Chapter 54
"I see a flaw with our group." Ashley said with a suppressed laugh.
"Shut up." Shepard grumbled as she kept trying to get the console to obey her. Why did technology hate her?
"Just contact someone else and let them guide you through it." Wrex growled. Shepard could tell that he was getting inpatient because of the low amount of resistance they had met so far. They had actually not seen a single geth nor krogan yet, which concerned Shepard. She was trying to hack this console in hopes of finding out the reason to why there was no one to be seen.
"I've almost got it..." Shepard lied as she was met with another dead end. Trying to restart the whole process, the damn thing decided to block her out completely. Placing her hands on either side of the console, she took a deep breath as she closed her eyes. "Will I be classified as insane if I start shooting and swearing at a console?" She asked the two crew members behind her.
"We've all been there." Ashley soothed as she patted Shepard on the shoulder.
"Humans..." Wrex mumbled before he turned his attention back to their surroundings, looking for a possible target.
"You're normally quite a bit more calm than this, commander." Ashley said as they walked away from the, unfortunately, undamaged console. "Is something bothering you? Well, you know. Excluding the whole Saren thing."
"I hate not being in control." Shepard admitted as she checked around another corner. Not a single enemy in sight, either the front-line group was being really effective or something else was up.
"It's just a console." Ashley told her as Shepard with a confused look.
"I'm not talking about that piece of junk." Shepard sighed. "My team is split up into four different groups, three of which I have no control over. One of who I don't even have any communication with."
"You sound like a mum." Ashley chuckled to which Shepard gave her one of her famous glares. "You don't believe that they can finish their missions?" Ashley continued with a more serious look.
"Of course I believe in them. I'm just... I simply don't like being in a position where my friends are in danger and there's nothing I can do about it." Ashley nodded in understanding and they kept walking in silence for a few moments. Wrex had taken point some time during their conversation and were swiftly walking through the facility.
"If it makes you feel any better. I highly doubt any harm will come to Holt. This sort of mission seems to-"
"Why are you only mentioning Holt?" Shepard interrupted. Ashley just raised an eyebrow and looked at Shepard with a smirk.
"Never mind." She then said while shaking her head.
"If you women are done gossiping. There is something over here that we should check out." Deciding to ignore the first part of what Wrex said, Shepard looked over to where he was pointing and saw a catwalk leading into some sort of hologram.
"What the hell is that?" Ashley asked as the three of them got closer. The hologram of... something was shining bright red and almost pulsating with its surroundings.
"Looks like some kind of structure." Shepard guessed. "It might just be me but it looks sort of familiar."
"I've never seen a structure which looked like that." Wrex grumbled as Shepard walked a bit closer to reach out to it.
"You are not Saren." A voice suddenly boomed all around them. They all raised their weapons and looked around but nothing or no one showed themselves. Shepard slowly lowered her weapon and looked back towards the hologram.
"Is this some sort of VI?" Shepard asked her team mates while still eying the red hologram warily.
"Simple creatures of flesh and blood. You reach out for my mind, fumbling around in ignorance, incapable of understanding."
"I... don't think that's a VI." Ashley said as she still kept her weapon ready.
"Sounds like it's mocking us." Wrex grunted as he tightened his grip on his weapon. Shepard didn't know if Wrex was bloodthirsty enough by now to actually try and attack a simple hologram.
"It's not mocking us, Wrex." Shepard ensured before turning towards the hologram to ask the thing itself. "Or is it?"
"You dare to refer to me as 'it'? I come from a realm of existence beyond even your unlimited imagination, beyond your comprehension! I am Sovereign!" That when it hit Shepard. The hologram was a hologram of the ship they had seen on Eden Prime. The ship that Benezia had told them about.
"It's the ship." Ashley whispered as she too realized exactly who they were talking to. "It's... a ship." She added as she must have realized that they were talking to a ship.
"It's a reaper. That's what Benezia said that they were at least." Shepard mumbled.
"Reaper." Sovereign echoed. "A name given to us by the protheans to give a name to their destruction. That name is irrelevant."
"Protheans died out more than 50,000 years ago." Wrex said in a louder voice than usual. Shepard guessed that it wasn't every day that Wrex faced someone with a deeper voice than himself.
"50,000 years is but a dot on our timeline. Organic life wither and die. We are eternal."
"He makes it sound like they're a race of machines or something." Ashley said.
"Why are you working with Saren?" Shepard asked, hoping to get some answers out of this Sovereign.
"Saren is but a tool. We do not work with him."
"So Saren isn't who we should be worried about?" Ashley asked.
"We'll deal with Saren first and the reapers second." Shepard declared and heard an approving grunt from Wrex.
"Confidence born from ignorance. The cycle cannot be broken." Sovereign's voice once again boomed through the room.
"What cycle?"
"Countless civilizations have been allowed to rise. Countless civilizations have followed the same steps of finding the citadel, the relays. Artifacts that your races believe to have been left behind by the protheans."
"Believe? Are you saying that you created the relays?" Shepard asked as she was taking in a lot more than she believed she would before she left for this mission.
"My kind forged them and allowed your kind to find them."
"Allowed us to find them?" Shepard repeated. "To what end?"
"To allow your societies to advance."
"They allow us to do a lot of things, huh." Shepard mumbled.
"You exist, because we allow it. And you will perish, because we demanded it."
"They want us to flourish just so they can harvest us. They're treating us like livestock." Ashley gasped.
"And it seems like we won't be the first." Shepard continued. "I'm guessing you're not the only reaper then? Where are the others?"
"You will see soon enough." Sovereign simply said before the hologram vanished. The three of them simply stood silent in the dark room for several minutes. Unsure of what to say or do.
"Well... This will be quite the report to send to the council." Shepard finally sighed before turning around to continue her search for Saren. "But first..."
"Saren." Both Ashley and Wrex said as they turned to follow her. The reapers would just have to wait their turn.
