Semper Vigilo

by CunkToad

Due to a drive core malfunction, a human vessel arrives just in time to save the Council Envoy from the yahg. What happens when humanity enters the galactic stage not as the race that got attacked by the turians for breaking a law they weren't aware of, but as the race that saved a turian platoon from certain death? M for wartime violence, pre ME1 - ME3, no OP humanity.

106. Catching Up

Chapter 106. Catching Up

---

2158 CE, Menae, Installation 237

"So until further notice, I'm afraid that Doctor T'Soni won't be joining your task force anymore," the Blackwatch officer on the other end of the comm channel stated, informing Nihlus of what he had already been suspecting; the 'brief operation' for which he had borrowed Doctor T'Soni to Arterius was going to turn into a permanent affair. "I can tell that you don't like this change of plans," General Arterius said as Nihlus' mandibles pressed themselves against his jaw in a brief second of anger.

Even if he wanted to say that Blackwatch stealing one member of the SLD-lead taskforce at this critical stage was a mistake, it wouldn't help. SLD was the pet project of a turian primarch, Olarion, yes… but Blackwatch had the backing of THE turian primarch; Fedorian. An act of defiance against Arterius was akin to an act of defiance against the Primarch of Palaven and no turian – even if they had been born outside of the system like Nihlus – would ever think about doing something like that.

"Doctor T'Soni is useful. Anyone would hate to lose her," Nihlus offered before folding his hands behind his back and mustering the other general. While they held the same rank, they couldn't have had more different biographies – excluding the fact that they had both started as outcasts. Nihlus was a self-made Oma-Ker born in the Terminus and Desolas Arterius was an Elapri-born bareface who judging by the lack of marks on his face had never truly started to consider himself 'palavanian'.

That alone should have meant that he was as much of a pariah as Nihlus himself. The sole difference of having a Hierarchy citizenship made little difference when you were from a nation infamous for being the Hierarchy's historical archenemy; doubly so when you actively chose to cling on to that heritage and wore it on your face for everyone to see.

… yet he wasn't one. Desolas Arterius was far from a pariah. He a model soldier and a model citizen – despite being Elaprian.

While his service record was buried under layers and layers of red-tape and the literal armor-grade steel of the secret TNI bunkers located underneath Unification Square in Downtown-Cipritine ever since his brother's betrayal, Nihlus had gotten the curtesy of receiving the censored biography of the officer he'd work with closely.

And there was only really one thing to say about it: it had gone from painfully average to extraordinary exemplary with the snap of a finger.

It had all started in 2094 CE when Desolas had been born as the first and by far oldest of two children of an Elaprian family; being nineteen years older than the disgraced and deceased traitor Saren Arterius.

While that age gap would seem strange in most other turian families – who generally speaking tended to have two or three kids within short succession after the end of one parent's military service- it had become a trend in Elapri culture for a family to only think about having a second child when the oldest male offspring had reached an age where he could feasibly become the next patriarch of his family and inherit said family's name and titles (which in itself was another concept foreign to the mainline of turian culture). Something about a succession crisis or two within an influential family had apparently motivated them to adopt that stance as soon as they produced something other than a daughter who could not inherit anything if one were to strictly follow elaprian practices.

… unlike with his own Oma-Ker, Nihlus really understood why the Hierarchy considered the Elapri a troublesome divergent… then again… a die-hard Elapri would probably say the same about them.

Either way.

After reaching the age of fifteen, Desolas Arterius, like every other able-bodied turian -Elaprian or not – had begun his mandatory military service. Unlike his brother, he hadn't displayed any signs of biotics or other extraordinary talents that could have cut the three year bootcamp short and as such, he'd enjoyed the full three-year curriculum before leaving the gates of bootcamp as a lowly private with nothing but a rifle and a lack of facial markings to his name.

After graduating from bootcamp, the barefaced Arterius had been assigned to a support unit within a light infantry formation of the 51st Palavanian Legion. There, he had received training as a combat engineer. This hadn't been his ambition, but being the rookie (and the Elapri bareface), he hadn't been able to refuse when his unit had volunteered him to the fighting arm of the Engineering Corps.

At the end of the one-year sapper program, Arterius had graduated with the bare average needed to pass. Then he had gotten reassigned back to his light infantry unit just in time to join a patrol deployment that would go down as one of the most-costly affairs the Turian Patrol Fleet had experienced within the last century. At the end of the one-year rotation, an emergency raid on a slaver barge had seen half of Arterius' light infantry company wounded in action and most of his squad and his squad leader dead. The turian hadn't gotten out unscathed either, losing a part of the fringes on the side of his face in the process, but unlike his squad mates, Arterius had walked away with not just scars, but also a Corporal promotion and a Nova Cluster awarded for 'unrivaled gallantry in the face of insurmountable odds'.

From there on out, the 'average soldier' had clearly been changed, and not just on the merit of getting his first command as a fireteam leader. At age twenty-two, Arterius had gotten selected for a fast-track to NCO: a rarity for people still within their mandatory military service and at the age of twenty-three, he had left his old light infantry unit behind on the virtue of being selected for 'advanced training' within the '23rd Arctic and Mountain Special Warfare Unit': or as it was informally - and commonly - known: the First Blackwatch Legion.

After passing the training program, the biography Nihlus had gotten had skipped nine years of special operations service, an apparent officer commission and the awarding of yet another two Nova Clusters (making Arterius one of the few individuals to have earned the highest military honor thrice outside of a major conflict). It picked up only after Arterius had jumped from 'Captain' to 'General' in 2126 CE in a manner all too similar to how Nihlus had turned in his Major insignias for those of a general overnight; albeit with the difference that Arterius had only been thirty-two – over fifteen years younger than even the youngest 'proper' generals within the Hierarchy.

And that was where the biography had ended.

Everything after Arterius being named seventy-ninth acting general of the Turian Blackwatch was either rated as 'need-to-know' or 'confidential' – barring the mention of his activity during the Skyllian Blitz, which was apparently considered 'generic' enough to not get redacted.

The fact that he had been handed a censored biography was rather ironic, at least in Nihlus' mind.

He knew exactly what Arterius had been up to for most of his career. He'd been chasing the Reapers and making allies after getting it in his head that this was 'his' war in the wake of the death of one Captain Elanos Haliat. While he'd obviously never get any confirmation on the matter, Nihlus would simply assume that Haliat and Arterius had been familiar. Spirits, they were close enough in age to have been part of the same training class.

Despite the obvious biographical difference of Arterius being named the acting general of the Blackwatch at a ridiculously young age - something rumored to be owned to the untimely death of his predecessor in wake of a now very much classified operation no one outside of the hall of Primarchs seemed to know any details about except for the words 'batarian' and 'bio-weapon' - and Nihlus spending most of his career as a TAC officer before blind desperation had painted him as a favorable candidate for leading a rag-tag bunch of misfits, the former auxiliary officer liked to think that they had at least two things in common: They were both officers who were acting very much unlike their rank implied and who had been thrust into a situation very much unlike anything a military school could have prepared them for.

As an old Oma-Ker saying went, they were two parts of the same weapon.

And as such, they would only achieve their aim if they worked together… which could get difficult if Arterius removed crucial staff members at the worst possible moments.

He took another breath and considered Arterius' implied goal. Once he did that, he came to the realization that from a rational point of view, his need outweighed Nihlus' need by a large margain.

… and that was all that needed to be said.

For the greater good, he would give up on T'Soni without a word of protest; just like any decent turian would.

"But even if I hate to lose her, if what you are looking for really could turn the tide of the upcoming war, giving up T'Soni is a sacrifice SLD will have to make. If I'd have to decide between delaying the Reaper invasion and finding a way to permanently stop them, I too would choose the latter," he nodded his head.

"I'm glad you understand my motivations, General Kryik," General Arterius replied, sounding almost as if he would have actually reconsidered after making up his mind. That was another thing he'd gotten the curtesy of being informed about: the general's outright legendary stubbornness. "I wish you good luck in the upcoming operation and again, if you need any assistance with whatever you find on Mnemosyne, do not hesitate to contact my XO Commander Melion. Blackwatch will help SLD however we can."

"As will SLD if you need our assistance with finding this Crucible," he stated in return. Two parts of the same weapon.

"Goodbye, General Kryik."

"Likewise, General Arterius."

The hologram cut out off and Nihlus plopped back into his chair to get back to what he had actually been working on prior to his call; signing off on research proposals.

He opened the terminal that depicted what little of Sovereign's blueprints the Council had been able to reproduce from the wreckage and after glancing at the weapons – which the Hierarchy's best scientists had already managed to imitate in the shape of the Thanix cannons even if they had had nothing but the scans to go by– he swiped his hand left to produce a still-frame taken from the battle of the Citadel.

It depicted Sovereign ignoring the combined fire of a turian battlegroup thanks to its shields, which instead of stopping projectiles like traditional kinetic barriers or deflecting them like the weaker but more universally-applicable human shields, seemed to outright annihilate every shot headed their way before it ever touched them.

… if only there were a way for them to reproduce that effect or study the original technology.

He let out a sigh.

Out of all the pieces to have gotten annihilated in Sovereign's destruction, the biggest lost truly was the utter vaporization of its defensive measures and most inner workings.

They could have learned so much if they had access to the Reaper's 'heart'.

