A/N: Italics indicate internal thought.

Bold indicates Reaper speech

Bold Italics indicate Reaper internal speech

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This is my first attempt at a story, so I am open to constructive criticism. Also If anyone has suggestions for the story feel free to give them.

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The Pen Name Writer: Thank you.

Cracking the Foundation

Location: Freedom Refuge, Tarvus System

Time: 0900

Date: 20th July

Freedom's Refuge was one of several Sanctuary colonies that Cerberus had created for those they rescued, that did not have any place to return to and also did not wish to fight, or were too young. They had been established on several worlds, unknown to either the Terminus Systems and, more importantly, the Citadel Council. It provided a safe place, where people could recover from the horrors they had endured as slaves.

Inside a housing unit, on one of the planets farming settlements, Jack sat on a couch reading through several data-pads.

"Shit…..you've really been shaking up this fucked-up galaxy," Jack said, turning her head to see Reaper looking at her, "I thought those Asari bitches were getting scared by some creepy bed time stories, but they were really selling it short."

"You said you wanted to talk to me."

"Yeah, I wanna make sure I haven't joined up with something worse. So first you tell me what you've done with all the others," Jack narrowed her eyes at him.

At that moment, the doors to the room opened, "I believe I can answer your questions adequately," Miranda said as she walked in.

Jack turned her glare towards the other woman, "who the fuck are you?" she asked.

"Miranda Lawson. To answer your question, we returned home, those who wished to return to their families. Others who did not have a family to return to, we provide a place here," Miranda turned to look at Reaper, "also a considerable number of them wish to join our fight, the Illusive Man is very eager for them to begin training," she said the last part with mild unease.

Reaper caught her meaning, "if they are eighteen or over then they are more than welcome, but make it clear to the Illusive Man….. we are not recruiting child soldiers," he responded forcefully.

"Certainly," Miranda replied, a hint of a smile on the face.

"And what about the alien ones?" Jack asked, her gaze still hard.

Reaper turned to Miranda, "you're sure she will be able to protect them?" he questioned.

"She has several locations where they will be protected, until we are sure they can return home without being 'silenced' by their governments," Miranda stated.

"Couldn't help but notice," Jack started, "some of your friends looked like they were ready to space em."

Yes….. And why didn't we do that John….. Instead of wasting our efforts rescuing xeno vermin.

Reaper scrunched his eyes shut, blocking out the words. After taking a second to compose himself he looked at Jack, "many who fight for our cause have endured great pain at the hands of aliens. All of them carry incredible rage…. and do not always comprehend that those they are punishing have not committed any crimes against humans."

"And what's your stance?" Jack asked.

We will drown their planets in blood… Remove any trace that they ever existed.

Reaper almost flinched, "my goal is the liberation of humanity. My 'stance' is that I am willing to kill anybody who would prevent that. Alien or human," he stated.

"Relax, I ain't gonna shed a tear over any of the squid scientists you killed, or any others like them. Hell, I really wanna get in on that. I just wanted to know if you were more than just a mad killer." She said with a small grin.

Reaper clasped his hands together, "there was also something I wished to talk to you about."

He pulled out the data drive and placed it on the table, "this contains all the research data from the facility." Jack's face became enraged as she glared at the tiny device, after a few moments she turned towards Reaper, "And You kept it?!" She yelled, "do you have any fucking idea how many they killed, getting their sadistic kicks while calling it experiments? And you wanna use it just like they did?!"

Reaper didn't react to her yelling, "you are correct, I understand only a fraction of the pain you and all the others in the facility went through. That is why I'm not deciding whether to use this or not. You should."

Jack's eyes widened as she was taken aback, "the Fuck…?" she said.

"You know as well as I do that our fight is barely beginning. Additionally, in regards to that facility, we may have destroyed it and left them with nothing, but they will try again, and when they do, more people will suffer just like you and the others have. So, any options that could prevent our peoples' suffering, should be considered."

Jack looked away, her teeth still clenched.

"You are correct in thinking that there are those in this organisation who believe we should use this information, but it didn't stem from their suffering, it stemmed from yours. So I believe you should decide what is to be done with it."

Jack picked up the data stick and studied it for what felt like ages, eventually she turned towards Miranda. "You're the one that'll be in charge of using this if I say yes, aren't you cheerleader?" she said coldly.

"That is correct. If you agree," Miranda responded.

Jack looked at the data stick closely, "I look through this first. I delete what I want gone. Any scraps left; you can use. Anyone you use this shit on, its their choice and they get told exactly the kind of crap they're in for," she narrowed her eyes, "and no fucking kids. Any problems with that?" She asked rhetorically.

