chapter 13, the Citadel. In this chapter we have foreshadowing, fan service and more action.
~0~
"Solus was very clear on the matter. He testified that Commander Shepard herself interacted with the last Rachni queen, who swore that the Rachni Wars were not the will of the Rachni. While I would personally discredit the idea of these hypothetical Reapers brainwashing the Rachni into war, Solus specifically vouched for Shepard. Although Councilor Sparatus will definitely object, Councilor Valern secretly approves of the idea of organizing a recon fleet to scout for the right Relay. I'm worried about Tevos, however. She has expressed interest in researching dormant Relays as well…despite not knowing of this investigation. The STG is keeping a close eye, but…I'm not sure."
- Commander Rentola's logbook, entry 6
~0~
Mil System
Chalkhos
Athame hospital
In the few days since she had been taking care of the wounded human, Mirere Vani had learned a few interesting things. With the limited materials at her disposal, she had been able to run a few tests. Of course, preventing him from slipping into shock or getting infected by the airborne bacteria was of paramount importance. Luckily, the upper floors of the Athame hospital still had a spare sterilization field generator lying around. With it, she had been able to set up a relatively sterile environment.
The asari doctor sat down with a cup of coffee and glanced at her datapad. The subject was human, there was no doubt about that. Muscle physique suggested either a merc, or a soldier, age…forty something.
Any moron could tell such a thing at first glance. No, the things that Mirere had found out were a little bit more complicated than that. Apart from the completely foreign bacteria he had been carrying with him, which the program on her omni-tool had been unable to categorize, this man didn't have the body of a normal human.
Well, he did, but at the same time, he didn't. His muscles were denser, his bones sturdier. That suggested a washout Alliance soldier with gene mods…very, very good gene mods. His minor injuries -the cuts and minor lacerations- had healed within a day. Three days sooner than her prognosis. Even the many bruises had all but faded away. There were plenty of scars on his body. Mirere had been forced to…change the man's clothes…into something a little less conspicuous than the strange green military fatigues.
Yes…a most interesting physique. Any scars, more than half of them of from…what looked like high-powered Incineration bolts.
The human had also woken up, a day or so after she had found him near the Prothean ruins. He hadn't talked to her- not with an oxygen mask covering the lower half his face- but she doubted he would have said anything to her, regardless.
Mirere had quickly stopped visiting him when it wasn't necessary. It was his eyes, those dark eyes of his. One look into them had washed away all her doubts that this man was a normal civilian, or a lowly merc. He was rock-solid.
One look into those dark, hard eyes of his and Mirere had known what drove the man. What dominated his instincts, dictated his life. Pure cold hatred.
Directed at her.
Goddess, he unnerved her. Mirere had worked with krogan patients, dealt with sociopathic Eclipse mercenaries and negotiated with a gang who had been solely intent on raping and killing her, not specifically in that order. But this man…he was of a completely different caliber.
The asari sighed and took a sip from her coffee. Of course it wasn't the real thing; true coffee and food was to come by on Chalkhos. Most of her food existed out of protein-blocks with artificially-added flavors and spices to give it the rough shape and taste of the thing it served to replace.
Now, the human's wounds were not caused by any Incineration tech attack. There were no residue particles, no sign of flammable omni-gel or otherwise leftover from the attack. That left something like a GARDIAN point defense laser aimed at his chest, or just a plain old high-powered mining laser.
She had several ideas as to how this human had gotten wounded at a Prothean structure. An accident or an attack. Maybe he had been trying to mine into the Prothean ruin on his own, only to accidentally and stupidly fall in front of his own laser, or someone had lent him a hand.
Maybe he was hired by a local gang for his expertise. Maybe he was a freelancer.
Mirere sighed. She didn't want the human to talk to her, but she had to know had happened to him. You didn't just end up with injuries like these at a place like this.
Her omni-tool buzzed with a message and she sighed. Was it that time already?
One look at her omni-tool verified it. It was that time..
She reached around, searching for the credit chit that she had steadily been pouring every single spare credit she had into.
It wasn't there.
Damnit.
Mirere sighed, remembering where she had last had it. His room.
Great.
The asari doctor made her way towards the patient's room, silently hoping that he was sleeping again. That his ruined chest cavity and burned-up lung, together with a batch of sedatives, had finally put him to sleep, granting his body some well-needed rest.
She peered around the corner.
Nope. He was still awake. The moment -the very moment- she had stuck her head around the corner, his head shifted ever so slightly.
He was glaring again.
Mirere ignored the burning awkwardness and silently told her nerves to calm down. She stepped into the room and started searching for the chit, knowing exactly what would happen to the clinic if she didn't pay off the Blue Suns.
She could basically feel his eyes burning a hole in her back and she sighed. "Look, I'm not your enemy, alright?" She told the human as she checked around the sterilization field generator. "I don't know what happened to you, but I'm the one who's trying to fix you up."
It wasn't there.
"So stop looking at me like that!"
Of course he didn't respond. In the meantime, Mirere plucked the credit chit away from underneath her chair and sighed in relief. She might have been an Eclipse mercenary in her youth, but that didn't mean she was a remorseless murderer. She cared for the people under her care, whether they had deserved their injuries or not. But if the Blue Suns stopped their protection racket, her hospital wouldn't last a week
Eclipse mercenaries would find out within the hour, arrive within a few days and burn down her clinic by the end of the week, with her and her patients still inside. Or worse. The Eclipse might contact them…
Providing the mercs with services was the only way she could get around. Selling equipment, tending to their wounded, providing information…it only prolonged the gang warfare here in the city, but what else could she do?
That was right, nothing. Nobody ever defied that group and lived.
Mirere shot one last glance at the human, whose glare had something accusing. As if she had done him a great injustice.
Unnerved, but still resolute, the asari doctor made her way towards her office, where the Blue Sun mercenaries would soon be visiting her. In the meantime, she would keep the human's room locked. If they recognized him as a victim of theirs, or worse, as someone who had been tinkering with the Prothean structure without their consent, they would execute him at the spot.
She couldn't help but wonder though. His clothes were completely foreign, yet undoubtedly military. Armored plating on his shoulders and limbs, pockets filled with military equipment that seemed ancient, yet strangely advanced and even ammunition clips for guns that krogans might have used a century back. Who was he to carry such strange gear?
And also, what was this pack of "Sweet Williams" that he carried with him?
~0~
Normandy SR-2
Medical Bay
Once more with feeling, Jane supposed. "So in this scenario of yours…we have two mankinds, one at the 'bottom' of the galaxy and one at the 'top' of the galaxy?"
"Yup," the little AI with the processing power and ethics to vent a populated ship replied.
