"Identify!"

Melara's rifle never wavered, nor did her biotics die, as she focused her light on the stranger standing on the bridge. The figure did not appear to be armed and its stance was neutral, posing no threat. His species was impossible to tell. Other than being bipedal and baring a rudimentary face, the thing was completely smooth and lacked almost all distinguishing characteristics. It looked almost like a rubberized plastic mold of a basic bipedal sentient being.

"I am called Alb," he said. "I am sure you have many questions, Iovino."

"Captain, whatever that is, it is not alive," Nevil said in a low voice. "I am reading thermal energy signatures and semi-solid mass. I think it's a synthetic, possibly even a very advanced form of hard light projection."

{Agreed,} Lily's voice came out of Glyph, Liara clearly having activated him and set the link as they were following Mel and Vina up the corridor. {Whatever it is, it is fascinating.}

"What are you?"

"I am called Alb."

"Not who are you, what are you?"

"I am called Alb."

Melara frowned slightly. "How do you know our language?"

"I have sophisticated scanners capable of extrapolating spoken language with brainwave patterns. Your language is both inflective and based on body positioning and physical gesture, as well as some hormone and pheromone secretion. I was able to duplicate the verbal portions within three solar minutes of your arrival on board."

"Why do you call us 'Iovino.'"

"That is your true name."

"Explain."

"Explanation is my purpose. I was designed to activate when you reached a level of technological advancement that allowed you to discover Goruba's resting place, to assess your language, greet you, and compile the Message into language you can understand. It is compiling now and will be complete in two solar minutes."

"Goruba? That's this…ship?"

"It is the ship that brought your people here."

Melara frowned, exchanging glances with her mother. It had become clear that Alb posed no real threat, and she had let her biotics die, lowering (but not stowing) her rifle.

"I do not understand. My people did not come here in this ship. We have our own ship."

"You may have developed the technology to create your own spacefaring vessels, but this is the ship that brought your people to this world in the beginning of what you would consider your history."

"I don't under-"

Liara touched her arm, then spoke to Alb herself. "Alb, what are we?"

"You are Iovino."

"And we came here to this world in this ship? As crew?"

"No, your substance was integrated into Goruba where it remained dormant until reintegration. The Message will have concluded compiling in one solar minute."

"Mel, I think this what Pio mentioned," Liara told her. "I think this is an Ark."

"Like the Reapers were?"

"Yes, but not one designed for the Cycles. This is what the Reapers were before they were pressed into that task, before they upgraded themselves, changed their design, evolved into what we fought."

Dae looked stunned. "If this is an Ark, and if Alb thinks we are Iovino and it brought our people here, then-"

"Message has compiled. Message begins."

Alb's eyes lit up, and a holographic figure appeared suddenly in front of it. Soft light, the figure was large enough that Alb almost vanished from sight behind it. Mel stiffened and could feel the others do the same.

The figure was dressed in an odd design of what was clearly some version of a hard-suit. He looked weary, battle-scarred, but there was an odd gentility in his face.

He was also a fertile male rakir.

"Greetings, Iovino," he said in a deep tenor. "My name is Relldo Sivarr, last Basileus of the Iovino. I know you are likely confused. I cannot imagine what you must be thinking or feeling right now. If you have come here than you have developed space travel. The Screen is in part a technological scanner, measuring the sophistication of any technology that comes near it. If your tech were not deemed advanced enough to allow for space travel, your vessels or divers would have been destroyed before even getting close enough to see Goruba. Perhaps a tragedy of this kind has happened in the past. If it has, I am deeply sorry. Our protections were necessary. If you discovered Goruba before you were able to understand her, it could have been disastrous for your people. Our people.