Miranda gave her a genuine smile, "I'm with all of those conditions," she said.

"And you," Jack pointed towards Reaper, "I still wanna fight. I wanna make those squid bitches, and any like them pay. But I get to cruise around with you," she said with finality.

"Why do you want to work with me specifically?" he asked.

"Until you showed up I thought I was the craziest son of a bitch in the galaxy, so maybe if I follow you around I can learn a few things," her expression then turned dark, "oh, and if I learn that you've screwed me over in regards to this," she held up the data stick, "I want you close so that I can crush that overrated tin can and watch your blood leak out like a busted keg."

Reaper stood up, he stared at her for a while,he turned around and began to walk away,

"are you coming?" he asked over his shoulder.

000

Location: Serice, Thessia

Time: 2200

Date: 28th July

There was a large building in the city that provided a service that many Asari had taken a liking to with the introduction of slavery. It was a brothel. Here many Asari, from maidens to Matriarchs could purchase the body of a human, male or female, to enjoy.

Tonight, many of them were regretting their purchase.

One Asari screamed as she was dragged along the floor by a human woman wearing an Ironman suit. Using her augmented strength, the human lifted the screaming Asari off the ground and slammed her into the wall, silencing her.

More screams filled the entire building as another Asari had her head crushed under the boot of another human. Yet another Asari had her head crushed between gauntleted hands.

The owner of the establishment was held between two more humans as a third one pummelled her. Her jaw was already hanging by a thread, and many of her bones were broken.

It was soon after Cerberus had extracted all the imprisoned humans that several explosions levelled the structure.

000

Location: Armali, Thessia

Time: 1200

Date: 5th August

An armoured woman slammed an Asari against the wall then began to choke her. Behind her, a teenage boy and girl knelt on the ground showing signs of both abuse and malnourishment.

"You're gonna pay for what you did to my kids you bitch!" The woman roared as her grip tightened.

000

Location: Attena, Thessia

Time: 2300

Date: 11th August

At first the large mansion looked calm and tranquil.

That was soon interrupted as one of the windows was shattered due to the withered corpse of an Asari commando being thrown through it.

Reaper quickly turned his attention back to the other commandos. He drew both his guns and began to cut them down mercilessly. Many of the commandos tripping over the corpses of their own comrades as they tried futilely to take down the monster massacring them.

"Get the Matriarch to the landing pad!" One of the commandos yelled, as another Asari right next to her, fell to the ground with a burning hole in her forehead.

Two other commandos practically dragged the Matriarch down the hallway with them. The Asari faced forward again, only to see Reaper an inch away from her face. In a flash he pulled the Deacon assault rifle from her grasp and crushed it. He then threw his other hand forward, his clawed fingers, skewering her lungs. As she choked on her own blood Reaper whispered in her ear, "she won't escape us. All of you will answer for your crimes against us."

The Matriarch and her two escorts approach the landing pad were a sky car was waiting, seeing their hope for escape, they started to run even faster towards it. However, when they were just a few feet from it, it was consumed in a massive explosion. The fringes of the explosion engulfed one of the commandos, who was thrown to the ground screaming in pain, while the force knocked the other two onto their backs.

"Leaving so soon," they heard from behind them, turning they saw another armoured human, this one drawing some kind of katana. One of the commandos pushed herself to her feet and began to power up her biotics. Kaidan leapt forward and severed her arm. He didn't give her the opportunity to scream in pain before he swung again, decapitating her.

Kaidan walked up to the other commando who was still screaming, he thrust his sword through her head, putting her out of her misery.

He turned his attention to the Matriarch as she was desperately trying to crawl away, "please," she begged, "I've done nothing to you."

"We both know that's a lie. You are the one that oversees the vast majority of the slave trade here on Thessia." He raised his sword above his head, "you know I was told this planet used to be beautiful before it was infested by vermin," the Matriarch was paralysed by fear, "I think we should do something about that," he said as he brought it down on her.

000

Location: Serice, Thessia

Time: 2200

Date: 19th August

In a luxurious apartment an Asari was slammed into a wall via a powerful biotic throw courtesy of Jack. She was wearing a black and red coloured Ironman suit, but without the helmet, revealing her brown hair that she'd combed back into a ponytail.

"You know when you heard about what happened to the Voeyra facility, you must've thought you were so lucky that you were on vacation." Jack cracked her knuckles as she slowly began to walk towards the terrified Asari, "but you were fucking stupid if you thought I was gonna let you get away."