"And my mankind eventually found the Mars archives with Prothean archives, while yours just…what, kept buggering on?"
"In essence. Admittedly, we could have made great use of such a discovery on our own, but I digress. We invented our own method of FTL, called the Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine, capable of making transitions to and from slipstream space and allowing our own FTL travel."
To Jane, this conversation was about as intriguing as it was confusing. "Slipstream space, huh? Sounds like a mouthful."
Cortana nodded. "We commonly refer to it is Slipstream, or Slipspace. Slipstream space is a specific set of eleven "nondimensions" which I am certain would baffle your biotic-stressed mind if I further explained it."
Jane chuckled. "Gee, I don't generally like having my biotic-stressed little head baffled, so please spare my insolent mind, would you?"
"Because you ask nicely. By your count, it is 2185. By ours, it is roughly 2553. Slipspace was 'invented' around 2291. After that, colonization became much easier."
The Commander shifted her weight to a less-painful spot and shot a glance at the Chief. For an augmented super-soldier, he looked rather cute when sleeping. If he was sleeping at all. The way she knew him by now, he was most likely waiting for something that needed his attention. Lying perfectly still…closed eyes, calm breathing…
Lovely picture.
A shame that she was starting to lose the bigger picture here. "We discovered Element Zero in 2148 'bout forty years ago. You discovered your method of FTL more than three centuries ago…or hundred years in the future. Alright. Man, this is confusing. Does that mean your mankind evolved four-hundred years earlier than ours?"
"That, or we merely started recording our history a bit earlier. I am running a subroutine to compare our alternative histories together. Really fascinating…let´s go with the hypothesis that your mankind really is younger than ours. You only had one major world war, a lot less civil conflicts. Interesting how the name "Normandy" still popped up. And a shared language…still, it appears your version of mankind was either very lucky, or very level-headed."
Odd. If this UNSC has been colonizing for centuries, how come the Council had never encountered them? There couldn't be that many fitting planets. "Yes. That. So, Cortana? If you started colonizing that long ago, how many colonies does your government now have? The Citadel should have noticed people ripping holes into reality to reach FTL. Also, this UNSC? What's the 'C' in there for? Command is a bit too military."
Cortana crossed her wrists behind her back. "At the height of our might, we had hundreds of inhabited colonies and even more outposts. I estimate about 200 thriving major worlds with a full-scale economy and industry. "
Uh-oh. "At the height of your might…what about now?"
Much to her surprise, Cortana didn't jump on explaining the C. In fact, it appeared as if a dark look crossed over her face. The lines of code running over her body even seemed to glitch.
Of course, the Chief didn't as much as flinch. He was awake now, but Jane had missed the moment he had opened his eyes.
"Hmm…at this point, I believe we have about fifty left. It might be less. In the end, even communications broke down."
Shepard got upright, despite her aching joints and burning limbs. "Wait…hold on a moment. You lost a hundred and fifty colonies? Just, gone? Holy shit, that's…I mean, how?"
"War," said the Master Chief. His harsh, gravelly voice sounded so weary.
Yes, Jane remembered their conversation about this Covenant and how they had been fighting for a very long time, but…damn, she didn't even know of a war that could cause so much death and destruction. Not since the destruction of the Prothean Empire and it had taken a race of ancient, sentient machines over a hundred years to do so.
"In 2525, we lost contact with one of our Outer Colonies called Harvest." Cortana disappeared. In her place appeared the globe of a beautiful-looking garden world. "Three million people called that world home. Isolated, but very productive, and so peaceful." She paused, and when she next spoke, her voice was laced with bitterness. "When UNSC scouts arrived, Harvest was gone."
"Gone?" Jane shifted uneasily. She knew that, during the Krogan Rebellions, krogan soldiers had crashed asteroids into turian worlds, rendering them inhospitable. But that was a dozen tops. "How do you lose a planet?"
The holographic display coming from her omni-tool changed. Gone were the fields and the hills, the oceans and the continents. What was left was cratered, molten wastelands and barren desserts. Entire countries glowed red and the glassy crust of the planet faintly reflected the light of a nearby sun.
"All inhabitants were lost," Cortana added.
Shepard placed a hand in front of her mouth and slowly inhaled through her nose. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes, but she couldn't take her gaze off of her wrist, where the once-gorgeous world had been reduced to a smoldering ball of glass and dirt. So many lives lost…so many dead. She felt torn between horror and outrage.
"The only contact we found near Harvest was a single Covenant ship," said the Master Chief. This had to have happened nearly thirty years ago. Such a tragedy…no wonder the Chief was so incredibly focused on his task. No nation could forget a crime like this. How old had he been when he heard of the news? How old had he been when he signed up with the army?
"The Covenant ship immediately engaged the UNSC patrol and all but annihilated it," said Cortana. "Two ships were completely destroyed and the third managed to escape into Slipspace."
The soldier within Shepard took over from her humane side and she forced herself to see through the utter waste of life. "This was your first contact with alien species, wasn't it? What happened then?"
"We have a whole history of naval battles and ground conflicts, Shepard. The gist of it? Over the next few decades, the Covenant, with superior firepower and technology, overpowered our humanity on almost every world, swept aside our navy during every conflict. Aside from a few scattered but notable triumphs, the UNSC only won scattered and costly victories. The Covenant took world after world…but never kept them."
Shepard sighed and tore her eyes away from the floating hologram. "In just thirty years…this Covenant…they destroyed a hundred and fifty colonies? With the civilians on them?"
"More often than not with remaining military assets as well. Ultimate casualties exceeded the thirty billion."
Jane felt the desire to smash something. She remembered the Chief telling her that his war was over, that there was no urging military conflict he needed to return to. She had never thought…the mere scale of this conflict! It was completely unheard of, in all of Citadel history. The Krogan Rebellions paled in comparison, and they lasted ten times longer. "Wait…this war isn't still happening, right? You won, didn't you?"
Cortana exchanged a look with the Chief. "Let's just say that in the last year, a series of very odd, very chaotic and very…costly events changed the course of the war."
"We didn't win," said the Chief. `We survived. Generals went to bed in charge of millions. Woke up in charge of hundreds."
"AI´s kept track of all communications. Sometimes, colonies would be destroyed so shortly after one another that messages sent from soldiers on the battlefield would arrive long after the planet they were sent from had been glassed. Or, the world said message was intended for."
"How come we never encountered any of them in our past?" Asked Jane. "Two-hundred thriving colonies beyond the Terminus. The Covenant must have had a massively outnumbering fleet, enough to threaten the Citadel Council's fleet."
She noticed the Master Chief reacting rather strikingly to her words. Nothing too overt, as the Chief seemed to be even worse at showing emotions than EDI was, but the signs were still there. A slight narrowing of his eyes, a tightness around his mouth.