---

One Minute Later, 2158 CE, THS Parnack, Laboratory

After breaking the bad news to SLD's commander – who Desolas was getting the distinctive impression did not like him all that much – the turian had made his way out of the conference room and into the opposing laboratory. There he had found a bored looking human and a clearly overworked asari.

"Do you know if she's been sleeping enough?" Desolas asked while standing in the doorframe of the lab, next to the human Spectre Captain Alenko. Because he'd been on the receiving end of both the beacon's message and the decryption process with Shepard, T'Soni had pretty much detained him to the lab to 'help' her figure out what the visions and messages about crucibles, kaleidoscopes and catalysts were supposed to mean. While Desolas had wished to also have access to the visions that Shepard, Alenko and T'Soni had gotten, the fact that that knowledge ensured that the asari archeologist would not let you out of her sight somehow made him glad that his brain remained un-beaconized after all.

"No idea," the human retorted.

"Showered? Taken a break? Eaten?"

"I don't think so."

"But she has been drinking something, right?"

"If she did, I wasn't here to see it."

"Spirits," the general muttered before walking through the door of the darkened lab and toward the table T'Soni had decorated with various holoprojectors that seemed to depict several maps of the galaxy. He was sure that there was more of a difference to them than being the colours red, blue and yellow, but since he lacked the asari's insight into this set-up, he had no clue what it was.

"Doctor T'Soni," he called, trying to get her attention and make her stop whatever she was doing on her omni. She didn't react or turn around. "Doctor," he repeated, this time consciously moving so that the asari could see him. It worked, but only marginally.

"Ah. General Arterius. I was just about to call for you. One moment, please," the asari – who looked exhausted – responded. She looked at him for a split-second before moving to another holoprojector and producing a fourth, green hologram of the galaxy that seemed to have its focus on the Attican Traverse. Then she shut off the other three holograms, closed her omni-tool and turned towards Desolas. "Do you recognize this?" she asked in expectation.

"No, I -" he began before a three year old memory surfaced from the shallow grave he'd buried it in. It was the prothean star chart his brother had found shortly before stumbling upon Sovereign, or rather a copy of its contents. The original map was by now locked deep inside the Citadel archives alongside all the other prothean artifacts located by Spectres. "That's the map Saren brought to you three years ago, isn't it?"

"Yes, exactly," the asari responded before enlarging the hologram. "This map is the single most complete collection of prothean sites in the galaxy and just about the only fully intact prothean star chart we've ever found."

"Because they destroyed all the other ones to slow down the Reapers during their war," Desolas added from memory.

"Exactly."

Much like everything else they had found in the years leading up to his brother's demise, T'Soni had created basically an entire room worth of notes regarding the map. He shook his head and reminded himself why he was here: get the asari to take a break before she collapsed and needed to find out the hard way that turian medics and turian medical equipment were used to treating people with harder skin than asari.

"Doctor, I understand that you're trying your hardest to figure out the beacon's message –"

"Go back to the start," she stated, cutting him off. "That's essentially what the prothean was trying to tell us when it said we need to begin where it all started if we want to find a way to end it," she weaved around him and walked up to the table. "I played through a thousand scenarios, thought of a million things every word in that conversation could have meant," she fumbled with her hands. "In the end, I decided that the start they're talking about has to be their homeworld. The world that fell. That's the essential hint," she repeated. "You're aware of the problem we're facing here, correct?"

Again, the asari looked at him in expectation, probably thinking he'd jump into the air from joy or go about ordering a galaxy wide search for said planet.

… but that wasn't why he was here.

"Doctor, I think you should take a break. You've been at this since we left the Normandy and that can't be healthy," he replied firmly instead of answering her question.

T'Soni looked at him for a second and then shook her head.

"I appreciate your concern, but I'll take a break when this is done," she stated before walking towards the table. "Can we return to the problem, please?" she asked, much like a math teacher trying to bring her students back to the topic of the lesson.

Normally he wasn't one to play games, or have his orders and requests ignored.

But since T'Soni wasn't military and every time she'd insisted on holding one of her presentations had ended with something good happening, he sighed and played along.

"The location of the prothean homeworld's unknown. That's the problem, right?" he said, entertaining her notion despite the fact that he wondered if T'Soni was right. He hadn't been part of the meld, obviously, but to him it seemed like 'going back to the start' could mean anything. Especially if the prothean had access to the minds of the participants as well. For all they knew, the start it was talking about could have been the start of this journey: the beacon on Eden Prime.

"Exactly," she clapped her hands and then pointed at Desolas with both her hands pressed together. "Despite nearly two and a half millennia of researching prothean ruins," that was how long the asari had known about the protheans, "no one was ever able to track down the prothean's original homeworld. There were theories, yes," she explained, "but no one was ever certain or found any conclusive evidence pointing to a single planet. And with the hypothesis of the Citadel being their self-made capital becoming widely accepted and the thrill of looking for new, unknown ruins being so much more tempting than trying to sort in the old ones, ultimately no one cared to look any further than that. Not even me," she admitted, sounding shameful. "I will rectify that mistake today," she leaned on the lap table. "Can we dim the lights please?" she asked towards Alenko, who was sitting by the door.

"You already did that ten minutes ago."

The asari blinked and looked at the ceiling where the lights had already turned dark.

"Right. Sleep deprivation makes us asari even more light sensitive. Apologies," she mumbled. "Anyways. As you can probably imagine, the process of locating something without knowing what to actually look for proved troublesome."

"Yes, I can," Desolas nodded.

"Good, so you will also understand the problem of us maybe already having sound said place without having realized it."

"Naturally."

"Good, good," she said quietly before rubbing her hands together. "For the sake of transparency, I will say that I am not as confident in what I am about tell you as I usually am when we do this. This is all highly theoretical," like all their other work hadn't been. "Even more so than the rest of my work," oh. "So please, view all of this with a high portion of skepticism and point out any mistakes you might see," the asari added in an unusually uncertain manner.

Desolas considered the asari's words for a second.

Even if he wasn't sure that she was on the right track, uncertainty was not befitting of someone like her. While she would rectify her own perceived failings, he would rectify the very evident ones immediately before they took root and affected her later on.

"Doctor, ever since I asked you to help me, you haven't really been wrong. Why should today be any different?" he said, reassuringly, albeit carefully. "Go ahead. The worst that can happen is that you'll need to start over," he added, not mentioning the fact that the worst thing that could happen was that they wouldn't find the answer in time and all perish in the ensuing war of attrition against the Reapers.

The asari nodded a small, grateful nod.

"To find the prothean homeworld, I decided to look at the expansion of all spacefaring species of a certain age and certain scale and determine if they share a recognizable pattern," she glanced at Alenko. "Excluding humanity."

That seemed odd.

"Why?" Desolas asked without missing a beat.

"Because the Relay Placement Paradox means that we had to move through the galaxy way different from everyone else," the Spectre offered. "Also, we're not exactly ancient. Especially compared to the big three but also in general."

"I can see that," humanity hadn't even invented gunpowder by the time the asari had found the Citadel, "I do however have to ask what paradox you're talking about?" he hadn't heard of this relay placement paradox.

"That's the human name for the Attican Relay Anomaly," T'Soni began, "it's the phenomenon-"

"- of the lack of a primary relay in human space and the general oddness of relay connections in the region," Desolas finished, recognizing the familiar term used by the asari. "I've been made aware of the issue during a naval exercise some years back, I just didn't know your people called it that."

Alenko only shrugged in response and then glanced at T'Soni.

"Sorry for cutting in."

"No apologies needed," the asari nodded. "As I was saying. To find the prothean's homeworld, I looked at the expansion of races that have been spacefaring on their own accord for at least one and a half millennia."

While the drell, yahg and raloi had been discovered in that timeframe as well, that definition really was everyone but the humans.

If not for the explanation that the Reapers regularly culled promising civilizations and as such put a bottleneck on the timeframe where species could rise, it probably would have seemed strange that nearly all truly space-faring races with empires spanning over several systems had stumbled upon each other within the 'small' timeframe of several hundred years and then gone on to not find anyone else even near their level of development for over a thousand years.

"Before I go into any details, it's important that we clarify one thing. While working on the model you're about to see, I took the data gathered on Ilos at face value and assumed that the protheans didn't build any relays other than the Conduit and also did not have any other means to travel large distances like different kinds of faster-than-light travel. I did this because Vigil seemed trustworthy enough."

Again Desolas nodded. A part of him wanted to say that a malfunctioning AI fifty thousand years past its prime should probably not be taken by word, but then again Vigil hadn't actually given them any false information; despite the heavy damage sustained by its age.

"Good. To understand the model, we first need to understand the way the relay network works. Yes, at times they skip entire star clusters, but with the exclusion of primary relays which cover large distances or the ones in human space which take strange detours and bounce back and forth and then lead somewhere else entirely in seemingly random patters, every other Mass Relay leads to one or more partner relay. They are part of a larger, very organized grid system spread across the galaxy and their spacing is very even. At least if they aren't removed from their position like the Mu Relay. I assume this is not new information or you?"

"Not really, no," Desolas responded as he leaned against the wall. "I'm not an admiral, but I've been on enough ships to pick up how FTL travel works. Primary and secondary relays, the network grid, the partner relays, the Attican Relay Anomaly, the mess that is the Omega-Four Relay and its twin," he listed. "If you don't mind, you can skip over the explanation of the network and go ahead with explaining what you did. If there's something I don't understand, I'll just ask."

