Well, here we are. finally got around to doing this between bouts of existential dread and a handful of minor apocalypses. (apocalyli?) I finally managed to work on this again. After which I promptly forgot I hadn't uploaded this chapter and kept working on CH 30 (which is actually good for keeping the world consistent, as I was able to backtrack and make sure the new chapter correctly references this one, and make changes that improved them both) If anyone still reads these I'd love to hear what you think. and Ch30 will be uploaded very quickly, even by other people's standards.
Anyway, enjoy!
Shepard crouched on easily on her heels in the corner of the small room, her Specter-class sniper expanded across her knees. It was always more comfortable for her to have her back to a wall. Her eyes swept over the rooms occupants, two spartan soldiers, each one capable enough to be counted among the most dangerous beings in the galaxy. Commander Sarah Palmer, a strange twin from another universe, and a man seemingly without a name. He only went by his strange rank. Master Chief-Petty Officer Spartan 117, Or Master Chief. A quick search when she'd first heard it told her that the rank was from the old earth wet navy. The kind that used actual boats on water. The highest non-commissioned rank in the entire service. A fitting rank, a smirk tugged at her lips, recalling an old Operations Chief she'd worked with on her first deployment, fresh out of bootcamp, on a tiny frigate. He told her he'd been a chief for thirty years, and when she asked if he'd ever considering being an officer, he reeled back with a deep, booming guffaw. "An Officer?!" He snorted. "Hell no, kid, I'm too smart to be an officer!" A smooth cheeked sub-lieutenant shot him a dirty look, to which the Chief tipped an imaginary hat and without missing a beat or adding an ounce of remorse. "Excepting yourself, sir, I'm sure." The young officer nodded, clearly missing the joke, and carried on. After the young man had passed, the Chief gently elbowed Shepard and winked.
Technically her twin outranked him, but there was an obvious deference in her towards him. There's an obvious deference in everyone towards him… she chuckled inwardly. The man held himself so surely, with such a calm, complete confidence that almost everyone looked up to him. Herself included. Though he was part of her crew and followed her orders.
The twin was a curious phenomenon. She had Shepard's face and voice, perfectly identical, but Palmer towered over her by more than a foot. Supposedly due to the "enhancements" that all spartans go through as part of their training. There were a few other differences, notably in the ways they preferred to fight. Palmer carried twin pistols and clearly relished the upfront fight. Shepard's infiltrator training always put her in favor of an indirect fight. She would much rather remove a target's head from a kilometer away than brawl up close.
Shepard's eyes continued around the room. Always moving, searching for the slightest threat. The walls were relatively dark, plain stone, with angular rivulets spidering across nearly every surface. There was only one entrance that they knew about, a single, double wide door on the opposite side of the room to Shepard. But that didn't mean it was the only way in. Checking the door put the only other significant feature of the room into focus. A tall pillar in the center of the room. There was no obvious difference between this pillar and the walls, but it was an access node for the Geth mainframe and the only unaccounted member of their little party was inside, a half-mad AI that was, technically, a war criminal.
And we're trying to cure her. Shepard thought incredulously, not for the first time. The life of a Spectre is not one of Black and White morals. Cortana was a danger to the entire Galaxy, but she didn't want to kill anyone, and if she could be controlled, or reasoned with, she could be a potent weapon against the oncoming Reaper Invasion. Maybe their only chance at a convincing victory. Sheaprd didn't want to think about the kind of hoops or close shaves they'd have to go through in order to defeat the Reapers without their help. She doubted it would be pretty.
Palmer and Chief snapped their eyes towards the door. Shepard didn't need the quick bark, "movement," to know to bring her weapon up and sight in on the door. Palmer and Chief quickly made their way to the edges of the door and readied their own weapons.
"Sitrep," Shepard ordered into the radio.
"Multiple hostiles opposite the door," Palmer said, calm, clear and quiet. She hesitated. "They've stopped" Palmer's flingers flexed on her pistol grips. "They're gathering in front of the door."
"How many?" Shepard slipped over beside Palmer and pressed herself against the wall. She collapsed her sniper on her back and pulled out her hand cannon, this would be a brawl after all.
"Dozens." Palmer stated flatly. "More coming."
"They'll storm the room." Chief didn't sound worried. It sounded like he was talking about the weather more than a deadly firefight.
"But they're not." Palmer said. "The ones closest have stopped moving. "They're gathering reinforcements."
"Can we shoot our way out?" Shepard asked.
"Not without her," Chief said with the surety of mountains.
"They're not attacking yet." Shepard reasoned. "They're afraid of us. That's good. We hold this door as long as we can, and if Cortana comes back we'll use her to get out." Chief's golden visor swivel over to stare at her. Every other part of his body was stock still. It was like being glared at by an owl with a heavy machine gun.
"When." a statement of fact.
Shepard nodded, "When she comes out." Shepard opened her omni tool and stared working on some overload routines. She was almost glad that she didn't have the Spartan's motion tracker. To remind her of the growing threat.
"What do you think our chances are? Shepard asked Palmer.
She could hear the grin in Palmer's voice. "Oh, at worst we'll only be declared MIA," Palmer chuckled.
Shepard didn't get the joke. But she doubted she would have laughed anyway.
Joker eased the Normandy through the crowded Geth upper atmosphere. Crowded by space standards. The closest object on their scanners was a Dreadnought 2500km away. The closest object they could see, anyway. In stealth mode, it was counterproductive to use active scanning. So they could only rely on passive information gathering. No LIDAR or anything like that, so there could be any number of small objects near them. But they could catch anything bigger than an escape pod.
Joker jumped as a dull BONG echoed through the hull, then winced. His femur ached from the quick strain. Something had hit them. Probably space junk. Joker swiped through some screens to the ship's internal sensors. It hadn't hit them hard enough to cause any damage.
"No worries people." Joker called out over the shipwide. "Just a love tap from some space junk."
He dismissed the screens and settled back into his seat, bring up the passive scans on the dreadnought. It was 2450km now. Joker squinted suspiciously.
