MASS EFFECT: ONE

"You're not in this fight alone."

~Commander Shepard~

We're ONE

Zakera Ward – Before Endgame

"I knew it! I knew it! Nobody would listen to me. Not C-Sec, not the Council, but I knew it."

"Would you shut up already," the volus hissed to the salarian beside him, after an intake of breathable air from his pressure suit. He had a very bad feeling that pretty soon the air wouldn't be breathable for anyone on the Citadel, let alone the volus or quarians.

Still, he wasn't looking to die any sooner. They might still have a chance. He and the salarian had found a nice, safe place to hide, in an upper level service corridor far away from the chaos outside. People rarely ever came up here, evidenced by crates stacked one on top of the other. They had found a place on the floor behind them, the crates too heavy for them to move and form a blockade. It would have to do, at least until things died down (died, what a terrible word to use), or until the Reapers decided to move on.

But those horrible creatures out there weren't going to go anywhere as long he ran his mouth. Bopping the salarian on the arm, he whispered, "Are you trying to draw every monster in our direction?"

"No, of course not, Jahleed," the salarian said with a shake of his spindly head. "I don't want to die anymore than you do, but as I've surmised, you do not get the significance of what this means."

Jahleed had known the salarian for a long time, worked with him. They were colleagues. Chorban was his name; a salarian with skin darker than any he had ever known, except for a small white patch that seemed to grow from the base of his throat all the way to his chin. It ended just beneath his bottom lip in what looked like a row of sharp teeth. Others were sometimes intimidated by this (he, too, at one point), but Chorban was no more harmless than a pyjack. What he was, in fact, was a brilliant scientist. While other people were busy trying to find a cure to Kepral's Syndrome or the Genophage, he and Chorban had devised a way to learn more about the Citadel's keepers.

Ingenious little creatures, always moving about, taking care of the Citadel as if the other millions of lifeforms living within in it hardly existed. Yet, the keepers had lived and worked on the Citadel long before Jahleed's species learned to move upon the surface of Irune. It's what made them so worthy of he and Chorban's interest, particularly once Chorban discovered that the keepers were not a part of the Prothean Empire fifty thousand years ago, as was the common understanding for as long as Jahleed could remember, but that the keepers in fact pre-date the protheans. The implication of such a monumental discovery was staggering. It meant the races in their cycle—the asari primary among them—were not the first ones to find and utilize the Citadel. It meant the protheans were not its progenitors. Just as the asari had discovered the Citadel and used it to expanded their influence and control over the galaxy, so had the protheans. Someone else had built the Citadel. Someone else had placed it in a unique position within the galaxy. Someone with a purpose.

He and Chorban had, over the last couple of years, painstakingly gathered this information by means of a special device which Chorban himself had made. Well, he hadn't actually invented the device they used to scan the keepers. It was someone else's medical invention. He and Chorban had merely liberated the company of it, found a way to modify it and make it work for their needs. They hadn't done this by any legal means, of course. Retribution for their actions would have been swift and potentially painful were it not for Commander Shepard. She had bought them time, and helped them out. The information Chorban had been able to acquire from the keepers boasted surprising revelations. Surely, this is what Chorban was going on about. Didn't mean Jahleed was willing to die to hear it.

He bopped the salarian once more on the arm to quiet him, and to chastise him. Chorban always talked down to him as if he were a lesser scientist. Despite his misgivings, and his fear of seeing again what he'd see a few moments ago, he was curious what Chorban meant.

"What what means?" Jahleed asked after expelling a hiss of processed air from his suit.

Chorban hit the back of his head against the wall and rolled his large eyes. "The fact that no one listened to my warnings. That Bailey in C-Sec just shook his head when I told him about the keepers, that they had been bio-engineered millions of years before the protheans…bio-engineered by the Reapers themselves! Of course, at the time, I knew little of the Reapers, but that doesn't matter. Even those reporters, al-Jalani and Wong, refused to release the information I'd gathered about the signal the keepers were scheduled to respond to every fifty thousand years. How could they have been so stupid?"

"You tried, Chorban. It was all you could do."

Chorban went on as if Jahleed hadn't even spoken. "Sure, maybe I didn't have all the facts, but I knew enough. They should have listened to me. Now, Wong is dead and al-Jalani's red brains have been splattered all over the Silversun Strip, who knows what may have happened to Bailey or even Shepard…and even worse than that, the Reapers are here, Jahleed, on the Citadel, just as I had predicted. Don't you understand what that means? We can run, we can hide, but none of it will make a difference. We are all going to die!"

"Don't be so fatalistic, Chorban."

An explosion sounded in the distance, shaking the floor they sat upon. Both of them flinched.

"Fatalistic?" Chorban eventually asked, his voice low. "I don't know about you, but I haven't forgotten what that thing did to Marvek!"

Marvek had been what Chorban liked to called his "bodyguard." Jahleed had always thought of him as a grunt or a lackey. He did Chorban's bidding, whatever he asked. Now, he did nothing. He was dead. Ripped to shreds by a couple of monsters, that someone else had called "husks", so that he and Chorban could get away. Though he was grateful, Jahleed found it hard to think of Marvek's move as a sacrifice; just a dumb decision which had gotten him killed.

Jahleed huffed the only way a volus could in a non-ammonia-based atmosphere. Huddled here behind their easily penetrable barrier, he found he couldn't raise a voice in further protest. They were no different from children hiding from their parents. The only difference was that when these parents came in search of them, it would not be to administer correction, but eradication.

Jahleed nodded and his pressure suit helmet nodded with him. "You are right, Chorban."

"Of course, I am." Chorban crossed his arms over his scant chest.

"But should we really sit here and wait for death to come to us?"

The salarian's eyes narrowed. "Do you expect me to go in search of it?"

"No, but there has to be something we can do."

"Like what? We're scientists, not soldiers. I have some weapons training. I might make it for a while, but not for long; and you, you couldn't run even if someone gave you a biotic boost. You're only alive because of Marv—"

A scream pierced the air, close by, somewhere below them. It shut Chorban up as quick as a kick to the midsection. Jahleed couldn't be sure, but it sounded like that of a child. Inside his suit, his eyes (a number of oculars unknown to anyone but the volus) snapped closed, and he grimaced. He thought he was going to be sick. That was never a good idea, but it was especially worse in a pressure suit.

Children, he thought. Not children.

There was the explosion of a shotgun. Chorban drew his hands over the holes on either side of his head that were his ears. The blast and the scream came from a lower level, but it was close enough to send a slight tremor through the floor.

Jahleed was not so lucky in his movements as Chorban. He could not cover his ears, nor could he draw his knees up to his head and bury his face as though it might shut out the world and what was happening in it. He couldn't even express his fears as Chorban could, with squeezed-shut eyes and clenching fingers. All he could do was talk, but his words would bring little comfort to their situation. That did not stop Chorban, however. He blithered a string of incoherent words. It took a minute for Jahleed's suit to decipher that his friend was repeating over and over: "I don't want to die. I don't want to die."