The Asari was picked up off the ground by Jack's biotics, then she proceeded to scream as the young woman she had tormented proceeded to rip her limb from limb.

000

Location: Fynn System,

Time: 1400

Date: 22nd August

A Turian patrol fleet exited the mass relay, it was a relatively small fleet consisting of two cruisers and four frigates.

In the distance a different group of ships was visible, making its way towards a planet.

The commander of the patrol fleet stood on the bridge; his gaze fixed on the other ships several hundred miles away from him.

"Slaver fleet identified sir," one of the bridge staff reported, "we are certain they are en route to that human colony. Shall we engage them?"

"Tell all ships to hold their positions," he responded, emotionlessly.

"Sir?" his subordinate asked, with a puzzled expression.

"Our purpose here is not to waste our effort protecting worthless slaves Ensign," he clarified.

"Then what are we doing here sir, I'm fairly certain it would not be good for the Hierarchy if it was found out that we had the opportunity to thwart a slaver attack and did nothing," he said.

"We are here to draw out the wretches known as Cerberus, that have made a mockery of the Hierarchy. If our lure fails, we will have lost nothing."

The Turians watched as the slaver fleet slowly approached the planet, the commander let out a sigh believing that their plan had failed, when suddenly a bright light shot through space, and a slaver cruiser was sliced in half by a stream of molten metal.

Three Cerberus cruisers accompanied by several frigates deactivated their cloaks and began to open fire on the slaver fleet. Thanix cannons sliced through the hulls of ships like paper, while mass accelerator cannons hammered others. The humans had appeared directly to the side of the slaver fleet, meaning by the time any of the invaders had acquired a decent line of fire, there wouldn't be any ships left to fire.

The Turian commanders' eyes lit up at the battle he was witnessing, "incredible," he whispered before activating communications, "Cerberus presence confirmed. All ships move in. Remember shoot to disable, we want to bring some of these wrecks back for study," as soon as he said that even more Turian ships exited from the relay behind them more Cruisers and even a Dreadnought.

"Tell me something Commander," a voice spoke and the screens of the ship changed to show the face of a human, "one of the things you're always talking about is how our subjugation under your Hierarchy is a good thing for us, is because you protect us from slavers that would take advantage of our weak species," the man spoke, his every word dripping with sarcasm.

The Turian commander looked at the face on the screen, "I recognise you, you're Mikhailovich, you're one of the terrorists highest ranking members," a smile formed on the Turian's face, "the only way this would have been better is if Reaper himself was here."

Mikhailovich ignored his miniature rant, "if you want to work with the slavers, then you can die with them, vermin," he stated, in a cold voice.

"sir more enemy ships just appeared, they are attacking our flank," one of the Turian bridge crew reported. And just as he said, several more human ships deactivated their cloaks. Including a Dreadnought.

They open fire, several Thanix cannons sliced through the nearest ships, others opened fire with mass accelerator weapons. The Cerberus dreadnought opens fire, firing a shot three times the size of a Turian dreadnought's shot it impacted the side of the Cruiser overpowering its shields and practically causing the ship to fold in half, before exploded.

"The terrorists shouldn't be capable of building ships this powerful," the commander said, his previously confident voice now full of fear. Seconds later a stream of molten metal sliced through the bridge of his ship, killing him and all of his crew.

000

Location: Slaver Base, Kryarg

Time: 1400

Date: 25th August

Cerberus forces were in the process of attacking a slave base.

The base itself was a simple structure, a large block like main building, with multiple shuttles and several tanks outside, which in turn was surrounded by a large wall sporting several anti-aircraft and anti-infantry weaponry that was continuously firing against the attacking humans.

The ground outside the wall was littered with the bodies of dozens of slavers, who had been unable to make it inside the compound before the attack had hit. Unfortunately, there were a few human bodies on the ground too.

Cerberus was making use of the hilly terrain for cover against the constant stream of fire coming from the base. Suddenly one of the slavers leaned over the wall and fired a rocket launcher, it hit one of the small mounds, sending the three Ironman suit wearing humans taking cover behind it flying. Two of them immediately got to their feet and immediately began to find more cover. The third however jumped immediately to his feet, grabbed his M-8 Avenger and opened fire. He successfully hit the slaver; whose body fell off the back of the wall. Unfortunately, two of the anti-infantry guns on the wall turned their aim towards him and opened fire, the man's kinetic barriers flashed frantically under the heavy fire, but were soon depleted. The first shots ricocheted off the armour plating, but even they could only hold for a few moments before the rounds tore through. He fell to the ground with a large clang.

