The First and the Last
Epilogue: Lazarus

"We were right to put our faith in you," Miranda noted as she led Liara through the Gozu district, Shepard's sarcophagus hovering dutifully behind them. "The Shadow Broker is not easily outsmarted, and yet Shepard's body is no longer in his possession. Furthermore," she spun the OSD from Alingon between her fingers, "thanks to you, we also gained important data about the Shadow Broker's methods and operations."

"Yes, Miranda." Liara moved briskly until she was apace with the Cerberus lieutenant. "But now you owe me some answers. What are Cerberus's intentions with Shepard's body?"

"We do." She paused to survey their surroundings, making sure that the streets were clear before speaking. "We believe we have the means to bring Shepard back."

Feron had been right after all! The realization floored Liara, and her brain set off on two divergent strands of thought. Part of her was elated, her heart racing at the prospect that all might not have been lost. Yet the cynical voice in her head told her that this was wishful thinking – a collective grasping at straws that Humanity's first Spectre might not have been taken so swiftly and soon. She kept all of this guarded from Miranda, choosing curiosity to respond. "How? Is that even possible?"

"We think so," Miranda responded. "Cerberus has developed technology far beyond what outsiders can fathom. I can't give you the details, but suffice to say that we've revolutionized medical science, and we believe that we can repair the damage to Shepard's body, reanimate his cellular functions, and restore his cognition and perception. In other words, we intend to bring Shepard back to life."

Liara threw back her head and laughed – laughed at the futility of it all, at the absurdity of the wishful thinking. Revolutionized medical science, she thought to herself. The madness of fanatics! "Your Illusive Man is either insane or a fool."

"He is audacious," Miranda corrected. "He is willing to take risks where the rest of Humanity won't. I'm confident in our resources and technology – not certain, but confident enough to try."

"And what do you want with him?"

"You've seen the Reapers – you've seen what they're capable of. You helped defeat Saren and Sovereign, but they were merely the beginning - a violent overture to something far darker. We don't know when the time will come, but when it comes we believe that it will be vital for Shepard to be alive and leading the fight."

"Oddly benevolent of you."

"We are dedicated to the preservation and advancement of Humanity. Avoiding extinction at the hands of the Reapers is to our benefit. Shepard gives us a fighting chance."

Liara pondered the possibility. Miranda seemed confident – perhaps too confident, given the deterioration of Shepard's body. Medical science was advanced – but this was different. To reanimate his cells was one thing; to restore and revive his spirit – his very consciousness and memory – was quite another. "Show me."

A smile crept across Miranda's face. "Gladly."

Three hours later. [LOCATION REDACTED]

Liara steadied herself as the Kodiak shuttle disengaged its FTL drive and entered the remote system. Tucked well away from the busy routes of galactic commerce and the violence of the Terminus, they were beyond the edges of Liara's knowledge of the galaxy, yet clearly amidst the hues of a magnificent stellar nebula that enveloped the surrounding stars in a pinkish light. She spotted the Cerberus station as the shuttle approached – its dual-pyramid structure piercing through the thick clouds of stardust and gas and its lights flickering out from amidst the steel superstructure.

She hadn't been allowed a view of their course as the shuttle had extracted them from Omega in the midst of the Gozu District – Miranda Lawson seemed on-edge and cautious after Liara's encounter with more of the mercs an hour earlier. Once they'd cleared Omega's rocky exterior, she'd found that her omnitool no longer picked up a signal within the shuttle's hull; clearly, she wasn't meant to know where they were going.

Miranda was silent as their pilot guided the shuttle into the station's small hangar bay. Liara felt the engines cut out as they settled onto the hangar floor, and she stepped out into the station's docking bay – a simple catwalk which led further into the station. Ahead, an elevated walkway descended into a staging and collection area where Cerberus personnel were busy unpacking and sorting newly-arrived equipment. None of them looked up or acknowledged either Liara or Miranda as they passed by them, though Liara got the distinct impression that her presence was being noted and documented by every one of them. Miranda coolly led Liara through the foyer and into one of the station's sleek, white corridors, the sarcophagus hovering behind them as they walked.

"This is quite the facility," Liara remarked as they continued to walk, "and a lot of resources you seem ready to devote to this."

"We're confident in our chances of success, but we're realistic about how difficult it will be: it took four days and a miracle for Lazarus to be revived. Bringing Shepard back will be longer and more difficult."

Furrowing her brow at the unknown allusion, Liara focused her gaze on the figure ahead of them. Standing in the frame of a turn in the corridor, the man was dressed in a lab technician's overcoat adorned with Cerberus's logo, his shaved head accentuating the short beard that covered his chin and upper lip. He appeared a mix of excited and anticipatory, and Liara could see his eyes burrowing intently into the outer casing of the coffin.

"This is Dr. Michael Wilson– the Chief Medical Technician for this station," Miranda presented as they neared one another. "Wilson, this is Dr. Liara T'Soni of the SSV Normandy."

"A pleasure," Wilson said curtly as he shook her hand. His eyes darted to the sarcophagus behind Liara, "I take it that this is?"