An opening door silenced him.

This area of the Citadel, a level above the shops and pubs, serviceable by a number of catwalks and storage rooms, was rarely used. The owners of the shops below kept some of their supplies here in the stockrooms, and C-Sec officers used the catwalks for surveillance. Jahleed knew. He had run into several officers, as well as a couple of stock boys, in the years he and Chorban had been in search of keepers to document. It wasn't a secret place. Everyone knew about the catwalks and the stockrooms. That wasn't the problem.

Over the last six months, Chorban had further modified the device to access hard to reach places on the Citadel. This was an easy modification, considering how closely linked the keepers were connected to the Citadel. It had just not dawned on him until recently how easy it would be. With his device, they were able to access keeper tunnels deep within the bowels of the station. Jahleed did most of the tunnel reconnaissance because of his stature. (He still thought Chorban more capable of such tunnel digging than himself. Chorban might be taller, but he wasn't as big around.) They would never attempt to gain access to high security places, like the Council chambers or C-Sec itself, but they could surreptitiously poke about in the tunnels beneath or above them. Only for gaining more insight into the keepers, though. If they learned a bit more about the Citadel in the process, that was merely a bonus.

When they had run in here, Marvek's screams still ringing in their ears, Chorban had used his device to lock both the entrance and the exit doors of the stockroom. To hear one of them opening on the far side of the room, chilled them both to the bone (though, whether volus had bones and not cartilage was still up for debate). They heard a shuffle of feet as the door swished closed behind whatever had entered. Jahleed chanced a look at his friend and colleague. Chorban was quiet now, but his whole body had begun to shake. If his wide, iridescent eyes got any wider, they would be bigger than his whole head. Again, as scared as he was, Chorban had it good. At least he could breathe. He didn't have to hold his breath in order to keep from hissing an expulsion of used air loud enough to draw the attention of whatever had entered the stockroom with them.

Suffocating himself proved to be for naught, however. The shuffling feet drew closer. Take that back. They didn't shuffle as much as they click-clacked like little kids with tapping shoes. Maybe the luxury of closing ones ears off to sound wasn't as much of one as Jahleed at first thought. The sound was familiar, comforting even. He'd heard it enough in the last several years to know it by heart. If he could have smiled, he would have.

Invisible hands lifted a top-stacked crate and set it aside. Chorban gave an audible cry, fear blinding him to a sound he already had memorized. But Jahleed knew. He had deduced the identity of their guest long before it picked up the crate.

Chorban gasped. "A keeper." The words, whispered shakily with the residue fear, held a worshipful tone.

"I knew it all along."

"You knew nothing of the sort, Jahleed."

He could have argued the point, but Jahleed didn't see the need. For now, they were still safe. It was all that mattered. The keeper, however, wasn't concerned with their presence one way or another. It had a job to do. Whatever that job was, as they piddled at their stations, neither he nor Chorban knew.

"What is it doing?" Jahleed asked, watching as it continued to move their barricade, crate at a time, as if they weighed no more than children's toys.

Jahleed didn't see it, but Chorban shook his head. Three crates set to the side, the keeper set a final to the floor (fully revealing their hiding place and their cowardliness), and moved passed them as if they weren't even there. The click-clack had been the sound of its hard toes making contact with a metallic floor. It held its scarablike and globose body upon four spindly legs. Three toes there were per foot, giving it added balance. Four arms with three-fingered hands also gave it greater dexterity in its work. And upon its shoulders was a long and flexible neck from which hung a small head sporting two protruding black eyes. It had a mouth and pointy mandibles jutting from either side, but no one had ever seen it eat, let alone heard it speak. Keepers were both endlessly fascinating and unutterably creepy all at the same time. Sometimes, Jahleed had wondered how he continued to work around them.

They were no less creepy on this day while Reapers invaded and overwhelmed the Citadel. The things seemed not to care. They went about their regular duties as if this were any other day. It click-clacked passed them and, with its four hands, removed a bulkhead. Setting the heavy piece aside as it had with the crates, it began working on something behind it. Jahleed could make no sense of it. What it was doing must be important enough to continue despite the people that were dying out in the streets. He wondered how many dead bodies it passed to make its way here uninterrupted.

"Do you think it's helping the Reapers?" Jahleed asked, but Chorban didn't readily answer. His head was turned away, his eyes upon the keeper. What could possibly be going through the salarian's mind?

As Jahleed watched, the fear seemed to wash away from Chorban, as though he were sitting beneath a shower of confidence. His hunched back straightened, his hands went frantically to work on his omni-tool, and he rose to his knees.

"I don't think so," he said.

The device, which was tuned into his omni-tool, activated and he began actively scanning the keeper.

"It's just working," Chorban continued. "Doing what it normally does to assist the Citadel and keep it functioning. It's probably making repairs even as the Reapers' minions damage the station."

"What if it's communicating with them? What if it tells them where we are?"

"Don't be dense, Jahleed. You know we've never found any definitive proof that the keepers communicate with anything. They respond only…to signals or to stimuli from outside sources, like the station itself."

Jahleed knew that to be true. He had made a nearly unheard of mistake some months ago. Deep in a keeper tunnel, somewhere between Heurta Memorial and the docking bay. He'd been scanning a keeper, constantly probing, pushing the envelope as he'd heard some humans say. He pushed a little too far. Chorban had once told him what would happen if one attempted to corner or detain a keeper, but he had never seen it before. He hadn't meant to alarm it. He just didn't want it to go just then. He'd been close to a breakthrough, close to discovering how the Citadel communicated with the keeper. He thought it might have something to do with its antennaed backpack, so he had grabbed one of its arms…and within seconds, it melted into a gelatinous puddle of proteins and minerals. The sight had scared him so badly he wouldn't go into the tunnels for weeks after that. He could never have told Chorban what happened, no matter how confused he'd been about Jahleed's fear of returning to the tunnels. Wild kakliosaurs couldn't have driven that tale from him.

Chorban gasped suddenly, making Jahleed worry that somehow the salarian had read his thoughts, but no. There was something else on his mind. He turned to Jahleed with wide eyes, and Jahleed could almost see the "light bulb" idea turn on above his head, right between his horns.

"I have an idea."

"Really?"

"Quick! Help me."

Chorban got to his feet and jogged a few paces to the crates the keeper had set aside. The one he selected was nearly as tall as the salarian himself, shoulder high. He removed a lid, setting it quietly to the floor and began removing packages from within.

With heavily expelled air, Jahleed scrambled to his suited feet as fast as he could. Instead of helping, he watched Chorban pulling what looked like freeze-dried meal packages for the shop below them. "What in the name of Plenix are you doing? Making dinner?"