Crouching down behind another mound, a squad leader who had witnessed what had just happened, clenched his fist in frustration and slammed it into the ground.

"Dammit," he turned towards his squad, "what is the first thing they tell you when you start training?! These suits may be the most advanced technology in the galaxy. They may be decades ahead of any armour that the other species can create, but they don't make you invincible!" He roared, "So don't get cocky!"

"Yes sir!" His squad echoed.

"Sir is there a plan? The longer we're stuck outside, the greater chance of the Hierarchy showing up," one of the soldiers asked.

"I understand soldier. I heard the eggheads want to use this as a chance to try out some new weapon of theirs."

A KODIAK shuttle flew towards the base, just as it was getting in range of the anti-aircraft guns it turned on its side, the doors opened and two figures leapt out. One of the figures had seemingly much more powerful jump jets, and rocketed towards the bases gate, it fired something which impacted the gate, blowing the large doors open.

The figure landed under the archway of the gate, finally providing all present a good look. It looked similar to a standard Ironman suit, sporting a dull grey colour, but it was much bulkier and had much more armour plating. Instead of carrying a weapon, this suit seemed to have them built into its gauntlets, the barrels protruding from under his arms. The armour also sported a large canon perched on the right shoulder, still smoking from having blown down the gates.

The second figure landed closer to the Cerberus troops, revealing a helmetless Miranda wearing her personal, purple and silver Ironman suit.

The first figure didn't wait, he walked into the walled area of the base and opened fire. Still recovering from the destruction of the doors, dozens of slavers were immediately cut down. A trio of Turians were gunned down before they could even raise their weapons, a Batarian took a burst to the chest and was sent hurtling onto his back, blood pooling around him. The shoulder mounted canon fired another shot that destroyed a nearby tank before it could take aim at him. By this time the slavers manning the outer wall had registered his presence and opened fire at him, he responded by turning his aim upwards. The rapid stream of high velocity slugs tore through the slavers, A Batarian was hit with enough force that he was sent over the railing and tumbled down outside. At the same time, powerful blasts from the canon completely demolished the gun placements.

The Cerberus forces outside the base, merely heard the sounds of gunfire, explosions and the screams of dying slavers. However soon those noises ceased and all that was left was silence.

Miranda face palmed before addressing the rest of the Cerberus soldiers, "I believe it safe to advance now," she remarked dryly while walking on ahead.

She approached the figure in the new armour who was standing in the middle of the base. Walking up behind him she smacked him round the back of the head, almost having to stand on her toes to reach him, "you were only supposed to breach the gate," she almost yelled at him.

"I wanted to give the War-machine armour a proper test," the wearer spoke, revealing himself to be John.

Miranda sighed, "please remind me why I agreed to let you test this prototype out?"

"Because if something went wrong, I have a much better chance of surviving than anyone else," he responded.

"Yes, but did you stop to consider the fact that if something had gone wrong and your survival had been witnessed, it would have exposed your other identity. My God I don't even know why you wanted to do this in disguise," she remarked with some exhaustion.

"Because we are trying to develop weapons that can be used by anyone, not specifically weapons that can be used by me. So testing them out in the same manner a normal human would use them is the most beneficial," he explained.

He turned to look at the Cerberus troops, "speaking of not exposing my identity, let's put this berating on hold, all right," Miranda merely nodded in response.

She turned to address the soldiers again, "all right there are still people in that building in need of rescue. Let's go!"

000

Location: Balem, Stryra System

Time: 1200

Date: 3rd September

Balem was one of the Alliances biggest mining colonies in the Traverse, it was for that reason that the Turian Hierarchy kept watch over the planet with extreme scrutiny. In addition, the Alliance had to give the vast majority of the material they mined to the Hierarchy as reparations for the First Contact War. This resulted in Turian patrol fleets passing the planet almost 24/7.

Today however, the Turian patrol seemed to have been delayed for some reason, and Terminus pirates had taken this opportunity to attack.

Unfortunately for them, they had not counted on a specific squad being stationed on this planet.

"Eat this asshole!" John roared as he launched a biotic warp at a charging Krogan. The Krogan could only let out a scream as the shifting mass effect fields tore his body apart. John then opened fire with his Revenant, gunning down a Turian and a Batarian, before ducking back behind cover and loading a new thermal clip into his weapon.

Next to him, Kaidan stood up and cast lift, causing several invaders hiding behind cover to float in the air where they were helplessly cut down by Kaidan.

