Chapter 8

Author's Note: At the moment, my aim is to put out a new chapter every couple weeks or so. I must admit, this is fuelled in large part by the number of people who have actually bothered to check out my fanfic, and, in particular, those who were generous enough to submit some comments.

One of the things I love about Mass Effect is the dialogue system, and I can think of no truer way to show my appreciation of it than to incorporate it into this novelization. Having said that, there are times where I feel certain conversations are unnecessary or would break the flow of dialogue if I added it in verbatim. And sometimes I just feel the need to put my own spin on things. For those of you who love the dialogue as much as I do, rest assured that there's plenty more to come. For those of you who want a little more originality, be patient: your time will come.

I also wish to respond to the readers who questioned whether Anderson is the best candidate to serve as editor to Shepard's personal logs, given my aim to incorporate elements from the Ciaphas Cain series, and the relationship between Cain and his editor. While several good points have been raised, I should clarify tha,t while I am drawing certain elements and inspiration from the Cain series, this fanfic is not intended to be a direct translation. I also thought that it might break some suspension of disbelief if the editor had to constantly explain themes or terminology to an audience who already knew that stuff—readers may recall that I phased out the more dictionary-type explanations early on. In addition, when I started this fanfic, Anderson seemed the best option, given his maturity, experience, and probable security clearance. If I knew what I knew now... maybe I would've picked someone else.

For the time being, I intend to stick with the status quo. More to Shepard's sorrow, I'm sure, given what the Hero of the Skyllian Blitz encounters during the "status quo." Speaking of which...

I've done a lot of crazy things in my time, especially since I gained a certain horrible title, but playing chicken with a tank is definitely not one of them. Especially if the tank has legs.

Given that I was clearly distracted, I may be forgiven for not noticing the red beam dancing over my hardsuit... right up until it flashed and my shields went down. Not just took some damage. My shields were completely drained!

I suppose, after all the times I've overloaded the shields of my enemies, it was bound to happen to me sooner or later. It just goes to show, the universe really does run on irony.

"Take cover," I yelled, leaping for a nearby shipping container, which was the closest cover I could see. As my fire-team joined me, I noticed Kaidan's fire-team follow suit, hiding behind another shipping container. Frantically, I re-routed some of the power in my hardsuit to boost my shield recovery. To my relief, I saw the little blue "shield bar" fill up. I was safe. For now.

"Commander," Tali said, somehow keeping the trembling in her voice to a minimum. "I might be able to shift the odds in our favour, but I need a distraction so I can throw a tech mine."

"How's that going to help?" I asked. From what I saw before the container blocked my field of vision, the geth were pretty spread out. Tali wouldn't be able to disable more than a couple of geth, at best.

"Trust me," she said, her fingers already tapping away at her omni-tool.

Her omni-tool. The Savant omni-tool that I'd given her. I looked down at my new omni-tool, which Tali had worked her magic on as a thank-you gift. If she could do that...

I glanced at my HUD. Nothing but static, and a red "JAMMED" error message. So much for using that to formulate a plan of my own. Might as well go for the next best thing: "People, Tali's got a plan, and we're going to cover her. Pick a target of opportunity, fire at will, and don't get killed. We move on three: one, two, THREE!"

In unison, the squad poked their heads out and started firing. I was able to deal a whopping amount of damage to one of the hopping geth before it started shining a little red laser at me. Not wanting to lose my shields again, I decided discretion was the better part of valour and ducked back under cover.

It was at this point that something occurred to me: the geth were still firing but, judging by the lack of shots hitting our hiding spots, they were no longer firing at us. Noticing that my squad was still following my original orders, I decided to follow suit, and indulge my curiosity later.

I popped back out and opened fire again. In a stroke of luck, the geth I'd chosen was the same one I'd been firing at earlier. Either that, or it had a twin who had also taken a lot of damage. Either way, its shields were gone, and it was "bleeding" conductive fluid, so I only needed a couple shots to take it down.

Apparently, that was the last geth that was jamming our sensors, because my HUD abruptly cleared up. To my surprise, there was only one enemy signal in the vicinity. (1) Warily, I poked my head around the corner of the container.

Not surprisingly, the geth armature was still standing. Surprisingly, it was surrounded by geth bodies. Did Tali just...

I shook my head. Time to query about that later. "Tali, sabotage its weapons. Garrus—the shields. Kaidan, Wrex—biotics."

Sounds like another crazy plan, but when there aren't any other hostiles around; you'd be surprised how vulnerable a giant geth can become. After that kind of tech and biotic onslaught, the armature turned out to be easy pickings. It still took a few minutes until it collapsed, but they turned out to be a remarkably pain-free set of minutes.

Now that we were safe, we gathered together. "Tali... what did you do?" I asked.

She shrugged. "Hacked the armature's IFF protocols," she replied, unwittingly echoing my own modest words back on Eden Prime.

Kaidan, Garrus and I looked at each other, looked back at Tali and extended our arms—the one holding our omni-tools—towards Tali. "Can I have a copy," we asked in unison.

Tali jumped. Maybe we came on a little too strong. "S-Sure," she stuttered.

While she was copying over her hacking program, Ashley and Wrex scouted around. They reported that there were no other geth in the vicinity, and no Dr. T'Soni. Unless she was somewhere else entirely, she was in the mine, and the only way in was through a hatch at the top of a ramp. So that's where we went. Come right in, said the spider to the fly...