"Very well," she nodded. "Broadly speaking, what I did was model the expansion of all spacefaring races to determine if there were similarities in their expansion patters," she reached for the hologram projectors and turned them back on, producing a blue, a red and a yellow map next to the green one. "Needless to say, there is. As you're about to see, you can create a nearly circular pattern of settlements based around our homeworlds," she pointed at the various maps, first the blue one.

"This map shows the asari," next she gestured at the red one, "these are the salarians," her hand moved to the yellow one, "and this is you, the turians," she tapped her hand in the middle of all three holograms and a ripple went through them. "Watch," she said with an undertone of excitement.

At first Desolas didn't see anything and wondered if the sleep-deprived asari had missed the spot she was aiming for… but then small white dots slowly appeared.

They began as lone irritations on the surface of the various portions of the galaxy that they were depicting but then shaped into rings around locations he now recognized to be the home systems of Thessia, Sur'Kesh and Palaven. After a minute of growing, they reached their pinnacle and he could now clearly see the current territories of the Union, the Republics and the Hierarchy.

"I could have chosen anyone," the asari said off-mindedly. "Well anyone except humanity," she corrected. "Batarians, quarians, volus," she listed, "every species that has been spacefaring for several centuries showcases the same spherical expansion around their homeworld. First there are lone colonies, then clusters and eventually, there's a high-density sphere of settlements located in the immediate vicinity of the original homeworld and a lower density ring of colonies and outposts located on the exterior borders," she tapped at the green map which had been sitting idly for now.

"Which brings me to what I actually did," she folded her hands behind her back and looked at the map. "By reversing this process, I think I have been able to confirm what we were all already suspecting," he watched as the dots on the map his brother had procured slowly faded out of existence one after another, morbidly wondering if some fifty thousand years ago, some prothean general had been looking at a similar map to track the slow extinction of his people, one planet at a time. As the colonies retracted towards the Attican Traverse – or more precisely towards the vicinity of human space – Desolas watched until only a couple, maybe five or six dots, remained and were surrounded by flashing red holograms. After a few moments of remaining red circles, the map vanished and six orbs surfaced.

"Those are the candidates you managed to determine?" he figured. Unsurprisingly, two of those dots were two well-known sites of prothean ruins. Much more surprisingly however, two other dots were squarely in human space: Eden Prime and Fehl Prime, one bordered what was now the Hegemony and finally, one dot had landed far too close to the galactic core for comfort. In a similar twist, Feros was not among the candidates.

"Yes."

"I don't want to be the guy who talks down on your model, but two of those are definite busts," Alenko injected, prompting both T'Soni and Desolas to look at him. "I mean there's no way Eden Prime or Fehl Prime used to be their homeworld. If it were, we should've found some evidence of that."

"There was an active prothean beacon on Eden Prime and from what I understand, you also recently found even more large underground structures there," Desolas pointed out.

"And Fehl Prime is the site of the oldest known prothean artifact discovery," T'Soni added. "Or rather it was before it got destroyed during the Blood Pack attack on the planet."

"Older than Feros?" Alenko asked carefully.

"Several thousand years older than the entirety of Feros if the scientists of the HSA can be trusted," T'Soni stated, sounding only a tiny bit skeptical. "Of course there's no way to know if the artifact didn't simply get moved there by a prothean from its original homeworld or say for sure that they didn't simply renovate the entirety of their homeworld sometime during the height of their power and it was Feros after all, despite the lack of any indicators to the colony every being settled after the construction of its cityscape…" the asari paused. "But even then, the model and the information we currently have do suggest that the protheans originated much closer to your kind than to any of ours. Away from Feros."

"Besides, if we assume that the Harbinger really does destroy all evidence of his Reaper invasion, it's also a pretty safe assumption that you wouldn't find any evidence of those planets being the prothean homeworld. They would have been purged of any and all evidence," Desolas offered next.

"I can see that. But didn't the prothean from the mindmeld say that your people were supposed to inherit their legacy? Have we ever considered that maybe he wasn't talking about their start, but yours?" the human Spectre suddenly said before looking at T'Soni, prompting Desolas to turn towards her. "I mean I don't want to sound like a nutjob, but if they had time to plan for you to pick up their pieces, maybe they also had time to meddle with your planet. Maybe there is something on Thessia you just don't know about?"

"Have we thought about that?" Desolas asked, to which the asari briefly looked at her maps.

"Like I said, I thought about every scenario I could come up with, so naturally the," she paused to look for the right word, "peculiar implications the prothean made about my people," interesting choice, "came to mind too."

"And you ruled them out why?"

"Because ultimately, the prothean said that whatever they had in mind for my people didn't matter anymore. They wouldn't have done that if there was something on Thessia that we needed to know about," she stated before rubbing the tiredness out of her eyes and looking at Alenko. "I will admit that me ruling out this scenario is based largely on the fact that this particular part of the meld is exceptionally hazy for me. You read my report, didn't you, Kaidan?"

"Yes."

"And you don't remember anything outside of what I wrote in it?"

"Afraid not."

The asari pinched her nose.

"Goddess," she muttered before looking at her map and then at the human. "I guess you could make an argument for the start he talked about not being the prothean homeworld," she sighed. "But if we factor in the part about returning to the world that fell-"

"- it could still refer to plenty of places," Desolas finally injected, recognizing that if he didn't step in now, the asari would spiral out of control, overexert herself and probably never get any sleep ever again. "You did good work with your hypothesis on the prothean homeworld, Doctor T'Soni, but this isn't something you can figure out in one attempt. You should get some rest now. Approach it again from a different angle with a well-rested mind when you wake up."

The asari leaned over her maps.

"We're in a race against time, General," he looked at T'Soni and the various holograms illuminating her in the darkness. Only now did he consider that maybe the asari was motivated not by her usual curiosity, but rather by the notion of thinking she was the only person in the galaxy who could figure this out in time; partially because he'd made it seem so.

That was an awful load to carry.

"I'm painfully aware of that. Yet no war has ever been won on an empty stomach or with a sleep-deprived mind," the turian stated just as Alenko's omni-tool vibrated and he opened it to reveal an orange interface. "Eight hours won't make a difference."

"Very well," the asari muttered. "I'll just collect my things and retire for the night."

"Morning, actually. But yes, please do," Desolas corrected before looking at the human Spectre and making an assumption based on the look on his face. "You need to leave too?"

"Actually, I think I need to use your encrypted communications array."

Desolas nodded, walked out of the lab and opened the door of the adjacent conference room.

"You're familiar?" he asked.

"The Parnack is pretty much a Normandy-Class ship, isn't it?"

"If you want to get technical about it, the Normandy's a Parnack-Class, but yes. They layout is entirely the same."

"Then I'll manage," Alenko responded before walking into the room and locking the door behind him instantly to make sure no one would eavesdrop.

Curious.

Desolas obviously wanted to know what this was about.

But if life in the military had taught him anything, then it was that at times soldiers weren't meant to know all the secrets.

He turned his head again and upon realizing that T'Soni had already fallen sleep on the desk next to her terminals and maps.

With a swipe of his hand, he closed the door of the lab and walked towards the CIC.

Mission accomplished, albeit with more questions than answers and a shattered hypothesis.

---

Meanwhile, 26. April 2417 AD, THS Parnack, Conference Room

"Didn't you say we wouldn't be talking a whole lot?" Kaidan asked while looking at the hologram of Director Jack Harper, who among other things was responsible for the experimental biotic amplifier in his neck and his current Spectre status.

"I did. But that was back when I worked under the assumption that you would not require a lot of supervision to do your job," the older man responded, nonchalantly insulting his competence. Alenko already had a feeling what this was about. Harper presumably wanted to talk about the same issue that had made him demand a spontaneous report shortly after the mess on New Canton: the missing pieces of Sovereign.

Back then, he had managed to fake ignorance instead of wondering how the hell Cerberus had become aware of what was pretty much one of the most crucial secrets the Council was currently keeping.

While there were some people who would brand him a traitor and / or idiot for not warning Cerberus – one of humanity's arguably best chances in the fight against the Reapers – Alenko had had his reasons for his decision.

First, the Council had been very specific about their intentions behind keeping the missing pieces a secret: they simply didn't know who had taken them. To them, anyone, even the secretive black-op division of the HSA (which naturally didn't officially exist and the Council definitely wasn't aware of - just like they most certainly weren't aware of each other's respective black op formations and operations because if they were, galactic stability would be in peril), was a suspect. As such, no one besides a handpicked group of Spectres (who were already handpicked to begin with) and a few select C-SEC investigators (who were selected on the basis of having cut all ties to any institutions outside of the Council) could know or be involved in the operation; lest they wanted to lose even more of what little footing they still had in the upcoming war.

It was a paranoid stance to take.

But Alenko could see the reason in taking it and therefore, he had adopted it as well.

The fate of the galaxy was too much to entrust to any single stellar nation or groups firmly loyal to those states; even if they were with the HSA and even if they were the reason he was a Spectre to begin with.

Besides his understanding of the Council's motives, something else had driven Alenko to lying.

He didn't fancy himself a Cerberus operative – no matter how much he owned them.

