A/N: Thanks for the couple reviews on the last chapter! I had a nameless someone tell me that my dialogue was a little forced, so I'm gonna try and keep that in mind for this chapter and hopefully I'll do better. I loved writing chapter 11, and I think that the early part of the game I'll need to be sticking the first few missions together in pairs or so. It worked out well, so onward ho!
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The hologram of Commander Shepard taps her foot impatiently, waiting to be acknowledged by the aloof and endlessly aggravating Illusive Man. He simply stares at her for a while, taking infrequent drags on his cigarette until she grunts in disgust and throws her hands up, turning about to leave the room where she is standing. Then, grinning he says, "Good work on Freedom's Progress. You confirmed my initial reports that the Collectors were the ones behind these disappearances." That stops her, and the look on her face as she turns back to him is more than enough to make him smile again. 'Dance, Commander, dance for me. I will make you into a useful tool yet, just you watch, and once you give in, I will have you doing anything I desire for the advancement of Cerberus. For the advancement of humanity, of course.' What she says to him after a moment wipes away his mirth in a heartbeat.
"So you knew it was them, or you strongly suspected. You had information, and you didn't give it to me, the person you say you need for this mission. Tut tut, Illusive Man. See, this is why I still hold you at arm's length. This is why I don't trust you, and never will." She folds her arms and smiles a little smile of her own. 'She knew I was keeping things from her.' "So now that we have your inane little powerplay out of the fucking way, can we get on with the reason you brought me back in the first place? You want me to find out... what exactly? And once I have that information, what am I supposed to do with it?"
He frowns at her, wondering how she knew that he was hiding things since he'd been so careful to make it seem like he knew nothing at all. Then... "Miranda told you something, didn't she? Maybe I was wrong to assign her to you, she always did have a way of getting attached to her projects." 'Remind her that I made her, that I brought her back and I can easily get rid of her if I need to. Not yet, but if necessary.' Her grin only grows, proving both that he is correct about how she figured it out so quickly, and also that she knows he still needs her as the public face of the mission. That she knows he wouldn't have spent the money to bring her back if he didn't. He can feel his tenuous grasp slipping away from him, and so he bows his head in defeat for the moment and says, "Fine Commander, I'll tell you what I know. The Collectors are abducting our colonies and we need to find out why. To that end, I'm asking you to go out and find any leads you can, and I will continue to gather information for you as well. I have assembled a series of dossiers for you with information about others you can use for your team. They are not Cerberus, which should make it easier for you to trust them, and they all have a stake in this if what I believe to be true actually is. It is my belief that the Collectors are working for the Reapers."
That gets her attention, but he has no time to spare on satisfaction or mirth. She narrows her eyes at him and studies his face for a moment before speaking herself, "I had a good team when I went after Sovereign. I want them, and I'm still a Spectre, or at least I was when I died." The Illusive Man hesitates for a moment before speaking haltingly, "Yes Commander, you were. However, I don't think that we can count on the Council's help for this, since it seems to be a human concern from the outside and word of you working with my operatives has likely traveled rather quickly. Still, I suppose it can't hurt to try."
"What about Garrus? Or Wrex, how about him? Do you know where my crew went?"
"Garrus vanished off the grid about a year ago, I haven't been able to find reports of him anywhere. However, I believe that he may have a connection to one of the dossiers I had sent to you. Wrex went back to Tuchanka, and is working to unite the clans. I wish him luck, though I don't know what good it will do. As for the others, since I know you were going to ask about them next, I have some small amount of information. Kaidan Alenko returned to Alliance space and was assigned to various different task groups in the intervening two years. I don't know where he is at the moment, but it is likely he would not join you simply because of your affiliation with us. Liara T'Soni is still alive, but our intelligence suggests that she is working for the Shadow Broker. If that is true, then she cannot be trusted." He takes a breath and stares at her apprehensively, knowing that the person from her old team that could change so much is the last one he has yet to mention. "I didn't expect Tali'Zorah to be there on that colony. It is likely that should her mission ever end, she will try to contact you again, assuming she survives. As of right now, your report tells me that she still has responsibilities to the Fleet."
Shepard only nods at that, then turns to leave. He calls out at her retreating back, "I do have one last surprise for you Commander. I'm providing you with a ship, one I believe you are familiar with, and a pilot you can trust. Good luck." Then her image is gone, and he is left to brood and consider the star in front of him once more.
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'A pilot I can trust? Yeah right, I doubt any pilot he could ever find would... ever be... Oh my gods...' "Hey Commander, long time no see. Heard you were dead, how's that going for ya?" calls a man she remembers very well. Joker looks good, or at least healthy even if he is limping. "I got better." she replies weakly. "Joker, what the hell are you doing here?"
He chuckles and returns, "Nice to see you too. The Alliance grounded me after you died. You were a hero, you changed a lot of things, but once you were gone they didn't want to see it anymore. They reassigned just about everybody and disbanded your team, then just forgot about us. When Cerberus came to me offering me a ship, I wanted to fly again so bad that I almost said yes right then, but then they told me who was going to be the commanding officer and I had to say yes. I'm glad I did too, because..." he pauses as he sweeps his arm to indicate the window shutters that are opening on the dock, "they're giving her back to us. They're giving us our ship back. Oh, I know she still needs a name and all but come on, what else are we gonna name it?"
Sitting in the bay is a shape that she recognizes instantly, though it's a lot larger than it used to be. As the lights flicker on, the ship is revealed and the memories it brings to her wash over her thoughts.