The salarian turned to him with narrowed eyes. "Didn't you want to do something other than wait for death to find us?"

The volus nodded his helmet.

"Then, get over here and help me empty this crate before the keeper finishes his job and moves on."

EEE

What an ingenious idea! Chorban really was the thinking side of their two-man group. They would use the crate, upended, as a shield, riding on the inside, and move about the Citadel practically unnoticed. If they happened to become stuck in the middle of a gunfight, well, crates nowadays were built to withstand just about anything. It could probably take more of a beating than a security shuttle. Turning the crate over hadn't been so easy. Salarians weren't known for their great strength, and Jahleed was little more than a ball with nubby protuberances, but they had accomplished the task with little noise. Now, they were making their way along the catwalk, turtlelike. Chorban, hunched over with his palms holding up the crate, and Jahleed, walking tall, they followed the keeper to its next duty. (If anyone made for a safe companion during a Reaper invasion, it was a keeper. The two seemed to pay little mind to each other.) Any sound, far off cry or pops of gunfire, and they would set the crate down and huddle until the coast was clear. Perfectly safe…

Until they could make a break for a keeper tunnel. From there, Jahleed surmised they would make their way slowly to the docks and hopefully find a ship on which they could escape. He hadn't the slightest idea how to pilot a shuttle, let alone a spacecraft, and he was pretty sure Chorban didn't either, but hey, it probably had an autopilot. No sweat. For now, they would shuffle along.

Chorban set the crate down, breathing heavily. It was dark inside the crate save for the one beam of light drilled into the crate's forward facing side by Chorban's omni-toll. He needed something to see by, but it helped Jahleed little. He didn't know Chorban had stopped until he ran into him.

"You could try to help," Chorban said.

"I would but you're holding it too high."

"Then hold it up from the sides."

"All right, I will try, but my arms are not very long."

Chorban issued a testy sigh, and suddenly, a bright orange light lit up their small space. An omni-tool. Not Jahleed's, of course, but it was comforting just the same. Chorban was making small notations onto his omni-tool and periodically looking out of the hole.

If Jahleed could have frowned, he would have. "Are you scanning the keeper?"

"Yes. Lower your voice."

He obeyed and continued at a whisper. "Why are you scanning the keeper?"

"Remember your almost breakthrough a couple of weeks ago?"

"Yes," Jahleed said warily.

"I've been analyzing what you found that day, and I've detected a pattern. Look," he said, and turned the omni-tool in Jahleed's direction. A vid screen as holographic as the omni-tool had popped up. He braced for a video of a putrefied keeper with himself standing there in a volus state of shock, which meant he would look no different than if he were reading a book. Instead, the omni-tool showed a graph measuring whatever Chorban had detected in a waveform. Daggerlike spikes jutted upward on the graph like deadly heartbeats, the kind that might kill you.

Jahleed resisted an urge to sigh in relief. "What is it?"

"I think it's a signal from the Citadel to the keepers...well, this one in particular."

"You mean, this is not my recording?"

"Of course not. I'm recording this keeper, but I've recorded others since while I worked this theory."

Fear of discovery gone, Jahleed now felt an uneasy grumble in his stomach. "Why did you not tell me of this?"

"Because, I—"

"Because you want all the glory," Jahleed said, pointing an accusatory three-fingered prehensor at Chorban.

"No, no, you dimwitted volus. This is sensitive information. I didn't want to reveal my findings until I was absolutely sure. We can't let something like this get into the wrong hands." Chorban shook his oblong head. "Look, the point is, it's just a theory, one I hadn't intended to test until I was sure, but with all that's happening, now could be my only chance."

Jahleed expelled a frustrated puff of used air. "But what about your idea? I thought we were getting out of here."

"This is my idea. Hijacking the crate was just part of it."

"Oh no," Jahleed said, trying but not accomplishing a facepalm. "If we don't get out of here, Chorban, we're going to die…just like you said!"

"Yes, but that was before I realized what an amazing opportunity—"

Another swish of opening doors cut him off and Chorban turned to look out of his peephole. "Hurry. The keeper is on the move." Chorban's palms were up and the crate was moving. Jahleed could do little else but follow.

Through the door the crate wobbled, the sensors picking up their presence where the keeper did not and keeping the door open until they passed through. Jahleed heard the swish of its closing behind them, but they did not continue. Chorban set the crate down. They weren't moving but another door was opening.

"What's—?" Jahleed began when Chorban's entire palm planted itself over his mouthpiece. There was a sound of heavy footsteps, unnatural grunts and mutterings above the crate, and Jahleed kept obediently quiet, holding his breath again, knowing one expelled hiss would give them away. The door behind them opened once more, the heavy footsteps, the grunts and mutterings disappearing behind it. It wasn't until Chorban dropped his hand that Jahleed felt it safe to breathe again.

Chorban, too, for that matter. He expelled a gasp at the same time and pulled in a healthy dose of fresh air into his lungs. "That was close. It was one of those things…you know, the big ones with the bumpy back and a gun for an arm."

"Do you think they tracked us here?"

"I don't know, but I think the keeper knew it was coming. You missed it, but it stopped outside the opposite door as if it knew what was on the other side."

Jahleed drew in another intake of air. That last breath-holding contest had been a tough one. "How is that even possible?"

"This is how." Chorban powered his omni-tool and another holographic vid showed another waveform. "The Citadel told it. If my theory is right, Jahleed, and so far it's shaping up to be, then I could actually control a keeper."

Jahleed could have asked another question, could have butted into his "theory" with one of his own that went something like 'you've got quite an imagination there, Chorban.' But he didn't. He let his silence be his answer, and unfortunately, since Jahleed's face was as unreadable as a rock, Chorban took it as curiosity.

"I could match the Citadel's frequency, send a simple command to a keeper and make it do whatever I want it to."

"Theoretically."

"Yes, of course, theoretically."

Jahleed snapped. He grabbed Chorban by the lapels. "Are you crazy? Were you not just here when that thing passed us by? There are Reaper forces everywhere. We don't have time to test theories."

"Maybe I am crazy." Chorban shrugged out of Jahleed's grasp. "Before, I was afraid of dying for nothing. All my life's work gone for someone else to discover fifty thousand years from now. Now, I have a purpose and I am not afraid to die to see it through."

"Well, I think you're nuts. I'm not willing to die for your theory."

"And just where do you think you're going to go?"

Jahleed lowered his head as far as his helmet would allow. Chorban was right. He wouldn't last ten seconds out there on his own.

"Okay, fine," he said. "What's your grand idea?"

Chorban wasn't one for smiling on a regular basis. He was always too busy working, too busy devising insane plans. But he smiled now. Perhaps that's what made his facial marking so intimidating to Jahleed. Thoughts of "mad scientist" came to mind.