The first couple hundred metres consisted of a long cylindrical mining shaft. Nothing but rock and the occasional light for illumination. It was pretty peaceful until we reached the end of the shaft and almost bumped into the geth shock trooper.

We never got to find out whether it was a sentry or just going out to see whether the organic trespassers were pushing up daisies. The shock trooper fired at us, we fired back, and we walked away. And then we ducked, as a shot dug a nice hole in the rock overhead. We had emerged onto a catwalk that led off to a small ramp on the right. Below us, another shock trooper and a sniper were trying to take us out. Two of them versus six of us, and we had the high ground. They didn't last long.

After that, we headed down the catwalk and over to an elevator, which took us to another catwalk, which led to another elevator. In the distance, we could see some kind of blue glow. Possibly the signal Joker had detected earlier.

We did face some more geth, this time in the form of three assault drones, but it wasn't much to worry about. In fact, some of the squad felt relaxed enough to chat immediately after the fight.

"It looks like this cavern formed around the ruins. After it was built," Tali observed. She had a point. It didn't look like any of the rock had to be blasted out of the way to make way for whatever the Protheans built, and it seemed unlikely that they just happened to find a perfectly shaped hole to set up base.

"I wonder what Liara's looking for in here. Most Prothean ruins have nothing more than dead instrumentation," Garrus said, as we entered the second elevator. In other words, no data caches like the one we found on Mars. Maybe it was a more "traditional" kind of archaeological dig.

This time, the elevator only went down about four fifths of the way before screeching to a stop in a shower of sparks. Looking at my team, I shrugged and hopped down to the ramp below. It looked like whatever it was originally connected to had collapsed at some point, but there was another catwalk a couple metres below. It looked like it was right in front of the blue glow we had seen earlier.

"Uh... hello?" a voice called out. "Could somebody help me? Please?"

We hopped down onto the catwalk and faced the blue glow, which turned out to be some kind of force field. Behind it, a young asari hovered in mid-air, her arms extended perpendicular to her body. Probably due to the blue energy sphere she was encased in.

"Can you hear me out there," the asari asked. "I am trapped! I need help!"

"Calm down," I said soothingly. "What's your name?"

"Dr. Liara T'Soni," she replied. "I'm an archaeologist."

"Are you okay? What happened to you?"

"I'm fine," she answered. "Listen: this thing I am in is a Prothean security device. I cannot move, so I need you to get me out of it, all right?"

"How did you end up in there?" I asked.

"I was exploring the ruins when the geth showed up, so I hid in here. Can you believe that? Geth! Beyond the Veil!"

While the novelty had worn off for us, we chose to stay silent and let her continue. "I activated the base's defences. I knew the barrier curtains would keep them out. When I turned it on, I must have hit something I wasn't supposed to. I was trapped in here. You must get me out. Please!"

Not before I ask a couple questions: "We're looking for a turian named Saren Arterius. Do you know of him?"

"My mother, Benezia, mentioned him."

"That would be Matriarch Benezia," Garrus asked.

"That's right."

"How did they know each other?" Garrus continued, his C-Sec training taking over. Qualms about C-Sec aside, Garrus seemed to be fully in his element, so I decided to let someone else do all the talking for a change.

"They are investors in the same company: Binary Helix. They met at some function or other, many years ago. From what Mother said, he sounds rather cold and grim."

Now Garrus asked the big question: "We believe your mother is working for Saren. What can you tell us about that?"

"Working for Saren?" She looked surprised. "I did not know that. But I have not spoken to her in years. It is hard to keep in contact when you are constantly moving between sites." She paused. "I am sorry, I realize you must have many questions, but could you please get me out of here?"

"We'll find some way to help you," I promised. "We just need to find some way past the barrier curtain."

Liara looked relieved. "There is a control in here that should deactivate this thing. You'll have to find some way past the barrier curtain. That's the tricky part. The defences cannot be shut off from the outside. I don't know how you'll get in here.

"Be careful," she warned. "There is a krogan with the geth. They have been trying different ways to get past the barrier."

"We'll keep our eyes open. Hang in there," I said.

Looking around, I saw another set of ramps leading down to the bottom of the cavern. It seemed like as good a place as any to start our search.

We had only taken a few steps when our sensors cut out and gunfire bounced off our shields. Ducking down, I grabbed my pistol. It looked like we had some more company. One shock... no, two shock troopers. A rocket trooper. And a sniper or one of those hoppers, judging from the havoc it was wreaking on our sensors.

While we had the high ground, they had a rocket launcher. And possibly a sniper rifle. We wouldn't win this battle if we all stayed up here and took pot-shots from a distance. Nope, as much as I hated it, we'd stand a better chance if we got up close and personal.

Though that didn't mean we had to abandon the high ground altogether. "Kaidan, take Ashley and Wrex and charge those geth. Garrus, you and I are on sniper duty. Tali, see if you can provide tech support from up here."

I suppose I could say that I wanted to shake up the teams a bit, give everyone a taste for working with different people. In truth, I just wanted to stay away from the action for once. (2)

Whether it was thanks to those instincts or some tactical fluke, my plan worked perfectly. Garrus took out the rocket trooper's shields with one shot, allowing me to drill a hole right through its flashlight head. Tali knocked out the shields of both shock troopers, who had the misfortune of standing close to each other, which made things very easy for Kaidan and Ashley. Satisfied that everything was under control, Wrex charged ahead to deal with the last geth. I couldn't see what happened, but I heard a distinct crunching sound, followed by a deep laugh.