Working with Bau and actually getting into the mindset of being a Spectre had taught Alenko a valuable lesson, one he hadn't expected to learn when he'd agreed to this in the wake of Shepard's death.

He might be on Harper's speed dial and he might still be an active-duty HSA officer … but he was fighting for something bigger than the HSA now. As such, any loyalties that would have made him spill the beans on the Council's secret two years ago were gone.

And therefore, Harper was nothing more than an acquaintance of his old self.

"I take it that was a dig at the whole missing pieces affair?" he suggested while folding his arms and looking at the director. "I already told you. I'm not exactly the Council's go-to guy. They don't tell me stuff like that."

Harper's hand appeared within the holographic projection and placed a cigarette in his mouth. Then, with a flick of his lighter, he ignited it.

"Cut the bullshit, Alenko, you are way too bad of a liar to even think about screwing me over," he mumbled. For a second, the Spectre was taken back by the fact that Harper had just cursed and spoken unclearly. He had known the man for two years and not even once had anything but highly sophisticated language left his mouth.

"I'm not-" he began to protest.

"Yes, you are," Harper cut him off. "And the sooner you admit it, the sooner we can stop wasting time and start working together to fix the Council's mess," he went on before pulling in a breath of smoke and blowing it out almost immediately again.

Alenko wondered.

Was this what an angry Director Harper acted like?

Did anger actually make him go from snobby to normal?

As if he could read his mind, the director pinched his nose; another un-classy gesture. "I mean I don't even want you to apologize for the fact that you helped the Council lie to everyone. I get that," he sighed. "All I'm asking form you is that you finally realise that we're far better off trying to fix this together than we are running around on our own."

Kaidan spent a second thinking about Harper's proposal and simultaneously considered what would be worse: betraying the Council's trust and possibly jeopardizing their recovery operation or getting further on Harper's bad side.

Considering Cerberus' reputation and the little bits of knowledge he knew about the actual person Jack Harper – for example that he was rumored to have been one of Arcturus' favorite hitmen back in his HSAIS days and gone over corpses for things far smaller than the collective fate of the galaxy - the answer he found surprised even Kaidan himself.

"I think the Council's got it handled. Besides, I'm hardly the kind of guy who could sanction a cooperation between Cerberus and the Council. If you really want that, you'll probably have to ask Udina."

Harper puffed out another cloud of smoke.

"Udina's an idiot who wasted precious time we could have spent looking for the pieces because of a false sense of loyalty towards the Citadel and political self-perseverance. If it wouldn't destabilize the galaxy even further, I already would've dragged him back to Arcturus for the grievous error of judgement he made when signing off on this idiotic and poorly executed maneuver," Harper responded coldly. "Don't repeat his mistakes. Let me help you. Cerberus already picked up one of your missing pieces and if we're lucky, it'll be two soon enough – " wait. What?" " - and that's just what we did with what little information we were able to gather ourselves. Think about how far we could get if we worked together," he said intensely.

Alenko narrowed his eyes.

"You already found a piece?" this was news to him.

"Yes."

"Where?"

Harper's cigarette carrying hand vanished outside of the view of the hologram, no doubt to extinguish it.

"If I were to take a page out of the Council's book, I'd now tell you that I'm not going to disclose that information to you until you agree to cooperate. But luckily for you, I'm a bit more sensible when it comes to stopping the literal end of the world," Harper said, once more uncharacteristically standoffish. "One of my operatives secured a chunk of Sovereign's weapons back on Korlus. A processor to be precise. It was in the possession of a krogan named Okeer, who sadly died in a Blue Suns assault that just happened to take place simultaneously to Shepard's attempt at securing the krogan," yeah. He was sure that just a coincidence. "It's since been moved to a Cerberus blacksite and destroyed. This time for good. So by all means. Feel free to cross it off the list," Harper's hand once more reached for something outside of his view and the Alenko felt his omni buzz.

"What's this?"

"Everything Cerberus managed to collect on the disappearance of the pieces ever since we've become aware of the issue. You should find a few solid leads in there and I'll update you whenever we make more progress."

"And you're giving this to me because?"

"Because unlike the Council, I understand that we are way past the point where we can afford to lie to the few allies we've got. If the Council wants us to lose against the Reapers, there are easier ways to achieve it."

"It's not like that and you know it," he wasn't quite sure why he felt the need to defend the Council, yet here he was. "They couldn't rule out anyone, so they can't tell anybody either. Plain and simple. The HSA would've done the same thing."

For a second, Harper seemed to smirk.

"Ah. Classic paranoia," he stressed. "As far as excuses to hide one's own incompetence from the entire galaxy go, that's a really uncreative one. I like to think we would've come up with something better. Or done the smart thing to begin with and told our allies what was going on," he stuffed his hands into his pockets and then nudged his head towards Alenko. "Think about what I said, Captain. You're a smart man. I know you'll do the right thing if you manage to get it out of your head that we're on opposing sides. Hell. Our faith in your judgement is half the reason we thought you could pick up Anderson's and Shepard's mantel to begin with," with that, the hologram vanished. Harper's final statement - which had really just been an expression of faith if he was being honest – still left Alenko with a strange, haunting sense of guilty and the urge to talk to Bau.

It was still true that he wasn't working for Cerberus.

But that didn't change that Harper was right.

---

Five Hours Later, 26. April 2417 AD, Eagle Nebula

"Impressive work. But I am still detecting residual lifesigns coming from-" the AI in his armor suit started, prompting Holderman to lift his gun and fire of a lone bullet into the head of the smuggler who had survived his onslaught in the cargo hold of the freighter. The salarian's head snapped back and a spatter of acid-green blood sprayed across the red floor of the vessel.

"And now?" the Cerberus operative in the bulky T5-V suit asked as he lowered the machinegun in his hand and gave the krogan he had just killed a hefty kick to the head to double-check that he was actually dead and not currently regenerating. When he felt something snap under his boot, he was satisfied. Although the gesture probably seemed strange, he'd learned that krogan could do that and then jump you from behind the hard way back during the merc war.

"No further life signs detected."

"Yeah. Figured that much," he stated dryly before glancing at the sealed, neon-green container strapped down in the center of the cargo hold and briefly wondered if he couldn't just set a course straight into the next sun instead of dragging the highly dangerous contents of the container all the way to Virmire.

"Alright, Tas. Preliminary analysis?" he asked while keeping his distance from the object. Logically, he knew that this wasn't going to lower his risk of exposure … but it still felt a tiny bit less irresponsible to handle Reaper tech if he did it from far away.

"Non-conclusive. The container is too shielded to be pierced by our armor's scanners," the AI responded. "If we want confirmation, we will need to find a way to open the container. Preferably in a way that allows it to be closed again. I suggest the door."

Holderman paused for a second.

He got that they had to know which piece this was. After all, thanks to Alenko – who Holderman had always been skeptical off and had finally been vindicated now that the Spectre had mircaously produced a list of the exact number of pieces after claiming he didn't know a thing about them – they now knew what to look for and as such could mark off items as they were found.

Still… he didn't like the idea of getting face-to-face with another Reaper artifact. Even if it was just for a few seconds. He'd been told not to go anywhere near Reaper tech before they even knew it was called Reaper tech. Yet here he was, his hand on the opening mechanism, about to do something incredibly stupid for the greater good.

Holderman frowned behind his visor. If this shit worked like radiation, he really wasn't liking his chances. Korlus hadn't been that long ago…

"And you're sure there is no way around opening it?"

"Not if we want to be able to reinstate the containers containment field as soon as we have confirmed the contents."

"Say that fast three times," the Cerberus commander mumbled before pulling the lever and hearing an audible hiss as the locks loosened.

"Apologies?" Tas responded right as Holderman pulled the green container door open and came face to face with a chunk of burned, silver alloy and heaps of white wiring.

"Jackpot?" he asked cautiously, already itching to slam the door shut again even if the thing didn't look anything like the other Reaper tech he'd seen over the years.

"Reaper origin confirmed. Suggest-" Holderman slammed the door shut "-immediate reinstatement of the containment. Good work, Coomander," Tas finished.

"What can I say, I like my brain unwashed," the man shrugged. "Any idea what we just found?"

"Running comparison," Tas responded before images of his own helmet camera flashed in front of Holderman's eyes far too quick to track. "Negative. Whatever device we just located does not match any of the pieces logged in by the Council clean-up effort. Either this piece missed cataloging, or the Council failed to notice its existence prior to someone else picking it up."

"Hm. So the Council screwed up things. Who could've seen that one coming, eh?" he chuckled cynically before pushing a button on the gauntlet of his heavy armor and activated his radio. "Team Machai, this is Machai-Lead. Package confirmed and contained. You're clear to enter."

Not a second later, the door to the cargo hold of the freighter pulled open and four figures - the remaining members of the now fully-trained Strike Team Machai – walked through the door. They were clad the same heavy T5-V armor that Holderman was wearing and because of it, individually, each of them could have probably completed this assignment on their own.

… but since this OP was as good of a final field test as any and overwhelming force was never something to pass up on, they had all boarded the ship and utterly crushed the mercs guarding the smuggled goods.

Speaking of the mercs...

Holderman turned on his feet and, after exchanging a nod with his second in command, knelt down next to something that had bothered him the moment he had noticed it but hadn't found the time to deal with up to now: the ash heap on the ground where once a black-armored merc in full body armor had been standing.

