Author's Note: And so, we get to the end of the ME2 storyline, DLC notwithstanding. Nameless, this one at least, won't be there for those, but he won't be sitting around idle, either.
Miranda was livid when they returned. "You unshackled the AI! The entire crew is missing! Why didn't you do something?" she railed at Joker.
"That's enough," Shepard growled, her voice sharp enough to make everyone flinch back. Most especially Nameless, who Samara had been studying non-stop since their rendezvous at the shuttle. "EDI, how the hell did they find us?"
"There was a signal being broadcast by the Reaper IFF. I have identified and disabled it. They will no longer be able to track our location," the AI explained confidently.
Closing her eyes, she leaned back against the bulkhead and sighed. "Fine. We go after them. Unless anyone has any last minute business that absolutely has to be taken care of?" She cracked her eyes open, glancing one by one between the members of her squad, receiving nods and gestures of acceptance from everyone.
Except for this new Nameless, who was tentatively raising his hand. "What is it?"
"I, ah, well, I, um, don't think I'm suited for this kind of combat mission," he finally blurted out in a rush as the whole room turned to glare at him. "I really don't know how to use these things," he gestured to the knives, still belted on at his side.
She sighed heavily, giving him a new once-over. He was now the third, or maybe fourth, depending on if he'd changed right at Alchera, version of Nameless she had met. "Mordin, have you had any luck getting that omni-tool to work?"
The salarian did a very human flip-flop with his hand. "Have been able to reconstruct only ten percent data, with Tali's help," he said, obviously disappointed with his slow progress.
"With everything else you've been working on, that's pretty good, actually. We've got three hours, max, before we're going through the Omega 4 relay," she said, capturing Thane's look, watching that little smile on his lips with the respectful dip of his dark eyes. "Mordin, let Nameless hear the first entry or two. Everyone get what rest you can." She swallowed through a suddenly thick throat. "We're going to go kick the Collectors right in the daddy bags."
Grim and resolute, everyone left the meeting room, Shepard watching everyone leave before she finally followed them out, going through the lab to watch the confused Nameless sitting down and starting to listen to the voice of the original, as she thought of him. Mordin had given the new one a quick physical, and he was still the same height, the same weight, but the differences were shocking. The original, once awoken after Eden Prime, had been a solid pillar, an immovable object. The psycho she'd been running around had been a giant monster, filling a room with his very presence, even when he was unseen. This new one was practically invisible, and had he demonstrated the slightest bit of combat aptitude, she'd have made Kasumi give up her cloaking device.
Shaking her head, she stepped out onto the CIC, staring at the empty, listening to the quiet. The stations made their quiet little hum, electricity singing through the aerogel keypads and holographic displays. But there was no human life, no quiet shatter or muttering, no Kelly bounding all over, chatting with everyone with those light, human touches that never seemed to go beyond casual flirting. "It is the silence of the depths," Thane said, making her jerk around in shock even as she identified the voice. "My apologies, siha, I did not mean to startle you."
He straightened up from his casual lean against the wall next to the elevator. "Not your fault, Thane. I'm on edge. We all are," she murmured, stepping forward, letting his arms slide around her as she pulled him tightly against her. "How did they know the ship would be undefended?"
"Likely they did not, but simply took their chances. How much more difficult would our task be, if even one of us had been on board and overwhelmed while protecting the rest of the crew?"
Closing her eyes again, she rubbed her cheek against the smooth scales at the base of his neck. "Your logic is impeccable, and I still hate it," she teased him, listening to his breath catch as she slipped her hands under his shirt.
"Hopefully, there is some way I can make it up and regain your good graces," he whispered, raising one hand to cup her jaw and tilt her face up towards him.
With only a fraction of an inch separating their lips, they were interrupted by a rude catcall. "Thane and Shepard, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!" Joker shouted down the neck of the ship, hands cupped over his mouth.
Amused, Shepard turned to look at him, letting Thane plant soft kisses on her cheek. "I have a plasma burst here with your name on it," she countered, waving her omni-tool from behind Thane's back.
"Getting back to flying the ship, yes ma'am," he laughed, turning his chair back around. She could faintly hear EDI questioning the pilot about his motives for teasing them, but ignored it as Thane turned her, backing her into the elevator, and forgot it completely in the kiss that took up their ten second elevator ride.
In the science bay, Nameless sat, mind whirling. The first entry had finished playing, and Mordin was graciously allowing him the mental and physical space to consider all of the implications. The occasional piercing whistle from the seeker bugs was annoying, though, as the scientist poked, prodded, and dissected them.
"Did I have it with me?" he asked out loud, mind and senses filled with an object, a brass sphere, almost the size of a skull, cold and smooth against his scarred and insensitive skin, filling his nose with the stench of rotten eggs. He blinked, looking over at the salarian, who was frowning in confusion. "The brass sphere," he explained, holding his hands up at exactly the right size.
"Do not believe so. Was not listed in original archeological dig or mentioned by that Nameless," Mordin said quietly. "Valuable?"