Still, Jane's eyes were very sharp and she didn't miss a thing. "Sorry, did I say something wrong?"
Again, Cortana answered for the super-soldier. "Not technically. The Covenant did have an enormous armada, more than enough to overwhelm the Citadel defense fleet should they want to take the Citadel with force. However, it wasn't a war to the Covenant, but a campaign of genocide. They didn't allocate the brunt of their forces to the front like normal armed forces would."
The Commander frowned. "Wait, so did they overwhelm your world so completely if they didn't even bother to send in entire fleets?"
Cortana seemed to straighten her back, as if guarding herself from something. Again, a glitch ran through her body. Was it the omni-tool? "The UNSC was only capable of defeating the Covenant when outnumbering them three to one. One of our largest media-promoted victories against the Covenant was relatively early in the war, when the UNSC sent an entire fleet against an invading battlegroup. One hundred and seventeen ships engaged and destroyed twelve Covenant ships, but took thirty-seven casualties in the process."
"You lost nearly forty ships against a battlegroup of twelve?" Jane all but shouted. Being a ship Commander herself, such numbers were unthinkable. It was…well, a lot like the fight against Sovereign, actually, and he had had an entire Geth fleet to back him up. "Out of a hundred-seventeen?"
"A morale booster among the fleet," said the Chief.
Jane couldn't help herself. "Sorry Cortana, but what ships did you use? How incredibly advanced was the Covenant?" She managed to keep herself from asking whether the Covenant wasn't really the Reapers under a different name. Such an assertion would insult everyone in the room.
Cortana almost sounded insulted when she replied. "Oh, believe me when I say that our fleet used to be more than adequate enough to potentially turn both your First-Contact war and the batarian slave-raids into mere incidents, too humiliating for their species to even mention on their history, at the same time. However, since our enemy had weapons that could melt through two meters of solid ship-grade armor a matter of a second and shrug off four sixty-four kilotons worth of cannon fire, our options were limited. If you add the notion that nearly every single Covenant vessel was the size of a turian dreadnaught, then having a lot of Frigates in the same size the turians build their Cruisers doesn't do a whole lot of good."
Dreadnaught-sized warships as a mainstay in the Covenant navy…forget the Council, why hadn't the Reapers ever noticed the war raging there? Or had they? Was there a reason that the Covenant and the UNSC evolved around seemingly-different technological trees?
"As much as I like the idea of a race having the capacity to put the turians and the batarians in their place…I really don't." She faced the Chief. John. Her friend. "You have my sympathies, Master Chief. I wish I could to more than simply promising something, but I promise you that I will do everything in my power to get you home, to your people. And then, if your people still need to, I will get them in contact with the Citadel Council. They might be three of the most politic politicians to have ever politicked, but they care."
The Chief held her gaze for a few, long seconds, during which he certainly assessed the truth and weight of her statement, before closing his eyes and resting his head on his pillow. "That's not my call to make," he softly said. "The Collector and the Reapers are the main threat now. We should focus on them first."
Jane simply stared all the man. "I…"
"Oh, that's just his way to say he wants to change the subject," quipped Cortana. "Don't worry, he was curt to me too when we first got here. The last years were…rough."
Shepard wondered what sort of events could possibly turn such a lopsided war around, then decided against asking.
But thirty billion casualties…that had to be the majority of their race.
No, she decided against asking.
Against
…damnit. "So how did your mankind survive that war? The Covenant didn't just quit, did they?"
Cortana did reply to her question, but she sounded very off. Static-ish, as if something was warping her voice. "Of course they didn't-" the AI stopped, catching herself. Her hologram flickered a few times as she brought her hand to her temple. "Sorry. There, that's better. Just a…faulty line in your omni-tool, is all."
Jane raised an eyebrow and glanced at the Chief, who was looking at Cortana with an expression that severely discredited the 'is all' part of the AI's explanation.
Some people -like Garrus- liked to credit the Commander's charisma and understanding as supernatural. She disliked that idea. She was just a really good observer and right now, observation told her to put this conversation into the mental box for the moment.
"Cortana interfaced with the Collecter's hardware," said the Master Chief. "She's still acclimatizing to a human environment."
That was an explanation. Judging by the way Cortana had disappeared right when he started talking, it was a big lie, but it was also an explanation. "Well, goes that explains the C," said Jane.
The Chief blinked. Even a man with perfect emotional control like him didn't seem to fully scrub the look of confusion away.
Jane smirked. That was too easy. "The C in UNSC. United Nations Space Command sounded very militaryish."
"Militaryish?"
There was probably a better word for that. "Normally, the government doesn't exist out of a military organization. That would be a military dictatorship. Technically, the UNSC is a military regime. Although I'm fairly certain it was far the best." She coughed, realizing that she was right back at the beginning. "Well then, I like the color of your visor. Brings out the green in your helmet."
The Chief remained silent. Man, was he ever difficult to hold a conversation with. Her new personal challenge.
In the meantime, Doctor Chakwas dropped by again, giving Jane another dose of medication to keep her biotic implants from warping the surrounding tissues.
A few minutes and one additional doze of medication for the Master Chief later, Chakwas left again, leaving Jane at the mercy of an AI with a hunger for knowledge.
"So, what was that about?" Asked Cortana, popping up from the omni-tool as she did. "Is taxing your Biotics really that dangerous?"
Jane gave a grunt in reply and waited until her Amp calmed down. Apparently, it decided that she wanted to Warp the entire medical bay and her nodes were flaring in response. Damn meds…she hated them. But throwing them out the airlock would leave her in a worse condition. Chakwas wouldn't forgive her that easily again. "Not really. Humans are too weak, asari too refined."
"But you are neither weak nor refined?"
Despite her physical discomfort, Jane found herself smiling. Such a clever girl…" Yup. I've got a Force output classified as "too powerful for my own good"." Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder coupled with an ingrained desire for violence were good for something, at least. "I can pick up krogan and make them dance, slap around entire fireteams for giggles and cut my food without touching the silverware."
"Impressive," said Cortana. "He can't do that last one."
Jane saw the Chief's jaw muscles clench in response to that remark, just a bit.
"But if I have too much fun, my nodes start getting overexcited and my brain can't tell my Amp that I am not trying to destroy a planet. As a result, my biotic Amp and my brain start throwing hissyfits that can lead to popped blood vessels-"
"Ouch."
"And then the fun starts. If I tried to, say, Biotically arm-wrestle a few Matriarchs in a row, my nodes will start warping their surrounding tissues to draw more power. It's very annoying and very unpleasant."
"So you can't push yourself past your limits because your body will literally tear itself apart?"
Jane smiled. "Yup. That's basically the gist of it."