Despite the remains still glistening from the incendiary pack that had set off this fiery flash-burial – something he hadn't seen since his run-in with the SIU prior to the batarian attack on the Verge - the Cerberus commando dragged his finger through the ash. While his skin probably would have gotten burned, his armor protected him from the heat. He lifted the now blackened fingertips to his visor, hit the magnification button and squinted at the silver, red and worryingly husk-blue particles mixed into the ash that he could now see thanks to a times six increase.

It could be anything, obviously, but if his time on the Strike Teams had taught him anything, it probably wasn't 'anything'.

"Tas," Holderman addressed the passenger in his armor, "you wouldn't happen to be able to analyze the composition of this ash here, would you?"

"I'm a combat AI, Commander, not a scientific one. I analyze movement patterns, not chemical compounds."

The man grimaced.

"You just analyzed the bit of Reaper chunk in that container."

"I compared its appearance to the database of known technology that you downloaded onto my memory," the AI talked back. "There is a difference and if you would have actually bothered to read all fifteen hundred and three pages of my manual, you'd know this."

"Are you shitting me? Your manual has fifteen-hundred pages?"

"No. There are only fourteen-hundred and nine hundred sixty-five pages. But by asking me that question you just confirmed my suspicions that you have yet to actually open the manual and follow up on my request," the AI responded.

Holderman let out another sigh and rubbed his fingers until the ash snowed back down to the ground like the fine powder it was.

He wanted to say that he had liked his artificial battle buddy better back when he'd first gotten him and he'd been less human… but that would be kind of a lie.

"You know you could always read it to me. I'm more of an auditory learner anyways," the seasoned operative said before reaching into a compartment of his suit and digging out a small plastic container. After running with the organization for thirty plus years – which was something few people other than Director Harper and him could claim – he had learned that carrying a box to put weird smudge into was essential to the success of any Cerberus field operation.

"Very well. Now reading the official field manual for HSANRDP Project CDI, Subtype 642-3-4-9-09-01-2414 – Armor Bound Tactical Assistance Intelligence," the AI began with dry sarcasm, or rather in a mockery of dry sarcasm. At times it was hard to forget that everything about Tas was artificial.

"Very funny, Tas, very funny. Safe it for bedtime, will you," he muttered before dragging the box through the part of the heap of ash that had stopped glistening. The last thing he wanted was for his trusty box to melt and fuse into a blob of plastic and whatever funky alien crap he had just put into it. He could say form experience that scraping weird goo out of the interior of his armor was a pain in the ass and he'd do everything in his power to avoid doing that ever again. Four times was four too many as it was. He looked at the glistening blue. "You figure this crap's as dangerous as the working stuff?"

"Protocol dictates that you treat any and all Reaper technology, be it suspected or confirmed, with the utmost caution. And while we can't be certain of its origin-"

"-we'll assume the funky looking blue stuff's bad news and wants us to kill our friends. Copy that."Holderman threw a look at the assembled Team Machai and then decided on his next course of action. "Get clear, everyone. I'm opening the container again."

He'd be damned if he'd get turned because he put a heap of brain-washing-ash into his breast pocket out of laziness and he'd be even more damned if he dragged Cerberus' newest Strike Team into the shit with him.

---

2158 CE, HSASV Normandy, Mess Hall

The first thing Callius heard when she stepped out of her quarters and into the mess hall as part of her mourning routine was a somewhat high-pitched human laugh and a much deeper sounding human chuckle. Since it was unusual for anyone beside Vakarian, her or Solus to be up at this time - most of the human crew would sleep for another two hours unless something drastic happened – the sound that indicated the presence of someone else immediately drew her attention. Although the light in the mess hall was dimmed, Callius had no hard time telling that the two people were Leng and Nader, who – judging by the way they were dressed and what she knew about human customs – seemed to be socializing after having partaken in physical exercise.

Unless something had passed her notice, this was a first. The N7 and the biotic lieutenant hadn't exactly traded words before, at least not when she'd been around, and hadn't worked much together either – barring the exception of their operation on Illium.

Normally, she would have thought nothing of this… but after talking to Vakarian and having him explain how he'd sought to build as much rapport with the crew as possible back when C-SEC had ordered him to keep track of the original Normandy… the little, presumably normal human interaction between the two made her suspicious. Not because of Leng, but because of Nader. The young biotic hadn't done anything to personally draw her ire. But the matter of fact was that unlike Leng, she held no attachments to Commander Shepard outside of this mission. She'd be assigned on the Normandy seemingly on the whim of someone further up the chain of command and that alone made her less trustworthy than any other member of the crew.

… or at least that's what she'd taken from Vakarian's insights…

Sure, the same thing she was thinking about Nader right now could be said about herself… but since Callius knew that she wasn't the mole and as such had no reason to suspect herself, she'd pass over that similarity for the time being and observe. (Even if it was probably nothing.)

Against her habit, Callius quickly grabbed her food and sat down not at her usual place but on a seat where she could keep an eye on whatever it was that Leng and Nader were doing. Whether it was her unusual choice of positioning, the narrowing of her eyes, her generally strange behavior in the past few days or the fact that they hadn't spoken much since the incident at the Dantius Tower (which she personally did not consider an issue – Leng had made a mistake, she had spoken up about– problem resolved, no personal animosities created); the moment Leng saw her, he stopped whatever he had been doing with Nader and got up. He walked in her direction, tilting his head to better catch her eyes and then plopped down in the seat opposite to her.

"Everything alright?" the human asked while Callius stabbed the human cutlery into her food. The fork was still awkward to hold and far too small for her hand, but she got better at using it every day and unless she wanted to eat with her combat knife or her hands, it was all she had.

"Shouldn't it be?" the Blackwatch officer returned.

"You've been staring daggers at Jack and me for the past two minutes," Leng offered with a shrug. First name basis. Interesting. "Or maybe just her. Or just me. Either way. Kinda hard to miss that. Something's going on, isn't it?" he went on.

The reddish-brown plated turian stopped chewing on her food for a second and then put the small fork down.

"Not that I'd know of," Callius stated before her eyes skipped past Leng and towards Nader, who naturally was now looking at them and leading the turian to wonder if that would pass as suspicious behavior as well as far as Vakarian was concerned.

If she'd learned anything in the last couple of days, it was that the sole other turian on this ship had proven to be exceptionally paranoid. And while that was a very appropriate mindset to try and root out a mole, she had to admit that her lack of … practical investigative experience … was making it somewhat difficult to separate the former detective's reasonable and applicable observation advice and investigative tactics from the ones he'd picked up while running for his life on Omega.

'A sideward glance, a brief nod, maybe a twitch. Everything can be a signal that they're hiding someone,' his voice echoed through her mind.

"Really?" Leng pressed.

"Really," Callius responded.

The human folded his hands in front of his mouth.

"I'm not convinced," he lifted his right hand into the air, showed her two fingers and tracked her look towards Nader. "Either this is about Illium," her plated face shifted into a serious look, "or you're jealous that Jack's stealing me away from you," and just like that a small laughter slipped from her mouth.

… he wasn't actually serious about that second part, was he?

"Okay. Laughter. So not jealousy. This is about us not clearing the air after Illium then, isn't it?"

Callius shook her head ever so slightly and voiced her earlier line of thought.

"Not really, no," she said, albeit a bit awkwardly. "You made a mistake in the heat of the moment, I pulled rank to prevent any more errors and then reported it to our superior. As professionals do," she went on before opting for the human idiom. "I know you might not feel like it, but as far as I'm concerned, there's no 'air to clear'. The matter is in the past and resolved."

Leng looked at her food for a second and then smirked.

"Mistake, eh?" he chuckled, sounding a bit disbelieving and slightly aggravated at the same time. Callius briefly wondered if he wanted to readdress the issue, reaffirm his previous mindset that he'd done nothing wrong and in generally act like someone who couldn't handle being confronted with their mistakes or got hung up on them… but then she remembered that the man had made it into the HSA's spec-ops program and found that he could act accordingly. "You know what, you're right. It's in the past. If you're chill, I'm chill. No air to clear."

Callius blinked.

"Turians are warm blooded. By definition, we are never chill," she stated, unsure why Leng was now chuckling. What did her body temperature have to do with this matter anyways?

"You're messing with me right now, aren't you?" She shook her head. "Come on, really? You know air to clear but you don't know chill?" she shook her head again. "Chill as in everything's fine? Cool? Okay?"

She grabbed her fork and pointed it at Leng.

"Human idioms are strange. Why would being cold equate to things being okay between two people?"

Leng narrowed his eyes and pressed his mouth against his hands.

"You know what? I have no idea," then he lowered his hands on the desk. "But I'm positive you turians also have weird idioms that don't make sense when you think about them."

Callius finished chewing her food and looked at the ceiling for a second, thinking.

"No, I don't think we do."

"Because they obviously make sense to you," he retorted. "Off the top of my head, I can think of building a house in an Invictus' jungle. That just doesn't make sense to anyone who's not a turian."

Again, Callius blinked.

How exactly did that expression not make sense?

"It does. Everyone who's ever opened a history book will understand that," she disagreed. Turian languages were straight forward. There was no such thing as a nonsense statement in the Pallian language.

"Hell, no it doesn't."

"'Hell', yes, it does," she retorted. "Definitely more so than 'being cool' meaning things are okay or 'shoot' standing for anything other than the order to open fire. And don't even get me started about the 'water under the bridge' saying."

