MASS EFFECTIVE 3: The Hero
The Reapers are here. Generations of Galactic Genocide. Engagements of Epic Proportion. Surviving a Saga of Super High Stakes. As Shield and Shepard race against the clock to put an end to this tale once and for all, one has to ask...how will it all end? Will their choices forever change the Milky Way and decide its future for eons to come? Probably. Rated T for Profanity.
We find Shepard taking a walk through Vancouver, escorted by a guard detail. The looks that she gets from passerby's is not the hero's welcome one would expect. Fighting with the terrorist organization Cerberus has tarnished her once untouchable legacy, and she is no longer held up as the pinnacle of human achievement by the Alliance propaganda machine. Though she is allowed outside, she is 'technically' being kept on house arrest, awaiting her next day in the Alliance tribunal. She's part of a greater indictment, as she's charged (along with the several others arrested on Eden Prime) with sedition and terrorism by the Alliance. This is viewed by Anderson, who has vouched for her every step of the way and has even gotten sacked from his job because of it, as a good thing. The Alliance will be more lenient to its own as the Council wanted to try her itself, especially the asari. They hold her accountable for the temple bombing on Thessia and the firefights that killed several citizens in Serrice's streets. She's also on the hook for killing a Council Spectre.
Despite the stance currently held by the Alliance and the Council toward her, many human colonists outside its influence laud her actions. And Cerberus too for that matter. In a huge scandal, Cerberus has gone public, directly challenging the Alliance's role as humanity's representative, extending it's influence to almost every single human colony in the Terminus Systems. They have opened embassies on several human world including even Earth, inciting the local populace for a call to arms. An Alliance crackdown on one in Ferris Fields led to several planetary riots on worlds (including Earth) that all had to be quelled with naval marines. With several Arcturus Senators announcing themselves as part of the Cerberus Party in Alliance Parliament, several nations from Earth allowing Cerberus to freely spread its propaganda, and huge galactic human-based corporations voicing their backing, the Alliance is suddenly fearful that Cerberus has actually gained enough influence to challenge its legitimacy. The political landscape of the galaxy has been rocked dramatically by it. Cerberus now openly broadcasts some of Shepard's missions from 2185 CE too, publicizing their role in stopping the Collectors when no one else did. The huge amount of evidence to prove it only embarrasses the Alliance further. There's talks it could escalate into a human civil war.
The galaxy is still reeling from economic turmoil due to its earlier market crash. Resources of every kind are hard to come by. The galaxy has also never been more divided. The asari have now been proven to have hid the prothean beacon from everyone, and several Council members advocate for the withdrawal of their seat. The volus announce they no longer wish to be a client race of the turians after their subjugation. Humanity now seems divided between those who support the Alliance and those who support Cerberus. Salarians are even fear-mongering about a second Krogan Rebellion now that there's a new central government being created by the Urdnot on Tuchanka. The Galaxy has never been riper for the picking, and the Reapers make their big entrance onto the scene with all this in place. The Reapers crash Shepard's last day in court, and the events of ME3 start off with a bang. It's time to get started.
Cue TAKE IT BACK! Official Mass Effect 3 Music Video by Miracle of Sound (Dude makes pure gold. Come on. Listen to it. You know you wanna. Do it.)
In the year 2186, a veteran traveler from the 21st century ends their journey in the realm of a famed franchise originally set in the Milky Way. In the time that followed, their subsequent adventurers led said traveler to eventually find their raison d'ĂȘtre, enabling them to survive countless more scenarios of peril that followed them throughout the stars. This is their story. The basis for their impossible existence is now known, contradictory to the very fabric of space and time.
The traveler called it utter BS.
The readers of this story call it...
MASS EFFECTIVE: The Hero.