"If I can control one keeper, then maybe I can control them all."

"To what end? Other than making yourself the coolest being to have ever roamed the galaxy," Jahleed said, rather depressed at the thought. He never came up with the good ideas. He thought Chorban's smile would grow wider at the comment, but instead it dropped like a rock.

"I can't be the first one to have discovered this. Some ancient prothean probably stumbled upon the same thing, but never had the chance to see it through. That cannot happen in this cycle. Imagine the possibility, Jahleed—even if we could control just a handful of keepers, perhaps we could turn the tide of this war. The Citadel is the Reapers' war machine, right? That's essentially what Commander Shepard claims. They used the Citadel as their entrance into our galaxy fifty thousand years ago to begin their systematic galaxy-wide genocide, but the protheans changed that. Yes! The protheans altered the signal the Citadel sends to the keepers to respond to the Reapers arrival. If the protheans could do it, then we can too. Only we will alter the signal. We'll send a signal that makes the keepers repel the Reapers. The keeper can then use the Citadel to follow out those commands. We could probably end this attack!"

Out of all that Chorban said, Jahleed only heard one word. "We?"

"Of course, we. I always mean we, even when I'm saying me or I. We're a team. We're one."

Stumped, Jahleed didn't know where to put himself. It wasn't like he had much room to put himself anywhere. They were sort of stuck in a box, but still, he had never thought Chorban was capable of such thoughtfulness.

"Well, I—I didn't know that," Jahleed began, but changed his tact quickly. Better to make it look like this theory of Chorban's was what interested him. "Still, I don't see how changing a few keeper commands is going to put an end to the attack on the Citadel."

"That's why I have to prove my theory, Jahleed." Chorban peered through the eyehole. "The keeper is on the move."

Crate raised to Chorban's shoulder level, they began their difficult turtle-waddle behind the keeper once again. Jahleed was even more confused than ever, but maybe that had something to do with the fact that he was now on…what's that human saying?...on Cloud 6? Yes, that must be it. He was on Cloud 6. He didn't exactly know what it meant, but he surely felt as if he were floating on a cloud right now. One of the Presidium's manufactured clouds, to be exact. At this point, neither of them could get any higher than that. Being on Cloud 6 felt pretty good. WE. It was a good word, WE. Jahleed felt like he could sing it all night long. He had never been part of WE before. He was part of a clan, yes, but even being in a clan was not the same as being a part of WE. WE had a magical quality. Yes, WE was awesome!

They were waddling upon another catwalk when soft voices reached them from the streets below. Chorban automatically settled the crate to the floor. The muffled sound of gunfire reached them and Chorban wheezed a frustrated breath.

"I can't see a damn thing!" He drilled another small hole on the side of the crate and peered; and seemingly as an afterthought, drilled one at Jahleed's eye level. "Can you see anything?"

Jahleed was feeling as giddy as a schoolgirl. For the first time in their working relationship, he felt important to Chorban. He pressed his prehensors together as best he could, considering they were curved like fingers for better grip, and peered through his little hole.

"Nothing." He hoped his tone didn't sound as giddy as he felt. WE.

"Then, let's keep moving or we'll lose the—"

A screech like the cry of a thousand people dying at once tore through the confines of their makeshift shield. Jahleed had never heard anything like it. Not on his homeworld of Irune nor on any space station or planet he had ever visited. It was horrible. It was demonic. If it were possible for a volus to melt right out of his pressure suit, Jahleed would have.

The fear he had seen in Chorban before his scientific revelation, reignited, only this time another flame roared behind it. Chorban wasn't giving up on his work no matter what monsters might come their way. He might change his tune once it begins to rip him to pieces, Jahleed surmised, but at least Chorban's lingering confidence was a boost to Jahleed's own...until the sight of the thing making that hideous noise on the street below them.

Hidden in their crate, they watched it lumber along with a tall and yet lithe woman's body. One might have mistaken it for something that used to be human, but its tentacled head gave away its asari inheritance. The similarities ended there, however. Breasts and belly garishly distended, as if impregnated with the Reapers' future children, its face was an empty skull, save for the obsidian eyes gleaming from within sunken sockets. It moved like an old man, careful with each footfall in case it should take a wrong step. Then, like a rocket, it shot forward in a blue streak of light, jumping two or three shops at a time. If it saw them, if it merely detected them on the catwalk above…

Like every other Reaper abomination, this one was on the hunt. Thankfully, he and Chorban weren't on its radar. Some other unlucky soul was. They watched until it was out of sight, its screeches dampening as it moved on.

"By all that is good and holy, what was that?" Chorban's voice had taken on a hushed quality, one that was both awed and irrevocably offended.

"I think it was asari…"

Chorban pulled away from the peephole, landing his butt on the floor. For a moment, Jahleed thought he looked utterly defeated, but that wasn't it. The sight had been an affront, by all means, but Chorban wasn't giving up (the idea of Chorban giving up again scared the life out of Jahleed). He was thinking. He was thinking deep.

"Do you think it was after someone?"

Jahleed nodded. "Most assuredly. It moved with purpose."

Chorban looked through the forward facing peephole and got quickly to his feet again. "Hurry. The keeper is on the move. I have another idea."

"What?"

"I have to test my theory first."

EEE

Mere minutes had passed. They had moved unnoticed into another storage room and Chorban was busily recording another burst of signal being transmitted to the keeper. A screech as hideous as the last one reached their ears. It wasn't as loud this time. The sound had to travel through walls, but it still had a way of shaking them to the core.

Jahleed had to speak or else the sound would drive him crazy. "What does it say?"

"I don't know," Chorban threw over his shoulder. "I don't speak Citadel."

"Then how do you intend to create your own signal?"

"Easy…or at least it should be. As long as I can match the frequency of this signal, I should be able to send a command as simple as 'open the door' and it will respond. If my calculations are correct, the keeper's hardware should transliterate my command into the language it understands, which may be something as simple as ones and zeros."

Another screech. Jahleed blinked. "What's to prevent your signal from crossing wires with the Citadel's?"

"A good question," Chorban said with a frown that meant he hadn't figured that part out yet. "And one that can only be answered with a test."

"Now?"

"There's no time for later," Chorban said and nodded with a confidence that seemed bigger than the Citadel itself to Jahleed. "Here goes nothing…"

"Oh, I hope it doesn't melt."

Jahleed watched over his friend's shoulder as he typed in the command. Several seconds passed. Chorban's finger hovered over the link that would send the signal straight to the keeper's hardware strapped to its back. Chorban pressed the tip of his finger to the holographic display.

Message sent.

EEE

He had a dream once. A persistent dream. One that evolved as the years went by.