"Are you specifically trying to use human idioms against me now to defend your own weird idioms?"

"Maybe I am. Maybe I'm not."

"Who even taught you about water under the bridge?"

Callius cracked a small smile.

"I believe you humans say that knowledge is 'water under the bridge' by now."

Leng smacked his hand against his forehead.

"Unbelievable."

"No, just your language really," she offered. "But to get back to the original matter at hand. Yes, as far as I am concerned, everything is fine between us. Illium happened, but it's in the past," she shrugged. "And without crushing your spirits, no, I am most definitely not staring at the two of you because I am jealous. I was merely," she considered her words carefully, as to not give away her earlier suspicion or the side-task Vakarian and she had been given, "curious to see the two of you get along. I didn't think you talked much, let alone spent time together."

Leng glanced behind himself at Nader and Callius wasn't sure how to read either of their expressions. Human faces had a softness and a lack of mandibles to them that made it hard for turians to understand anything but the most obvious clues, especially if they were turians like herself who had spent nothing but a fraction of their lives outside of turian company.

"What can I say, I'm a likeable person," he said with a chuckle and a small wink.

On the risk of reading too much into the gesture, Callius responded with a quip of her own that she knew would throw the human off-guard.

"You better be. Biotic breakups are not fun."

She didn't need to be an expert to read any more into Leng's next reply.

"Wha- no, no, no. It's not like that. Seriously," he replied, somewhat flustered and very surprised by her bluntness, which he really should have learned to expect by now. "There are fraternization rules," the N7 stated. "And she's an officer too. There's no way in hell that's happening."

"Neither of those stopped you from trying to buy me a drink on the Citadel," she pointed out jokingly.

"That wasn't like that either-" he began before noticing her smirk. "Christ. You really are in a clown-mood today, aren't you?"

"I don't know what that means, but yes. If you say so, I probably am," Callius said before looking at Nader. She had no idea what passed as pretty by human standards, but even so she grabbed her tray and decided to give the much younger Petty Officer a piece of solid, turian advice she'd learned aboard her first assignment. He'd be free to apply it at his own discretion and while she got the distinctive impression that he wouldn't, she'd still say it – if only to tease him a little. "The Reapers are on their way, we've got a one-way trip through the Omega-Four Relay coming up in our near-future and as if that weren't bad enough, we'll be dropping into a geth-infested colony any time soon. Life's too short to pass up on a good thing. Especially if it could be over by tomorrow."

Leng looked up at her with a look she couldn't quite place – again.

"… I'll keep that in mind."

---

Meanwhile, 26. April 2417 AD, HSASV Normandy, Captain's Quarters

Emily had been awake for quite some time now. An hour to be precise. Yet in an uncharacteristic manner, all she'd been doing ever since waking up had been looking at the ceiling; a habit she had developed ever since the three-way meld with Liara and Alenko.

A lot of important stuff had happened recently. Among other things, there was the issue of Sovereign's pieces being unaccounted for, a civil war brewing in the Salarian Union (at least that's what HSAIS was considering it), a mole possibly hiding aboard the Normandy … and most recently: HSAIS killing the Shadow Broker.

The only reason she knew about that latter event and the aforementioned Salarian Civil War was because someone had clearly 'forgotten' to remove her from the list of HSAIS intel briefings N7 officers received on a regular basis despite technically being dead for two years. Not that she was complaining, mind you. It was nice to not be out of the loop entirely.

In theory, the break-neck speed at which historic events were occurring right now should give her more than enough reason to not get lost in thought and be even more motivated finish up her own mission quickly to return to the Reaper issue at hand… but in practice the only thing she could think about wasn't stopping the Collectors but rather the echo of the message left behind in her head.

It was Eden Prime all over again.

Every time she closed her eyes, she was back to incoherent prothean visions flooding her senses and every time she thought it was finally over, they came back stronger and with a vengeance.

Truth be told, she'd much preferred the lack of dreams she'd suffered from since waking up from Project Lazarus (or at least the lack of dreams excluding the one time the rachni queen had apparently invaded her sleep – which by the way was a hell of a thing to suddenly remember thanks to Liara).

Not having any dreams definitely beat having nightmares that weren't even her own.

As her holographic alarm blared to wake her up once again, Shepard groaned and smashed the snooze button – or rather hit the air where the snooze button was being projected. Then she forced herself to sit up and quickly got dressed, all the while thinking about some of the unresolved issues that were bothering her every morning.

Some were old, others more recent.

Either way, addressing them ended up being shoved further into the future every morning.

The first on the list of her personal and therefore currently irrelevant issues was that she'd been back among the living for one month and eleven days and hadn't had a face-to-face conversation with any of her family yet, who she had no doubt had even more issues adjusting to the reality of her being back than she herself did.

While it would probably be emotionally important for her to say 'Mom, I nearly died and I really need you to know what I love you just in case this whole Collector thing goes south as well' and using the 'I don't have time for that right now' excuse hardly worked when she'd just spent an hour doing nothing… the red-haired marine was currently justifying her behavior with a very altruistic (and therefor perfectly understandable) reason.

The Normandy was on a comms-lockdown to prevent anyone from following her and she was simply complying with the same rules as the rest of her crew.

Moving on from the subject of her … debatable death … the next thing weighing on the N7's mind as she went through her mourning routine at twice the usual speed (that was the downside of lying in your bed and doing nothing – you had to hurry up when you actually got up) was something much more recent. It had only really worked its way up this high on the priority list because of how much it bothered her (even if there wasn't really a reason to do so).

As she spat out the tooth-paste foam, Emily told herself the same thing she'd been telling herself ever since talking to Leng after the Dantius Tower incident: her old friend was still the same person and whatever he'd meant with the off-hand comment that he had to make 'a lot of compromises' in the time she'd spent being dead (or only mostly dead depending on who you asked) wasn't anything to worry about. It was just a weird way of saying that things had gotten different, nothing more, nothing less.

Shepard looked at her own reflection in the mirror and took note of the faint orange surgical scars. Contrary to what Chakwas had been saying, they weren't actually receding or becoming less noticeable. If anything, she got the feeling that they had started to glow more and more as of lately.

She ran her fingertip along the brightest glowing one alongside her neck - which thanks to reading her own medical examination she knew to have been caused by a fragment of the Normandy's exterior hull. After hitting her from the back, it had separated her armor's oxygen supply, pierced the softer armor fabric off her undersuit's kinetic weave and missed her jugular by only two millimeters. It had caused massive bleeding in her neck area and torn through a whole lot of muscle - a sensation she luckily did not remember due to passing out almost immediately after. If it had been any faster, it might have even cleaved her spine in two at which point not even Lazarus would've been able to restore her. (Again, this was the phrasing of the scientists, not her own assumptions.)

Talk about a close call.

As she leaned against her sink and once more began to consider her own mortality – a subject Leng had offered to talk about with her whenever she felt like it (which she really didn't see herself doing any time soon) – Emily felt a wave of relieve wash over her when EDI's voice announced that they had just crossed into the Dholen System and that she could now begin the final briefing for the ground op.

She'd take geth shooting at her over resolving her personal issues any day of the weak.

---

Fifteen Minutes Later, 26. April 2417 AD, HSASV Normandy, Dholen System

"Damn," her fellow N7 was the first to break the silence that had settled in the room after EDI had started to depict the 'estimated' number of geth within the vicinity of their mission site. "That's a lot of geth," Leng went on.

"A lot of geth?" Garrus responded. "That looks like all of them," he turned towards the bluish avatar of EDI. "Are we sure we didn't accidentally fly to Rannoch?"

"Negative, Detective Vakarian. There has been no navigational error. This is Haestrom," the AI replied unironically.

"And we're absolutely sure she's down there?" the N7 mumbled while looking at the hologram in the middle of the room and then at the faces of her ground team. Given the size of the operation ahead of them, she had decided to bring along everyone. Even Mordin, who up to now had stayed behind most of the time to ensure that he could focus on working on the counter measure and the data from the Collector ship, was tagging along. And considering what she'd seen from him on Tuchanka… she was glad for it.

"Yes. Our long-range scanners have detected the signal of the distress beacon. It is in the exact position Cerberus' intel from the Migrant Fleet said it would be," EDI's blue avatar replied before the map – which consisted of nothing but red dots blotting out the landscape at this point – zoomed in on a complex just outside of the city. "This is where Miss Tali'Zorah is located."

"You mean where her beacon is currently located," Thane Krios, the drell assassin they had picked up on Illium, and who as Shepard had now learned happened to be dying of an incurable lung disease and was looking at this entire mission as a way to 'make amends' before he literally drowned in his own blood (that had been a rather depressing conversation mind you), said. "As the Petty Officer pointed out, the number of geth is extraordinarily high and while I do not claim to know anything of Miss Zorah or her abilities to survive, I do believe that it is possible that she is no longer of this world," he folded his hands in front of his mouth – a habit he seemed to share with Mordin – and then looked at Shepard. "Please do not mistake my caution for fear or a reluctance to join you on this mission, but I believe this endeavor might not be worthwhile."

"Noted," Shepard said, still trying to wrap her head around the fact that the soft-spoken and calm alien in front of her had reportedly spilled rivers of blood in the name of the Illuminated Primacy. Something about the way he spoke and acted just didn't align with the image of someone who had happily murdered his way through the galaxy since the day he'd turned nine.