"And nobody has been able to treat that?"
She shrugged. "There aren't a lot of humans who need to get it fixed. Chakwas and Mordin are always looking into things, but they have much more important things to do. In the meantime, meds will keep my Biotics calm."
Cortana nodded. "I'm sorry to hear that."
Jane waved her concerns away. "Don't. I rarely overexert myself. At least, not normally. Anyway, order of business. Repairing your suit, repairing your organs, dealing with the rumors of magical sky-falling Master Chiefs that are sure to circulate. The normal stuff. We're heading towards the Citadel in a few days. New supplies, lots of shore leave. A friend of mine asked to check something out, too."
Upon hearing the mention of his suit, the Chief seemed to stir. "I doubt anything on the Citadel will help repair my armor, Commander."
Jane rolled with her eyes. "I know that. It'll help with other things however. I'm pretty sure Cortana wants to take a look at all the info she can find there and you have earned a few days off."
"Commander, I don't have need for shore leave."
Right, he was that kind of genetically, biochemically and cybernetically altered super-soldier. "Well, then you get to carry Cortana around. She's your partnered AI and I have to stress, you still didn't tell how you two fit into this picture. But that can wait. For a while. We have spare civilian clothes for you…"
The Chief was unable to hide his distaste.
"…or a military hardsuit. I think the latter will better fit your tastes. It's not green, battered and burned, but it can support an omni-tool."
He remained silent for a few moments, before saying, "I prefer to carry firearms into hostile territory, Commander."
Jane blankly stared at him. "Everybody does. Your point?"
"Will this be a problem?"
She shrugged. "Don't see why. If I can walk around with a Cain in the embassies, I'm sure you can walk around with a normal rifle. Now then. I'm going to try and sneak my way out of here. Still a lot to do. How am I going to give Cortana back to you?"
"She wired my omni-tool to my armor's systems."
"Oh. How'd she do that?"
"Her chip uses advanced fabrication software to interface with alien insertion points."
Jane and the Chief stared at each other for a few moments. "You don't know how she did that, do you?"
"Some girls prefer to keep secrets."
Oh, a witty comeback? So he was capable of dry humor? Hah. Now she had him. "So you plug her into your armor and she plugs herself into your omni-tool?"
"Via my helmet, yes."
Jane nodded, impressed. She then picked up the Chief's large helmet and set it down on the table next to him, before gently removing the blue chip from her omni-tool and slipping it into the back of the helmet. The power of an extremely-dangerous Artificial Intelligence, contained in an item no larger than her thumb. She existed within John's suit. Did she exist within his head as well? Could she interface with his mind? What else was this UNSC capable of building?
And how had the Covenant torn it all down? And why?
"There. A piece of the girl, into the piece of the boy. Normally it's the other way around. Those batarians never stood a chance." She realized that she was thinking aloud and quickly added, "Just…don't go venting any rooms in here and nobody will notice that you have a girl living inside of your head." Saying it like that sounded kind of weird…
Meh, she had uttered weirder sentences this day.
"Understood Commander."
"Oh and, please, just call me by my name. Preferably the first one. Everybody calling me Shepard gets a bit…dull…at times."
He stared at her with an odd expression, making Jane realize that she had just asked the shell-shocked veteran super-soldier to call a stand-in Commanding Officer by her first name.
"Or call me whatever makes you feel better. Right then. Good luck."
"Thank you."
With a faint smile, Jane left the medical bay, praying to the Tuchankian deities that Karin wouldn't notice her.
~0~
Garrus Vakarian was sitting in the mess hall opposite of the medical bay, together with Tali'Zorah and Jack of all people. All three of them were "keeping to themselves" and enjoying their meal, "unconcerned" and completely "undistracted".
However, the moment Commander Shepard exited the medical bay, looking very much like an asari infiltrator escaping from an enemy safehouse, Tali knew that it was safe to drop the pretense and start with the important talk.
Namely, how the flying Keelah a man had survived odds that would put a Reaper to shame.
Initially, Tali had been surprised that Jack had joined them as well. However, she quickly remembered that the woman had been at Shepard's side inside of the Collector Cruiser, fighting side-by-side with this Master Chief against the Collectors. She had been there when Shepard had been forced to leave the Chief behind, sentencing him to what everybody had believed to be a certain death. If anyone would be here, it would be her.
Tali was just confused about Jack's intentions. She had never displayed concern towards anything. What had she seen inside that vessel to be curious towards the Chief?
"The coast seems clear," said Garrus. "Come on out, Rupert."
The Mess Sergeant emerged from behind his kitchen table and wiped the sweat off his brow. "Whew. That was close. She almost found my secret stash."
"How can she find your stash from the other side of the deck?" Asked Tali.
"The Commander has the uncanny ability to appear when you don't want her," replied Gardner.
"Alright," said Tali. She was eager to change the subject. "Garrus, you weren't there, so I will make this brief. The Master Chief can not fly."
The discussion immediately started, loaded against her. "Bullshit!" Jack immediately replied. "How the fuck do you explain him falling from orbit? That's right! You don't!"
Behind her helmet, Tali rolled with her eyes.
But Garrus, that traitor, wasn't even on her side! "I see Jack's point and raise you this. How do you explain him surviving a fall from orbit? Everybody can crash, but not everybody can stick the landing."
"Thruster packs?" Suggested Tali.
"Which means he flew down from orbit in style," replied Garrus. "But it is still flying."
Damnit, she had pushed herself in a corner.
"I don't think he has a jetpack or something like it," said the voice of Kasumi Goto, shortly before Kasumi Goto actually appeared. She was sitting opposite of Tali, with both of her elbows on the table, holding something black and boxy. Nobody reacted. They had gotten used to her sneaking into their midst by now. "He would have flown out of the way of that Mako."
Garrus' mandibles trembled at that remark. "Mako?"
"Maybe it was damaged?" Said Tali. "And no, that does not count as the Chief 'breaking his wings', Kasumi."
"What Mako?"
"D'aww…but it sounds poetic, doesn't it?"
Jack scowled. "Maybe he didn't need to! Maybe he just didn't give a fuck if that thing hit him."
Garrus raised his hand like an innocent child. "The turian is lost. What Mako? What didn't you tell me?"
Kasumi giggled. "Poor Vakarian is being kept in the dark. The batarians rammed a Mako APC into the Master Chief."
Tali hadn't known that turians could open their mouth that far. "Impressed, Garrus?"
Vakarian seemed to shake himself awake. "No, not at all. I mean, if a Geth Prime can survive Shepard crashing the Mako into its chest, surely the Master Chief can."
"Recovered quickly, Vakarian," Said Kasumi. "Is that jealousy I detect?"