In it, he'd had a home on a garden world like Eden Prime or something. Only it wasn't Eden Prime. This had been his own planet. There had been lush jungles, white sand beaches and pinnacled mountains. Indigenous animals of all sorts roamed its surfaces and swam in its oceans.

He couldn't recall if he'd given it a name. One thing he'd learned over the last several years was that making a name wasn't all that important. It's what you did, and how you treated people, that's what mattered.

Anyway, the best part about the dream was his house. Nothing special. He didn't need much. It was the location that set it apart from all else. His house rested upon a sea of green grass. The blades moved with the wind, rolling and dipping as one. A gorgeous stretch of land that jutted out over one of his planet's many oceans. In this dream, he actually had a couple of houses—one in the mountains high up with the billy goats, one on high stilts way in the middle of the swamp where he could spend a couple of days fishing, another he stupidly lost in the sand dunes—but this one over the ocean was his favorite. There was a reason for that.

Inside, he had all the modern amenities with none of the fuss of modernity. He lived like the men during Earth's pioneer days hundreds of years ago, and yet he made toasted bread without a brick oven and an open fire. He sipped his wine off the back porch and watched the grass move with the wind, smelled the ocean air, listened to the seagulls, and he waited for the call of a soft voice, the feel of a soft hand on his shoulder. His dream always ended with him looking up at her beautiful face, her smiling down at him. She was beautiful in an off-the-shoulder cotton dress. The setting sun's rays silhouetted her slender body through the thin fabric, and her hair moved with the wind just as the grass did.

And he would think: No more faking, no more imagining, no more candles framing pictures on the wall. She's really here and she's with me. This is our house.

He would stand up, look into her glistening eyes, lower his mouth to hers and…

Okay, so maybe at some point the persistent dream turned into a persistent fantasy, but his doctor had said it was the best way to combat anxiety. "Create a mental safe zone," he said, "a place where you feel relaxed, until the anxiety passes." That dream had always been his safe place; a dream that over the years had expanded and stretched into an elaborate mental fantasy instead of a mental safe zone. Yes, it was dumb, and sometimes even downright wrong. Conrad knew that without anybody having to tell him. Just like keeping pictures, tasteful or otherwise, of a certain person plastered to a wall surrounded by candles. Anybody with half an ounce of good sense would tell him he's off his noggin. Worse yet, everybody else would call him a stalker, and maybe even a pervert. But, they couldn't possibly understand. His fantasy was necessary. He needed it like most species needed to drink water to live. It was his place to escape to when real life got a little…terrifying.

Terrifying, like watching all your hard work go up in flames. His orphanage, for example, coined "Shepards," was meant to help the abandoned and lonely children scattered across the galaxy. He'd been one of them back in the day, and if it weren't for Shepard's shining example in his life, he would probably still be one of them. But he had watched on a closed-circuit vid as the Reapers destroyed his orphanage. The kids, thank God and thanks to every last dime he had saved up, made it out in time.

Not like the ones here on the Citadel.

Terrifying, like watching a school full of children and teachers be overrun with Reaper forces and knowing there was absolutely nothing he could do to save them. The screams of children had shot him back into his safe place so fast—standing on the back porch, glass of wine in hand, soft hand on his shoulder, soft wind in his hair—he couldn't remember much of what happened after that. All he knew was the sound of her voice in his ear. Shepard's voice.

You're okay, Conrad. Don't be afraid. Everything is going to be all right now. Her fingers in his hair. No one can hurt you. Do you know why? Because you're Conrad Verner. Thumb rubbing the back of his neck. Conrad, the soldier. Conrad, the should-have-been-second human Specter. Conrad, defender of the weak. The thumb had begun to dig into his flesh. Conrad, the former Cerberus agent. No one messes with Conrad Verner and lives to tell about it.

From behind her back, his imagined Shepard in her billowy cotton dress produced a shotgun. The breadth of it she slammed into his chest like a hammer. It pulled him from his safe place as surely as if Shepard had tied a rope around his neck and yanked. Next thing he knew, he was somewhere far from the school and there was a shotgun in his hand. Don't ask him how he got it. He wouldn't have been able to tell you. Maybe he pulled it off a dead officer, or maybe it came from an officer, done with trying to defend a people who were impossible to save. Maybe one of them had slapped the gun into his chest. Either way, that's how Conrad found himself with a shotgun in his hands. He'd never used one in his life. All the guns he'd ever carried around were just props. This one had been as real as the death he saw all around him.

Bodies everywhere. Different shapes. Different sizes. Different colors. All races…and some of them were children. He could remember feeling suddenly cold and hot at the same time. His whole body began to tingle. The blood in his brain must have dropped to his feet, because his head felt light, like a balloon. He'd easily slipped right back into his safe place—the quiet of the ocean surf, the cool breeze, the soft hand. He looked up hoping to see soft eyes and saw nothing but a sneer and a fast approaching fist.

Get back out there, he thought he'd heard before the fist met his nose. His head had rocked back and hit a wall. He was fully in the now at that point, and there was no going back to the safe place. His Shepard wouldn't let him back in. He'd heard the bolt slide into the lock.

That's when he heard the scream of a child, and just like the dog he used to have when he was kid (Soldier he had called him) whose hackles would raise when he got angry, Conrad felt something awaken in him he didn't think he ever had. He didn't even know what to call it. Bravery or insanity? All he knew was that he had stepped out of his hiding place, shotgun in hand, and saw a woman running with a little girl in her arms. A husk was tight on their tails and within scratching distance. He screamed, they moved and he shot.

It was like Shepard had stepped into his skin and taken over. An intoxicating feeling, if he must say so. Though he would no more tell Shepard that than he would tell her of his little fantasy. He had saved them. He, him, Conrad Verner had save two people. A mother and her daughter. Got them right into safety's arms. But where did he now find himself?

Terrified, like giving yourself into the hands of death in order to see someone else to safety. He had no idea death could move so gracefully, and with such unhurried assurance. It held no doubts it would take his life as surely as Conrad had saved two. No more need for death to streak toward him. It was but steps away. It's pointed fingers like daggers reached for him. Its death cry pierced his eardrums. Conrad beat on the fantasy door. He begged to be let in. He wanted to feel the grass swaying at his ankles. He wanted the taste of wine on his tongue. He wanted her hands on his shoulder, her voice in his ear. He wanted…needed to be let in, but the way was still locked.

Fight, Conrad! he heard from the other side of the door. Don't give up! Fight! You can do it! I know you can, so DO IT!

Conrad turned from his fantasy's door. He raised his shotgun. Death screamed, he screamed and he shot.

EEE

Click-clack. Click-clack.

The keeper moved toward the door. Instead of opening it, the keeper stopped. Its four hands went busily to work on a panel near the door. It came away easily. The keeper set it aside as it had the one before and set its hands again to work on the conduits and wiring within. Tubes came apart, wires were cut and others spliced together. In a matter of seconds, the room went dark.

