He was standing in the field again, but he was next to the fir tree this time. The birds high above were gone. Dead leaves drifted from the sky. A horrible sound tore through the air, and when he looked upwards, it was to see the shadow of a massive creature of many legs and one, terrible red eye.
Crow jerked awake, stifling a scream. He'd gotten good at silencing himself when he slept; if Spider wanted to hear him scream, he'd kill him violently, but anytime else was considered an annoyance. Glint rose silently, scanning the area. The sun was high, and the dirt was hard. He couldn't remember falling asleep.
"Are we still doing this?" Glint asked hesitantly.
"Yeah." His voice still felt raw from the previous night. He got to his feet, wincing as his entire body protested the action. Glint ran Light across him, and the soreness gradually faded, but didn't leave completely.
"Do... is there anything else you want to talk about." his Ghost asked. Crow blinked, eyes still feeling strange after all the crying he'd done. Was there anything else? Probably, but last night still made him feel wretched, and he didn't trust himself not to explode again. The topic was exhausting, and he'd just as soon never speak of it again.
"Not now." he rasped. Glint nodded, and a sudden, loud hissing made Crow jump and his Ghost phase. It seemed to be coming from all around them, and a guttural roar seemed to come from beneath them. Oh Light! They're down here already!"
With a mighty gurgling sound, water shot up into the sky, first twenty meters to his left, then further along to his right. It arced in great blobs and spray, and Glint rematerialized, while Crow tried to steady his heart rate.
"Thank the Light! It's just sprinklers!" he exclaimed. "We should probably leave before we get soaked."
"That might not be a bad thing." His armor still stank of Hive, and he'd never seen something like this before.
The sun was getting low by the time they made it back through the cave. Crow hadn't managed to avoid the sprinklers, but hadn't really minded; it had been rather refreshing, and if he was in a better state of mind he might have taken the time to enjoy the new novelty. At current, they were stepping silently through the tunnel to the warehouse, Glint doing wide-range scans the whole way while Crow kept an ear and eye out for Hive.
"The power they're sapping seems to be coming from the surface, not down here. Power cables running up through the ground, perhaps?" his Ghost theorized.
"Maybe. Any clue what's up there?" he asked quietly. They were getting close, and he drew Hawkmoon, just in case.
"Another warehouse, maybe? We could go up and check." Glint suggested, pausing near one of the lighting rods and scanning it. "This technology is human, all the markers are there. Same goes for that tractor from last night. But they're nothing I've ever seen. Even the internal schematics for the things on this planet are off. Circuitry placement, wiring, hydraulics, all of them just similar enough to be human in origin, but drastically different from what's typical. Fascinating."
Crow couldn't help a smirk. Everything was 'fascinating' to Glint. But it was strange, and Crow couldn't help but feel something was wrong here.
"So, have you figured out where we are yet?" he inquired. "I couldn't find any familiar constellations last night."
"No, I haven't." his Ghost admitted worriedly. "This planet's day to night cycle doesn't match anything from our solar system, and the flora and fauna are unlike anything I've seen."
"You think... we're in another solar system?" The thought was both terrifying and exhilarating. On one hand, they were incredibly far from home. On the other... this meant he'd been farther than any Hunter before him, and they'd found humans who's ancestors had successfully fled the Collapse and colonized.
"Maybe." Glint shrugged, though it was joined by an excited spin. "It would be so incredible if we are! In fact, we must be! All of this would make complete sense if it was!"
"Shhh!" Crow reminded. They stood in silence for a few moments, listening for activity.
"Sorry." Glint whispered, phasing. Crow came up to the corner, crouched low to the ground, and carefully peaked around.
"Oh dear." His Ghost exclaimed. You can say that again...
Pacing in front of the warehouse, seemingly trying to find a way in, were two armored individuals. The woman, blond and decked out in heavy black armor, looked like she could easily be a Titan, but the taller individual was a species he'd never seen before. It looked like the forbidden love child of a cockatoo and a lizard, and it was fiddling with a holographic interface on (his?) wrist. There was a third man who looked like some kind of lizard outright, only wearing what seemed to be a coat of wire weave similar to what Warlocks preferred in place of plated armor.
The armored bird-reptile seemed to be trying to get the main door open electronically, while the woman had removed a side panel in the nearby wall in what looked like an attempt to get through that way. The lizard Warlock was investigating the window Crow had made his escape from thoughtfully, examining the crusty Hive growths that had spilled out of it and along the wall.
And he had a 'I'm thinking of going in this way' look about him. Oh man. Crow carefully backed away and crept back the way he'd come.