I motioned for Garrus and Tali to follow me, and we headed to the ground. Kaidan nodded to me when we arrived. "We're clear, Commander," he reported.

"Good," I responded. "Link up with Wrex and search the right side of the cavern. We'll take the left."

"On it," he said. "Ash, with me."

"Right behind you, LT."

It took us about forty minutes to search the cavern. I found a couple lockers filled with ammo blocks, weapons mods, and a few weapons to slot them into. Or sell for creds. I also found the crumpled remains of a geth sniper, its chest plating completely caved in. Death by krogan, I guess.

More importantly, I found a large mining laser. Tapping the controls, I found it was still operational. Command functions were locked out, though, but it seemed pretty easy to crack. I radioed my discovery to Kaidan and the others, and told them to meet us.

By the time they arrived, I'd managed to get the laser working. With a roar, the laser blasted into the ground. It was only active for a minute before the power cell gave out, but that was enough. Peering through all the dust that had been stirred up, we could see the laser had cut through the ground and into some kind of artificial chamber.

Taking a gamble, I hopped down. It looked like the chamber was a short passageway. There was a control panel of some sort at the end. I jogged over and examined it. To my surprise, I recognized the configuration as a standard holographic interface for an elevator system. I guess some things haven't changed, even after fifty thousand years or so.

I relayed my discovery to the squad and told them to join me, activating the controls as soon as they arrived. The platform hummed and rose to another level. Like the previous level, it consisted of a small passageway. It also had a console, a barrier curtain, and a floating asari.

Liara turned her head as we approached. Apparently, the security device only restricted movement from the neck down. "How... how did you get in here?" she asked, bewildered. "I didn't think there was any way past the barrier."

I gestured back towards the elevator platform, and then mentally slapped myself as I realized her peripheral vision probably didn't extend that far. "We blasted through with the mining laser."

"Of course. Yes. That makes sense. Please... get me out of here before those geth show up. That console over there should shut down the containment field."

I walked over to the console and activated the holographic interface. Again, I quickly managed to figure out the controls. It was just like every other operating software I'd learned since school. Were the Protheans really so good that they had made the perfect OS? One that no one had bested in the last...

I shook my head. Time to ponder such questions later. Tapping the appropriate controls, I turned just in time to see Liara land on the ground.

"Any idea how we get out of this place?" Wrex asked. He had a point. With the gaps in the catwalks, there was no way we'd be able to get back up.

"That elevator back there should take us out of here," Liara answered. "Come on!"

As we walked, I filled Liara in on the rest of the events that had brought us to Therum. To say she was shocked might be an understatement.

"I—I still can't believe all this," Liara said in a dazed voice. "Why would the geth come after me? Do you think my mother is involved?"

"Saren's looking for the Conduit. You're a Prothean expert," Kaidan pointed out. "It's logical to assume he wants you to help him find it."

"The Conduit? But I don't—"

Liara broke off as a tremor shook the cavern. Dust and pebbles started to tumble from above, raining down over us.

"What the hell was that?" Ashley asked tensely.

"These ruins are not stable," Liara answered. "That mining laser must have triggered a seismic event."

Great.

Liara moved over to the elevator panel and activated the controls. "We have to hurry. The whole place is caving in."

I opened a channel to the Normandy. "Joker! Lock in on our signal for immediate evac. On the double, mister!"

"Roger that, Commander. ETA: eight minutes."

"It's going to be tight," Garrus muttered.

The elevator ride seemed faster than anything else I'd seen. Or maybe I was distracted by the thought of impending doom. It didn't take long before we emerged in a large round chamber. There was only one passageway leading from it, blocked by another barrier curtain, four geth and a krogan.

"Wrex, Tali, you're with me again," I said, my voice remarkably calm given the circumstances. "Ashley, Garrus, follow Kaidan and stay close to Liara."

Before they could respond, the other krogan spoke. "Surrender," he ordered. "Or don't. That would be more fun."

"In case you didn't notice, this place is falling apart," I replied mildly.

The krogan grinned. "Exhilarating, isn't it? Hand the doctor over."

"Whatever it is you want, you're not getting it from me," Liara snapped.

"She'll stay with us, thanks," I said. Just in case the krogan didn't understand her.

Unfortunately, he understood, but wouldn't take no for an answer. "Not an option," he shook his head. "Saren wants her. And he always gets what he wants." He turned to his geth goons. "Kill them. Spare the asari if you can. If not," he shrugged, "doesn't matter."

So much for giving Saren what he wanted. The ex-Spectre really ought to look into his hiring practices.

"Kaidan, get Liara to the back of the room!" I ordered. "Everyone, weapons free! Take out the geth first!"

That last order was given for a reason. Experience, especially the recent ones, had proven how krogan could soak up a ridiculous amount of damage. Spending time in an attempt to take this krogan out would give the rest of the geth ample opportunity to shoot at us. In this case, it was better to take out the small fry.

I decided to start with the small fry packing the rocket launcher. I charged at the rocket trooper, noting with some dismay how often I'd been doing that lately. Clearly, my attempts to listen to my once-keen sense of self-preservation needed more work.

It didn't help that it felt damn good to knock the geth over on its synthetic ass and shoot it at point-blank range.