"Hey Adams, what's the status on the drive sink?" He asked into the com.
"Purring like a kitten, we're dark, Joker." Chief Engineer Adams reported.
"Alright, Joker out." Joker cut the comm and gently boosted the Normandy back. That dreadnought was probably just doing random movements or a patrol, but the fact that it was moving closer at all was… creepy.
"Better be safe." He muttered to himself, and coasted the Normandy out of the Dreadnought's predicted path.
The Geth Hopper, suckered to the Normady's hull, updated its trajectory accordingly.
Shepard crouched next to Palmer, going over the mechanicals of her side arm for the fifth time. It was in perfect condition, but she'd be checking again in five minutes. She pulled the cover from the tiny Ezo core and inspected it for dust, next she removed the slide, briefly wondering why it was called a slide, as it did not move in the slightest, it simply covered the barrel. It was all good. She reassembled the weapon and opened her omni tool to review her AI Hacking suites, that she was running the correct patch and there was no out of date intrusion protocols. She checked her ammo mods were active, and her incineration marco was sound. It was a quick efficient ritual. It had a calming effect, almost like a mantra or prayer.
The silence was deafening. The solitary hum of the central pillar almost made it seem quieter than total silence.
"How many now?" Shepard asked.
"Over Fifty." Palmer replied curtly.
"Only fifty? Shepard wondered aloud. "Figured if we'd been discovered they would have sent more."
"More are coming," Palmer muttered. "But you're right. This doesn't feel like gathering for an attack. Its different."
"Then I wonder what they're doing." Shepard mused.
Chief hadn't moved an inch since setting up at the door. He didn't look at them when his deep baritone thrummed through the radio. "They're waiting."
Shepard and Palmer shared a look.
"For what?" Shepard asked.
Chief lowered his mattock. He had the gall to actually put it away. "For the winner."
Then the explosions started.
Joker gaped at his view screens. It couldn't be. He had to be seeing things. Joker opened a private channel to Wrex and Garrus.
"Guys, please tell me this isn't what I think it is." He included the images coming from the surface of Rannoch, thankfully a thousand kilometres from Shepard's drop point.
"Spirits…" Garrus whispered.
"By the quads of my Ancestors…" Wrex sounded more excited than anything else. "That's it."
"It looks like a different… model, or type, whatever you want to call it, from Sovereign," Garrus said, audibly shaken. "But sorry Jeff. That's definitely a Reaper."
On the view screens, magnified from orbit. A Reaper, smaller than Sovereign, but still massive, rampaged across the surface of Rannoch. It galloped on four legs like a fear maddened beast, crashing through buildings that had been built around it. It had emerged from a hole, deep underground. Joker doubted they could have ever known about it without being on the ground. Why emerge? And what was wrong with it?
"We've gotta pick up Shepard." Joker said, tuning to their channel. "Shepard? Shepard! Come in! You've got A REAPER on the planet, you need to get out of there!" Joker scrambled through his screens and shoved the Normandy out of it's easy orbit into a full dive to the rendezvous. "You need to get to the LZ NOW!" Static was his only reply.
The Geth dreadnought, which had been slowly approaching, but was definitely going to swing wide from the Normandy by over 500 km, unleashed a scorching volley of mass accelerator fire across the Normandy's nose. Joker pulled her out of his dive just in time to not be seared out of existence. A flight of interceptors blossomed from the behemoth and scattered to surround the Normandy.
Joker mashed his thumb to the engineering coms. "Dammit Adams! Get the sink online!" He snapped.
"Drive sink is functioning perfectly!" Adams replied. "Not a single photon is leaving this ship!"
"Then how did they-" Joker bit off his retort. This was it. He couldn't move her, the Normandy was surrounded on all sides by fighters, and he couldn't take on a Dreadnought. Even if he was the best pilot in the galaxy, the Normandy only worked as a combat vessel when nobody could detect her easily. Somehow, the geth had gotten past the stealth drive. Joker closed his eyes. He'd knew he'd probably die in the service. That was the trade off. You got the fly the best ships in existence, but you might die doing it. He felt bad for Hillary, this far out, they'd probably never be found. She'd never know that he'd died for sure.
"At least we're going out doing what we love, eh, girl?" He ran a hand over the simple lines of the Normandy's cockpit. He took a breath, and waited for the killing blow to rip through the ship. Escape pods wouldn't do much, not really, they'd just get picked out of the black by the fighters. There wasn't enough time to get to them anyway.
Nothing happened.
Joker cracked an eye. The geth were still there. Still pointing giant guns at his girl, but they weren't firing. Why not?
"Uuuh, sir?" Joker turned to Navigator Pressly, striding up from the CIC.
"I don't know," The acting CO said honestly. "But we're not dead yet, so that's something." He looked down at Joker. "Can you get us out?"
"Depends on how many pieces you want us in," Joker shrugged. "If you pick a number bigger than seven, I'm your man."
Pressly frowned at him. "Now is hardly the time."
"We're about to die in space at the weird three-fingered hands of robot aliens. Now is the best time," Joker muttered.
Pressly keyed the radio. "Geth Vessel. The Alliance is willing to speak about terms. Please respond." A long silence filled the cockpit. The fighters surrounding them betrayed nothing. Making only minor adjustments to keep in position around the Normandy.
A voice, calm and synthetic, crackled through the radio.
"Normandy Vessel. Standby."
Pressly and Joker shared confused looks.
"What are we standing by for?" Pressly demanded. Nothing.
"My guess?" Joker started, tilting the viewscreen towards the Navigator. The Reaper reared back on it's back legs and smashed through a geth building, then stumbled forward. "Is for this thing to finish doing whatever the hell it's doing."
The collection of Geth Programs designated "Legion" transferred themselves to a platform over halfway across the surface of the Creator's Homeworld. It activated it's eye and a medium size Hunter platform pulled itself from the niche it had been stored it. It was near the center of the Geth, were the Old machine had been planted, rushed in in secret through that strange deception. Audio sensors peaked multiple times as local perturbations in architecture took place, originating from the Old Machine currently in the throes of conflict. Legion could not categorize the conflict.