"Yes. You are not native to this world…a world we named 'Hope'. You are likely realizing now that the legends may actually be true. I can say to you that yes…they are true. Millions of years ago, our people were scattered throughout the galaxies, a strong and proud race. Through a…long and complicated series of events, we have been slaughtered. World by world, system by system, galaxy by galaxy. The power in the universe- the Senate- has no desire more fervent than to see every last one of our kind erased from the face of existence. It…grieves me deeply to say, they have all but succeeded. From the time of my great grandfathers, this intense and deliberate genocide has continued. In desperation, I commanded my crew to steal Goruba, a young Ark newly matured at the edges of the Deveritan Breeding Grounds. We took her to a world on the fringes of Senate space, a disease-ravaged refuge where the last of us were preparing what would be our final engagement with Senate forces. Three million were sacrificed, laying down their lives in order to buy us enough time to preserve the remaining three million in Goruba, along with our culture, our history, our knowledge. The records of our entire species…all are recorded in Goruba's databanks, tended by her Pio-along with the distinct genetic material of three million Iovino. With another stolen ship and a crew of ten we managed to get Goruba out of the war zone and into one of the quarantined galaxies. We knew the Senate's fear of Foundation energy would keep them from pursuing, and Goruba had the tech to keep hidden from their Harvesters."

Relldo straightened a little, pain in his eyes. "From my point of view, we are in a final desperate battle. We are about to part ways with Goruba, give her a chance to get to safety and hide. You are the last of us, our last fervent hope to deny extinction- our second chance. By the time Goruba is programmed to come out of dormancy, the rest of us will have been dead and dust for at least ten generations. Hopefully, the Senate fulfilled their promise to find a solution to the problem of Foundation energy. If so, then you will be able to venture among the stars and spread once more through the Universe, carrying the memories of our legacy with you. If not, then you must be warned. The Senate has set modified Arks- creations they call Harvesters- to quarantine this galaxy and those others where we were able to harness Foundation energy. They promised that this quarantine would be temporary, only long enough to find a solution to their concerns about this energy-however the promises of the Senate are not worth the spit used to speak them. They as well promised not to slaughter innocent Iovino who had nothing to do with the Foundation breeches, yet entire worlds of us have died. If they did not keep their promise about the quarantine than it is only a matter of time before the Harvesters return to wipe out you and every other space faring race in this galaxy, a Cycle they have repeated since before I recorded this message. If that is the case, this injustice cannot continue. There is information, both saved in Goruba and seeded elsewhere in this galaxy, that will help you to construct a device that can return justice, bring control of your destiny back into your own hands. As well, you will have all the known records of your ancestors, as well as personal hopes recorded by the very Iovino who gave up their lives so that their genetic information could be stored, giving you the chance to be.

"You are their children. You are our legacy. Upon completion of this message Alb will provide any information you wish. He will also start bringing Goruba out of her second dormancy so that you can access all of this needed data. Goruba is our gift to you. She is your mother, the reason that you have this life, this chance. Treat her with respect. This chance is all we have left to offer. Use it wisely."

The image broke up and faded, the light in Alb's eyes fading.

"You now have authorized access to all logs and records," he said calmly. "Welcome home, Iovino."

YYY

Lily hurried to the lakeside as the submersible emerged from the water, watertight door opening even as its nose touched dirt. Melara's boots splashed slightly as they landed in the shallow water, and as she strode up toward shore, the vehicle closed again, sinking back into the water as Daenys guided it deep into the lake again.

"They're heading down now," the young asari said as her aunt pulled off her helmet.

"Are you receiving transmission?"

"Yes, but our equipment here cannot keep up with the data. I am tight-beaming it to the Normandy and to the research base."

Melara looked up as she reached camp, the landing lights of the Normandy shuttle appearing out of the overcast afternoon sky. "I should be back soon," she said. "Get the additional equipment hooked up and continue monitoring the data transfer."

The shuttle landed, the door opening. Almost immediately, Joker and EDI stepped down to the ground, followed by four of Melara's security lead by Private Laws. Over Joker's shoulder he was carrying the inactive Pio chassis, and EDI and the others were carrying QEC equipment.