"Um," came a cautious volus's voice. "I don't think it worked, Chorban."

In the plunging darkness, Jahleed could not have seen the smile spread upon Chorban's face. This was good, for he might have found the smile a tad uneasy on his system. As much as he appreciated Chorban including him in so much of their work in the last several minutes, he continued to find him intimidating. Safer to hear it from his voice.

"On the contrary, Jahleed. It worked perfectly."

"It did?"

The salarian nodded. "You assume I asked it to open a door, when in fact I asked it to shut off the lights in this room."

"Amazing."

"Yes."

"Now what?"

"Now, for the ultimate test."

Ultimate, Jahleed thought. It meant many things. Vital. Critical. Crucial. But to Jahleed it meant something else—final. He hated that word and the triumph on Chorban's voice when he said it. Final meant the end, and in the middle, as they were, of death and destruction upon the Citadel with the skin-crawling screech of hideous monsters so nearby, the end was not something he wanted to contemplate.

EEE

A shotgun isn't designed for long distances. You can't take aim from a rooftop or the upper floor of a building and hope your well-practiced aim will meet the target with any amount of force. You might hurt somebody, but you're not likely to kill them. Why? Because shotguns shoot pellets, not aerodynamic bullets. Now, if you wanted to get up close and personal with an opponent, the shotgun is your friend. The shotgun is like the dagger in the blade world. It's intended to cause considerable damage at close range. If someone points a shotgun in your face, don't expect to come out of it unscathed when they pull the trigger. The medical examiner would have to source your DNA to identify you, since your face would become a meaty bone pie. Your fingerprints might be a good source of identification, as well, provided you didn't shield your face, palms outward, before the bad guy pulled the trigger.

These ideas, however, were not ones Conrad Verner had ever pursued. He liked guns, but only inasmuch as they helped him complete the picture of a soldier like Commander Shepard. He never tried, nor had ever wondered what it would be like to shoot someone up close. It was okay to pretend he knew what he was doing. Guys sometimes thought he was a real bad dude. They would drop their weapons, apologize, all while the gun in Conrad's hand was no more dangerous than a sandwich. It got him what he needed sometimes—respect, supplies, credits—which he, in turn, used to help others. He was a regular Robin Hood; a thought which made him smile.

Though, not today.

Today, the gun was real. Today, the bad guy wasn't just a poor fool as dimmed witted as his opposer. Today, the bad guy was a monster, and though it didn't know the difference between a real gun and fake one either, it wasn't going to stop unless he pulled the trigger. Today was the only day Conrad Verner was happy to have a real gun in his hands.

The half monster, half asari thing with a mouth opened like the gates of hell gave its final screech with a gurgle. The force of the blast sent its row of near-perfect yet scabrous teeth down its throat. Conrad watched it happen in the split second after the shotgun blast, but before its energy, backed up by micro mass effect fields, propelled the creature backward. It flew like someone had hit it with a powerful biotic kick and it skidded across the ground at least three feet. Yet, his gun, his arms and most likely his face were coated in a fine black mist. Reaper blood.

Heart pounding, body shaking like a leaf in a strong breeze (ocean breeze), Conrad waited. Three or four steps away, the hideous creature lay twitching. He could go to it, make sure, but he wasn't moving one step toward that thing. The luck of the Verner's had always been that the bad guy has the last laugh. That's why his parents were no longer around. He had turned a lot of that crappy luck in his favor lately, but in the last few weeks, it hadn't been all that good. It started with the destruction of his orphanage. He thought his good luck had been coming back around after seeing Shepard multiple times in the holding area of Docking Bay E. Helping her discover what Cerberus had done to the medi-gel supplies, meeting Jenna; each had given his luck, and his confidence, a healthy boost. Then the Reapers had come. He could still hear Jenna's screams when the husks took her. He could still see the blood.

The current state of his luck meant that if he walked up to that monster just to make sure it was dead, it would show him how dead it really was. It would jump from its place on the ground, grab him by the neck with one spindly hand and bring him close…kissing distance close. That was not a position he had any desire to be in. So, he stayed put. Even as the twitching stopped and an ooze of black blood flowed from either side of its ugly head.

It was dead. Sure it was dead.

Conrad sank to the ground, trying to breathe, and rested his head against the quickly cooling metal of the shotgun. He tried the fantasy door one more time, but it was still locked.

"Let me in, Shepard. Let me come in."

He longed for the breeze, for the grass, for the wine, for the touch. This time, though, she didn't even answer. He could almost see her, as if through a peephole. His Shepard was done with the Reaper war. She sat in his chair, she drank his wine and she enjoyed his view. There was no going back in now. He was in this for good or ill.

Conrad tried not to cry, but failed.

EEE

For someone stuck in a pressure suit, breathing manufactured air, not able to move with the freedom he grew up knowing on Irune, Jahleed actually felt liberated. There was something invigorating about not being inside the crate anymore. No low ceiling or four walls enclosing him, nor was he sharing that small space with Chorban, their bodies competing for a place. They were out in the open, free to move about as they wished. There was, however, one drawback.

Reapers.

They'd had to time it just right. Light traffic had passed through their room once again. More than just one or two this time. It felt like a whole battalion. Stomping feet, grunted commands, and Chorban muttering so softly that they didn't have time to wait. Jahleed barely heard him. Thank Plenix those things hadn't, but that was just like Chorban, to let his mouth get him in trouble. All through Chorban's muttering, he had busied himself entering commands into his omni-tool, making sure the keeper kept working. The lights went on. The panel went back in place. Another panel was removed. Mechanisms and wires were realigned.

With perfect timing, and with an opportune gap in troop alignment, one door closed behind a retreating Reaper soldier while the door on the other side of the room slammed shut upon an approaching one.

"Ah-ha!" Chorban exclaimed, though not as loudly as that. Pounding upon the doors meant he hadn't just closed them, but he had locked them as well.

"Was that the ultimate test?" If it was, it was also an exceedingly stupid test.

"No." Chorban entered one last command and shut off his omni-tool. "We must move quickly. We don't have much time."

Without waiting for Jahleed's consent, Chorban rose to his full height, his palms pressed flat against the top of the crate. Light as blinding as the sun stung Jahleed's eyes, but he kept them open. There was always the chance that Chorban had not calculated as perfectly as he thought he had, and that as soon as he walked out from under the shadow of the crate, another shadow would fall over him. The shadow of a monster. But no such threat existed, except for what pounded on the outside to get in, and the room was empty save for himself, Chorban and their new friend, the keeper.

Speaking of the keeper, it had removed another panel, and instead of a wall filled with more wires and tubes, it revealed a lighted keeper tunnel.

"Oh, praise Plen—!"

Chorban pressed his hand over Jahleed's mouthpiece yet again. "Shut up," he harshly whispered, "and get in quick."