Liara nodded. "I understand that you intend to bring him back to life."

"Well, we intend to try," he responded. "We'd like to examine Shepard's body to assess the scale of damage and deterioration."

This was it – the moment that Liara had to set something in motion that she couldn't undo. It made sense to let old ghosts rest, to not trust Cerberus, to bury Shepard and begin a life without him. And yet doubt and longing gnawed at her gut, urging her to reconsider. If there was a chance – any chance – to see Shepard again, to feel his strong shoulders engulf her and his lips on hers, then her soul screamed at her to take it, no matter the risks.

"Okay," she nodded and gestured at the sarcophagus. Wilson keyed something into his omnitool, and the sarcophagus moved past Liara and followed him into the adjacent hallway – no doubt to a medical lab where a full examination would be carried out.

Miranda's eyes followed the sarcophagus as it disappeared around the corner, and she allowed a turs smile as she nodded approvingly. "You're doing the right thing, Dr. T'Soni." She glanced around the hallway behind Liara, as if killing time in her head while searching for conversation. "The scan and autopsy will take several hours, and you must be exhausted. May I show you to your quarters?"

Liara nodded and allowed Miranda to lead her through a second winding hallway – this one strangely empty of the personnel who had buzzed through the portions of the station she'd been to thus far. "What is this facility, Miranda?" she asked as they walked. "Surely you didn't build this exclusively to try and restore Shepard."

"We didn't," Miranda noted as they turned the corner into another corridor. "We built this facility several years ago – the gas clouds of the nebula make it impossible to find on heat signatures, and it's located conveniently for our needs. It's served a variety of purposes and housed a variety of projects in that time." Liara quickly deduced that Miranda wouldn't be forthcoming with more details about them. "But for now, the station will house Project Lazarus."

"Is that what you're calling this effort?"

Miranda nodded, "an allusion to an ancient myth in a major Human religion – about a man being brought back from the dead."

"Only you don't have miracles on your side."

"If we're successful, what we're about to do will be indistinguishable from one."

Arriving at another door, Miranda keyed in a code that opened the lock to reveal a simple chamber: a single bed rested at the side, with a mirror, sink, and shower unit embedded in the far wall. A strange, cylindrical unit that she hadn't seen before stood against the wall opposite her, with a table resting between it and the cot.

"The chamber opposite you will clean and repair your armour. Everything else you'll need is already inside. The intercom against the far wall offers basic functionality – if you need anything that isn't already in the room, we'll bring it to you if and when it's feasible." Miranda strode back through the corridor as Liara stepped into the room. "I'll be back when our examination is done."

As soon as the door closed, Liara stripped off her armour, placing it in the cleaning pod and activating its functions. It was nearly silent as it worked, the dull hum of its machinery cleverly obscured and muffled by its design. She showered for a long time, letting the scalding water run over her and wipe away all the grime, sweat, and soot of the past week. She stayed underneath the water for what seemed like an eternity, just revelling in the purifying feeling of it. When she was done, she retrieved a clean set of clothes from her pack and lay down on the bed. It was narrow and uncomfortable, but Liara's exhaustion was so total that it was only a matter of minutes before sleep claimed her.

The knocking at the door awoke her nine hours later, and she rose – still groggy – from slumber. She quickly ran water over her face from the sink, and then opened the door. Miranda walked into the room, her face diplomatically sombre as she turned to face Liara. The Asari breathed in apprehensively as Miranda came to stand in front of her, her piercing ultramarine eyes briefly locking with Liara's before looking away.

"I wish I had better news for, Doctor," she said simply. "Shepard's body is in significantly worse shape than we expected – the body was exposed to the vacuum of space for a long time before entering Alchera's atmosphere and falling to the surface, and the stasis pod used a number of crude, unsophisticated technological tricks to try and preserve his body."

"Just tell me how bad," Liara said curtly.

"Clinical brain death," Miranda said simply. "His biological functions are restorable – his body is in worse shape than we thought, but not beyond saving. It's his mind that worries us – it may have been partially or totally destroyed."

Liara's knees went weak as Miranda spoke, the taste of bile returning to her mouth as her mind tried to grapple with this development. To resurrect Shepard was possible, but if he was only brought back in a vegetative state, or as a shell of his former self, would it have been worth it?

"Can it be undone?"

"We're not sure. Wilson's diagnosis isn't positive, but the Illusive Man and I believe that it's possible." She put her hand on Liara's shoulder; for once, she didn't flinch at the touch of the Cerberus officer. "I can't promise you any results. But I can promise you that we're going to try – we're willing to spend everything we've got to make this possible. It will take a long time, but we will exhaust every option that science has to offer."

That didn't reassure Liara, even if she could hear the determination in Miranda's voice. She could already see herself trapped by her own desires; she had to make the wager – she had to let Cerberus try. To hand Shepard's body over to the organization that she'd watched carve a bloody path through the Attican Traverse still put filled her with an emotional pit, yet they were perhaps the only ones audacious enough to try to bring Shepard back. Even if the voice in her head still told her to let the dead rest, she could hear the resignation of defeat in its tone.