"Hell of a return to active duty. Huh Loco?" James said as he took out a Vorcha and another Batarian.

"Are you kidding me," John responded, "part of me wanted to get that training over as soon as possible so I could get back to the fight," as he scored a successful headshot on a Turian.

Jacob leaned out of cover and launched a pull attack, yanking a Batarian out of cover and into his line of fire, "Yeah sure Shepard. You wanted to get back to us losers real fast….. so you could laud your new N1 designation, as well as your new rank all over us, right Sergeant," he joked.

"Okay Jacob, next time I'll let you take the lead when saving a colony," John responded, carrying on the joke.

"hey John," Kaidan called out, "are you gonna take the other N courses as well?" Kaidan said while casting a throw and sending an Asari flying backwards with enough force to break her neck.

"Damn right," John responded as he launched his own slam, causing a Batarian to hover in the air for a few moments before he was smashed back into the ground, "I'm gonna work my way all the way up to N7. Just like my mum and dad."

"Its actually good to have you back loco. This might have turned out like Elysium if you didn't have us keep an eye on the defences," James said, opening fire with his weapon again.

Kaidan and Shepard quickly exchanged knowing glances. The Cerberus probes had detected this fleet coming two days ago, remembering what had happened at Elysium, the four of them had kept a vigil over the colony defences, and as expected they had thwarted a traitor in the act of attempting to sabotage them.

The result of this, was the slavers did not have as easy of a descent onto the colony as they expected. They had been forced to land their forces several miles outside the colony, and attack the hard way. Shepard, Kaidan, James, Jacob and the rest of the troops stationed there had, so far, been successful in holding them off. Additionally, communications were still working, so they had successfully sent a message to the Alliance, and even the most obstructing Turian had not been able to deny the validity of the threat and reinforcement soon arrived, destroying the attacking ships. The ground forces knew that the attack was almost over.

"Hey Shepard, did you see everything the Hierarchy's been saying about your sister," Jacob said as he let off another burst.

John's face morphed into a scowl, "the re-forged sword program is a glorified PR stunt meant to show how our species can cooperate. She's got name recognition thanks to… well me unfortunately. So she's ended up being the face of it," he said with a great deal of displeasure.

"How does she feel about that?" Kaidan asked as he erected a barrier to shield them from the gunfire.

"Oh she hates it," John responded, while he fired his Revenant, taking down two more Batarians. A smile then graced his lips, "she told me in her last message that her SO stormed into the office of the guy responsible for those PR vids of her, and it ended with him slamming the guy's face into a window."

They all let out a laugh at that.

James looked thoughtful from moment, "Loco, you seen all the shit that's been happening with Cerberus at the moment? I mean that Reaper guy attacked Palaven and Thessia," he looked down slightly, "I actually heard that two guys back in my hometown, just one day up and vanished. Word is they joined up with Cerberus. What do you think about that?"

John considered his response, while at the same time continuing to fire at the attackers, "until recently Cerberus didn't seem like it could actually do anything to help humans. Now that they've shown they can actually hurt the Council races; people see a chance to fightback and they want to take it."

"As for me though, we all heard the speeches, but how do we know they don't have another agenda. And the stuff that Reaper does, why haven't they released any explanation for that? I don't think I could work for people who keep secrets like that."

The four of them were brought out of the conversation by a rumbling noise and they turn to see a tank making a beeline straight for their barricade.

John just sighed, "give me a sec guys."

He leapt over the barricade and ran towards the tank, gunning down any slavers in his path. The tank began to aim its large mass accelerator gun at him, but just as it was about the fire….

John used a biotic charge and launched himself out of the way, just as the position he previously occupied was hit by the tank. John kept running and soon found himself flanking the vehicle. He grabbed two grenades, primed them and threw them under the tank. He then quickly ducked behind a piece of cover that the slavers had been using, as the tank exploded.

John stood back up to witness the slavers running away now, demoralised by the ease in which their armoured support had been taken out.

"Stop hogging all the badass moments Shepard!" James yelled.

000

Location: Citadel, Presidium financial district. Consort's Chambers.

Time: 2100 CST

Date: 6th September

A Salarian in black armour looked at his omni-tool observing the information he had just been given.

"These are co-ordinates. Is there a mission you wish for me to undertake at this location that will aid?" he asked Sha'ira.

"No," she responded, "in two days head to that location to observe him," her expression turned grim, " I must apologize in advance, for what you find there will be horror surpassing anything you have seen."

A/N: The War-machine armour is based of War-machine mark VII from Endgame.