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Prologue
Priority: Earth
Shepard busts out of the trial room with Anderson as the Reapers attack. They would head straight for the Normandy, where it was currently being retrofitted at a facility nearby. As they get assaulted by Reaper forces, soldiers join the fight, helping stem the tide of endless mooks. However these are not Alliance marines, but soldiers identifying themselves as Cerberus troops. Gasp. Despite the unwanted ally, they reluctantly fight alongside them until they get to the dock. There, they meet Kaidan and Ash who's currently defending it from a horde of Cannibals and Husks. After taking them all out with the help of Cerberus, Kaidan would have time to tell the two that Hackett had given them all orders to immediately leave the planet with the ship. 'They' is clarified to be all the members of Lazarus who had decided to turn themselves in alongside Shepard, and those who were arrested on Eden Prime. Joker, Pressly, Chakwas, Gabby and Daniels, Adams and Traynor (who were overseeing the retrofit), the rest of the named side characters, etc etc are already on board. Hackett knew they'd need the Normandy and its crew to win the war as soon as the Reapers appeared at Arcturus Station. Shepard was humanity's x-factor. Anderson agrees, right before telling them both he's staying to lead the resistance instead of fleeing. Though Shepard REALLY does not like that, Anderson says he's going to lead the resistance effort, save as many as he can, and also find out what Cerberus is up to, convincing her it was okay. And he cautiously follows the Cerberus troops that says there's a staging point nearby. Though things are still awkward between Shepard and Kaidan after their last meeting on Horizon, they quickly move past it, escaping just in time as the Reapers level the hangar around them.
Priority: Mars
Shepard immediately receives an update from Hackett directing them towards Mars. Not too long ago, a new chamber had opened in the prothean ruins there, and the researchers there had relayed they made a reality-shattering discovery before the station went dark. They head there immediately, land a shuttle, and proceed to find evidence of a Cerberus attack. They go in, and it quickly becomes a race to the chamber. Eva Core throws Cerberus troops at them after Shepard refuses to talk the situation over peacefully, as Eva relays that Cerberus is saving humanity, don't try to stop them, etc. She takes them on a winding path through the facility, and they defeat her right before entering the chamber, shocked to find she's a robot. As they reach the console though, they find it already destroyed. A holo of TIM appears, and he explains that while they were enemies today, that doesn't mean that Cerberus isn't looking out for humanity or willing to work with the Alliance tomorrow. The discovery there will allow them to beat the Reapers, and he tells Shepard to meet him at the Citadel to learn why he's doing what he's doing. Shepard brings along the Eva robot for clues as to what happened. Going over her files on the Normandy, they see Rasa personally access the archive, telling Eva to lead them on a wild goose chase while she finishes her job. Angered at the setback, Shepard follows TIM's advice, heading to the Citadel to see for herself why TIM's suddenly working for the Reapers.
Priority: Citadel I
Upon arriving, Shepard meets with Udina who reinstates her as an Alliance marine on Hackett's orders, and invites her to the next Council briefing. It's made known that the Council had been preparing for the Reapers since a cadre of Spectres, the STG and Turian Reaper Taskforces, Thessia's Beacon Research Team, and Alliance Spec Ops pooled intelligence on everything found. The events at the Alpha Relay cemented their existence, where Amanda Kenson sent back a video of a Reaper coming through the Relay right as it (and the surrounding system) was destroyed. Kenson had nobly done the deed herself, after the new IDK's they received had revealed several of her crew had already been indoctrinated. She died making sure it went off. Shield who had tipped Anderson who had tipped Hackett who had tipped Kenson about the predicament would be revealed sometime later in the story for why that series of events had changed. Shepard herself never went.
Due to this, the Council (and the Republics/Hierarchy/Union/Alliance) have been secretly mass producing IDK's, retrofitting ships with Thanix cannons, and stockpiling resources (prolonging the economic recession) to ramp up war efforts against the oncoming threat. But the Reapers already arriving and taking out the batarians and humans happened quicker than expected. They only now realize that a conventional war is out of the question. As Shepard is unable to stop their subsequent debate on the next course of action to take, who to save first, a new person intrudes on the meeting. Despite Shepard's expectations, it's not TIM. Udina instead recognizes the person as his predecessor, former Alliance ambassador Anita Goyle. Right as he asks how she got into their war summit, she activates a holo and lets TIM take the stage. He plainly states that the Reapers will destroy every civilization in the galaxy, regardless of if they pool their resources to fight them or not. The only way they would win is by continuing the work thousands of races had started before them, and says that Cerberus is the only one with the plans to make this possible. As evidence, he sends everyone there the theoretical output of the device that's capable of such a feat. He thanks Shepard for allowing him to get the blueprints for it on Mars. As the Council debates over the legitimacy of the data, TIM elaborates that the Council should start sending Cerberus the resources and personnel necessary, and following whatever orders he gives to make this possible. Cerberus will take charge of the war effort.