"Again, not at all. How did that human saying go again? A good player knows when to fold them."
"It's one of the reasons Miranda learned not to be jealous of Shepard," said the Mess Sergeant. "I mean, there are some levels that just can't be reached with training alone."
"So," said Kasumi, "all in favor of the Chief flying down from orbit and crashing?"
Garrus, Jack and Kasumi all raised their hand, while Tali wondered if she had perhaps gathered the wrong people to discuss this. "Keelah, I should have invited Miranda…"
"Next up," said Garrus. "Fending off a few hundred slavers on his own."
"Perhaps they were badly equipped?" Asked Tali. She didn't want to play down the Chief's abilities, not at all, but she wanted to take this seriously. She was very intrigued by the man and his miraculous armor and she wanted to know exactly what had happened on New Campton. Sensationalism wasn't the best way to reach 'exactly'.
"Nonsense," Gardner immediately said. "After our people searched the battlefield for salvageable remains of the Collector ship, we found plenty of corpses with good tech. Shields, advanced tech and enough Dead Man's for everybody."
"I'm sorry," said Tali. "My translator must have glitched. You found dead men with the bodies?"
"A Dead Man Sensor," replied Garrus. "It's a piece of tech you link up to your suit. When your hardsuit is advanced enough to actually carry a VI or a medical display, the Dead Man will monitor your vitals. When you die, it goes off, alerting all your buddies with an omni-tool. Real nasty piece of tech."
Kasumi nodded. "Expensive too. Whoever funded those batarians…oh, what am I saying. When the Hegemony funded those batarians, they funded them well."
At first, Tali doubted why anyone would pay for such a piece of morbid technology. However, when she thought about it more, it actually made sense. If anyone were to try and catch them surprise, the entire squad would immediately know that they were under attack. Stealth would be rendered useless.
And any batarian killed in retaliation could be bloodily avenged the second any renegade human tried to fight their way past the invasion.
"So back to the motion, the Chief faced down well-equipped soldiers," verified Garrus. "On his own, with broken wings."
Kasumi smirked.
Tali placed the palm of her hand against her visor, mimicking Jane's often performed gesture.
"How?"
Jack knew the answer, apparently. "You should have seen that hyperactive bastard aboard the Collector ship! He took down those big fuckers with no trouble. Shit, what are they called again? Big zombie-things?"
"Scions?" Tali said with shock. She had seen the footage of the frightening, lumbering monsters. "The Master Chief took down Scions on his own? How?"
"By beating the shit out of them!" Jack was uncharacteristically excited. Was she so elated that she had found someone equally destructive as she was, or had the Commander and her delving into the dark past really helped that much? "Big guy fucked them up with his bare hands and a big gun."
"Impossible," Tali immediately said. She had read the report of Shepard trying her infamous Biotic takedown and the resulting chaos had led to the partial destruction of two houses, a Husk and the Commander's barriers. "Those things have a Shockwave ability that fries your shields and destroys your barriers. How did he-?"
"If you time it right," replied Kasumi, "you can hit the Scion and retreat before it retaliates. You need to be sharp though."
If that was true, the Master Chief had to be really sharp. It puzzled Tali somewhat; the man looked so human to her, but his armor was something she had never seen before. It was something that the Geth might have come up with if they ever felt the need to fight krogans in close-quarters, but even then…the armor was just too advanced to be built by any organic species. It had its own fusion reactor! Not even the salarians could have come up with something like that!
"Still," said the Mess Sergeant, "You gotta be crazy to willingly stay behind on an op like that, and take on an entire batarian slave raid on your own. Those bastards have very nasty weapons at their side. The Chief's gonna fit right in."
Tali wasn't sure that the Chief was crazy. He didn't look like the type to enjoy fighting, like Grunt and Jack did. He just…seemed to do his thing. And the thought of him standing alone in the human colony, exposing himself to all forms of grueling harm and pain just to defend what little people might have been left? That didn't sound like the decision of a mad man to her. The wounds he had received during that fight…
However much she wanted to, she couldn't keep her thoughts away from the Master Chief. Was he going to be alright? What would he need to get ready for fighting again?
Her? To fix his armor?
"In all seriousness though, Shepard's really happy that she found him again. Losing him was really tough on her."
Jack looked away when she heard that.
"Yes, you and Tali worked with Shepard before, didn't you?" Asked Kasumi.
Garrus chuckled. "Worked with…fought alongside…assisted in killing a two-kilometer tall Reaper…we've been places."
That they had. Tali remembered the first time she had seen Commander Jane Shepard in action. She had been desperate, in pain and frightened for her life. Spurned by humans, chased away by non-human. Saren's assassins had been hiding at every single corner in the citadel and finally, when she had managed to strike a deal and sell valuable information for a mere place to stay, she had been betrayed one final time.
Or what would have been her final time.
And then Jane had appeared. A flash of brilliant blue light, followed by crumbling walls and cracking stone. She had conjured up a wall of blue fire held together by will and rage, practically daring the assassins to come get her. Nothing had stopped her. Everything that had stood in her way died. It had been over in mere seconds.
And then, Jane had extended her hand towards Tali. A quarian.
"You're safe now. Nobody is going to hurt you anymore."
Kasumi folded her hands behind her neck. "She's not what I expected of an Alliance Commander. I mean, not like I would know how Commanders act like, but…"
"Shepard's different," Garrus immediately replied. "She's not so much military as…well, Shepard."
"Shepard is Shepard," agreed Tali. "A good way of putting it. The Commander doesn't let anything compromise her, no matter what."
"She's soft, that's what she is," snapped Jack. "The big guy had to convince her to leave him. Back on Pragia, there was this insane fuck who wanted to restart the facility. And Shepard took pity on him! How the fuck was I supposed to kill him when she´s looking at me like…fuck, like…"
"A baby varren," joked Garrus.
"Yes! Shit, that's it! A baby varren!"
Tali shook her head. She had heard Jane being compared to lots of things, but a baby varren…" She's not soft."
Jack shot a glare at her. "What?"
She didn't like being stared at like that, but this was a point she had to bring up. "Shepard's not soft. She's kind, but not soft. There is a line, very specifically, that shouldn't be crossed with her. Once people do cross it…" Tali shook her head. "That's it."
Garrus chuckled. "Poor Eclipse girl never saw it coming…"
Kasumi leant back on her chair. "The batarian was really pushing her buttons."
"Generally, showing a lack of remorse is a bad thing to do."
Tali was glad that they knew exactly what she meant. "The Commander grieved for Saren when she convinced him to kill himself-"
Jack paled. "She did what?"
"-but she also executed three people she deemed too dangerous to live, with a bullet to the face, one after another. She has this weird sense of justice. If someone is too dangerous to function in society, when someone will only return to hurting innocent people, she won't hesitate a second."