"Nice," Wrex complimented, shooting at a shock trooper with his shotgun. Tali didn't say anything, choosing to throw a tech mine at that trooper to disable its shields, which allowed Wrex to finish the job with one shot.

"Commander, look out," Kaidan yelled. I turned around, just in time to see the krogan charging at me. Remembering what Wrex said about krogan in Chora's Den, and the fate of the geth sniper back in the cavern, I did the only sensible thing: I ran like hell.

I managed to avoid getting crushed into the wall. Unfortunately, I wasn't quite fast enough to avoid him entirely, as he managed to clip my shoulder. Thrown off-balance, I tumbled to the ground.

I rolled onto my back and pointed my pistol at the krogan. There was no way I could get onto my feet and start running in time. Maybe the others could save my ass, but, if not, at least I could fire off a shot or two. The krogan turned around, took one step forward...

...and rose into the air, limbs flailing madly. I jerked my head around in confusion, and saw Liara, arm extended, body wreathed in biotic energy. I guess she could hold her own after all. Good to know.

Glancing around, I saw that the other geth had been taken out. The rest of my squad moved to join me, followed by Liara.

"Commander, you okay?" Kaidan asked.

"Yeah. Thanks for the heads-up." I turned to Liara. "And thank you for the assist."

"We really shouldn't just leave him like that," Wrex said, lifting his shotgun. The rest of us followed suit. It was the oddest game of piñata I'd ever played, but damn if it didn't feel good.

Leaving the still-floating but certainly dead krogan behind, we moved to the barrier curtain. It looked like... I squinted. It looked like it was flickering.

Abruptly, it vanished. Another tremor shook the room, hinting at the cause of the curtain's disappearance and reminding us what we were originally trying to do.

We all started running at once. The passageway opened up into the cavern we'd originally entered, linking up with another catwalk... I couldn't believe my luck. It looked like it would connect with the mining shaft that connected with the mine entrance!

Doing a quick head-count, I realized that Liara must have fallen behind, and turned about. My eyes landed on Liara, then moved to the catwalk behind her. Just to see a couple boulders plummet down, ripping right through the catwalk like it wasn't even there.

"Move, move, MOVE!" I yelled, reaching to grab Liara and yank her ahead of me. Not needing any more encouragement, everyone broke out into a sprint.

I pumped my arms and legs until I thought they'd fall off. My heart was pounding so hard, it felt like it was going to explode. Rocks and boulders were falling all around us, and the tremor had grown from an intermittent tremble to a constant rattle.

Somehow, we made it out of the mine. Judging by the sudden rush of debris, it looked like we'd made it out just before the whole thing collapsed. Relieved, both by our escape from being buried alive and the welcome sight of the Normandy descending in front of us, we slowed to a walk, panting and heaving.

I'd say the universe would have to try harder to bump me off, but it would probably take me seriously.

"Too close, Commander."

That was Joker. It had been about three hours since we stumbled back onto the Normandy, so relieved to be alive that no one complained about the length of time it took to complete the decontamination cycle. I had ordered the squad to take a long relaxing shower before drafting up an AAR, sending it to Joker (who would collect all the reports and send them off to Alliance brass), and meeting up in the comm room for a debriefing. Well, Kaidan and Ashley had to write an AAR. The others weren't part of the Alliance chain of command. I later learned that Liara spent the time walking around the ship while Wrex lurked in the garage. Garrus and Tali spent the time carefully extricating a geth rocket trooper from the left front wheel. One of the casualties from my unorthodox Mako technique, it had gotten caught in the wheel and dragged along for the last part of our journey. I figured the Alliance could figure out what to do with it.

Anyways, since I had given those orders as we were leaving the airlock, which was within spitting distance of the cockpit, I gathered that Joker had overheard, and knew when and where we'd be there.

"Ten more seconds and we would've been swimming in molten sulphur," Joker continued. "The Normandy isn't equipped to land in exploding volcanoes. They tend to fry our sensors and melt our hull. Just for future reference," he finished helpfully.

"We almost died out there and your pilot's making jokes?" Liara asked.

"Joker pulled our asses out of there," I shrugged. "I think he's earned the right to a few bad jokes."

"I see," she said hesitantly. "It must be a human thing. I don't have a lot of experience dealing with your species, Commander," she admitted. "But I am grateful to you. You saved my life back there, and not just from the volcano. Those geth would have killed me. Or handed me off to Saren."

"Do you know what Saren wanted with you?" Kaidan asked. "Could it have something to do with the Conduit?"

"I'm not sure," she replied. "I only know that it was somehow connected to the Prothean extinction. That is my real area of expertise. I have spent the past fifty years trying to figure out what happened to them."

I thought my ears were still ringing from the mine collapse. It sounded like she had said fifty years.

"How old are you, exactly?" I couldn't help but ask. Rude, I know, but maybe asari weren't as prickly about that question as humans were.

My hunch proved accurate. Either that, or she was really polite. "I hate to admit it," Liara said, embarrassed, "but I am only a hundred and six."

"Damn!" Ashley admired. "I hope I look that good when I'm your age."

"A century may seem like a long time to a short-lived species like yours. But among the asari, I am barely considered more than a child," Liara responded. So I wasn't completely off after all. "That is why my research has not received the attention it deserves. Because of my youth, other asari scholars tend to dismiss my theories on what happened to the Protheans."