"But you will try?" Miranda nodded, seeming to set that question aside. Another thought entered Liara's head as the pit in her stomach subsided. "What about Feron?"

"The Drell? He knew the risks when he offered to help," Miranda said as she moved to lean slightly against the wall of the chamber. "We won't be going after him – even if we did, the odds recovering either him or his body aren't high. If you want to, that's your business, though I'd focus on something else if I were you." She reached into the pocket of her uniform and handed Feron's OSD to Liara. "The information you acquired on Alingon may be of some help."

It seemed that it was time for Liara to leave. It could take months – years, even – for the Lazarus Project to be completed, and she doubted Cerberus were keen to consider her a guest for long. She gathered her handful of possessions and set about reattaching her cleaned and refurbished armour.

"This wouldn't have been possible without you," Miranda noted as Liara buckled her pieces of armour back into place. "You're the reason Shepard isn't currently on a Collector ship bound to wherever the Omega-4 Relay goes."

Her work finished, Liara stood up and regarded Miranda coolly. For all that she didn't trust Cerberus, this woman had given her the one companion who could have successfully led her to Shepard. She suspected there was far more at play than mere altruism and survival instincts in Cerberus's plan to revive Shepard, but for now she was begrudgingly grateful for what they had done.

"I know, Miranda." She shook the Cerberus officer's hand and left the chamber without another glance back.

"The shuttle that brought you here is waiting in the hangar," Miranda noted as Liara retraced her earlier steps through the corridor. "Simply tell the pilot where you want to go, and you will be taken there."

Arriving at the hangar, she entered the shuttle without a word to any of the Cerberus operatives or officers who still filled the foyer. She sat down against the cold steel of the Kodiak's hold, and pondered to herself the most immediate question: what now?

Miranda Lawson watched the shuttle depart from the expansive bay of windows that looked out onto the nebula that Lazarus Station floated amidst. She didn't know where Liara would choose to go next – her predictive powers and guesswork ended where love and sentimentality began. She'd mentally itemized the shortlist of likely destinations – the Citadel, Thessia, Intai'sei, maybe even back to Omega – and planned to alert operatives at each of them to watch for an Asari.

For now, her mind was already racing to unpack the challenges that Project Lazarus was sure to pose: restoring shattered limbs and organs was simple enough. Cerberus's previous research on human enhancement, and the ill-fated super-soldier project on Binthu, had provided enough promising leads to solve that portion of the puzzle. It was the question of restoring cognitive function, perception, and memory that was more challenging. What publicly available cognitive restoration technology existed – even the most bleeding-edge Salarian technology – was purely experimental, and inconsistent in its effectiveness. There might be more; the STG had no-doubt pushed further against the boundaries of scientific research than most, but their counterintelligence operations were too thorough to make the long-term penetration that would be required feasible.

Temporarily relegating the medical questions to the back of her mind, she strode away from the observation deck and back towards one of the station's several communications posts. Stepping onto the holo-terminal, she felt the system hum to life and watched as her view of the comms chamber was dissolved and replaced by a view of the Illusive Man's inner sanctum. He stood at the edge of the room, a glass of rye in his hand as he stared out onto the blue- and red-hued supergiant that his station orbited. The technology on Lazarus Station was far more sophisticated than the mobile comms post they'd set up on Omega, enabling Miranda's holograph to move freely within the room.

"Wilson tells me that you've encountered problems," he noted simply as she approached him from behind, "that the corpse is in far worse shape than we'd hoped." He turned to face her, his luminous eyes steely and framed by the star behind him. "He tells me that what we're attempting is impossible."

"It's not impossible; merely extremely difficult," Miranda responded. "There are a number of avenues worth pursuing – experimental technology, theoretical research. It will mean the project takes longer, but I believe that it's possible."

"I told him the same thing," the Illusive Man noted. "He sounded ambivalent about much of his authority being transferred to you."

"Don't burn him too hard," Miranda chided him. "He's a far better medical technician than I."

"Yet you can see the big picture, and think of unconventional solutions to unconventional problems. I like that; it's why I recruited you." He paced the length of the room, sipping his rye as he visibly pondered something. "Do you know where the Asari will go?"

Miranda shook her head. "She didn't say, but there a number of possibilities worth shortlisting." She tapped away at her omnitool and saw her collated thoughts flash up on one of the many terminals that her boss kept in the room. "The relevant observation posts should be notified, but for now we can assume that she will not bother us."

"Giving her the data was smart. More birds with fewer stones." He drained the last of his rye and regarded her coolly. "And the other loose end?"

"As far as we can tell, tied up on Alingon. There's Endline footage of him boarding Thelion's shuttle with Doctor T'Soni. There's none of him returning."

"Keep a close eye on Omega and the Salarian systems," he noted. "There are too many pieces moving on the board for upstarts to be allowed to disrupt them."

"The most important piece is ours, sir."

"Indeed it is," the Illusive Man smiled, reclined in his chair, and motioned to disconnect the transmission. "Get to work."

Miranda smiled back. "With pleasure."

Next - Act III: Hunted