While the Council declares this outrageous, Ambassador Goyle then tells the Council to switch on the news. To their shock, a huge swath of humans refugees are suddenly pouring onto the Presidium seemingly out of nowhere, with C-SEC on the verge of firing upon them. Goyle states that these humans are from Earth. TIM clarifies, telling them that Cerberus were the ones who stole the Conduit from Ilos back in 2183 CE (see AHL Ch 4 Curtain Call). After repairing it, Cerberus would now use the Conduit (which they have moved to Earth) to evacuate its citizens to safety. While the Council is furious over this security breach, TIM states that he has all the cards, and that they should acquiesce to Cerberus' demands. They can't destroy the Conduit, as they saw what happened in the Bahak System (and would they really doom billions of human lives to be harvested by the Reapers?). And if Cerberus doesn't have the resources or 'morale' to prevent the Reapers from using the Conduit themselves, the station would fall, resulting in the Reapers controlling the Relays and winning the war.
Shepard calls him indoctrinated, as he holds the entire galaxy hostage for no reason. TIM says that his IDK show he's not indoctrinated, with Goyle demonstrating the evidence by scanning herself. The Council then calls his bluff, saying he wouldn't doom humanity if the spoiled child didn't get his way. TIM disagrees, saying he'd build this device regardless, only it'd be scaled down so that it's range only saves humanity. If the rest of the galaxy also wished to survive, Cerberus would need their efforts to make it happen. Udina, though reluctant to side with Cerberus, now sees how a human-led effort could prove useful to their people. He agrees to Cerberus' demands if they share their work with the Alliance, backstabbing the Council. TIM refuses, citing that their organization is too prone to infiltration, as evidenced by Cerberus' own success. It's TIM's way or the highway. Shield and Liara then come in like big goddamn heroes, announcing that they have the plans for the fabled Crucible themselves. Flashback time.
Priority: Klencory
Liara was not at Mars due to the Cerberus debacle. As a brief member of the Lazarus team and giving Cerberus Council intelligence (the IDK), she was put on the Council's most wanted list alongside the rest of the squad. Shield himself has also been blacklisted, with Cerberus leaking that he was a member of their organization and the one responsible for assassinating an Alliance Major. Due to this, both were unable to gain access to Mars. Even Anderson, due to losing his position, lacked the pull to get them clearance. So they have instead been on the lam, researching leads on how to fight the Reapers elsewhere, with the main focus chasing the fabled Crucible, which Shield has continually told Liara about. With Glyph's (limited) access to the Broker's information network, they've visited several leads to find the plans elsewhere, already crossing TIM on Kahje and Feros. And just before the invasion, they had recently been extended an invitation by Kumon Shol, telling them he has what they are looking for.
Enter Kumon Shol, the CEO of the Elkoss Combine. Despite inheriting one of the largest companies in the galaxy, he has become an infamous recluse, being labelled insane and ignored by the galactic community. This was for constantly spouting about receiving visions from beings of light, telling him to protect all organic life from machine devils by finding their lost crypt. After twenty years of excavation, he has finally accomplished his mission. He is now carrying out the second piece of his divine vision. Contacting the others he's seen in his vision. Despite his reputation, Liara and Shield visit Klencory, where the volus leads them to the ruins he's uncovered. Shield experiences the same head pounding he felt on Haestrom, and talk of beings of light make him relive his vision from 2183 CE. Kumon is ecstatic when he realizes that Shield's seen them too. Kumon had only met one other before him, Manuel from Eden Prime. Who spoke of a prophet. He always thought it himself but...
Liara accesses the archives console while this is all going on, revealing that this might be what they sought after-all. A rogue group then attacks the operation, proclaiming themselves as Dalemetrians, otherwise known as cultists from the ever-growing Church of the Divine Plan. They have received orders from their higher-ups to destroy this heretical facility. Their sheer numbers rout the mercenary force hired by Shol, and Liara and Shield barely escape with the Crucible plans they find. They then head straight for the Citadel upon hearing that the Reapers have finally invaded.
Priority: Citadel I (Cont.)