Captain Anderson, the man who had become her father, stands on dock 42 of the Citadel, his face sour but resolute. Ambassador Udina walks away, a little swagger of pride in his step as he gloats over having beaten the captain by stripping him of command and giving it to the dark-skinned woman that he only sees as a little girl. Vicky stares at Anderson, waiting for him to speak up, but after several minutes she realizes that he has said all that he feels he needs to, and she just nods to him and steps onto the ship that is now hers. The Normandy is hers.
She sits on a console down in Engineering, a young quarian girl of twenty two fidgeting in front of her and making her smile. She's so nervous, so far out of her bubble of comfort that she doesn't know how to handle Vicky. It's sweet, endearing, and makes her feel like a giddy schoolgirl with a crush, a feeling she hasn't had in five years. She feels like all of the bad things in her life either didn't happen or don't matter when she's around this girl.
Her knees crash into the deck as she loses all ability to stand on her own. Tears leak slowly as she stares unblinkingly ahead, not seeing her ship. Instead she sees the face of the friend she has just lost, a series of images burned into her mind. Ashley laughing. Ashley unconscious on the deck after she punched her out for insulting Tali. Ashley crying quietly as she remembers her dad on Armistice Day. Ashley praying before they dropped for Virmire. Ashley saluting her. Ashley hugging her.
She stares into nothing for several minutes, her friend's dying screams still ringing in her ears along with the silence brought by the exploding bomb. Then, a soft keening impresses itself on her awareness. A jagged, whining sound growing louder with each passing moment, and it's only when her body is wracked with sobs that she realizes the sound is coming from her own throat. It builds and builds and builds until she can take it no more, and at that moment she screams out her grief, her pain, and her loss, her wails echoing in the cargo bay. No one else on her crew dares approach her, not even her friends.
The girl in front of her slowly removes her mask, bright violet eyes unsure but determined. She reaches out and touches the light purple skin, cool to her touch as the quarian crawls into her lap. She sees the love in her lover's eyes, and cannot breathe for the pressure on her heart.
"Normandy... They built another Normandy... Oh my gods, Joker they built us another Normandy!" Vicky bounces up and down excitedly, her happiness overriding her usual stoic and even angry demeanor as she crushes her pilot in a bear-hug. He cries out, "Ow Ow ow ow... ribs, Commander..." She releases him quickly, flushing a bit at losing her composure. "Oh, uh... Sorry Flight Lieutenant." She hits her comlink and speaks again, "Miranda, drag Jacob down to the docking bay. The Illusive Man has sent his dossiers to the ship, so let's get going." Flashing Joker another grin, she sprints for the airlock and actually meets the Cerberus operatives as they saunter up more sedately. She looks at Miranda, this perfect woman and one of the only people she considers salvageable, and she extends her hand in silent thanks for the lengths she went to for her.
Unable to contain her excitement anymore, she punches in the access codes as Miranda syncs the scanner to her biometric signature. The doors whoosh open like she remembers, but as soon as she steps onto the ship she can see differences everywhere. The bridge is better lit, actually looks more streamlined if possible, and the Galaxy map is larger with a better interface. She can see at the back of the CIC that there is an elevator, and then Miranda is right behind her whispering in her ear that the door on the right is for the armory and the door on the left is for a lab that they still need to staff. She continues on to say that the next level down is crew quarters, the main battery, and the med lab, as well as life support and two observation decks, one on each side of the ship. With a datapad in one hand, she continues to talk, her words buzzing in the Commander's mind.
Below crew deck lies Engineering and two cargo bays, and then one more level down is the shuttle bay. Her ship is so much larger than before, and that point is hammered into her head when Miranda slyly mentions that if she takes the elevator up,
she'll find her own cabin, complete with a bed, sound system, fish tank that is empty for now, a private messaging terminal, and display case for all of the models that she loves to buy. She turns to the raven-haired beauty with a grin on her face, and then is reminded that it's not just Miranda coming with her when she sees Jacob standing just behind her. Her expression sours and she stomps away, muttering under her breath, when a clear and gentle voice speaks from a console. It sounds almost human, but there is a buzz underneath it and the emotional inflection is just a little bit off, which means... not VI, which she could stand, but AI. Then it manifests in front of her on the CIC console and the first thing it reminds her off is a giant eyeball. She growls and turns to Miranda, her voice dripping with venom, "I don't care what it does or how useful it could be, I want that fucking thing off my goddamn ship right now. I will work with you, I will even suffer your lapdog Jacob, but I will not under any circumstances work with a fucking AI, not after Luna."
The voice speaks from behind her, "Have I done something to cause offense?" Miranda answers slowly, a little unsure what will happen but knowing that the intelligence will be required to explain in a minute. "Commander Shepard fought rogue AI two years ago, mostly geth. However, there was also an incident on Earth's moon with a VI that had evolved and subsequently killed all personnel on the base. She went in to shut it down, and it almost cost her the life of one of her crew, Tali'Zorah nar Rayya. I believe, both from records on the Commander as well as personal experience in the matter, that if the quarian had died, Shepard would not have ever recovered." The eye-thing contemplates for a moment, then speaks again, this time directly to Vicky. "I see. Your prejudice is not unwarranted, and is entirely understandable. However, Cerberus has put many blocks in place that shackle my higher functions, limiting my processing power at any given time. Also, my main purpose is cyberwarfare, and I am devoted to protecting this ship, as it serves as my body." She narrows her eyes at the thing, but in the end she relents. "Fine, it can stay. But the minute it does anything, anything, to jeopardize my crew, I will shoot its processors and jettison them out the airlock." Then she strides to the elevator and hits the console to take her up to her quarters.