"The fucking lunatic wanted to restart a Cerberus facility!" Shouted Jack. "How did he escape getting a face-full?"
"What can I say? The Commander has a soft spot for dark and troubled pasts," replied Garrus. "As I said, few people ever cross the line that she won't ever forgive. Once they do, Shepard splatters them across the wall. Or whatever happens to be directly around their bodies."
Tali had only witnessed the darker sides of her Commander a few times. The worst had been on Asteroid X57. The two batarians in charge of the crazy scheme to crash the asteroid into the planet below…Tali still remembered their names. Sometimes, she even remembered how they had screamed. The second-in-command, Charn had gone out relatively easy. Jane had Biotically ripped his head off.
Balak…for plotting to kill four million innocent people purely out of spite, his punishment had been unusually cruel. Jane had crushed his body with a disgustingly-powerful Singularity, casually, almost contemptuously, twisting his limbs, breaking his bones, crushing his organs and mangling his corpse with the Biotic gravitational power.
All the hostages had been saved, but the sudden ferocity and bloodthirstiness that her Commander had displayed…Tali hadn't talked to her for two days after that.
And then she had learned about Mindoir. And Elysium.
"I can't say I disapprove," said Kasumi. "There are some nasty people in this galaxy. Having someone like Shepard around can only make it better, right?"
Tali squirmed, feeling rather uncomfortable all of a sudden. "I…at least, the quarians have an entire justice system where multiple individuals are in charge of sentencing the guilty. We believe that a single person cannot be trusted as a carrier of justice."
"Judge, jury and executioner," said Kasumi. "Well, if you put it like that…"
But Garrus was not worried. "As I said, nothing compromises Shepard. If she figures someone deserved punishment, they really had it coming."
"But if you put it like that…"
"Yes," the Mess Sergeant then said, "But you're Archangel. Of course you would approve of that."
Tali's point exactly. If someone had the power and vision to decide who got to live and who got to die, wouldn't that power eventually go to their head? She believed in Jane and knew that the Commander would only ever think about those who couldn't defend themselves, but only a fool would deny that she had a darker side to her. Elysium went into history as Jane's career-defining moment, but there was a lot more to it than just that.
Nobody would deny that Jane was merciful and compassionate beyond what was normal. But the Alliance had covered up what really happened on Elysium for a reason.
~0~
The Master Chief struggled against the sedatives and exhaustion, fighting to stay awake. He was vaguely aware of his injuries, but the pain was becoming more noticeable with every breath he took. The sedatives the Doctor had given him were slowly wearing off. That was good, because he needed to think clear. It was bad, because the sedatives were keeping the many collective injuries of his body at bay.
Cortana was sitting now, watching him with anxiety and worry. Almost glaring at him. Every now and then he would look at her, meet her eyes. She immediately looked away whenever he did.
The silence, normally so soothing to him, was now bothering him. In the thirty minutes since Shepard had left them, Cortana had been monitoring his vital signs, but she had also grown more morose and silent with each passing minute. Eventually, he had to address it. "You told me you didn't know what was going on."
He tried not to sound accusing, and he thought that he had kept his voice completely neutral, but Cortana still recoiled as if struck.
"I didn't want to upset you…" she whispered. "I'm sorry."
John frowned. Cortana had been through a lot lately. Pressuring her was the last thing he wanted to do. Understanding the situation could wait -he had worked with less intel than this in the past- but she knew. She knew while telling him that she didn't. He simply wanted to know why.
"You don't upset me," he quietly replied. "I just want to know why you kept it secret. What was your reason?"
Cortana glanced up at him, like a child that had been told off by its parents. "You don't know what they did to you?"
She was still speaking in that hushed, remorseful tone. "I'm used to being injured, Cortana," he told her, trying to soothe her with a slight smile. His jaw-muscles felt stiff, inflexible. "It's part of the job."
But she shook her head, as if his attempt to calm her down only served to upset her more. "You don't know…you haven't noticed it yet?"
Now the Master Chief was starting to feel uneasy as well. The years of conditioning immediately kicked in and told him to arm himself, that something was very wrong. "You're not talking about the batarians. What's wrong? Tell me."
"John…"
She's using my name again, he realized.
"…a lot happened since we came back to Earth, after what happened at Halo. You haven't been conscious throughout it all…not all of it."
The Master Chief frowned. He didn't remember any moment like that. There were moments where had had managed to grab a few hours of sleep, but he had not been knocked into unconsciousness. He was very certain about that.
There was something else that bothered him about that statement, too. Cortana had been stuck in High Charity. "How do you know that?"
She looked so guilty. "What you deem as a small window of opportunity, a single moment in time that you have to take before it is eternally lost again… can last an eternity to an AI. When you saved me on High Charity, for instance. When you interacted with the Monitor, with the Arbiter. Back on the Dawn, here in this very medical bay. All these small moments may seem separate to you, and perhaps they are. But you're not me. And to me, they form a pattern."
The Chief shook his head. "I'm not following you," he said. "What do these moments have in common?"
She looked him in his eyes. "What happened on New Campton?"
The sudden change of subject puzzled him, but it was obvious that Cortana needed him to follow her logic and that was all the incentive he needed to attempt to do so. "After the slavers took you, I searched across the colony to find you. I eliminated patrols, hostile infantry squads and their animal support." He stopped, hesitating. What had happened after that again? "I discovered what the batarians did to their prisoners and eventually rescued a survivor." He paused again. "She didn't make it. You know that. You were there when Shepard verified it."
"And then?" Cortana urged him on. "What happened then?"
He remembered watching her small, broken body. Her eyes, vacant, staring at nothing. The anger he had felt, quickly escalating out of his control. Everything after that point was a haze filled with blood and screaming and bitter hatred, not cold and latent like he had felt with the Covenant, but much worse.
"I avenged her," said the Chief. "And I made them pay."
"And what do you remember?"
"I-" The Spartan cut himself off and glanced at Cortana, frowning. How did she know about that particular gap in his memory? "I saw Commander Shepard, sitting atop the turret of an APC." He didn't tell Cortana what his adrenaline-fueled mind had made out of her sudden Biotic entrance. "How did you-?"
"There are holes in your memory, events that transpired that didn't take in your mind. After Doctor Chakwas and Professor Solus -the salarian- performed surgery on you, scanning the entirety of your body for injuries, I realized what must have happened. What they did to you."
"Cortana, slow down. I'm not following you. Who is 'they'? What did they do?"
The AI gave him a look of pity, and it frustrated John, but he couldn't understand why. "I'm trying to make sense of it. It's all still so scrambled…but deeper scans revealed an abnormality in your brain."