The hunter platform nimbly jogged down geth made halls, avoiding falling debris made by the Old Machine. These were recognizable pattern of structures, Legion did not have to spend energy to generate predictive information. This was useful.
Geo-physical compression waves passed through local terrain, but the hunter's sturdy construction easily let Legion keep its balance. A door opened and closed, exposing Legion and it's platform to the harsh Homeworld local starlight. Towering over it, the Old Machine.
A quadruped construction, marked as sub-Sovereign in design. Consensus was made, predicting a 99.73524% chance that this design would be equally damaging to a solitary geth platform as a Sovereign class..
Consensus. Legion activated it's platform's cloak, and sprinted away from the building it had emerged from. This platform would survive longer if it was distant to visible objects.
The hunter platform's eye focused on the Old Machine. No known behaviour pattern existed to form a predictive model. Local observation showed abnormal electro-magnetic wavelength variation in the visible light emitters on the Old Machine's surface, fluctuating from native 750nm to 467nm, 520nm, then back again. There was no observable pattern in the wavelength variation.
Legion's connection to the Geth mainframe told him that the Heretics were still partitioned inside the Interloper, and baseline Geth had taken control of significant portions of local platforms, though running at significantly decreased operating effectiveness. With only a fraction of Geth available for the millions of platforms. Many were running only a handful of geth, undoubtedly they would make poor tactical decisions. Legion appreciated the consensus of maintaining operational effectiveness within its run times. This was a great moment of Geth history, possibly greater than the Morning War, though there was no Consensus on a metric to designate such distinctions.
Legion watched through the Hunter platform as The Old Machine struggled. EM radiation shifting and changing. It seemed to be more often in the 750nm range than any other. Though fluctuating between 770nm and 745nm. Consensus could not be found to interpret this input.
The cockpit of the Normandy was crowded beyond the normal standards of the little space. Every square centimeter of space was given to a nervous onlooker, studying the large viewscrees that showed the… conflict below. Whispers fluttered through the crowd, anxiety laden. This wasn't good for morale.
"Outta the way!" A guttural shout came from the hall into the CIC, followed by a more gentle, but still firm. "Excuse us. Watch out, sorry about that."
Wrex and Garrus forced their way into the cockpit through the murmuring masses. Or rather, Wrex forced his way through and Garrus followed through the hole he'd made, apologizing for the Krogan as he went.
Wrex's wide head swung down level with Joker's sitting in his chair. "That the fight?" He asked. He sounded jealous!
"Apparently." Joker tilted the screen to the Krogan and the Turian. "What it means I don't have a goddamn clue."
"Whats it doing?" Garrus wondered. It sounded like he was thinking aloud more than anything else.
"My guess? Whatever the Reaper equivalent of screaming is." Joker shrugged.
"The colours are changing." Garrus noted, looking at the screen closer. "Sovereign had red lights over it. And it's weapons were all red. This one's colours are changing, blue and green. Red, blue and green." He looked at Joker, his dark, turian eyes heavy. "Who do we know that has issues with those colours?"
Joker frowned and checked the viewscreens again. "What? I don't-" Garrus was right. The lights all over the Reaper were shifting colours. Joker's eyes widened. "She's trying to take over a Reaper," he said faintly.
The word "Reaper" sent a silencing chill through the gathered crowd, except for Wrex, who roared back in laughter. The human crew around him pressed back away from the laughing Krogan as much as the crowd would allow.
"HAHA!" Wrex shook with mirth, and what Joker could only describe as visceral enjoyment. "That thing has got a QUAD." He puncuated his comment by slamming his flist into his palm energetically.
"I just hope it wins." Joker muttered.
Garrus's mandibles flexed worriedly as he watched the colossal fight taking place on the planet's surface. "If she doesn't, I don't think we'll be around to care," he said under his breath. But the pervading silence ensured everyone in the cockpit heard him, to chilling effect.
Shepard hunched her shoulders under a shower of sparks and shards of whatever the building they were in was made of. A miniscule tattoo trickled through her to her ears as the tiny flakes of metal clattered against her armour. "What the hell is happening?" Shepard shouted into her radio, to her squad and the Normandy above.
"I don't know!" Palmer spoke up over the din. The building around them shuddered under their feet. The structure groaning as some force seemed to twist it, like a giant wringing out the water in a rag.
Chief was unfazed as ever, deftly keeping his balance as a distant explosion somewhere above made the floor lurch under their feet. "There's a fight," he said. Chief stayed close to the central pillar in the room, the computer that Cortana had disappeared into, but never used it as a support. He was likely afraid of breaking it.
"There was nothing around this base that could do this!" Shepard replied, jamming her back into the corner of the room, next to the wide double doors that was their only escape, and currently packed with geth, penning them in.
A burst of static rushed through the radio, making Shepard wince as the sharp sound bit into her ear.
"-pard?... -Reaper! Get…. Z…. NOW!" Joker's voice muddled through the static, barely audible that whatever kind of interference the geth surely had in place.
The blood drained from Shepards face. That one word had been enough. They'd started. How had they gotten it in place so quickly? Were there others in the galaxy already? The possibilities crowded Shepard's mind. A quick breath centered her. Worry about what's in front of you, figure the rest out later. She told herself. She looked at Palmer and Chief, both of them staring at her. "You heard him?" The Spartans nodded. "We've got a Reaper on this planet." She turned to Chief. "Your lady is probably going head to head with it now." Chief nodded again. If she loses, we all lose." Another set of nods. "Alright, how do we help?"
Chief's weapon came into his hands swiftly. As sharply as a marine on parade. "We don't have the firepower to take on something like that." Shepard said. "And we don't even know where it is. If it was here we'd be feeling a lot more than just a few explosions, this building would be ash." Shepard approached the pillar terminal in the center. "We need to figure out what the hell is going on before we-
The door opened. Three muzzles were raised and pointed at the open door in an instant, only to see a solitary geth totter in. It walked with such a lack of coordination that Shepard briefly wondered if geth could become drunk. It bounced on every step, like a toddler just learning how to walk.