"I've got my own theory about why the Protheans disappeared," I said, my mind flashing back to Eden Prime and that wonderful beacon.

Liara smiled politely. "With all due respect, commander, I have heard every theory out there. The problem is finding evidence to support them. The Protheans left remarkably little behind. It is almost as if someone did not want the mystery solved. As if someone came along after the Protheans were gone and cleansed the galaxy of clues.

"But here is the incredible part," she continued, getting slightly more animated as she talked. "According to my findings, the Protheans were not the first galactic civilization to mysteriously vanish. This cycle began long before them."

"Where'd you come up with this theory," I asked curiously. "I thought you just said there wasn't any evidence."

"I have tracked down every scrap and shred of evidence over the past fifty years. Eventually, subtle patterns started to emerge. Patterns that hint at the truth. It is... difficult to explain to someone else. I cannot point to one specific thing to prove my case. It is more... a feeling derived from a half-century of dedicated research.

"But I know I am right. And eventually I will be able to prove it. There were other civilizations before the Protheans. This cycle has repeated itself many times over."

"If the Protheans weren't the first, then who was?" I asked. This was getting interesting. If nothing else, the beacon's visions suggested at least part of her theory was accurate.

"I don't know," Liara admitted. "There is hardly any evidence on the Protheans, and even less on those who came before them. I cannot prove my theory. But I know I am right! The galaxy is built on a cycle of extinction. Each time a great civilization rises up; it is suddenly and violently cast down. Only ruins remain.

"For example, the Protheans rose up from a single world until their empire spanned the entire galaxy. Yet even they climbed to the top on the remains of those who came before. Their greatest achievements—the mass relays and the Citadel—are based on the technology of those who came before them.

"And then, like all the other forgotten civilizations throughout galactic history, the Protheans disappeared. I have dedicated my life to figuring out why."

"They were wiped out by a race of sentient machines," I replied. "The Reapers."

"The—the Reapers? But I have never heard of—" Liara's confusion at this new theory was quickly supplanted by her curiosity. "How do you know this? What evidence do you have?"

"There was a damaged Prothean beacon on one of our colonies, Eden Prime, which was attacked by Saren and the geth. It burned a vision into my brain. I'm still trying to sort out what it all means."

"Visions?" Liara said slowly. "Yes... that makes sense. The beacons were designed to transmit information directly into the mind of the user. Finding one that still works is extremely rare. No wonder the geth attacked your colony. The chance to acquire a working beacon—even a badly damaged one—is worth almost any risk."

She turned to look at me directly. "But the beacons were only programmed to interact with Prothean physiology. Whatever information you received would have been confused, unclear." No kidding.

"I am amazed you were able to make sense of it at all," she marvelled. "A lesser mind would have been utterly destroyed by the process. You must be remarkably strong-willed, Commander.

"Okay, this isn't helping us find Saren. Or the Conduit," Ashley interrupted impatiently.

"Of course. You are right. I am sorry," Liara apologized. "My scientific curiosity got the better of me. Unfortunately, I do not have any information that could help you find the Conduit. Or Saren."

Maybe not yet. But my mission was far from over. If we did turn up something, Liara's expertise might come in handy. In the meantime, keeping her around would make it harder for Saren to lay his mitts on her. I said as much, and she agreed. Wrex added that her biotics would come in handy when the fighting started again. Recalling her performance in the mine, I had to agree.

"Thank you, Commander," Liara said again. "I am very grate...whoa." She lifted a hand to prop her head up. "I am afraid I am feeling a bit light-headed."

Kaidan frowned. "When was the last time you ate? Or slept? Dr. Chakwas should take a look at you."

"It is probably just mental exhaustion, coupled with the shock of discovering the Protheans' true fate. I need some time to process all this," she replied. "Still, it could not hurt to be examined by a medical professional. It will give me the chance to think things over. Are we finished here, Commander?"

I nodded. "Crew, dismissed."

Joker's voice came over the intercom again, as the squad got up and left. "Mission reports are filed, Commander. You want me to patch you through to the Council?"

Right. I had forgotten. Now that I was a Spectre, my AARs would go to them, too. "Patch them through, Joker," I replied. It wouldn't be the first time my superiors wanted to clarify a point or two. Or second-guess me from behind their desks.

"Setting up the link now, Commander." I turned to face the holo-projectors, which were stationed in front of the room's viewscreen. I had only been waiting for a minute before the projectors lit up and TPTB flickered to life.

"We've received your report, Commander," the asari councillor greeted me. "I understand Dr. T'Soni is on the Normandy."

"I assume you're taking the necessary security precautions?" the turian councillor asked pointedly.

Not sure whether he was questioning whether our security precautions were adequate or whether I was implementing them at all, I answered with the truth. In simple terms, just in case. "Liara's on our side. The geth were trying to kill her."

"Benezia would never allow Saren to kill her daughter," the asari councillor spoke again. She seemed quite convinced.

"Maybe she doesn't know," the salarian councillor suggested.

"Or maybe we don't know her," the turian councillor said suspiciously. "We never expected she could become a traitor."

"At least the mission was a success," the salarian councillor tried to change the topic.

The turian councillor snorted. "Apart from the utter destruction of a major Prothean ruin. Was that really necessary, Shepard?"