"Glint," he whispered, "Do they have a comm network? They looked like a fireteam."
"Let me try." his Ghost materialized, and hovering low to the ground, approached the corner. He did an area pulse scan, and fled back to Crow. "I'm in. Are you sure about this?"
"They don't know what they're doing. If this is a colony, they might not even know what Hive are." He whispered urgently. "We can't just let them get themselves killed."
"Alright. Let's gain some distance and I'll patch you in." Glint agreed. Crow backed up the tunnel, and broke into a sprint halfway up. These people might not know Uldren's face, but Spider's policy of never being seen was strict, and Crow new better now than to trust strangers. The easiest way to avoid harm was to avoid being seen. "Ready when you are."
"Patch me in." he took a deep breath, steeling himself. He'd never been the one to pass along warnings before. He always let Glint take care of that. The Ghost materialized as if sensing his thoughts, and bumped his shoulder encouragingly.
"This is... a concerned passerby. If the fireteam in the tunnels is receiving this, go no further. I repeat: go no further. Your lives are in danger and you don't know what you're up against. Are you receiving me?"
At this point, Commander Shepard was procrastinating. Sure, she could say that her crew had head issues that needed shrinking before they went near a dead Reaper filled with possibly-active indoctrination tech, but there came a point where you could call 'solving all your friends problems for them' procrastinating.
But honestly, was it really so bad that she would rather help Mordin rescue an old colleague or fight a thresher maw on foot with Grunt than do anything the Illusive Man said? 'Go rescue our operative, Shepard', 'go retrieve this experimental transport, Shepard', 'let us feed your friends to some thresher maws, Shepard'.
And Miranda had the gall to whine at her, even after helping with Oriana, when she got snippety with TIM. They had leaked footage of her in Cerberus colors so she couldn't run to the Alliance. She reserved the right to be as salty as she wanted. The only reason she was on Eden Prime at the moment was because it was Eden Prime, and indoctrination might be involved.
"Alright, lets make this short and sweet." she told her squad as she jumped out of the Kodiak. Garrus and Thane dropped down after her, and she took a deep breath; it didn't smell like fire and blood this time, so she'd mark that as an improvement.
"What if we see the zombie?" Garrus asked. She suppressed a sigh. They were all calling the blue guy from the portal that. It had been an interesting unit briefing, that was for sure.
"Don't shoot unless fired upon." she told him. "We don't know what he wants. EDI's standing by if the AI tries to give us trouble."
With that, she, Garrus, and Thane made their way up the hill to the main encampment. As they went, she began to see the tell-tale signs of a prothean ruin. Of course Protheans are involved. It's Eden Prime. Granted, so far this trip had been far more peaceful than her last visit. As the came up on the camp, something bright flashed in the corner of her eye, and she double took.
"To think, protheans are involved again." Garrus mused, voicing her thoughts and distracting her from the flash. "Hopefully things don't go as bad."
"I do not think they will, at least out here." Thane commented. "There's a... disturbing lack of life here. No birdsong. The only animal I've seen was back at the landing zone. Unless of course, you saw something, Commander?"
"No, I don't think I did." Not even the trees seemed to be moving, and she shook her head, dismissing the incident. "EDI, anything interesting you can find from up there?"
"There is a massive power drain from the main camp leading underground, likely to the Cerberus observation post. It is exponentially more than the post requires, by a factor of twenty." their AI informed. "Such a power drain would have aroused suspicion from the excavators, and blown their cover. I cannot determine the source of the draw."
"If I was an interdimensional rage monster," her turian friend pondered out loud, "and I had to keep my portal open, I wouldn't think twice about stealing power. Something like that would take a massive amount of energy to maintain, wouldn't it?"
"Yeah, but I wouldn't sign off on 'interdimensional rage monsters' just yet." she shook her head. Thorian? Believable. Reapers? Well, the proof was there. Rachni? Sure, why not while we're at it. Collectors were Protheans? Well, shit, she thought they looked familiar.
Inter-dimensional rage monsters? That was stretching things a bit.
"Well, they're after a zombie and a tiny AI that makes him come back." he shrugged. "The threshold for preposterous is a bit out of whack these days."
Grimacing, Shepard couldn't help but agree.
The encampment was empty, but there were some fascinating things there. Apparently, they'd found a bunker similar to the one on Illos, but the accompanying VI was too damaged to get anything useful from it. Shame. Would've been nice to flaunt some Reaper proof in people's faces. There were small sections that still had power, but the area was unstable, and the geologists were trying to figure out how to breach the area without bringing it down.