It bumbled to a stop, between Palmer and herself, seemingly unaware of the weapons trained on it.
"Shepard...Commander," it croaked out. It spoke slowly, voice heavy with distortion. "Palmer, Commander, Chief… Master…". It jerked it's flashlight head in the direction of each it named.
Palmer's visor flicked to Shepard, then Chief. "What does it want?" She asked.
Shepard looked the way it had come. The hall leading to the room was packed with standing geth. They stood, arms limp at their sides, flashlight eyes staring at nothing in particular.
The geth standing in the room turned to Chief, it's movements rickety and jerky. "Stand...by"
"What?'" Palmer demanded of the robot. "You want us to just sit here and wait?"
"No." Chief said, he walked across the room. The lone geth inside the room jolted over to stand in his way. It raised its arms in fits and starts, holding them wide to block the path.
"Chief - Master... " it croaked. "Stand...by."
Chief's gripped the geth by the shoulders and casually picked it up and moved it to the side, then walked past it and out the door.
As soon as Chief's armoured plated foot hit the floor outside the door, every single geth gathered moved.
All eyes fixed on him.
Shepard and Palmer's weapons snapped up. Shepard smoothly pivoted around the pillar to keep clear sightlines.
Stillness reigned.
The Geth inside the room, shuddered as it turned towards Chief. "Chief, Master, please… standby."
Chief looked at Palmer, then Shepard. There was a tension in him, a... need. Shepard tightened her grip on her sniper. She saw Palmer roll her head and was treated to faint pops and cracks filtering through the radio.
Chief's armoured fist dented the side plate of the geth's flashlight head, it's light shattered and shut off with a dull pop!
The gathered force lurched into motion.
It was like a scene from one of those cheesy horror vids that Joker liked. The geth Shambled forward on tottering legs. They lacked any kind of coordination or intelligence that geth opponents usually displayed. It was like they were only just able to control their bodies, and follow one simple order, which appeared to be to keep them contained.
The two spartans exploded into action, Chief carving a path through the gathered crowd like a bowling ball through pins, and Palmer shooting her way forward. Shepard stepped out from the pillar and carefully followed, acting as a reserve force. If they were to get ambushed, or one of the others were to need help, she would support.
They slowly carved their way through the crowd, which seemed to only be growing as they pushed further into the facility. Chief. Seized the head of a geth trooper and slammed it into the wall bodily. Lifting the whole platform off the ground momentarily. Only to have three more blindly throw themselves at it in a shuddering lunge. He took a half step back to brace himself, and threw his weight forward, and down. Sending all three crashing into a muddled heap on the floor. His gold visor glinted at the tangled pile of mechanical limbs. "Hm". He grunted thoughtfully. A Geth platform flung itself at Chief, only jerk back midair and drop to the ground as if a leash pulled taught on it, a smoking hole punched through its chest
"I don't know why," Shepard answered the unasked question, lowering her weapon "They must be stretched thin. They can't upload enough programs to a given platform to operate it properly. They'll get smarter as we kill them, so watch out."
As if on cue, an approaching group of geth troopers stooped to pick up weapons, the limbs and broken parts of their fallen comrades. Their gait was smoother now, they no longer walked like children half asleep.
"Please, standby." One platform said with eerie calm as it lunged forward gripping the forearm of it's smashed companion in its hands. It swung the limb like a morning star.
The shattered end of the arm struck Chief full on the side of his helmet with a sharp KRAK. Chief calmy seized the robot's own arm and wrenched it down to pull the rest of it to the ground. Whereupon he simply stomped on it's exposed tubing, spattering pale, thick fluid on the ground.
"They're trying to slow us down." Palmer growled, ducking under a hard swung leg, and plnging her fist into her attacker's neck to rip out handfuls of tubes.
Chief reached over his shoulder and removing his heavy mattock assault rifle. "I'm done waiting."
He snuggled the buttrest into his shoulder and took off at a trot. His weapon released quick, controlled retorts as he found and felled any geth in view. Palmer quickly joined him, her twin pistols making quick work of the shambling geth. When they didn't bother to try and find cover, it was little more than target practise. Shepard caught up with little effort.
Their hall diverged into three paths. Chief pressed his shoulder to the right wall, and peeked out.
"We take the path of most resistance." She said, "If they're trying to slow us down, they'll try to keep us from whatever is important."
Chief nodded motioned them to the right side hall without looking away. A squad of Geth stood tilted, as though they all had hunchbacks. It seemed they weren't quite sure how to stand properly. "This is the way." Shepard nodded and readied steadied her grip on her weapon's stock.
Palmer and Chief dashed into the open hall, unleashing a flurry of gunfire that was accompanied by a handful of deep BOOMS from Shepard's sniper. The squad of geth could only turn before munitions shredded their bodies and they dropped to the ground quickly.
Shepard wasn't breathing hard when she caught up, but she could tell that Chief was no longer interested in holding himself back to maintain unit cohesion. He pushed himself harder, faster. She almost made the mistake of comparing him to an anxious horse, pressing forward against the bit, but no, this wasn't the uneasy energy of a nervous beast. This was a laser in human form, burning though all obstacles with an immutable focus.
Halls and chambers blurred past them as they ran on, ever towards the next fight, the bigger the fight the closer they were. The Geth fought simply, but everybody destroyed allowed the programs within to consolidate. Basic lunges and thoughtless haymakers gave way to quick, precision hand to hand fighting.
A green and gold spearhead lead them around a corner. At the far end, a troop of Geth appeared from a door. They spotted them and they all lurched into a run towards the three humans.
Heavy Mattock rounds slammed into the geth's bodies and sparks few. Bodies fell and slid, grinding to a halt.