Absolutely. See, I wanted to run through a mine while it was collapsing all around me, so I deliberately fired the biggest laser I could find. "The geth were crawling all over those ruins," I said sharply. "We were lucky to make it out of there alive."

"Of course, Commander," the salarian councillor said soothingly. "The mission must always take priority."

"Good luck, Commander," the asari councillor concluded. "Remember: we are all counting on you."

Clearly, they were suffering from the collective delusion that I could save the day. Now that was funny. Still, I waited until the transmission cut out before chuckling to myself.

While this mission didn't provide any smoking guns, I considered this mission a success, never mind what a certain grouchy turian said otherwise. I pondered my next move. There were the other two leads Udina had provided. Mind you, they still seemed like wild-goose chases to me. And there were two more systems in the Artemis Tau cluster. Since I was already here anyways, I might as well check out them out first. If nothing else, I could do a quick survey and earn some more credits.

With that decision, I ordered Joker to head for the Sparta system. We had just entered when Joker called me over the radio.

"Message coming in. Patching it through."

"Commander Shepard, my name is Nassana Dantius," a woman spoke. "I have a job for you. I can't say any more in an unsecured communication. If you're interested in hearing my offer, meet me on the Citadel so we can discuss this in person. I'll be waiting in the diplomat's lounge on the Presidium."

Interesting. Another somebody who wanted me to do something for her. But this one had a sense of discretion, and enough class or influence to hobnob with the bigwig elites. This could be really good or really bad.

Okay, slight change of plan. Finish exploring this system, head back to the Citadel to listen to this request (and sell off the surplus weapons I'd acquired), and then I'd follow up on one of Udina's leads. Oh, and there was Admiral Hackett's request/order to deal with a rogue VI, up close and personal. Maybe I should handle that before I reach the Citadel. Well, at least I wouldn't be bored.

To my delight, we found a few interesting things. Two of the planets had resources worth noting—a small deposit of plutonium and a large concentration of hydrogen, to be exact. The asteroid belt had some kind of bio-dome, still functioning after all this time, with a Prothean data disc embedded in a control console. I gave that to Liara to play with.

Just as we were about to leave, we picked up a distress signal from one of the planets: Edolus. We were the closest ship in the area, and my reputation would hardly stand for me to sit by and do nothing. Sighing, I radioed the squad and told them to gear up. I pretended to ignore the groans as they signed off to prepare themselves for the delights of riding in the Mako. Nothing I wasn't feeling myself, believe me. I also paged Dr. Chakwas and inquired as to Liara's status. Upon hearing she was fine and ready for duty, I told her to send Liara to meet us in the garage.

Once Liara arrived, I looked over her equipment. All she had was a Mark VIII Stiletto pistol, apparently to fend off any pirates or grave-robbers she might encounter on her archaeological expeditions. No other weapons, no hardsuit, nothing. Well, other than her strong command of biotics. Anyways, I gave her some of the weapons and equipment I'd acquired so far, giving thanks for my compulsive scrounging. I even managed to dust off a Mark VI Crisis hardsuit. That particular hardsuit was designed for humans, but, thankfully, it was compatible with asari physiology. And it would surely provide a lot more protection than her uniform.

Once the Normandy dropped us off, and we headed for the distress signal. It was coming from the middle of a large, flat depression of land, approximately 80 metres in diameter, right next to a burning vehicle. As we got closer, we ID'ed the vehicle as a Grizzly and the probable source of the distress signal: a transmitter of some sort. Once we got even closer, we saw bodies. A lot of bodies.

Suddenly, the Mako's sensors screamed as it detected a localized ground disturbance to the right. Glancing over, I saw a large light brown mass burst out of the ground. Its four mandibles opened up and it shrieked, just before it spit a glob of neon green acid at us.

"What the hell?" Ashley and Tali exclaimed in unison.

"Thresher maw," I said tersely. I'd seen them before, both from the comfort of my desk during OCS lectures, which I infinitely preferred, and a couple times up close and personal during my career. Thankfully, I'd stayed awake during the lectures, and knew how to handle them, or I would've been killed a long time ago. For once, I blessed the perils of our recent jaunt to Therum, as all the armatures and turrets we'd found there provided some excellent practise.

"Kaidan, Ashley, get on the weapons. You know the drill," I ordered, making a mental note to get the other squad members trained on the Mako as soon as possible.

The thresher maw was most accommodating, standing there and spitting acid at us rather than burrowing back underground and making us play any guessing games, so it's understandable that we brought it down after a few minutes. We waited for a few minutes, just in case any cousins to pop out. When none appeared, we cautiously crept out of the Mako to investigate the bodies.

They were human. Alliance marines, to be exact. "They must have been lured here by the beacon," Ashley realized.

Kaidan was busy interfacing with the Grizzly's computer. "Looks like they were under Admiral Kahoku's command. He'd want to know what happened here." I made a note to look up his contact details once we got back.

There was nothing else to do but get back in the Mako. Before we left, I had Ashley send a MAC round to blow up the transmitter. The thresher maw might be dead, but I didn't want to get dragged all the way back here just because some other doofus got lured in. (3)

After we got in the Mako, I did a quick 180 and headed in the opposite direction, rather than getting on the radio and calling the Normandy for a pickup.

"Sir," Kaidan was the first to break the silence. "Where are we going?"

"The Normandy picked up some additional features when we got into orbit, including some possible mineral deposits. I downloaded them into the Mako's map and figured we could check it out."