"Get set up," Melara said as they offloaded and she stepped aboard. "We'll be back soon."

Waiting aboard was Matron Neska and a couple of her staff, all three ignoring the faint swoop of the shuttle's deck as it was lifted back into the air, the pilot aiming it toward the rakir capital.

"There is so much data, coming so fast; it will take years to comb through all of it," Neska said as they gathered around the asari Spectre. "The rakir are really non-native to Nakira?"

"We learned a basic outline," Melara told her, gesturing at them to sit down before she did as well. "The others are still working with Alb, pulling what they can as more and more databases come on line. But yes, that is true."

"Goddess…"

"Here is what we have so far," Mel said. "The Iovino were the species that first discovered what they called 'Foundation energy'-the source of this mysterious 'infection' these galaxies were quarantined for. We're still working through that one but Pio mentioned the 'Foundation Levels' and from the context we are almost positive now that it is, in fact, dark energy- biotics. The Senate deemed this energy far too dangerous and outlawed it, but couldn't stop it spreading through the handful of galaxies where it had already been tapped."

"Hence the quarantine."

"Exactly. The Iovino took exception to the quarantine and the method decided upon to enforce it, and rebelled. For their pains, they were systematically eradicated from the rest of the universe. In a final, desperate bid to save the last of their people, they stole an Ark themselves, processed three million Iovino, and saved their genetic material on that Ark-along with the sum total of their records, culture, knowledge. Goruba- that's the name of the Ark- was then smuggled into this galaxy, guarded by the head of this operation- a man named Relldo Sivarr- and a small crew aboard a second stolen ship. We have no solid verification but I'm willing to bet credits that second stolen ship is the one that was found in that methane ice. But they didn't make it in clean. They were attacked along the way, and it's possible their attackers even followed them into the Milky Way despite their fear of infection. Relldo and his crew sacrificed their lives to get keep Goruba safe long enough to hide, drawing away her attackers. They were successful but only partially- Goruba suffered damage."

"And she hid at the bottom of that lake?"

"No, actually. She hid in a comet."

"A comet?" Neska blinked.

"Yes. Encased herself in layers of ice and set herself in a preprogrammed path in this very solar system. Then she went dormant, letting gravity take care of the rest. Then, forty thousand years ago, her timer ticked over just after the Prothean harvest and she woke up, cleared herself of her ice cocoon, and realized that Nakira was the only garden world nearby capable of supporting the Iovino. So she landed herself in that lake and began to reconstitute the Iovino from the genetic material stored in her archives. The problem was, the damage she sustained interfered with her 'timer'. She was supposed to seed the rakir- the Iovino-millions of years before she did. Also damaged were some of her systems, which interfered with the repair protocols of the Pio within them."

"You sent me images of the artwork from that 'detrak' cave you found. They show images of rakir drowning in that lake, and of them attacking the natives."

"The attacking part is correct; not the drowning," Melara said. "The way the system was supposed to work failed. Goruba was supposed to pick a garden world suitable to the Iovino and she did-but she was supposed to pick an uninhabited one, and in that she failed- there was already a sparse population of natives here."

"The Detrak."

"Yes. Also, she was supposed to grow the new Iovino in life-pods, educating them as she did with her databanks. They were intended to wake up with their culture and language and a basic history ingrained in them as if they had never been gone. When they were matured, Goruba was to release the pods into the lake. As they floated to the surface they would dissolve, the rakir would emerge and move to shore, and start their lives over again.

"However the education programs failed. The rakir were reborn sapient but with only their primitive instincts. They surfaced in that lake with just those instincts…no education, culture, or even language. They literally woke up flailing in water with no idea what they were, who they were, or what water was. Several of them drowned. The Detrak-religiously awed by the ship they had seen landing in their lake and now these emerging strangers- tried to help them."

"And were killed."

