Normandy-War Room
Ashley Williams walked down the short group of stairs into the bottom of the War Room pit. She walked slowly because it looked as though EDI and Traynor were engrossed in a deep…and technical….conversation.
EDI turned on her at first, "Ah Commander Williams." She announced.
Traynor's head snapped around and she arched her eyebrows into her hair line.
"You two wanted to see me?" She asked.
Traynor and the AI traded a brief look before turning back to the Lt. Cmdr. And yet they still hesitated.
"We think we've come up with a solution to find Commander Shepard." Traynor started.
"Oh?" Ashley asked. And then it dawned on her. "But let me guess, it's a great feat of daring doo and borderline illegal? And with my dressing down of James Vega you didn't want to tell me in case I'd shoot you down?"
"Something like that" Traynor nodded, blushing sheepishly.
"Basically we think we can hack the Trygerisch corporate databases." EDI supplanted.
"Where? Not Tiptree." Ashley asked furrowing her brow.
"No, not Tiptree." EDI shot a look to Traynor who began to enter in commands on the War Room, it shifted to a map of North America/ Europe, showing crisscrossing and pulsing lines that seemed to indicate a power grid or communication.
"Basically," EDI continued, "The first thing that the Corporation did is set up a central 'hub' for their operations in North America and Europe; it handles all of their data and all their repair efforts, and coordinates their greater operations on Earth."
"Why would they set up such a hub? Wouldn't it be easier to just let them work as is?"
"From what we know about Mr. Faulkner it is not unreasonable to assume that he built a communication hub and database so that he, and his Board of Directors, could monitor and 'advise' on the situation on Earth." EDI surmised.
"And we think that whoever captured Shepard probably sent a message to their headquarters via that hub." Traynor added on.
"So you want to hack it?" Ashley asked looking at the map of Europe.
Traynor nodded slowly before bringing up another picture. Their target most likely, a building or complex that was a series of boxes wth anetenae sticking out of it, stretching towards the sky.
"The risks are minimal." EDI offered. "We can set up the downlink from the Normandy, and we can hack the facility without detection most likely. And we might be able to get the lay of the land and security arrangements."
"Are you sure that you won't be detected and can actually get the info we need?" Ashley asked just to be sure.
"Well we can't be completely sure…" Traynor acknowledged. "But EDI is a fully evolved and unshackled AI, her cyber warfare has evolved quite extensively with her experience in the wars. The only thing that could really defeat us would be if they have Reaper intelligence or a fully evolved AI of their own."
Ashley frowned and leaned over the War Room table.
"The risks are minimal." EDI assured.
"Do it." Ashley nodded. "But after we are done with that get me a com link with Admiral Jameson, let's see if I can't give her a heads up and put something together in the event that we can find the Commander and her current whereabouts."
"Understood Commander" Traynor nodded.
Trygerisch Corporate Headqurters
Abigail Shepard groaned as her head lolled around. After another bout of mental attacks from the Reaper in the room, but for whatever reason he had stopped.
She felt hot, and flushed, sweat was pouring off of her from the mental effort in keeping a being over a billion years old out of her mind, at least enough so where she didn't give in. Though she did suspect that was not how indoctrination really worked at the end of the day, that Harbinger was probably doing something just to weaken her mental defenses, to make her more susceptible to when he was trying the indoctrination in earnest. It was quite devious and she imagined that this was the 'quick' method that she knew about.
Well so much for keeping me in one piece…but even if I give in for a day the effects on the Galaxy could be tragic. Some days I hate that. So many people relying on me.
Her head snapped up as she felt a movement within her mind, a slight recoil, she began to look up slowly to see if she was alone. And her vision was beginning to clear.
The room she was in was spartan, at least in its set up and along the walls, but she could make out the clutter. Boxes and conduits lay on the floor, stuck right smack dab in the middle seemed to be an examination bench, a microscope leading over a plate, and then in one corner was a plate glass window that revealed what looked to be an observation bay.
And off to one corner…she hissed in…hoping it was all a dream…Miranda Lawson…back from the dead, in the flesh…but how?
She tried to summon spittle to make a coherent message that she could speak, "Miranda." She managed to groan out.
"Shepard." Her former compatriot sneered.
Abby flinched as if Miranda had just slapped her face, her psyche, she was a little gun shy it seemed.
"Why Miranda? Why? Why attack me, why join the Disciples, why try and undo everything that we accomplished together?" Shepard croaked out.