Then again, he wasn't the only soft-spoken and well-mannered killing machine she'd recruited.

"Attempting to save an innocent life is never not worthwhile," the asari justicar Samara said before bowing her head ever so slightly. "Especially if they may lend a hand in saving even more innocent lives," she turned away from Thane and towards the N7. "Do not let caution stop you from doing the right thing, Commander."

"Also noted," she hadn't planned on it anyways. "Any more insights or worries you'd like to share? This might be the last chance we get to talk this out before we hit the ground," she looked at the assembled group. Garrus and Leng were silently looking at the map, Thane and Samara seemed to now be locked into something akin to a stare-off, Lieutenant Nader seemed just a tad nervous and Lieutenant Callius – as expected - appeared unphased by the prospect of landing inside an army of geth.

Much to her surprise however, Mordin was raising his hand.

"Yes?"

"Haestrom's sun notorious for high UV output," he turned his head towards Samara and Thane. "Suggest wearing protective layer or armor. Otherwise might suffer consequences ranging from skin irritation to cancer."

… not what she had been expecting.

Samara nodded her thanks.

Thane blinked, first with his inner-eyelids and then with his outer ones.

"Drell can't get cancer."

"Sunburn still unpleasant."

"We have scales. We don't get sunburned."

Now Mordin blinked with his one set of eyelids.

"Will remind you of that common misconception when you require post-mission medical attention."

She looked at the lizard and the amphibian.

"Any more questions or insights?" no one spoke up. "Good. Then let's go over the plan one more time."

---

One Hour Later, 2158 CE, Haestrom, Dholen Anomaly Dark Energy Observatory

After finding the DADEO on her map and managing to reach it despite the city of geth between them and it, Tali and the other quarians had quickly found out that the observatory, while stocked to the roof with supplies way past their expiration date, didn't actually have anything resembling a spaceship.

The underground hangar which she'd put so much hope in had turned out to have been repurposed into an emergency shelter. Instead of holding a means to escape, it was filled with nothing but skeletons, dust and – thanks to an old booby trap in the shape of an actual, Conclave-made plasma grenade – the burned remains of two of the six remaining marines who'd embarked on this journey alongside her. After they had been incinerated in a bright orange explosion, their little group had now shrunken to five survivors.

Form a neutral point of view, it had been bad luck that they had walked into it. Still, Tali felt like their deaths were also her fault and it was gnawing at her just as much as the rest of the utter disaster that her first (and probably final) expedition to a quarian planet was shaping up to be.

In a similar stroke of misfortune, albeit a less immediately deadly one, the communication equipment of the observatory hadn't survived the war either. It had been destroyed at the curtesy of the same blast which had blown the huge hole into the ceiling that she was currently looking at from the second level of the observatory.

"How much longer until we go dark for good?" Reegar asked quietly, probably unaware that Tali could hear him whisper from the level above them.

"That really depends on a whole lot of factors, Sir. Solar-radiation, sunspot activity, UV fluctuations… whether or not the geth put a round through the solar panels- "

"Stop talking around the problem, Prazza, and just tell me how much longer it'll last."

"Five hours. Maybe six if we're lucky. Then the beacon will be done for and so will be our chances of the Fleet finding us," the marine sighed. "Not like it matters anyways. Like I said. If they aren't here by now, they aren't coming."

"Didn't I tell you to drop that attitude, marine?"

"Don't give me that marine crap, Kal. You know we're screwed. Let's just stop pretending we aren't. If we don't get found by the geth, we'll dehydrate. And if we don't dehydrate, the sun will kill us eventually. This entire op's been shit from the beginning-"

As Prazza cursed, she zoned out and squinted at the bright sun shining in her face. Tali briefly wondered if anyone in the history of the Migrant Fleet had managed to lead their subordinates into as many death traps as she. First Haestrom's capital, then the complex, then the city's aqueducts and now this. Every time she had a bright idea, the very thing Prazza had warned Reegar of happened. It failed miserably and the marines sworn to protect her died.

She had tried everything to be a good leader, only to end up getting people killed.

At this stage, she'd stopped thinking of creative ways to fasten their deaths and started to wonder the same thing as Prazza, namely what would get them first; exposure, the geth or dehydration.

Personally, she was hoping for the geth.

That'd at least be quicker than dehydration or solar exposure…

She mentally slapped herself for already thinking about her death and leaned on the broken rubble in front of her. She obviously knew that it would do little good, but still, she looked at the sky and wished for a miracle just as she had done a hundred times over back when she'd been a child and her mother had been dying with the sole difference being that this time, she wasn't looking at stars but rather the destroyed remains of her people's colonial history.

In all honesty, she hadn't actually expected it to work.

And in retrospective, what occurred next really wasn't a miracle but rather a coincidence caused by an untold number of interconnected events.

- but still…

As she looked at the distant midday sky and spotted several small dots maneuvering themselves in front of the sun – growing ever larger until the green exterior hulls of their human design became visible – Tali could only muster one word and one line of thought.

"Keelah."

This time, her wishing had actually worked!

She struggled to her feet and towards the ladder.

"Turn up the transmission signal," she muttered down at the other quarians.

"What?" Prazza called back from the shadows below.

"Turn up the transmission signal! They're here! Keelah! They're actually here!"

"Wha- who?"

"The human navy!" she exclaimed with an enthusiasm no quarian dead or alive had ever used when referring to the newest arrivals to the Council before leaning down from her layer to look at Reegar, Prazza and the remaining marines.

"What the fuck are humans doing here?" one of the marines asked towards Reegar, who only shrugged in return.

"Can you think of any other bosh'tet crazy enough to land on a geth-infested world?" the marine lieutenant responded.

Prazza paused for a second but pressed a button at the side of the beacon, producing a hologram that could be used to dial up its strength.

"Fair enough," he said.

---

Meanwhile, 26. April 2417 AD, Arcadia, Engram-City

"It's interesting that you would ask me to help you track her down considering we are paying you to do that for us," the man pointed out.

"Just answer the question. Do you know where she is or not?" the asari on the other end of the comm-link asked.

While he'd obviously never admit it out loud, Henry Lawson was glad that half a galaxy worth of stars divided him from the Ardat-Yakshi. If they were in the same room, he'd never even think about toying with this freak of nature the way he was currently doing. His self-preservation instinct was far too big to even think about putting himself into the room with a blood-thirsty monster such as this one, let alone taunt it.

Monster.

He wasn't using that term lightly. Morinth – that was the name under which she had introduced herself – was a monster. All Ardat-Yakshi were. That was why the asari were rightfully trying to keep them under lock and key or failing that; dead. Genetic freaks like her sucked their victim's nervous system out of their body and used it to bolster their own and improve their biotics…

He'd obviously signed off on some pretty wicked stuff in the past but that was just… wrong.

"Naturally," he responded with a smugness that was fueled by his most recent acquisition, which was currently running on the terminal to his left: his access point to the Shadow Broker's (or rather Insight's) intelligence network. "Half the point of an inside-man is that we know where Shepard's going."

"Where," the asari said. It wasn't a question; it was a demand. While he usually wasn't one to humor aggressive negotiation tactics, the reality that he wanted the asari to kill the commander made him more compliant… as did the whole sucking the nervous system out.

"Last I heard, she was headed to the Dholen System. A quarian colony called Haestrom, if that name rings a bell by any chance."

"Yes, it does," the unseen mercenary responded. "What does Shepard want in geth space?"

"Her objectives aren't your concern."

"They are if you want me to kill her for you," Morinth responded.

"You're getting paid to pull a trigger or suck her life force out or do whatever it is you people do," Lawson countered with disdain before kicking his legs up on his desk and looking at the ceiling. "Tell you what. I give you another million on the spot and you stop asking questions and just get it over with. Deal?"

The asari was silent for a moment.

"One and a half."

Lawson looked at the terminal with the Broker's network. Thanks to its information, Insight was drowning in a pool of blackmail material. Whereas another one or two million credits would've already been peanuts before given their corporate background, now it was literally the same as flicking away a penny or two at some homeless person to get them to stop bothering you about 'change'.

Besides. What's another one and a half million in the pursuit of Utopia?

"Fine. One and a half. You can even let the geth do it if you're feeling creative. As long as she's dead it's all the same to me," the corporate man stated before yawning and expanding a hand into the room to produce a holographic depiction of the young commander. On the surface she was just another soldier and as such shouldn't have been too much of a threat to their plans… but considering what she stood for ever since her contribution to the death of Saren Arterius, the N7 had become so much more than a person.

She was a symbol of the old world and if their new order was to become a reality… all symbols of the old world had to go. He grasped his hands together, causing the pale-blue hologram to crumple up like a piece of paper. Then made a throwing motion as if to aim for a basket that wasn't there. The hologram vanished and the issue was out of sight and – hopefully soon – also out of life. Next he transferred the desired sum to Morinth's account. "You got your money. Now stop asking me questions and go kill that ginger-bitch for me."

"With pleasure," the asari responded. "One more thing."

"Oh for fucks-" Lawson began, suddenly angry. He'd been getting easily aggrevated like that lately. Probably the stress of running a galaxy-wide conspiracy. "Didn't I just pay you to fucking stop asking questions?"