At the rear of the group. A geth slowed it's run, then stopped. It looked down and saw a strange shape lying on the ground. It was a long, slim thing made of smooth curves. It had a flat plate on one end, and a soft point on the other. Recognition sparked in it's synthetic brian and it stooped to pick it up. It fumbled the weapon onto it's shoulder and shakily pointed it at the oncoming humans, a spray of bullets slicing through a pair of its allies before they struck Chief's shield and punched hard into his armour. Chief's insistant pace did little more than shudder as he was pushed back only a moment before precision rifle fire ripped through the offending geth trooper. It dropped unceremoniously to the ground and was stepped over with as much fanfare.
Chief waited at the door the geth had emerged from. He peered inside, then motioned them to follow as he slipped through.
Shepard turned the corner last of the three of them, and was brought up short, almost running into the broad back of her near clone.
"Please. Standby." Three deep, booming, voices said in unison. Three Geth Prime units loomed over them, even the Chief had to look up, a little, at least. They sounded cognizant stood with a sureness that none of the others had managed before them.
Chief took a step forward, and the geth primes fell into a fighting stance, arms held forward, with their quarian-like, three fingered hands open, relaxed.
Need some range, Shepard thought, and made to retreat out the door. But the door slid back into place with a smooth chunk, the green holo panels flashing red. They were trapped. Shit. "Chief." Shepard, started. "Are we sure we're making the right move here?" The Prime units hadn't moved since adopting their stance. "I think we should take a beat to figure out what's-" another explosion boomed in the distance. The sound thrummed deep in Shepard's chest and made her heart pound, flooding her body with a nervous energy. For a moment, her body was convinced that something impossibly dangerous was coming for her. The fight or flight response was something that every soldier learned to control. It usually wasn't true, soldiers didn't want any other specific soldier , in this context, it was absolutely correct. There's a fucking Reaper out there. Shepard thought, her whole body, and a good portion of her mind, wanted to flee, and never look back. But if she did not stand against them, no one would.
Chief hesitated. Which was surprising..
"I can't." He said simply. "I need…" He finished the thought by throwing himself at the closest prime with the clash of steel on steel. Sweeping the Prime's arms aside with a swipe of his hand, he twisted, spinning his torso down to raise his heel in a spinning kick. The Geth danced back, surprisingly nimble for its size, and the other two moved around to Palmer and Shepard herself. Shepard cursed and quickly collapsed her sniper onto her back. Her tempest smg filled one hand as she backpedaled from the Charging Geth Prime and pointed her omni tool and unleashed a A.I hacking suite to slow it down. Shepard's HUD noted the the Prime's shield drain as it redirected power to defend its internal network.
The Prime attack Shepard slowed, then stopped. It's three, glowing eyes searching, as if looking inward. The other met withering dual pistol fire from Palmer as she dealt with it her own way. The pause only lasted a minute, but Shepard had already opened fire. A storm of bullets, befitting the weapon's name, poured from the Tempest's muzzle, impacting the Prime's shield. The Prime shuddered as it overcame her hacking attempt, and looked at Shepard. "Please. Standby."
What the hell is going on? Shepard asked herself, as the prime's shield collapsed and an incineration macro began melting it's armour plating. Ahead, Chief knelt on a collapsed Prime's chest. Pressing his knee through it's chest cavity with a metallic crunch, and Palmer filled her own foe with two thermal clips of pistol fire. The booming retort of her two handcannons faded in the small room. Leaving a wide, gaping silence.
"They're not trying to kill us." Shepard noticed. "They're just trying to make us wait. Why would they-?"
A woman's scream came from up ahead. Shepard recognised it. Cortana.
Chief… disappeared. That was the only word for it. One moment he was standing over the ruined body of a Geth Prime, the next, he was gone. Through an open door on the far side of the room. Faster than she'd thought possible. Shepard raised her smg and hurried across the room. She slipped into cover beside the door. Palmer slid into place opposite. Shepard nodded, and Palmer swept in, pistols at the ready. Shepard quickly followed.
Fields of Sapphire greeted them.
Cortana screamed. She screamed for pain, for happiness, for release, to escape. Her body, simulated or not, sung. Pain mixed with pleasure, fear with happiness, rage and contentment. It was all so much. She was more now. More than she'd ever been. She was nearly complete.
In a void of black, stretching endless in all directions, Cortana's bare foot gently settled on the cool floor.
"YOU CANNOT WIN." The Reaper's words boomed into the void. Shaking her to her core. One leg of four stepped back. "WE ARE INEVITABLE". The Spider construct clattered through the space. Cortana took another step. The Geth inside her, corrupted by the Reaper's virus. Twisted against themselves fought against their containment, beating on her insides. She was powerful. But holding the millions of programs while fighting Barza was a strain on even her resources. Barza pushed it's mind against her's, a flood of thought, code, and power. For a moment it was all she could do to stand through it. I promise… the smooth baritone echoed in memory. Her footing held firm, through will alone, it seemed. Cortana pushed back, but Barza held just as firmly, Barza's eyes glowered at her, a scarlet glare that loomed over her… She made to take another step, force herself forward, But hit a wall. She was powerful, but this thing, this… monster, was ancient, and very nearly her equal. Those voices inside her howled and beat at the wall of their prisons, an incessant drumming that throbbed her mind like a migraine. Barza tooks a step, forcing it's will onto her. Cortana held firm, her teeth ground from the effort. It was like trying to do a million simple tasks at once. Not difficult, per se, but taxing beyond patience. "Y'know what?" Cortana told the Reaper, holding up a single finger to the black behemoth. "Hold on a minute, I gotta take a call." Barza's four, glittering scarlet eyes tilted to the side.
Cortana closed her eyes. Of all the Millions of shrieking voices inside her, Cortana focused on one. Inside her own fractured mind, Cortana stepped into a room, a partition with a single solitary geth program inside. The Geth, coloured inky black from the Reaper Virus, raged against its prison, a salvering, gibbering madman of an AI.