"You left me, you betrayed me." The woman who used to be her XO, and her friend, said simply. But that belied the venom dripping from her words.
"I didn't. I thought you were dead." Shepard tried to plead, to make sense for herself and for the woman glaring at her.
"No you didn't, you betrayed me, twice. You knew I was alive and you didn't give me the information that I needed to save Orianna and avoid Kai Leng. You betrayed me." She said again moving to glare.
What? Abby asked as her heart fell through the floor of her feet, just enough truth to convict her in a court of her own mind. The ghosts of her past were accusing her, why didn't you help me when I needed you Shepard?
But no, she had to know, had to know that it was not her fault that something else was going on. This wasn't Miranda, at least not the one she knew, not yet. They had gotten to her. And I can guess how.
This allowed her to rally her will.
"Miranda, Orianna is alive, she is not dead." She said, hoarsely, but didn't completely croak it out. "And I couldn't have given you that-"
"And for that I have only your word." Miranda sneered. "No I'm sorry Abigail; you are going to have to do a lot more than that to get me to trust you again."
Abby was about to continue her challenge but she heard a door open up over in one corner that she couldn't quite see, but quickly saw Keith pace into the room.
"Good morning Shepard." He announced happily.
"Morning?" She glanced out the only small window leading to the outside, "its dark out."
"Isn't it dark during the morning?" He asked with a mysterious smile.
"I guess." She tried to shrug in her restraints.
"Thank you, you may go now" He said bowing slightly to Miranda.
She nodded and shot Shepard one last parting glance before leaving for the observation bay, where she stood and folded her hands behind her back. Staring, watching.
"What did you do to her?" Shepard asked moving her head to peer at Keith.
The Corporate CEO, looking every bit the cliché role of one, bit his lower lip, inclining his head and twirling around in one place. "You know the answer to that, I mean you were at Torfan, you saw what we were moving through there."
"So you did use the Lazarus project on her?" She asked.
"Sort of…as it turns out that was not completely necessary actually." He nodded. "It seems that her father designed her to shut down near death, to assume a coma like state to preserve her bodily functions and brain, personality, her persona, in the event of extreme injury that couldn't be healed. It mimics death almost perfectly but she is not actually dead. All she needed was a slight, but very delicate…hence the equipment…restart."
"OK," Shepard's eyes narrowed, "That explains how she exists but not how you were able to turn her into a perfect little Lieutenant. Nor does it explain why you haven't used her before."
"Well we had to train her didn't we? Let her stay low until we could've used her again." Keith said and then descended into silence, his head dropping, his eyes squinting. This went on for nearly a minute. "But imagine, imagine being reborn, getting your life back, coming out of a coma and regaining consciousness…but with the steady pulses of a Reaper indoctrination single boring into your head. Basically you have the mental state of a baby as you are waking up, confused, disoriented, and the steady thrum of a Reaper reprogramming you, convincing you of almost anything."
"So it is a matter of simple indoctrination?" Well that's something
"Nothing simple about indoctrination as you should know."
"Which," Abby's eyes flitted over to the now quiet Harbinger cube, "brings us to Harbinger. How did you find him?"
Keith laughed tilting his head back. "Oh him, that's easy." He smiled and continued to think. "After the war you dealt with the Reapers and sent them into the sun to roast, but a lot of their tech was just scattered around, destroyed and damaged dreadnaughts and destroyers. We knew something had to survive, a power core, a personality matrix. So I ordered my people to look."
He stopped abruptly turning back to Harbinger and Abby had the nasty feeling that the two of them were communicating with each other as a faint glow was coming from the center of the cube.
Keith turned to her and smiled, "And it was lucky that we had found him too, intact. He was able to jettison a piece of his consciousness off from his body, not the full database which is why we had to study certain pieces of Reaper tech over the last several months, to duplicate it. But we were lucky we found him, he has brought our understanding of our subject matter by leaps and bounds. He is really…quite special."
"He is special?"
"Yes, he really is the first, the oldest of the Reapers. And as such he was there at the creation of the Catalyst, of the birth of the Citadel, he has a will of his own, and thus was able to resist the Catalyst's directives long enough for him to jettison himself into the Citadel, where we found him shortly after the war."
"And you aren't afraid of indoctrination?" Abby scoffed with a raised eyebrow.
"If we are to bring order to this cycle or the rest of the Galaxy then we need him. But he recognizes that things have changed. He cannot be a leader without an army, and right now he doesn't have one. If he hopes to see the balance that his race has been working for a billion years then he needs us and humanity. He needs our ingenuity. So he will indoctrinate only who he needs to survive. Corporate heads, military leaders, government-"he winced, "ow, no, not that."