"Of course, sir," Kaidan responded.

Naturally, the closest deposit was at the top of a mountain. So I had to weave the Mako back and forth, zigzagging my way to the top. As I drove, I heard Liara whisper to Ashley "Is this sort of activity encouraged in the Alliance, Chief?" To which Ashley replied: "Not in Basic. Maybe in OCS. LT?"

"Not when I was there," Kaidan said.

"It doesn't seem so unusual to me," Tali commented. "In the Flotilla, we're always searching for resources, so we can stay as self-sufficient as possible."

Wrex had other concerns on his mind. "Shepard," he barked. "Are we there yet?"

"Yep," I replied, seeing the mineral deposit as I rounded a particularly large boulder. Parking the Mako, I hopped out to get a more thorough survey. The squad also took the opportunity to bail out and stretch.

Wrex was the last to get out, in part because he had to manoeuvre his bulk around the seats and out the hatch. "Whoever designed that piece of crap should be shot," he grumbled.

"Amen to that," Ashley agreed.

We hit two more mineral deposits and a crashed probe (that was carrying grenade and ammo upgrades for some bizarre reason) before I decided to call it a day. By that point, Wrex was offering his services at a discount and the others were at least considering that option.

Deciding to stay in Hackett's good graces, my next stop was Luna. Earth's moon.

Luna is pretty much what you saw in the vids: gray, lifeless and boring. At least the terrain provided plenty of possible drop zones. Joker was able to drop the Mako so close to the training ground, we got there in less than five minutes.

The training ground consisted of three compounds. Each with two turrets. Naturally. This time, Garrus and Wrex grabbed the weapon controls. Officially, because they had received a crash course between Edolus and Luna. Unofficially, because they wanted a chance to stretch their limbs, even if it meant they'd have an increased chance of bumping their heads against the roof when I inevitably and repeatedly hit the thrusters. They did a pretty good job, too. The shields did take a lot of damage, but that was mostly due to the challenge of dodging and jumping six rockets at once.

Once the turrets were destroyed, I picked a compound at random, we got out, and we went in.

The compounds are another example of how unoriginal the Citadel races are as a whole. If the compound is circular, and has a flat roof, it always has the following layout: first passageway leads from the entrance to a small room, which probably has some lockers, crates and boxes—some of which you can hack. To the left is a door, with another passageway leading to a larger room. This room will inevitably be filled with haphazardly-arranged shipping crates, boxes and whatnot. If there's any action to be had, the majority will be in there. At the far end of the room is a T-shaped corridor, with each end opening up into a smaller room that'll likely have more supplies to loot, more enemies to shoot, or both. (4)

The Alliance training ground compounds were no exception. In this case, the room at each end of the T-shaped corridor had four computer cores. That meant we'd have to disable twenty-four computers. Someone clearly had an obsession for redundancy. Since Hackett had neglected to give me any shutdown protocols or specify exactly how he wanted me to "disable" the VI, I chose the simplest solution: venting my frustration on the computers with my pistol.

Anyways, the first compound was guarded by about half a dozen assault drones and some toxic gas dispensers that weren't very toxic. The second one had more drones and automatically raised kinetic barriers at each and every door when we started taking out the computers.

Those two compounds were so easy; we entered the third one thinking it would be a piece of cake.

The swarm of drones, many of whom were armed with rocket launchers, vaporized our complacency in a heartbeat.

We hurtled back into the first room. I lunged for the door and slapped the control panels. As the door obediently slid shut, I sagged to the door. Everyone was feeling the adrenaline rush. Even Wrex was impressed. "This compound may not be so boring, after all," he conceded.

The next few minutes were spent adding upgrade mods to our hardsuits. Medical exoskeletons, energized platings, shield interfaces. Anything that would keep us alive a few minutes longer.

It was while I was handing Liara a combat exoskeleton package that I noticed a small storage locker. It was tucked away between two large shipping crates, which was why I hadn't noticed it earlier. I hacked it open and stared. My eyes bulged.

It was like my prayers had been answered. Sure, there was a shotgun and a pistol, but the real treasure was the Mark IX Predator M armour, equipped with one of the best shield and tech/biotic protection packages out there. It was just sitting there, mine for the taking, without having to pay the exorbitant prices one would typically expect of an Armax Arsenal product.

I ducked behind a crate to change hardsuits, reflecting on how odd that felt. The last time I'd had to go shopping for clothes was back in school. Ever since I'd enlisted, the Alliance had handled all of my clothing requirements. Simple, basic, and immune to the constantly changing whims and fashions of the snooty bimbos with way too much time on their hands and nothing of value between their ears.

I indulged myself to admire the green-and-black camouflage pattern on my new hardsuit before stepping out. "Everyone ready?"

"Waiting on you," Kaidan said, with a completely straight face.

"In that case, here's the plan," I replied, laying out the thoughts I'd strung together while I was stuffing myself into my new hardsuit. "Ashley, Garrus, Liara—you're under Kaidan's command. Wrex and Tali; you're with me. Kaidan's team will soften up the drones with biotics; my team will disable their weapons and shields with tech mines. Once that's done, pick your target and fire at will. Concentrate on the rocket drones. It doesn't matter how many assault drones we take out if we get blown to smithereens."

"The effects of our biotics and tech mines will only last a short time, Commander," Liara pointed out. "What if they wear off before we are done?"