"This is mother's speculation. The Detrak were peaceful. They were not prepared for the savagery of the newly born rakir. The rakir, however, had only their instincts. Over a period of about forty years, rakir would emerge from the lake at random intervals…in groups of hundreds scattered throughout a handful of days, and spread out into the surrounding world. Many of these groups began to form packs, and whenever they would come upon Detrak, they would slaughter them.

"Mother thinks that the Detrak- in an attempt to appease this angry god in their lake and its bloodthirsty minions that it was birthing-tried to get their approval by carving idols of them and setting them around the lake itself. Of course it didn't do any good. We don't know for certain but Mother is fairly sure that the last Detrak on Nakira probably died less than two hundred years after the rakir began appearing. They utterly destroyed this world's own original native population and took its place."

"They formed their own language, their own culture, with no memory of their origins," one of Neska's assistant's said in a hushed voice.

"And because they had no history or background of knowledge, they learned everything in the same pattern as any native developing species would have," Neska said. "First fire building and crude tool work, then rudimentary language- family groups growing into tribes, more sophisticated tools…they followed the expected pattern, and because we could not come down directly and study the fossil record after we discovered them and this world, we had nothing that would indicate they had not developed here naturally."

"But…the taboo?" The assistant asked. "They believe this lake is poisoned, and the rakir who try and go into it lose their minds."

"That's the Screen," Melara said. "In order to reconstitute the rakir from the genetic samples, Goruba needed access to energy and water; that's why she landed in the lake- in this lake in particular, because it is so close to geothermal energy. She needed immense amounts of water to regrow three million Iovino, but that water had to be free of absolutely anything that might contaminate the Iovino's genetic samples. The Screen sterilized everything it touched down to the microbial level. More complex animal life was no threat to the process but without the microbes the plants died, then the fish. The other animals just sensed the field and avoided it. However that was only half the Screen's purpose. It was also designed to stop any intelligent life that didn't have technology on the space-faring level from finding Goruba. If any sentient being entered that lake without evidence of the proper level of tech, the Screen was designed to…deter them. First confuse them, then literally reboot their brains back to the primitive instinct, causing seizures. If they persisted or accidentally got in deeper, it was designed to outright kill them. Now that Goruba is reactivating, the Screen has shut off."

"Reactivating?" Neska looked alarmed. "You mean she's waking up?"

"Yes, which is why we're now able to access her databanks. We're not sure how far the return from dormancy will go but it is very possible that at some point soon, we'll have a sentient Ark and its millions of Pio rising up out of that lake."

"To do what?"

"Whatever she is instructed to do, I suspect. We're working on that. For right now, I need to talk to the Ubuuta. Somehow we have got to convince her to give us more time at that lake."

"That…will be touchy, Captain. She was very reticent to allow you even this opportunity."

"I know, and I do not want to endanger our treaty with her or the trust we have managed to garner, but we are in a very troublesome spot. I need your advice, Neska. You know the rakir better than anyone. You've studied them and their culture for two hundred years now. The fact that the rakir are the Iovino puts them at an incredible amount of risk right now, but I am unsure if full disclosure is best. How would the Ubuuta take it to find out-"

"That her people did not originate on this planet? That they were born here, wiped of all culture and history, the children of genocide and extinction? I am still reeling from it myself, Captain. The Ubuuta and the other rakir…I can honestly say I do not know. Chances are she would rebel against the very notion with incredible and likely violent fervor. It might destroy the treaty and damage their relationship with our peoples for centuries to come. But if you do not tell her the truth, if you are holding something back-"

"She'll know it in an instant."

"Yes, and that will also shatter her trust in us, probably nearly as violently. There is…goddess…" She covered her face with her hands, bowing forward. "Goddess, there is no good answer."

"Well, we have until we arrive at the Capital to come up with one- otherwise everything we fought for to get the rakir uplifted just might blow up in our faces. And if it does, it's likely going to be bloody not only for us, but for this galaxy."