Abby arched an eyebrow at him yeah keep telling yourself that buddy.
"But I'm afraid Commander we need you, your mind, your skills, what you represent, and your very soul. I was hoping to convince you of the righteousness of our mission but if you can't then we still need you. If you won't serve us willingly then you will serve us on your knees, eating out of our hands, and that image will send a shockwave through the Galaxy. It may drive up recruiting, it may bring society to its needs, and anyone who resists you, Miranda, and the rest of our forces will crush them…."
"In your dreams." She said as he began to turn away from her.
He turned back and was grinning dangerously, "Yes, in my dreams indeed. Harbinger my experiment is over, you can have at her." He said leaving through the door.
"Shall we begin?" The Reaper burst out suddenly.
Her eyes widened appreciably as the Reaper mental attack continued to slam into her, to renew itself.
Rapid fire images flashed past her.
A nuclear explosion, she leaning on the railing watching it as they hurtled from it, from the man she had just killed…Virmire.
Torfan as she was dodging Batarian bullets and light artillery as she charged to the building.
And Anderson, next to her, on the Citadel floor, his head sagging to the side, his eyes closed, sleeping the sleep of the damned, the last rest he would ever take. She saw herself check her sides and it was bleeding.
She screamed again, but this was one more of despair then pain.
Normandy-War Room
"Looks good." James Vega said looking at the revolving picture of the Trygerisch corporate headquarters on Tiptree.
It had to be at least sixty stories he decided, with a highlighted underground complex, and what looked like a few barracks and fortifications build around the place. What even looked like a wall ten stories up in one side of the building facing the rest of the compound.
Hmmm that's odd, he thought, a corporate center mixed with a military fort…Tiptree has certainly grown up from the way Joker had described it.
"What's that?" Paul asked pointing at the underground area.
"We aren't sure." Traynor admitted. "We think its ship yards of some sort but we couldn't get anything definite even in the database. It was actually oddly fragmented despite his reputation."
"What the hell would they be doing with ship yards under their headquarters…especially that…" Vega gestured vaguely at the screen. "Large."
"Which is why we aren't sure." Traynor said. "It doesn't make sense. But this was also a recent addition."
James nodded, "Fair enough…got intel on Shepard? Do you know where she is?"
Traynor manipulated her console and the camera panned upwards to the upper face of the building. "All reports seem to indicate that she is…there. In that room, just one floor removed from the top and the corporate offices. We don't know why she is there but it reads as if it says 'high level concept testing' whatever the heck that means."
"Doesn't this all seem a little easy?" Cynthia blurted suddenly. The assembled group all looked at her in unison. "What? If I were them I would certainly dangle Abigail Shepard out there for all to see in the hopes someone would come after her."
"This certainly wasn't easy, the encryption was surprisingly complex and seems specifically designed to defeat AI or VI counter programs." EDI reported. "It took me about five minutes even to get through the defenses."
"What's their security look like?" Paul asked turning around to glance at EDI.
"Very light, for now." EDI said. "But they seem to have protocols in place if they are expecting an attack."
"Sounds convenient." James snorted. "I certainly can imagine…what they mean…by that."
Ashley's appearance out of the communication bay distracted him, her head was drooping.
"Commander?" Paul asked.
"The Alliance Government has officially stepped in; there will be no attack on the Trygerisch headquarters."
"What?!" James yelled.
"But…why?" Cynthia asked.
"Have they not seen the information we've gathered?" EDI turned curiously.
Ashley nodded, "They have. But they do not know where we got it, it could be a fabrication they said…or obtained illegally….Jameson 'wants' us to sit tight."
"Wants?" Paul asked.
Ashley smiled, "Yeah she couldn't actually say anything but she gave implied approval."
"Well, shall we go then?" Jaes asked smiling wolfishly.
Ashley nodded. "Damn straight. But we are on the rickety edge now. There is no going back and we are on our own. We go in, get Shepard back, get out."
"Sounds dangerous." James smirked.
"Just letting you know the stakes."
"We're with you Ashley, one hundred percent." Cynthia piped in.
She nodded and smiled her thanks.
"Alright, James, you Paul and I are going after her. Liara, Palin, Cynthia, you've got our backs. Let's go get Shepard."
AN/AC: Now THIS is the longest any of my stories have been!