They had found a variety of artifacts, including dozens of old, rusted weapons and armor, and-
"Oh, hey; a mummy!" Garrus pointed at an open cryo pod, and the corpse within.
"Don't start, Garrus." she sighed.
"Hey, zombies and mummies, don't tell me this isn't like something out of a vid." he shrugged matter-of-factly. "Next thing we know, Thane'll get jumped by some monster from the fourth dimension."
"That... is oddly specific." the assassin raised an eyebrow, setting down the rusty knife he'd been examining.
"The drell always dies first, that's just how it is." Joker piped in from the Normandy.
"Clear the line Joker." Shepard ordered.
"Just saying..."
Apparently, dying in an airtight cryostasis pod left one's body remarkable well-preserved for science.
They set about trying to find the entrance that led to the coordinates EDI had provided, but after an hour they'd still had no luck, even split up. Rubbing her forehead, she bit back a sigh of frustration as she paced the perimeter. Bright white streaked through her peripheral, and she whirled around, carnifex at the ready. Shepard blinked, unbelieving.
It was a hawk, pure white, circling low through the trees, leaving a trail of whispy smoke and fine embers in it's wake.
"Garrus, Thane; converge on my position. I got something... weird over here." The hawk swooped low as she tracked it, and alighted on a fallen tree a few feet away. It reguarded her with eyes of liquid fire, and every feather seemed to glow with white light. Lowering her weapon slightly, she approached the bird cautiously. It's gaze met hers, and she suddenly felt lighter-
she soared over the camp and through the trees, down to a ravine. Diving between the rocks, she found a tunnel full of rot and death, writhing with things from the Dark-
Gasping, she stumbled backwards and fell.
"Shepard!" Garrus shouted as he and Thane came scrambling from opposite sides of the hill. She looked up at the hawk. It looked back, and spread it's wings. She quickly got back to her feet as it took off. "Are you okay?"
"Fine, I'll tell you about it later, just follow that bird!" She ordered, knowing full well how crazy it sounded.
"Not something I thought I'd hear today." Garrus told her as the three took off after the strange creature. It wove through the trees, doubling back whenever they fell too far behind. It's leading us somewhere... gradually, she began to recognize their surroundings, until they came to the ravine she'd seen in her vision. The hawk dove towards a dark shadow among the rocks and vanished.
"Bingo." Turning on the flashlight of her omnitool, she examined the cave entrance.
"Commander, I feel somewhat apprehensive about following ethereal birds down dark holes." Thane spoke up, eyeing the darkness warily. Shepard could see artificial lights further down.
"It's more than we had a minute ago. Stay sharp, we're going in." She brought her carnifex to bear, and beside her, Garrus adjusted the settings on his visor. They pushed forward, acutely away of the tones of earth over their heads.
As they descended, the smell of rot became sharper. Chitinous grows appeared on the walls. Sickly-looking crystals grew intermittently, letting off a faint, pale glow to accompany the fading lights that Cerberus had put up.
"Homey." Garrus commented as they came up on the post. "Really... crusty. Extra moldy-looking. Brilliant."
It was the ugliest stuff she'd ever seen, and that was saying something. The chitinous barnacles seemed to join together with yellow, throbbing pustules and stretches of tube-like...flesh that wove throughout it all. It made the Thorian look pleasant, and reminded her slightly of the Collector ship, but only just. She though she could hear something, just beyond the door, like a familiar voice on the edge of her hearing.
"Right. Let's try to find a way in." she brought up her omnitool, unsettled, and Garrus followed suit. "Thane, man the perimeter. Keep sharp, and keep an eye on your thoughts. If indoctrination is involved, we'll need to be careful."
The drell nodded and stepped away. Big surprise; the main door wouldn't open. She tried a manual override while Garrus continued a hacking approach, but it still wouldn't budge.
"Maybe that stuff has sealed it shut?" Garrus suggested as Thane came back their way.
"It's possible." she agreed, wiping her brow and trying to figure out a way to force the door.
"If I may, there appears to be a window open on the east side. I may be able to fit through." Thane spoke up. He eyed the two of them, as if mentally sizing them. "I'm not so certain about the two of you."
"You calling me fat?" Garrus deadpanned.
Static burst through their comms. She immediately tried to re-adjust the settings.
"Shepard, someone has forced their way onto the comm channel" EDI informed.
"Let them." Shepard ordered. Something happening was better than nothing happening, and this was definitely something. Besides, the hawk hadn't ended badly, and she felt like rolling the dice for another pleasant surprise.