He rubbed the back of his head, the crawling cold, like worms made of liquid nitrogen creeping up his brain stem, now gone, and with it the vivid memories. "I don't know. He, um, or I, I guess, mentioned it being important." He stared down at his scarred hands, flexing them slightly. "Going through a tomb designed with traps only he could survive. Something you had to die and then get back up again to get past." He looked at Mordin again. "If that's what happened to me, then why don't I remember any of this? Why am I different?"
"Unknown. Conducted many scans, some minor experiments. Mechanism for continuous resurrection still unidentified." He smiled, picking up the scalpel that just finished cutting the third seeker apart. "Could do more experiments, if you like."
"No thank you!" Nameless said, shrinking back. "I'm in no hurry to die and find out if I come back to life!"
"Good." The force behind the scientist's declaration made the immortal blink in surprise. "Shows wisdom, forethought. Previous Nameless valuable in combat, but short-sighted. Had good timing on personality death."
"Er, if you say so," Nameless muttered. "I'm going to listen to another one, if that's alright?"
"Go ahead. But must caution, no chronological continuation. Data fragments retrieval somewhat random due to damage." Mordin had already turned back to his dissection table, marking out any minute differences between the three seekers as Nameless keyed up the next intact entry.
"To my surprise, fiddling with the joints on the little doll produced a portal," the original said in his ear, and the crawling ice went up his neck and into his brain again, giving him flashes of the Modron Maze, simple hackneyed opponents and trite treasures generated to try and reduce the unpredictability of adventuring to an equation.
Their brief fight through to the base was terrifying in the extreme, and it was hard to know if it was because he wasn't involved in it, or because he might become involved. The next two hours were filled with the quiet dread of waiting, his only companion the unusually taciturn pilot and the computer for company.
Then suddenly came the rest of the crew, racing for safety, supporting each other, with Tali guarding their retreat, blowing away a small crowd of husks one at a time with her shotgun. "What's wrong," one of the crew asked him, an older woman with a charming accent, "why aren't you out there fighting?"
"I can't," he told her simply, as he stood in the airlock, helping people on board, trying not to let his legs tremble so badly they sent him crashing to the ground.
She stared at him for a moment, the pain and exhaustion in her eyes not enough to stop her from making an evaluation. "You've changed," she declared, "you're a different Nameless. Again."
"That's what they told me," he agreed. The last of the crew was on board, with Tali now standing guard in the airlock, her shotgun at the ready. The husks had dispersed for the moment, but something told him they would be back.
"Nameless, go to the armory and pick up the missile launcher on the shelves on the left," the quarian ordered him, and he gaped.
"I don't know how to use it," he babbled, shifting backwards.
"I do, you bosh'tet! Move it!" she swore at him, summoning her drone as a new wave of husks came running towards them. "Hurry!"
Stumbling over his own feet, he ran inside, managing to slip past crew members without knocking anyone over, and into the armory. "The second one from the left," EDI helpfully told him, and he grabbed it in one hand. "I also recommend grabbing the last one on the right," she told him, and shrugging, he picked up the organic-looking weapon, running back to Tali with the weapons held over his head, almost brushing the ceiling.
"Here," he said, holding both of them forward. She holstered her shotgun quickly, grabbing the missile launcher. "What should I do with this one?" he blurted.
"Point it at them and pull the trigger!" she shouted as she launched a missile at the largest clump of husks, blowing four of them apart and wounding three more. "Honestly, this is worse than training children," she muttered, without realizing her vocalizer was still on.
Taking a breath, he pointed it at the husks, squeezing the trigger sharply. The brilliant beam of light danced and wavered as he trembled, leaving vicious charred lines across the husks. Still, his efforts were enough to weaken them and make them easy prey for Tali to finish off.
They did this for the next hour, holding off one wave after another, a mind-numbing blur of adrenaline combat, until they saw the rest of the ground team running for them. Mordin was leading the pack, Jacob and Miranda at his sides, cutting themselves a hole. The base was shaking itself to pieces as they ran, and they streamed aboard just before the ramp collapsed.
Zaeed shoved him roughly down to his knees, almost making him drop the beam rifle as gunfire erupted inches above his head. "Where's Shepard?" Garrus shouted, his own sniper rifle cracking out shot after shot. "Where is – oh, spirits," he swore.
They watched her running, racing for her life as Joker tried to keep the ship steady and close enough for her to make the slowly widening jump. Panicking, Nameless realized, right as her feet left the ground, that she would fall short. Dropping prone to the deck, he dangled his arm down, holding on to the butt of the rifle for dear life, hoping both that she could catch it and that he wouldn't drop it.
To his surprise, she did catch it, and he didn't drop it. That was where things started to fall apart. "I can't lift her," he gasped out, having to repeat it two more times before someone heard him. Garrus dropped down next to him, pulling on his arm as Jacob grabbed the baldric and strained, pulling his whole torso six inches off the deck. With a little biotic assistance from Samara, they managed to get Shepard high enough to grab a handhold, and inside.
"Joker, get us out of here," she shouted, letting EDI slam closed the armored door. "Good job," she told Nameless, right before he passed out from the exhaustion of adrenaline letdown.