"Good question," I smiled. "In that case, we give 'em another dose. Kaidan's team will handle biotics, unless it looks like my team can't provide tech support for some reason." I looked at Wrex. "You'll have to do the same if Kaidan and Liara are otherwise occupied." He nodded.

"Everyone got that?" I received a chorus of acknowledgements. "Good. Check your gear. We move in one minute."

One minute proved to be more than enough time. I spent my time talking to Tali, establishing that she would drop their shields while I'd knock out their weapon systems. After an eternity, we were ready to go. "Opening the hatch in five..." I warned. "...four, three, two, one, GO!"

On "GO," I slapped the control panel, waited for the doors to slide open and threw my tech mine. Tali followed suit, while Liara pulled off some biotic trick or other. For a second, all I could see were several explosions of sparks, accompanied by a blinding haze of biotic energy. Then things cleared enough for me to visualize a target: a nice big rocket drone. Right in front of me.

I just raised my pistol, pointed it at the rocket drone and squeezed the trigger. Between shots, I was dimly aware that the rest of the squad had also opened fire. I kept a very close eye on "my" rocket drone, ready to jump out of the way should its weapons cool down. Thankfully, that didn't happen, and I moved over to fire at the next rocket drone, taking care to throw another tech mine. Just in case.

This seemed to go on for hours, though my hardsuit's chronometer indicated only a few minutes passed by. Eventually, the fact that we had destroyed all the rocket drones and had nothing more to handle than assault drones penetrated my head. I silently breathed a sigh of relief. This would make things much easier from here on out.

Once we mopped up the last of the drones, we headed for the computer core clusters, shooting out the kinetic barriers that were blocking our way. I recall wondering why the computer was bothering, since they could only take a couple shots, or one shotgun blast, before shorting out. Even the most basic hardsuit has stronger barriers than that.

As it turned out, I shouldn't have tempted fate like that. The first set of computers was destroyed without an issue. The second set, though, was guarded by drones. Some of whom had rockets. Apparently, the VI decided that it needed something more effective to protect itself.

The only upside to this most-unwelcome development was the fact that there were only three of them versus seven of us, and we'd just had some very useful practise on how to handle them. The drones, and the computers, were taken out quickly, much to my relief.

The only odd thing was the burst of white noise that blasted through our hardsuit comms, on every possible frequency, upon the destruction of the last computer core. My hardsuit computer converted it from an auditory screech to a series of ones and zeroes. It also helpfully decoded this binary code as a message that read "HELP." This seemed a bit worrisome, so I added it to my AAR before sending it off to the Alliance. Let the brass sort it out.

After taking care of that laborious piece of bureaucracy, I checked my vid-mail. To my delight, the vid-mail I was expecting had finally arrived. Time to do something a little more fun. That required another trip to the cockpit, to make use of the comm systems.

"Ah, I prefer gold to silver, Commander," Joker said upon seeing me. "For my medal. I figured you'd recommend me for one since I, uh, pulled your boots out of the fire."

Not to be outdone, I was quick to reply. "If we present you with a medal, you'll end up sitting on stage listening to politicians make speeches for a couple hours."

"Good point," Joker admitted. "They'd probably make me shave, too." He stroked his beard. "I spent seven weeks working on this baby. No medal's worth that. So, Commander, what brings you up here?"

"You'll see." I gave him a wink, reached over and set the comm to intra-ship mode. "Crew, this is Shepard," I started.

"Some of you may be aware of my tendency to perform mineralogical surveys during missions, both as an Alliance officer and as a Spectre. Some of you may also be aware that the Alliance Geological Service pays bounties to individuals or teams who conduct such surveys. It is my pleasure to inform you that these bounties will be divided equally amongst the crew."

I had to stop as the command deck, and likely the rest of the ship, broke out into cheers. When things died down, I continued. "Furthermore, just to keep things interesting, whenever we dock at a port, an extra bonus will be given to the watch or watches with the most exemplary performance ratings."

As expected, this second bit of news was met with a more enthusiastic response. Were it not for the fact that sound does not travel in the vacuum of space, I'd wager that we could be heard all the way to the Citadel. (5)

Speaking of which, now that I'd made everybody very, very happy, it was time to head back to the Citadel. Sell off some surplus gear (to line my pockets and fund this "extra bonus"), do a little window shopping and generally give myself (and the crew) some semblance of R&R before we had to jump into another hellhole.

Naturally, given my horrible luck, I was forced to settle for two out of three.

(1): As readers are aware, the sensors were unable to distinguish enemies from non-combatants. Given that they could distinguish squad members from everyone else, though, Shepard's assumption is understandable.

(2): Shepard neglects to add that, given the situation, there were tactical advantages in dividing the squad into tech/fire-support and close-quarters-assault teams.

(3): Shepard is being a little disingenuous here. A perusal of his earlier personnel reports reveals a great deal of empathy for individuals caught up in events beyond their control, no doubt due to his own personal experiences, regardless of whatever disparaging remarks he might care to use.

(4): From a logistical perspective, the repetitive and redundant construction made stocking supplies and repair much easier. From a tactical standpoint, this predictable layout gave a distinct advantage to any invading force. While this would normally be a problem, it naturally served as a benefit for this mission.

(5): Given that Alliance soldiers are attracted to bars and similar establishments like moths are attracted to lights, it is understandable that the Normandy's crew quickly termed this bonus "Shepard's Round."