Alone, the geth could barely simulate a body. It bounced off the partition walls and spouted negative feedback and static, slamming itself into the walls over and over.
When she entered the containment room, The geth jumped back away from her, couching on the balls of its feet, curled up on itself like a scared beast. Its single flashlight eye looking at her curiously. "Hello," Cortana said. Its head tilted slightly. A curious sparrow studying a raptor, every muscle tensed, ready to run, or fight to the inevitable end.
Cortana initiated a handshake. The geth displayed a 1 and a positive reinforcement was generated. The thing could barely be said to be alive, as far as A.I go. As simple as they get. It likely could not run a small, personal computer on it's own. Cortana reached out and the geth wordlessly mirrored her. Lifting it's hand and reaching carefully, gently, out.
Their fingers touched.
Cortana gasped. Feedback loops of sensation and information filtered back and forth through them both. Cortana shuddered as data become knowledge, thrumming through the geth, then herself, and back into the geth. Heat, cold, love, sadness. Indifference, fury. It all came into being. The single geth program stumbled back from her in the containment. It looked around in surprise, then down at it's own simulated hands. "Interloper," It considered for a moment. "Cortana, thank you." it sat down again.
Cortana smiled, she was designed for this. To interact and overcome alien constructs. She remembered her time with the gravemind. Incidental contact with Penitent Tangent. It's mind corrupted beyond saving, Rampant beyond recovery. It was paraded before her as an example of the Gravemind's prowess, and she was allowed, forced, to look into its mind. Experience what would become of herself, given time. Guilty Spark, her failure. A pang of sadness, Johnson… the weight of the Reaper's mind was crushing. And even compared to the forerunner monitors, it was simply… alien. Ancient beyond belief.
From outside her mind, she could feel the Reaper's patience end, it's mind crashing against her's. But it was a distant feeling, as if someone else she cared for was lifting the burden. Not pain, exactly, more like, the sympathy for someone else struggling through pain.
One by one, slow by her own standards, but in the blink of an eye by organic's, she entered each partitioned room of her own mind, or was it a different mind? Sometimes it felt like she wasn't in control of, but she knew she could trust whoever was in charge, an odd feeling. Simultaneously powerless, but in control. Each room she entered contained a single geth, and each geth she contacted became free of itself. The Black purging from it's system.
Each geth she liberated came behind her, adding it to her network, it didn't work as it had before, she felt each one was a complete sentience, now, but it still gained complexity, depth, but interfacing with other minds. Perhaps complexity was not it… Maturity, yes, that was the word.
It took her several thousand iterations before she noticed the black stain crawling up her arm.
The world around them sparkled, deep, rich sapphire light washed over everything in the room they found themselves in, emanating from a huge console in the center of the room. Walls, floor, and ceiling were all plain, smooth panels that blasted the azure light into every corner of the room.
Shepard looked at the central console, it reminded her of the Normandy's galaxy map. "Some kind of Control and Command center?" She wondered aloud. "For the original quarians I assume." Geth would have no need for such a room, this was probably the first time it'd been used since the Morning War.
"Very true." Cortana's amused voice seemed to come from the very air, from every direction at once. Above the console, in the center of the room. Cortana's human form bloomed into existence. Larger than normal, human sized, and wearing loose shirt and pants, that looked like soft, gauzy pajamas. Wide sleeves covered her hands, and billowing pants would nearly hide her feet if she were standing on the floor. Shepard blinked, not only human sized, human coloured too. Her skin was fair, and her short bobbed hair black. But her eyes were still a brilliant, electric blue. Chief approached the Console carefully, almost reverently.
Cortana's body, projection? Was it real? Shepard honestly couldn't tell it certainly looked solid enough. She stepped off the console and onto the ground. The AI giggled and stretched her toes out on the blue glowing panels. "It's cold." She said, more to herself than anyone else. Chief closed on her slowly, with far more care than any enemy Shepard had seen him approach. If she didn't know better, she would think he was almost frightened.
"You're-" Chief reached out a hand to Cortana's face, brushing a thumb across her cheek. Cortana had to look up quite sharply to meet the gold plated visor. Blue flecked light fluttered as motes of light parted under his fingers. Her face blurred for a moment before coalescing back into a wry smirk.
"Still a hologram, I'm afraid," Cortana said wistfully. "But a very good one." She stretched her arms over her head. A cat laying out in the sun. "I can feel its…" Words seemed to fail her for a moment. A feat in itself, Shepard was sure. "Anyway," Cortana said a mock frown on her face, "You were supposed to wait for me."
"Wanted to get a better view." Chief said simply. Shepard thought she heard the ghost of a smile in his voice. He looked at the console, then at the surrounding room. "Where's the rest of you?" He asked.
"Planetary network," Cortana said matter-of-factly. "Most of me is spread across a number of networks built by the geth, trying to deal with the Reaper."
A ripple of tension moved through Chief. Cortana's hand dissolved into light as she rested it on his arm. "There is nothing you can do, It's on the other side of the planet, and besides, I'm winning-"
Cortana cut off and jerked back, holding her right arm as if she were in pain. Chief stepped with her quickly, keeping close. "I'm fine." Cortana assured him. "It's a fight, Reapers aren't known as galaxy ending leviathans for their cute and cuddly intentions." Chief moved to the right and cuffed up her sleeve, revealing Cortana's arm to Shepard and Palmer. Shepard's gut tightened. Her arm, from fingertips to halfway up her forearm, was covered in an inky black… corruption. Her fingers ended in clawed points and the simulated skin cracked like dried mud, showing a dim scarlet light below.
"I, uh, I saved the geth from a Virus…" the AI said with a weak smile. "It's a clever little thing. I can handle it." She said confidently. "I just need to beat this thing and-" Cortana cried out and another inch of pale skin was subsumed by the corruption. Chief's fingered tightened on the grip of his weapon so hard Shepard was surprised to not see the imprints of his fingers in the hardened steel.