TIM curses Shield for foiling his efforts as they share the blueprints for the Crucible with the Council. But it's quickly made clear that they have an incomplete version. To prove this and prevent everyone from wasting resources an obsolete weapon, TIM says that he is willing to share his Crucible plans, but only if they allow the human refugees to stay on the station, and that Cerberus is kept in the loop and treated as a member of the Council's ruling body. After a meaningless exposition dump explaining why the Council would ever agree to this or trust him, they acquiesce. Anita Goyle says she will stay on the Citadel as Cerberus' envoy, and gradually give them updated schematics every time they reach a new juncture, but only if they continue to keep their word. She also offers Cerberus aid to any race that asks for it. TIM states that despite its methods, Cerberus will contribute to the war, and do everything in their power to ensure that humanity might survive. With the Crucible decided as their only hope, and its construction beginning, the meeting is adjourned. Not before giving Shepard her Spectre status back too. Shepard, Kaidan, Ash, Shield, and Liara all catch up in Udina's office afterwards, where Councillor Sparatus then secretly calls in to request their help. While Shepard is assigned Priority: Palaven, Liara receives her own call. Dr. Unira T'Lam, liaison from the Citadel Committee on Paleotechnology, informs her of an urgent discovery on Eden Prime upon meeting them in person.
Shield had been searching for Javik since the beginning, telling the Broker agents in Glyph's contacts to keep him updated on the ruins there. Receiving no information whatsoever has him fear that Javik won't be found this time around. This is proven false as T'Lam informs Liara that as a Prothean expert and ally of Commander Shepard, she must head for Eden Prime immediately, as Cerberus has taken over the research site there. That's why there had been no news. Stupid agents. With this revelation, it's conveyed that Shield does not have nearly as much information at his disposal as the Broker did without the network hub that was destroyed inside the Collector Base. Due to the urgency of both missions, Shield propositions that the team splits up. While Shepard takes Ash and Kaidan to Menae, Shield and Liara will go to Eden Prime. This will start the branching of Mass Effective's story between Shepard's Canon A Plot and Shield's Fictional B Plot. And off we go.
Author's Notes:
Because there was so much I wanted to add in ME3's story, and because it'd be so stuffy with the sheer amount of characters introduced on the Normandy, I decided for this story to have Shield and Shepard's paths diverge. While we'd have brief glances into Shepard's ongoing struggle to find allies for the Allied Forces, the main focus of the story would be Shield's missions to find resources for the Crucible, which will be delved deeper into the next chapter. Because I wanted to add new squad-mates and new story arcs concerning different races, I just couldn't fit them all into the timeline without the whole thing becoming a bloated mess and chronologically infeasible. It'd also allow Shield to finally become an official deuteragonist to Shepard, and come into his own after all the experiences he's had.
And concerning lore, I wanted Cerberus as a rival to the Alliance instead of TIM being a straight up Bond Villain simply because I wanted them to have nuance. How Cerberus was treated in ME3 was stupid. In the kill count I mentioned previously in AHR, Shepard is able to kill 879 Reaper troops in ME3. Want to know how many Cerberus troops you kill? Go ahead. I'll wait. You give up? It's okay, it's understandable. Did you guess 300? Those are rookie numbers. You gotta pump those up. 500? What are they, Blue Suns? 800, as there's no way they'd have more Cerberus troops than Reapers, right? ...1000? Haha...no. No reader, you kill over 1100 Cerberus troops in ME3. We're trying to save humanity in this game, but somehow, we end up killing more of them than we do Reapers. What the fuck Casey Hudson.
In the comic ME: Homeworlds and ME3 itself (in the description for planet Benning), there's been a continuous reference to a rogue faction of Cerberus at work. It's never followed upon, and I assume it was a leftover plot point from trying to make TIM and Cerberus not intentionally straight up stupid evil. Though the plot point is obviously dropped as he's indoctrinated and they become bigger bads then the Reapers, I really wish they at least did that rogue Cerberus thing instead of the mustache-twirling villain TIM became. Though the dude touched a Reaper artifact several decades ago and got husk eyes, it's just so much more engaging if Cerberus isn't just an army of indoctrinated goons. Cerberus as a renegade option to the Alliance's paragon would have been a really cool dichotomy for ME3, and being able to choose which dogma humanity ends up backing in ME3 would have been a really interesting theme to have, especially after allowing you to work with TIM and agree with his agenda in ME2. Giving them the backing of huge galactic corporations (that they've repeatedly been hinted to own) and the Terminus colonies they've saved also help explain in my mind where the hell the dude got a fleet of warships and the logistics to field an entire army. I don't care how many people you reaperfy, where the hell did you get all the weapons and armor to equip them with?