Jahleed did as commanded, Chorban ushering him with demanding hands into the tunnel; though, he couldn't help but stare and wonder at the keeper, who stood patiently waiting. A keeper opening panels to secret tunnels wasn't new to Jahleed. He had watched them open these panels before, but they usually entered and closed the panel from the inside before he had a chance to follow. Those were sucky times because Chorban always yelled at him. Jahleed couldn't help it if his suit made him incapable of moving fast. Volus were not known for keeping pace with anyone, not even keepers.

This time around, the keeper stood still, panel held fastidiously in its four hands like a waiter holds onto the menus while waiting for his guests to take their seats. The sight was as curious as a batarian with only two eyes.

As soon as they were in, Chorban furiously tapped his omni-tool and the keeper followed them in. This side of the keeper tunnel was new for both of them. Sure, they had shuffled along inside many a keeper tunnel, but this was the first time inside a hidden one. And never had they witnessed a keeper closing off such a panel from within. Sad thing was, they could no more tell what it did to close it than they could to open it. The keeper's hands moved as fluidly and as quickly as a spider spun silk and weaved the fibers into a web of the most intricate design. Before they knew it, the panel was sealed.

Turning three-sixty, the keeper faced them—Chorban kneeling, with Jahleed taking up the breadth of the tunnel behind him—just as the doors to the room they had just been in whooshed open. They kept quiet, they didn't even breath, as the troopers met each other within the room he and Chorban had just vacated. They had to know something wasn't right. The keeper gone, the upturned crate. They might be big and ugly, but they weren't stupid. There was the sound of something heavy being tossed about—the crate—and then the room went silent.

Over Chorban's shoulder, Jahleed watched a rippling waveform scroll across his omni-tool's holographic screen. A Citadel signal. The keeper turned, reached for the panel, but Chorban was quick. He tapped in a silent command and the keeper dropped its hands. It turned back to face them. Another waveform appeared and the keeper turned back around.

Chorban gasped. "Something keeps overriding my every command."

"Do something, Chorban! Do something!"

The keeper kept twisting back and forth, back and forth. Facing them, then turning away. Facing them, then turning away. It looked like a malfunctioning robot whose internal direction programming had gone haywire. Jahleed felt sure the poor little keeper would turn into a bubbling mass of liquid if this went on much longer.

Chorban's fingers moved so fast they were a blur. Unhappy growls came from the other side of the panel, and then BOOM!

Whatever made the sound was close. Close enough to levitate Jahleed off the ground for a millisecond and stop Chorban's heart for an equal amount of time. But it did something else. It caught the attention of the troops on the other side of the panel. More grunted commands and soon, the monsters were gone. The keeper turned back to them one final time. It seemed relieved. Jahleed could have sworn he saw its shoulders rise and fall.

Chorban breathed, his chest heaving, but he got to his feet, though still hunched over like he had been in the crate. Not everyone was as lucky as Jahleed to be so short in stature.

"What do you think that was?" Jahleed asked.

"It sounded like a shotgun," Chorban said. "We need to move, and quick."

"And go where? Can't we rest for a minute or two?"

"No. Are you crazy? There's no time for rest. People are dying out there."

"But what if we die in here?"

Chorban gave his question a sneer, but otherwise ignored it while he happily tapped away upon his omni-tool again. "Now for the true test."

"Ah, does that mean we are past the ultimate test?"

"Be quiet, Jahleed. You ask more questions than a hatchling." Chorban resumed tapping furiously and did his thinking aloud. "I've just entered a command that, if correctly worded, will perhaps make the keeper obey only my commands in the future. Any commands it receives from the Citadel will be automatically ignored…unless of course, they are important to the security of the Citadel." Chorban moved away and pointed to an overhead light panel. "Bust out that light."

"Why?"

"Jahleed! This is not the time for twenty questions! Please…" Chorban forced himself to calm. "…just do as I ask."

What a frustrating salarian his friend could be at times! Not a day went by that he didn't ask for Jahleed to perform some nonsensical task, so why should today be any different. He shrugged in shoulders, and again, did as commanded. He was perfectly suited, no pun intended, for the task. The glass wouldn't penetrate his flesh or his suit. Inside the keeper tunnel, where Jahleed felt the freest, everything was in easy reach. With just a little bit of force, he slammed one suited arm into the overhead light and glass showered down around him.

"Just as I calculated," Chorban said, looking down at his omni-tool.

Jahleed couldn't see from his vantage point, but he must have captured a Citadel signal, for no sooner than he spoke, the keeper began to move toward the damaged light. It touched a seemingly pointless section of the wall and a bottom panel protruded at Jahleed's feet. He had to stumble quickly out of the way, lest it knock him over. In five seconds flat, it had sucked up all the broken glass.

"Would you look at that!" Jahleed said, shaking his head in astonishment.

"If only we tried this months ago. We wouldn't be scrambling now. Now, to see if my command works." Chorban tapped onto his omni-tool as the keeper reached above its head to begin repairing the light.

Mid-reach, the keeper stopped, lowered its hands and turned to face Chorban, who in turn, and in a very unsalarianlike manner, pumped his fist. "Yes!"

Jahleed gasped. "It has imprinted upon you. It must think you're its mother!"

Happiness at his success quickly waned, and Chorban drew a hand over his wide eyes. "Ugh, Jahleed. Seriously? It's obeying command. A keeper is nothing more than a bug with a computer for a brain; a computer that only does what it's told."

"Well, I think you're being rather impersonal and rude," Jahleed said. He reached out a prehensor to stroke the keeper's arm, like one might a cat or a dog, or maybe a friendly varren…until he remembered the incident in the tunnel some months ago and refrained.

"Of course, I am. Have you ever been personal or polite to a bug?"

"Sure. I think we should name him. What about…Keepie?"

Chorban facepalmed once again. "We don't have time for this foolishness." He tapped his omni-tool and the keeper moved past Jahleed as if he weren't even there. It would have knocked him over if he hadn't gotten his bulk out of the way. Shuffling over to Jahleed, Chorban added, "You want to name it, name it Servant, because that's all it is. Now follow that keeper!"

Jahleed shook his head and followed his shuffling friend's lead. Chorban had never been much for animals. Jahleed, on the other hand… "Oh, I know! How about Greenie, or Buggie? Those are cute names."

"Ugh!"

The keeper disappeared around a corner and so did Chorban, but not without first shooting Jahleed an exhausted glare. Jahleed waddled behind him, miffed only because his suit prevented him from expressing his joy. They were free of the crate, free to go wherever they chose, safe in the hidden keeper tunnels. Best of all, his friend, the very one he at one time thought was out to kill him, had saved his life. Not once, not twice, but three times since the Reaper attack started. That had to be a record of some sort. Sure, they didn't always get along, and maybe sometimes Chorban could be a jerk, and maybe sometimes Jahleed enjoyed intentionally doing stupid things and asked stupid questions just to annoy him (like now), but he could not forget what Chorban had said less than twenty minutes ago.

