with a chillingly familiar voice.
"I am Sovereign," came the distorted, deep, a-tonal rumble from Saren's twisted form, its lower jaw lost completely, "and this station is mine."
"Like hell it is!" came Shepard's challenging reply, "Get ready to be taken down by an inferior species, you sack of shit!"
One moment Saren was there, the next he was gone, having jumped at least twenty feet backwards in order to cling to a tall pillar, his glowing red eyes now trained on them with deadly efficiency.
"Fuck he's fast," Kaidan breathed out as he did his best to fumblingly reload his pistol one handed, slotting the disrupter rounds in with difficulty before lifting and shooting in quick, successive bursts.
The limber husk proved a difficult target, with its quick and agile movements. It launched itself at Tali, leaping to the ground in front of the Quarian before reaching out and knocking her aside, not even reacting to the three or four pulse rounds she managed to empty in it point blank before it did so. Shepard wasted no time in attacking, Liara and Kaidan following his lead.
"Commander, are you there?" Kaidan heard Joker's voice over the sharp cracks of their gunfire and the racing of his own heartbeat, "I don't know if you can hear me but we've commenced our attack. Only there seems to be some sort of shield around Sovereign, we can't get through it, we're taking heavy losses. If there's anything you can do down there, do it fast!"
Liara sent a sharp wave of disruption at the husk of Saren, sending the thing fizzing backwards as Shepard laid into it with quick, precise shots to the torso and head. Kaidan aimed low and managed, on his third shot, to blow off one of its feet, sending metal, bone and blood spraying out over the ground as they thing wobbled and was forced onto all fours.
"Shepard, we have to take it down!" Kaidan said, knowing that what he said sounded ludicrously obvious, considering the circumstances, "If Sovereign has poured all of its control into this husk, maybe destroying it will lower the Reaper's defences!"
Kaidan found himself grabbed and thrown to the ground, Shepard practically atop him as a vile and deadly looking bolt of red energy shot over their heads.
"Doesn't look like we have much choice!" Shepard said as he pulled himself back to his feet and Kaidan along with him, "We'll just have to hope this works."
Knowing what could be at stake, knowing that every second the husk was alive meant there were people dying outside in a desperate attempt to slay Sovereign, was a motivation Kaidan would be glad if he never had to experience again. Every shot missed seemed like a kick in the face, his shoulder strained and he felt weak, faint from the pain, from striving to win, from worry and anxiousness for his teammates and the Normandy. When what was left of Saren finally went down, instigated by a well placed grenade from Shepard and finished with a severe but deadly shot from Tali which severed the slim cord which kept its deformed head attached to its mutilated body, Kaidan could only sigh in relief. It's all gonna be alright, he thought as the thing twisted one final time, its limbs convulsing as the light in its eyes died, it's all gonna be alright.
The light from the explosion outside was what made him turn. The sight itself was as awe inspiring as it was devastating. Sovereign crumbled before their eyes. They watched, staring as the Reaper tumbled as if falling through water, its appendages seeming to twitch as its underbelly lit up with a ferocious glare. Kaidan reached up with his uninjured arm to shield his visor from the furious light.
"By the Goddess herself," he heard Liara breathe out.
"It's over," Shepard said, so quietly that Kaidan wondered if he was speaking to himself more than to them, "it's done."
"I almost don't believe it," Tali said, limping slightly as she walked forwards to watch the morbid fireworks displayed before them, "we killed it!"
"Everything has its weakness," Kaidan said, letting out a sound of discomfort as he held his left arm tightly.
"Hey."
Kaidan looked round at the call, as well as the feel of a hand against his shoulder. Shepard was there, watching him closely.
"Are you alright?" he asked with concern.
"Yeah," Kaidan lied, pasting on a smile even though he knew his CO couldn't see it; maybe that's what it's all for, he thought, maybe it's what you make me feel that's important. It goes beyond just a show for me. You know I think I might just..."I'll be alright, Shepard."
"You know, you really have to work on your lying, Lieutenant," Shepard said, amusement obvious in his tone, "you're really..."
"Oh Goddess..." the sound of Liara's voice, followed swiftly by Tali's sharp intake of breath, was the only warning they received before they turned to stare at the window, at the looming, fractured leg of Sovereign which was now coming into view, headed straight towards them.
There was a deathly silence as Shepard grabbed him and ran, the others at their heels. Then it began. It was a terrifying thing to hear such a deafening roar behind you, a terrific crash followed by the falling, splintered glass in a cacophany akin to a thousand birds crying out at once, and cracking, fractured masonry, the environmental controls coming online to contain the vacuum, the lights flickering and the flames dying and the long shadow passing over them as they ran for the door, ran and ran, and his arm burned and his breath came in gasps and their footfalls were nothing compared to the screaming of metal and the unimaginable sound that grew closer and closer and then...