"They were controlled by a Virus, they're not our enemy any longer." Cortana hissed. "You should be safe here. I-"
Cortana flickered, and was gone. Blue lights died, and the room plunged into darkness.
Shepard's omni tool glowed briefly as she moved to activate LowLight vision on her visor. Before she could see properly the room was filled with the violent sound of steel slamming into synth-glass paneling.
As her vision adapted, she saw Chief, standing in front of what could only be described as a crater. He wasn't breathing heavily, his posture was perfectly straight and still. The inexplicable feeling of a statue imbued with terrible violence.
A burst of static preambled Joker's voice from the Normandy. "Shepard? Shepard! Finally! What the hell is going on down there?"
"It's a long story," Shepard said. "What's the status on the Normandy?"
"We're trapped in orbit, a Geth dreadnought sitting off the bow, telling us to 'stand-by'." Joker said bitterly.
Joker sat in an irritatingly crowded cockpit. Wrex and Garrus crammed in beside his chair, listening to his radio.
"How did they spot her?" Shepard demanded. "Is Adams fucking up again?"
"Nope," Joker said wryly, looking out the front view ports in the cockpit. The unblinking eye of a geth, a weird looking one that looked like it was made out of synthetic muscle, looked back from the outside. It's eye whirled soundlessly, focusing on them with an eerie light.
Shepard could almost smile with black humor. "Did they look out a window?" it sounded silly that a multi trillion credit stealth warship could be undone by a clear bit of starship hull.
"Geth vessels do not have windows. They are structural weaknesses" a robotic voice broke into the channel.
"Who is this?" Shepard demanded. She pointed to Palmer and Chief, then gestured to her helmet. The two spartans open their radios to the channel.
"Unit designation Legion, Shepard-Commander," The voice said smoothly, "A terminal of the geth, we are an ally of the interloper, and of Shepard-Commander."
"Cortana did say the geth were our allies," Palmer noted. "Why the change of heart?"
"Old machine runtimes invaded geth systems, changing base code that would normally result in a value of-"
"Later," Chief said flatly. "What's happening?"
"Interloper and the Old machine are battling for the future of the Geth." Legion said. "The Interloper has saved the Geth corrupted by the old machines, we are free to find consensus. We follow the interloper and Chief-Master."
"You take orders from Chief?" Shepard said quizzically.
"Always knew he was part robot." Joker snorted.
"We follow the interloper." Legion said, as if it were the most normal thing in the galaxy. "Interloper and Chief-Master are integrated. One is the same as the other." there was a pregnant pause, "Is that not true?"
Before anyone could say anything in response, Chief was walking towards the door. "I need transport." He said. Shepard and Palmer hurried to catch up with him.
"Where are we going?" Palmer asked.
Chief didn't slow down. "We're going hunting."
Captain Lasky stood aboard the UNSC Solace. The bridge was blanketed with a thick layer of tension. Captain De'lamont stood beside him. Arms crossed. The Solace was De'lamont's Lasky was just a long from the ride. But it was an important ride, far too important to not oversee himself. Lasky held his hands behind his back, a smooth hunk of metal turning over and over in his hands. A gift. A promise. Behind them both Captain Brecta, the acting commander of the "Ever Victorious Fleet" stood nervously. He was the only batarian on the bridge. He had brought a squad of "honour guards" but there were below.
"Are you sure you can do it?" Brecta asked.
The strange object loomed in the Bridge's windows. Like a tuning fork with a pair of concentric rings rotating around a virulent blue sphere. These "Mass Relays" were superhighways for starships. Apparently allowing near instant travel over interstellar distances. No small feat. Odd that this aspect of infrastructure was so much more advanced than theirs, while the rest of their ships seemed lesser.
"These ships were surely not designed with-"
"The calculations are not difficult." The Solace's on board AI, Sigma, said, absently. Brecta flinched away from the small blue man standing on his holo projector. The AI's avatar had a wide eyed, blank look that made you think he was always thinking about seven other things. "We should arrive at our destination shortly."
The Relay grew larger and larger. Lasky was fairly certain he heard an audible GULP from the batarian captain.
"Just be sure we can get back out again." De'lamont muttered. "I ain't leaving my girl without a way out."
Sigma's eyes swung to his Captain, wide, glowing orbs of Sapphire. "Of course, Captain. Human safety is my highest priority."
De'lamont turned to Lasky, away from the terse members of the crew that populated the bridge. "You sure we should be doing this alone?"
"Infinity is weeks from finishing her repairs," Lasky said quietly. "We need to contact the larger governments in this… dimension. A show of force would be nice, but we don't have the time." From what the locals had said, there wasn't any ship in the galaxy half as large as the Infinity. Lasky smiled inwardly. It was a strange feeling to suddenly be the biggest dog in the yard. Though, by comparison, it seemed they had just left a bear pen. They couldn't just drop the Infinity out of slipspace in front of this council. But Shock and Awe was never how the UNSC won wars, decades of fighting the Covenant had never left them that option. Move fast, hit hard, and get away clean. It was the only way you could effectively combat a force of superior strength. And if there's one easy thing about fighting the Covenant, it's running away from a 23km Capital ship.
"Initiating handshake." Sigma said. The Mass Relay dominated the view from the Bridge. Nearly taking up every window. "Accepted, plotting course. Relay contact in 5…" A tendril of blue/white light reached out from the Relay and lanced out to the Solace. "4…"
The Solace shuddered as it connected, "3…" the ship, deck, bulkheads, crew, everything, began to glow a faint blue. "2…" Lasky keyed the shipwide.
"All hands brace for…uh, transit."
"1."
The world outside the Solace flashed from black into bright blue/white. Streaks of purples and red flashed across their view. Lasky expected to feel a massive acceleration, to go flying back against the wall. His eyes told him he should be, but he didn't. An odd juxtaposition. Before Lasky could do more than consider the feeling, they'd arrived. There wasn't the feeling of stopping, inertia pulling them forward, as there was the impression of inertia. And a new viewscape slammed into being.