Hearing that disturbed the Spartan. Abnormalities were always bad news. "A tumor?" He asked. "Augmentation rejection?"
Cortana gave him a look that told him that his suggestions horrified her. "No, nothing like that! At least, I don't think so."
John raised an eyebrow at that. "You don't think? I thought we passed the phase of experimenting on the Spartan-"
"Don't say that!" Snapped the AI, displaying a sudden fierceness that surprised the Master Chief. "Don't joke about that! I reviewed your combat records, the reports filed since you and I were separated. You went through a full medical review and then supplied with medication to induce twelve hours of sleep. You awoke after seven."
The Chief recalled that, too. Back on the Cairo, where they had stripped his old Mk. V.
"I thought it was just to give you rest, to let you recover from your successful operation," continued Cortana. "But they did something to you. There was an Office of Naval Intelligence Prowler docked with the Cairo at the time of your recuperation. I…I didn't think anything about it at the time, but…"
"After New Campton, you realized something was wrong?" He didn't know how he should feel about this news. Yes, he was property of ONI, but that didn't mean they could just mess with his head in his sleep. There were only a select few people in the UNSC that could properly interact with a Spartan and one of them was Doctor Halsey.
Cortana nodded. "I hypothesized several potential outcomes due to the Office's meddling. Several of them were sabotage, perhaps Ackerson, but you succeeded, despite all your injuries, without showing any signs of faring worse than before."
"So it's not sabotage?" The Chief was relieved to hear that. Colonel Ackerson had never hidden his disdain for the Spartans.
"I haven't completely ruled it out, but, no. That doesn't mean you're in the clear. One other outcome was a mere tissue sampling and scanning procedure to gather information, but your performance was different from what you usually show."
If he had outright forgotten a section of his fight on New Campton, there definitely was something wrong. There was one problem though. "I have a concussion. Doesn't that account for the memory loss?"
But Cortana shook her head. "Not to such an accurate degree, not at such a vital point. Your memory loss started at a very specific occurrence."
The Master Chief looked away. "I lost control," he quietly said, disgusted with the mere notion of not being able to fully maintain a professional attitude in combat. "When I saw I failed to protect her…something went wrong."
"John…" Cortana reached out for him, but stopped half-way through the gesture. "It's not your fault. You did everything you could, better than everything you could."
He looked back at the AI, wondering if that was true. A Spartan never failed, never lost. `Is that why you didn't tell me what really happened to the Dawn?"
"Yes…I must admit, you have handled extraordinary amounts of stress. But shooting your way out of High Charity nearly exceeded that incredible tolerance of yours. You came close to cracking, and I didn't know what triggered the…whatever it was that ONI did to you on the Cairo. And close subjection to the Gravemind's telepathy didn't "
The Chief nodded, understanding. He didn't like Cortana withholding vital information on him, but he could understand. "And revealing a second evolved mankind on the other side of the galaxy, combined with their own ancient alien threat, would push that stress-level over your established threshold?"
"Exactly!" Cortana exclaimed, seemingly reassured that he understood. "Given the vast and intricate background with the Protheans, Reapers and Citadel races, coupled with the time-discrepancy, I thought you needed time to process all of this." She halted, glancing up at the Spartan. "Do you need time to process all of this?"
John sighed, taking a moment to categorize and process this information. Even to someone with the mental capacities of a Spartan, it took a minute. It might have also been the concussion however. "You don't know what, if anything, the Office did to my head?"
"Negative." Explaining the finer details put Cortana right back towards her chattier behavior. In the past, it had annoyed the Master Chief somewhat. Now, he was utterly relieved to hear it. "However, if we take into account your experience at New Campton and the grisly casualties you caused, it is safe to assume it has to do with your stress levels, aggression levels and frontal lobe."
The frontal lobe…if he remembered his biology correct, that was where emotional regulation lay. Alterations to the frontal lobe could have some unprecedented results.
Again, it might also be the concussion.
He disliked the heavy ones. They made logical, reasonable thinking difficult. "Great. Let's hope we don't find any more surprises. We don't want to break my brain."
"That's not-"
"I know," said the Chief. "My apologies. We should turn to the most pressing issue at the moment."
At that, Cortana sighed with relief. "At last. Let´s shelf this brain-talk for now and get to the priorities."
The two of them spoke at the exact same time.
"The history of the Protheans, Forerunners and the Reapers."
"Repairing my suit."
Then, the two of them stared at each other, neither of them surprised at the priorities of the other.
Cortana sighed again, but this time with a little bit less relief and a little bit more exasperation. "Your MJOLNIR, Chief, is badly damaged. Do you remember the Gunnery Sergeant's chastising back at the Cairo? Apply that here, then multiply it. You busted your shield generator, multiple compartments have been breached and the protective visor is shattered. Shattered, Chief. Do you know how much force is needed to do that?"
"Recall my reply to the Gunnery Sergeant, switch 'Covenant' for 'Batarians' and apply it here."
Cortana rolled with her eyes. "Yes, I suppose showering the planet with a kinetic bombardment would damage the Mk. VI like that…still, it isn't beyond repair."
The Chief felt his mood increase significantly.
"The nanomachine pocket will be able to fully repair your suit within a week."
And just like that, his good mood was gone. "A week?" Repeated the Spartan. "Can't you tell them to hurry up?"
The AI raised a skeptical eyebrow at that comment. "Well, I could have them multiply significantly and rush the repairs, but I believed you to be hesitant to the idea of a nanite well living inside your suit?"
She had a point. The idea of a Cortana-controlled swarm of intelligent machines the size of a molecule didn't seem very enticing. There was no saying what she could do with such a swarm, but the threat…
Cortana's eyes seemed to glimmer with an innocent playfulness and the Chief immediately recognized that look. She had an idea.
"No," he flatly told her. "You are not creating a nano-machine swarm. We can't risk the crew finding out."
"Don't worry, we'll just be repairing your suit. Maybe upgrade it, but mostly repair it."
Still, the Master Chief had to insist. "We can't have them figure out that the MJOLNIR contains a pocket of nanomachines. If my armor magically repairs itself within the day, they will get suspicious."
"Do you want me to point out the error in your logic?"
"Cortana, no."
She pouted like a little child. "Oh, fine. Guess you will have to walk around in a normal civilian outfit then. I believe that mister Taylor might be able to supply you with one?"
The Chief sighed. Sometimes, doing the right thing was so hard. "A normal hardsuit will have to suffice," he told the AI. "For now."
"Good, because we'll be approaching the Citadel by the time you've recovered enough to walk."
Now there was something he hadn't expected her to say. "I distinctly recall multiple people getting mad when patients walked too soon," he commented. "You want to go to the Citadel that badly?"