"This is... a concerned passerby." the Unknown started. The voice was male, and laced with uncertainty. "If the fireteam in the tunnels is receiving this, go no further. I repeat: go no further. Your lives are in danger and you don't know what you're up against. Are you receiving me?"
"Well, that's ominous." Garrus commented. "How does he know we're down here?"
"Repeat: are you receiving me?" the newcomer asked again. Here goes nothing.
"This is Commander Shepard of the SSV Normandy, I receive you. State your intent." Best to start simple.
"My intent is to stop you from dying." the stranger replied, relief evident in his voice. "You have no idea what's in there, and unless you're a Guardian, you don't have the means to stop it."
"I don't know what a 'Guardian' is, but don't be so quick to underestimate us." she told him, looking up at the facility again. They knew what was in there, but really... what did they know about what was in there? Besides whispers? "We've examined the camera feeds, we know about the portal."
"Did they give you a visual on the cryptolith that's in there?" For a moment she wondered if her translator had glitched.
"Cryptolith? Clarify." she asked. She'd never heard of such a word, but it sounded bad.
"The organic spire on the far end of the room, the one all the people are worshiping." Garrus muttered a quiet curse, and Shepard felt a new wave of dread. 'Organic' spire didn't sound like Reapers... and none of the disgusting corruption in the facility looked like Reaper tech, either. "It's from the other end of the portal, my end, and if you get too close, it'll ensnare your mind just like the others. You need to get away from there, I can't stress it enough."
It's not Reapers, but it can indoctrinate. She tried to swallow the uncertainty the implication brought. The thought that there were more beings with abilities like the Reapers was chilling. Waving for her squad to follow her, she led them some distance from the door. The whispers became fainter, like a fading song.
"Your end? What's your relationship with these creatures? How do we close that portal?" she questioned, determined to get to the bottom of it all. They already had a Reaper problem, they didn't need this on top of it.
"They're called Hive, and trust me, our relationship is less than friendly. I came through to try and stop them. They have... paracausal abilities that allow them to traverse through a different plane of dimension, and they tore their way through to here from there." Wait, what.
"You're not making any sense." she said. Thought of the hawk came unbidden. This was becoming way more complicated by the second.
"They're interdimensional rage monsters." Their new ally simplified. Garrus let out a heavy sigh. "I have... powers that are of the opposite end of the paracausal spectrum they operate with, the Darkness. I can seal their portal with my abilities, and remove the cryptolith, but the power the Hive are draining has to be cut to destroy the portal completely. "
"That's... a bit far-fetched." this was way outside her suspension of disbelief, even after the glowing, disapearing hawk act. "We haven't seen any of this stuff, or proof of all this... 'paracausal' nonsense you're talking about."
"Please, you have to. I don't want anyone to get hurt, I just want to stop the Hive." he pleaded.
"Then meet with us. Show me I can trust you, show me what you can do, and then I'll see what we do next." she demanded. No way was she trusting the word of a stranger on something like this, especially with words like the ones he was using. There was a long silence, and she wondered if he was leaving it at that, when the comm cracked to life again.
"O-okay. I'll meet you up the hill near where the power's being drained." he told them. Shepard smirked.
"We'll see you there. Shepard out." she switched off the channel as a precaution. Garrus looked worried, and Thane looked thoughtful.
"Well, this is certainly an interesting turn of events." the drell stated. He glanced in the direction of the window he'd suggested going through. "And perhaps a lucky one, at that."
"Are we really going to trust this guy, Shepard?" Garrus asked. She shifted her weight, and chitin crunched under her boot.
"I don't know if we have choice on this one." things had certainly taken a turn for the stranger.
To clarify, this is taking place about the middle of ME2, with a Sentinel Shepard who romanced Kaiden in ME1. Everyone but Legion has been recruited, and the following Loyalties have already been completed: Jacob, Miranda, Kasumi, Jack, Zaeed, Mordin, Grunt. Mostly because after so many playthroughs, I consider these the most tedious and boring(except for Grunt's), and they would be more tedious to write about in the future. Granted, Crow wouldn't go on EVERY mission, but I just don't want to deal with this stuff.
Crow's next challenge is to introduce himself in a high-risk social situation and establish that he is not a zombie, and that Glint is not from Boston Dynamics.
Meanwhile I would very much enjoy even one new review. Is it good? Is it meh? Are you just reading this because you need a Crow fix? Are you just reading this because you want more ME/Destiny content and my sad self is the only fresh thing around? I'll even take someone pointing out a typo, I always seem to miss one when I come through editing. Oh, the suspense.
Fare Thee Well!