Had it really been only twenty minutes? Jahleed checked his internal time clock, and yes, his guess was right.

Chorban had said, "We're a team. We're one."

So, maybe it wasn't the absence of the crate that made Jahleed feel liberated and invigorated after all.

EEE

He had another dream. This one was not so good, nor had he bothered to turn it into a recurring fantasy he could enter and exit at will.

In this dream, a monster was pursuing Conrad. A big one. This thing was tall, it was ugly and it had a scream that could rival the cry of a creature in an Irish folktale—a banshee.

In Irish lore, the banshee is a spirit that heralds the death of a family member. Conrad thought he heard the cry of the banshee once as a child when he found out his parents were dead, killed as they stepped out of a restaurant for the credits in their pockets, but that turned out to be his own voice. It didn't change the dream any, the dream that began the night his parents were murdered. The thing chased him down dark streets, keening its hideous cry. It wanted him the way it had wanted his parents—DEAD.

For years, he had outrun it. It was only in recent years, finding his safe place, his "mental safe zone" as the psychologist had called it, finding someone he could look up to, he could aspire to be like, that he had been able to banish the banshee. He hadn't heard his pursuing banshee in so long, he had forgotten what it sounded like…until tonight.

Now, it lay as still and as lifeless as a rock. Bloated belly flattened. Bloated alien breasts hanging on either side of its chest like the air-filled floaties little kids wear on their arms when swimming. It was a sin to call them breasts. That thing was like no woman he had ever seen.

Had he killed it? Had he finally banished the banshee? If he did, it wasn't because he was Conrad, the soldier or Conrad, defender of the weak. He wasn't "so brave" as Jenna said he was. Just because he jumped in front of a bullet meant for Shepard? He only did it because the thought of Shepard dead while he still lived was worse than all the deaths in the galaxy. He surely hadn't been brave when that wave of husks infiltrated the restaurant he had invited Jenna to earlier in the evening. They had been hand in hand, as he remembered. He hadn't thought of Shepard all night, hadn't felt the need to slink into his safe place where nothing could hurt him, and he surely hadn't pretended he was something he wasn't—a soldier or a former Cerberus operative. He had just been Conrad, and it felt good.

When husks started running into the restaurant, when the screams started, he'd tried to be brave. He'd tried to get Jenna to safety. He could remember the way she held onto his arm as though no one else could or had the right to protect her. He hadn't had a weapon, so he had taken her to the back of the restaurant and through the kitchen door, hoping maybe they could get out that way. The thought hadn't occurred to him that the whole station was under attack. He should not have missed the signs. Shepard wouldn't have.

He took her through the kitchen where the staff was already freaking out at the mayhem taking place on the dining room floor. They had buzzed through the kitchen, looking for a back exit, her hand in his, when more husks poured in from the very door he had been searching for. He'd doubled back, knowing they were caught in the crossfire and not knowing what to do about it. His first thought—hide!

So, he had twisted Jenna around, found a broom closet, opened the door, and had been about to shove her in when two husks tackled her to the ground from out of nowhere. He still had the scratches on the palm of his hand from where her nails had dug in.

In a restaurant…just like his parents.

The sound of her dying screams as he hid in the closet hurt so badly that he'd retreated to the safety of his "house." So, no. He wasn't brave. He was a coward. Maybe he had saved the mother and her daughter, but in comparison to Jenna's loss, it didn't really balance the scales in Conrad's mind. He deserved to be chased by the banshee, and if she still wanted him…well then, she could have him.

Conrad pulled himself up, using the butt of the shotgun as a crutch. His legs were like jelly, but he made them move anyway. He took shaky steps toward the banshee, his fingers playing across the scratches on his palm. Shaky step by shaky step until he stood over it. Its face was essentially gone. Its mouth was still a wide-open maw, but now it was a bloody and obliterated maw. Teeth that should have been embedded in the jawbone were now embedded in pieces into the back of its head. The top jaw was a mess of shattered bone and the bottom jaw sat askew and dislocated. One obsidian eye was still open and staring, but the other was gone, the buckshot having gone through the top jaw and out the right eye socket. A piece of jawbone rested upon its boney crest as though it were meant to be there.

He wanted it to move. He wanted its long, daggerlike fingers to pierce him through the chest and end this once and for all. But the banshee wasn't going to be moving anymore. It was dead, and Conrad thought he was going to be sick. In fact, he turned to vomit up everything he had ever eaten in his lifetime when…

SCREEEECH!

His whole body went cold. It wasn't the one on the ground before him. It was another one, and following it was the sound of dozens of feet moving in his direction. And just that quickly, Conrad decided he wasn't ready to die. Not by the hands of a banshee. Not by the hands of husks or any other such creature. He had to run. He had to get away!

Forgetting all about the dead banshee at his feet, Conrad ran for the lift he had seen the mother and her daughter to. It should have opened automatically, but it didn't budge, and he realized with a bit of finality why.

There was a C-Sec regiment on the floor above. That's where he'd been trying to get to when he'd stumbled upon the hell taking place at the school, when his mind locked up and sent him back to his safe place for a while. They must have locked the lift when the mother and her daughter made it to their level. They must have locked the lift and now he was stuck with an approaching army headed in his direction. He was just one man. Was he so dangerous that he warranted an army?

Conrad looked down at the shotgun in his hand. He still had rounds left. Maybe he was so dangerous. Maybe it was his time to die. Conrad pumped a round into the chamber and—

Stopped dead in his tracks.

On the wall opposite the lift, a panel shifted. A beam of light penetrated the darkness on all sides of it and it slid open like a door, held steady in the left hands of an innocuous keeper. Seeing it standing there, bright white light silhouetting it from behind was like something out of a dream, or maybe even a fantasy. There had never been keepers in any of his imaginings. Stranger still, as he watched in ever-growing awe, the keeper raised its two right hands, and in a movement eerily reminiscent of a "come here" gesture, it beckoned him forward.

The screech grew louder. The pounding of feet drew closer. Red lights began to dance on the wall behind him. He was imminently close to death. Conrad could either stand and fight, or run to the light.

Conrad decided to stick with what he knew best. Dreams and fantasies, even the weird ones, were not always a bad thing. You might do things that people outside of them would question (people like your psychologist), but in the end, once inside the fantasy, no one else ran the show but the fantasizer. If, in your fantasy, Command Shepard lived for no one but you, or a keeper could wave you toward an imaginary light, what was the harm? I mean, really?

Conrad ran to the light.

Wanted to get this out yesterday, but life got in the way. Hate it when it does that! Anyway, hope you enjoyed this chapter.