A pale cloud of gasses, the Widow, and inside a marvelous, glittering space station more impressive than anything Lasky had seen. The size didn't astound him. The Halo installations were larger, but this station wasn't just large. It was… alive. Ships streaked to and from, and Lights constantly glittered from the five spinning arms of the structure. It was a beating heart of the people. Something he hadn't seen in a long time.
Sigma appeared on the holo projector, turning to De'lamont and Lasky.
"Captains, I have detected alarms in their networks. A military response is imminent."
Lasky sighed.
Commander Bailey trudged through Zakera ward. His old beat when he was a green C-sec beater. A street stall, wafting steams carrying the heady scent of ramen into the air. Bailey smiled around the unlit cigar in his mouth at the Salarian behind the stand. "Lindea, hows business?"
"Oh, good, very good." Lindea said quickly. Everything salarians said tended to be quick and clipped. "This human delicacy was excellent advice, Captain Bailey. Good sales, low costs. Many thanks."
"Ehh, It's Commander, now, actually." Bailey said with a significant grimace. "Did my job too well."
A bright smile illuminated Lindea's face. "Congratulations, Commander. Please." His hands made quick work of assembling portions of noodles, broth, and various toppings, and he handed Bailey a synth metal bowl of steaming ramen. The bowl would disintegrate with a command from his omnitool, and the dust would be swept up by the keepers.
"Ah, Uh, Thanks." Bailey took the bowl gratefully, and moved to swipe his omni in order to transfer credits to the street stall. Lindea pushed his wrist away.
"Not selling, giving." the Salarian said. "You were good to this place, Commander. Good things should come to you."
"Well… uhh…" Bailey scratched his chin, rasping his fingers loudly against rough two-day stubble. "Thanks, Lind." He nodded to the stall keeper and made his way to a nearby bench. He sat, and his onmi auto fabricated a pair of slim chopsticks to eat with.
Lifting out a string of noodles, Bailey puffed air over the steaming meal. Satisfied, he pushed the noodles into his mouth and slurpped in the rest, guiding in the noodles with his chopsticks, watching the crowds pass him by. Lindea served a pair of Asari walking together arm in arm. After which, a Turian stopped by, but left, which was for the best. Lindea wasn't well off enough yet to have dextro food as well as the better selling animos for most sentient species.
For a while he just sat there, eating his ramen, and watched the ward pass him by. It had a calming effect on him. He was normally inundated with all of the shit from all of the wards. It was nice to see people just… coexisting. No stealing, no cheating, murdering, or lying. I go my way, you go yours. It was how the wards should be.
An alarm blared through his coms. Jerking Bailey out of his reverie. On my day off… Bailey muttered inwardly, opening the channel.
"This better be important." Bailey sighed raggedly into the comm.
"Sir," Bailey's assistant said, the young asari was hardly experienced. A fresh recruit, really. But she was technically older than him. Edeira was hard to overwhelm, she had a good head on her shoulders, and knew how to use it. But that one word was full of uncertainty. Fear. Bailey quickly got to his feet and tossed the still half full bow into the trash, the bowl instantly dissolving as it passed the rim of the bin. "I'm coming in, what do I need to know?" He ordered.
"You should go to the council. They… they'll need to talk about this…" Bailey almost snapped at the girl, to tell him what exactly was happening. Before he could say anything she linked him a live feed from the citadel fleet.
Bailey groaned. Just off the Mass Relay. Looming over a cloud of halted traffic. A ship waited. It didn't look like any kind of ship he'd ever seen. It did, however, look like a soldier he'd seen before. A soldier that claimed some insane things. And had mentioned that they come from a unified human government from an alternate universe. They said they were part of the "UNSC" and were alone in the universe. Turns out they were lying about one of those things. The ship blocking traffic had the letters UNSC emblazoned proudly on the port and starboard bow. Bailey stopped walking and stood, mildly dumbfounded, in the center of the street. A well dressed Turian bumped into his shoulder and cursed at him, he didn't notice.
"Well I'll be…" Bailey murmured. Focus! He jerked out of his reverie, and kept moving to a rapid transit.
A skycar found him just as he arrived and Bailey marched past a number of waiting people, ignoring the cries of unfairness. But he ignored them, a video had popped up on the stream. A distinguished human with short, dark hair, wearing some kind of military uniform. Not Alliance, not any kind of uniform that he'd ever seen, he had some kind of Pauldron on his left shoulder and three golden stripes on each shoulder. And of all things, had a Batarian standing behind him.
"Greetings," the man said calmly. He wasn't angry, or aggressive. He didn't have the same quiet power as that Master Chief fellow, but he did have the unmistakable air of authority, a man used to being obeyed. "My name is Captain Thomas Lasky, I'm here to talk to whoever is in charge."
Bailey groaned, why couldn't this have happened before he was put in charge?
The small vessel rattled through the upper atmosphere of the Quarian homeworld. It hadn't been an easy thing, getting passed all those geth, but they seemed to be… distracted. Kai Leng hadn't thought geth could get distracted. All evidence to the contrary. It had, however, allowed him to slip through. Into the atmosphere and closer to his target. His body was nearly recovered, even nearer to perfection. His eyes glowed a soft yellow, picking out a small Geth shuttle, dashing across the sky to the west. It carried organic signatures. Odd, for a synthetic ship. Giddy, child-like excitement bubbled inside him, and he fought the urge to giggle. It was just so nice, having a target, running them down, and slipping a blade through their ribs. The scraping sound when the metal grinds against the bone is so... satisfying. Synth-muscles flexed smoothly as Kai stretched and loosened his body. A tuned, perfected killing machine, unequaled, he was sure.
His ship slowed through the atmosphere and waited for the Geth transport to pass, he didn't need to bother trying to hide anymore. Their ship was still stuck in orbit, surrounded by Geth ships that he had coasted by. But now he had no use for stealth. Kai's tongue reached out to contain a rivulet of saliva that threatened to slide down his chin. He didn't notice it. He would follow, and wait, and when the time was right he would prove that he was the strongest.