"I'm sure this one's in your interest."

"It better be."

"Your inside-source. Is there any chance I'll run into them?" the asari offered. "I'd hate to kill your mole by accident."

Lawson pinched his nose and made a buzzing noise to indicate the asari's misconception.

"Like I'd ever tell you who my mole is," he sighed before waving his hands in a 'get-going'-gesture. "Now stop thinking, start killing and hush," before the asari could retort, he smacked a button on his communicator and terminated the line.

…god damn asari assassins.

They really were only good for a couple of things and despite most of those purposes also ending on an '-ing', 'thinking' or 'talking' weren't among them.

After getting over Morinth's attempt at being anything but a killer, Henry Lawson cracked his knuckles and glanced at the Shadow Broker network to get back to what he had been attempting prior to sorting out the asari's inability to track down Shepard: finding his wayward daughters. Oriana hadn't been a problem. Miranda however… His eldest had always been bothersome. Let's just put it that way.

But before he could ever decide on how to phrase the order to his new minions, Judy, his darling of a personal secretary, informed him that his three o'clock was here: the representative of the Sirta Foundation a.k.a. the non-profit organization behind Medigel.

He turned off his conspiracy terminals, reopened the blinds to let in some nice Arcadian sunlight and buzzed his guest into his office.

"Mister Lawson, it is so great to finally see you again. Before I say or do anything else, I'd just like to thank you for your yearly contribution to our research sector," the man, Jebediah, opened, only for Lawson to get up and offer his hand. "Without people like you, we could never achieve half the progress we've been making.

"Jeb, please, I told you to call me Henry," he said with the kindest and best PR smile he could offer before they shook hands. "And as for the donation, I can only repeat what I always tell you. Any time my money can help someone, it's money-"

"-well spent. Yes I know," Jebediah said before sitting down in the chair opposite to him. "Still. It's not a given. Kindness like yours really is a rarity these days."

Lawson put his hand where his heart was and continued to smile his PR smile.

"What can I say, philanthropy comes naturally to me."

---

Codex: Early Elapri History - 1912 BCE to 1604 BCE (Part of the Entry Series 'Turian Civilization until the discovery of Mass Effect technology')

Located on the smallest continent of the western hemisphere of the equator of the turian homeworld (English: Dexima Minoris Turian: - not pronounceable with human vocal cords, roughly 'small disk' - ), 'Elapri' is a densely populated administrative region– and former nation state – of Palaven famous for not only the white cliffs stretching along almost all of its coastal borders but also its history as one of the major players (and enemies of the Hierarchy's predecessor state) during the Strife of Palaven and the space race leading up to the discovery of the mass effect.

Tracing its history back to 1912 BCE – the middle of the iron age of turian civilization on the continent Cipritine – the founders of Elapri were descendants of a sea-faring people original native to the southern and comparatively cold fringes of the central continent.

After being forced to migrate away from their home due to a series of wars with the collection of turians that would later form the core of their Cipritine-based rival nation and famines, the first action taken by the displaced southerners was the armed subjugation and social integration of the more numerous but less advanced native population of Dexima Minoris – the first group of turians known to have evolved the observable phenotype of plate colorations ranging from green to brown and thus lying outside of the white-silver-grey-black spectrum observed in Cipritine.

Following the conquest of their new home, the newly-minted city of 'Elapri' (literally meaning anchor point in the language of the original settlers) – like many other early colonies in the history of other species - quickly became the gateway to the riches and wonders of Dexima Minoris. Trade, culture and technology flourished and with it, the originally cipritinian colonists quickly forged themselves a new identity and became the first collection of turians to give themselves a national identity.

They were now Elaprian and in their mind, so was the entirety of Dexima Minoris landmass and the archipelagos surrounding it.

After securing a foothold on the white-cliff coasts Elapri is still known for to this day and laying the final brick of their city walls in 1905 BCE, the rulers of Elapri placed their entire population and the more numerous native Dexima Minorians – which had formed the bottom layer that complimented the citizenry of Elapri - under arms. Wheres as the elaprians were armed to create a militia that could quickly form a standing army, the Dexima Minorians were given weapons and asked to serve in exchange for the promise of 'becoming elaprian through fire, valor and blood'.

This practice of putting non-citizens into separate, specialized military units and rewarding them citizenship at the end of their serivce would later shape the Turian Auxiliary Corps.

At the eve of the year 1904 BCE (which in Elapri culture was traditionally celebrated with the renewal of now-banned blood oaths – promises that had to be fulfilled, no matter the cost), an astronomical phenomenon later known to be twin-lunar eclipse of both Menae and Nanus was interpreted as a sign from the collective spirit of Palaven and led to the city-state marching to war. Its declared goal: unify their new-found home under their rule and their vision.

This endeavor would turn a three-century long struggle.

While mostly focused on the landmass of Dexima Minoris, the ambitious rulers of Elapri also included the island chain known as Demar Jaxar Tari,(see Codex Entry 'Oma Ker') within their plans of conquest. And while they failed to subjugate the island thrice, they were successful in conquering the more developed and even more numerous Dexima Nation – the elaprian term for a now extinct native culture settled on the opposing coast of Dexima Minoris.

While little is known about this Dexima Nation – the Elapri practiced cultural assimilation similar to their Cipritine cousins- it is believed that the largest civilization on Dexima Minoris originated on Dexima Majoris – the northern sister continent. More precisely, it is believed that people from a civilization only referred to as the 'extinct empire of Dexiam Majoris' by the Elapri used of primitive but large rafts and expert knowledge of the tides between the two halves of Dexima to colonize their side of Dexima Minoris some centuries prior to the Elaprians.

Although the leaders of Elapri excepted another quick victory against the rest of Dexima Minoris and the Demar Jaxar Tari, the reality of one city trying to take over a continent (and a colony of a larger empire) was much different.

The Dexima War – or as it is known in Elapri history 'the Restoration of the Rightful Order' resulted in three centuries of bloodshed, three failed attempts to subjugate the Demar Jaxar Tari islands, the utter extinction of the Dexima Majoris-based culture and the complete 'elaprization' of the Dexima Nation and all other natives to Dexima Minoris.

Additionally, these three centuries of constant war fostered the development of an highly-militant, extremely aggressive and honorbound culture that carried Elapri into the turian medieval ages and remained at the city-state's core right until its integration into the Turian Hierarchy in 794 BCE. (and beyond.)

At this point it should be mentioned that while not considered a historical certainty and discredited by official Hierarchy sources, it is believed that the turian work of literature called 'Memories of the Night', an old turian book of war with no known author or title originated from within the now extinct Dexima Majoris culture and was first carried back to Cipritine by elaprian sailors returning from the razing of the empire's capital.

While its shared cipritinian roots, Spirit-based religion and militant tendencies would imply that Elapri culture had an easy time integrating into the larger Turian Hierarchy – which is also predominantly dominated by cipritinian traditions - it should also be noted that Elaprians, much like Oma Ker, are considered a troublesome divergent within turian society.

In addition to the seemingly collective refusal of adopting the facial markings (a tradition that ensures almost all Elapri are considered 'bare-faces') and the disassociation from the rest of the Hierarchy, considerable parts of the population of Elapri (and by large Dexima Minoris and its surrounding islands) still cling on to their unique national identity and social and cultural practices.

These practices include among others: a paternal lineage system standing opposite to the maternal norms practices within turian society; social norms that value sons over daughters, a highly-detailed code of personal honor – including but not limited to death being preferable over dishonor and ritualized and glorified suicide practices. Additionally, most Elapri who still follow their culture hold the believe that the Turian Hierarchy may only truly prosper under 'true' (as in bare-faced) Elapri leadership – a scenario that has never come close to being realized with no bare-faced elaprian ever even ascending to the rank of Primarch.

---

A/N:

So. After a monthlong break (mostly caused by me rereading SV up to chapter 54 as part of my effort to re-read ALL of it to check for any inconsistencies or forgotten plotthreads - i have not found any big, plot-relevant ones yet ) we are back wiiiith... another set-up chapter.

Yeah.

After the twin-action sequences that were Morneau's last outing as part of the Shadow Broker arc, I figured we could all use a breather (and a chapter that gets us back to at least two of the main-plots: Shepard's collector war and Desolas' reaper war and a couple of the sideplots: the missing pieces, Cerberus, Tali and Lawson)

I find myself in the unique position of not actually having a whole lot to say other than that I think my pacing will continue to be.. slower for as long as it takes me to re-read SV (which frankly is going to be even longer now that I hit ME 1 where the chapters suddenly started to become much larger.)

On the bright side, these longer breaks allow me to give you another 16k chapter. (ok, 15.5 if we dont count the A/N) ... which is right in line with what I am intending to from here on out: longer chapters, more plot and attempts to subtly recap what happened up to now without brekaign immersion.

I talked to some of you and yeah... it is as I feared, SV has become a bit bloated with plotliensa and long update phases ensure that you forget stuff here and there and well... I am still working on a solution. For now, my aim is to just put "more" into each chapter so that it doesn't feel so long ago since certain narratives last got their time to shine.

Yup.

Not ideal, but other than that I don't actually have any "immersive" ideas.

Either way.

long story short: get ready for some more waiting while I slug through another 52 chapters of SV.

For the record we're at 798 reviews, 1222 favorites and 1316 follows.

See you around next time.