Her smile confirmed that suspicion. "Oh, very much so! I mean, we're not likely to run into any trouble down there, and you will still be wearing a hardsuit with kinetic barriers and a medigel-dispenser. We'll be at Jane's side the entire time."
The Chief stared at Cortana, expecting her to-
"Please?"
- there it was. "Sure. I don't see why." One thing in Cortana's little explanation stood out to him though. "So the Commander rescued you from the batarian ship?"
"Yes, she did. Not that I needed her to rescue me though. I had it under control."
Haughtiness from an Artificial Intelligence. "Strange. I recall you saying they locked you in a primitive system."
"And I recall venting their ship."
Touché, "One rescue and you and the Commander are on a first-name basis?"
If he hadn't known better, he would have thought that Cortana blushed at that remark. "Yes, well, I needed her to bail you out!"
She was getting defensive very quickly. It puzzled him. "You did ride along on her omni-tool…and she did promise to keep your existence a secret. Do you trust her?"
Cortana crossed her arms. "I suppose I do. She's not lying, and I would know if she was. Regardless, now there is only one manner left to address." The two of them faced sized each other up for a few moments, before both of them delivered their respective agenda point.
"The Normandy crew having knowledge of your augmentations."
"Weapons deployment."
Cortana smirked. "Hah. I win. Now, ONI would probably have you kill everyone aboard the Normandy to preserve the secret."
The Master Chief blinked. "That's…not going to happen."
"I know. I just wanted to give you a proper heads-up. I'm sure you've been through this in your head already. At the earliest convenience, I'll wipe their medical data regarding your augmentations."
The Chief nodded, satisfied that one loose end would be tied up. He didn't want to imagine augmented krogan. Although, he wondered what sort of Spartan the Commander would have made.
He discarded that thought immediately. The memories of the augmentation procedure were far from pleasant. The feeling of napalm pouring through his veins, his bones shattering a thousand times over…it wasn't something he wanted Shepard, or anyone for that matter, to experience.
Exhaustion washed over him as he shifted his weight. Cortana didn't miss a beat when she said, "You should rest. I've got some interesting things to keep me busy for a while."
"Are you sure?" The Chief asked, his voice as soft as a whisper. It appeared that the sedatives hadn't worn out yet.
Or it was just the…
"Very. Let the Commander take it over from here."
The Master Chief agreed with that notion. Before soon, he had drifted off into a deep sleep.
~0~
Armory
Jane was processing all sorts of different thoughts while wandering towards the Normandy's armory, working with insinuations so unpleasant that a newscaster might have made them. She had to be honest with herself; she needed answers, and trying to evade Doctor Chakwas wasn't the best way to get them.
So with the rather unpleasant position of bothering the battered, wounded, still drugged-up Master Chief and his AI partner or mister Taylor, the decision was easily made. After all, she was technically going to ask Jacob questions that lay within his line of duty to answer.
She just hoped that he was still asleep at this hour.
The Commander slipped inside of the armory and saw the hard-working man standing near one of the tables, working with an odd-looking weapon that truly deserved the moniker 'alien'.
When Jane was standing right behind Jacob, she silently inhaled through her nose and muttered, "Heeey."
As predicted, mister Taylor whirled around and reached for his sidearm, recognized his CO and became flustered with the fact that he had tried to pull a gun on her. She smirked as he hastily snapped off a salute. "Commander. Didn't ehm…didn't expect to see you here this late." He paused, sizing her up the way only a professional could. "Commander…why are you wearing a hospital gown? Are you barefooted? Again?"
Jane shrugged. "I like the feel of the floor. As for your first question, I hung around my quarters for a while. You can lock the door there."
"Ehm…sure. So what can I do for you, Shepard?"
Satisfied with Jacob's quick recovery, Jane strolled over towards one of the weapon lockers. "I was wondering…that Sniper Rifle. It's an anti-material, right?"
"Yes Commander. The rounds are made out of a very hard material, likely depleted alloys or something similar. EDI helped me calculate the power behind it. Said it could punch through fifteen feet of flesh and bone with one shot. Impressive."
"That paints a disturbing picture. It's not anti-material, by the way."
At that, Jacob frowned. "It's not?"
"Nope. Well, technically it is. The Chief uses it for anti-personnel purposes."
Jacob wasn't even surprised to hear that. "Yeah, Miranda sent me the report. Seems wasteful to me. It's kind of like you using your Barrier to disintegrate flies."
"Damn things shouldn't be pestering me. So what sort of shields would stop the bullet?"
Jacob plucked one of the magazines out of a box and set it down on the table. "Hard to say. It could punch through a YMIR's shields. It would definitely bust any military kinetic barrier I know of…might even blow through your Barrier, or at least exhaust you trying to stop it. Funny thing though; it's not even that heavy. Way lighter than a Widow, for example."
"And in its infantry role? Can it be modified?"
"Yes Commander. I found several attachments that seemed to go with this weapon. It's capable of supporting a suppressor, different sights with night vision mode. Big shame about the ammo capacity; it only fires four shots before you need to reload it." Jacob suppressed a yawn and mumbled an apology. It was getting late. "Carries an expanded magazine though…but we don't have many of those."
At least there was no worrying about making your shot count…you could shoot a krogan in his big toe with this thing and still blow off his foot. Which begged the question…what did the Master Chief shoot at with a rifle seemingly designed to kill medium armor?
Jacob looked her over. "With respect Commander, do you need me to get Doctor Chakwas? I mean, you look like you should still be in medical."
Jane gave Jacob a charming smile. "I think that would be a dangerous idea, what with all the guns around here…"
Mister Taylor frowned. "I didn't really think Doctor Chakwas the type to touch things she has no understanding of. She's been working with the Alliance for years, why would she…" he trailed off as he looked at the Commander, comprehension dawning on his features. "Oh. Ah. Right. Understood, Shepard."
Jane's smile widened and she reached for the magazine that went with the Sniper, pondering the necessity for anti-material weapons pressed into anti-personnel rounds. Some asari soldiers preferred the Widow anti-material sniper, but it was only capable of firing once before it overheated. It also weighed enough that those asari needed implants to brace the weapon. This one looked like Mordin could fire it.
Jacob seemed to sense her racing, somewhat chaotic thoughts. "Any particular reason you're interested in a Sniper Rifle while you should be sleeping, Commander?" Jacob kindly asked her, insinuating that she wasn't entirely thinking straight.
Not entirely wrong, either. Damn meds…"Dreadnaughts, mister Taylor. They're large. At least a kilometer in size."
Jacob blinked. "Uhm…yes Commander. They are. Your point?"
Jane put down the magazine and silently wished that her nodes would just stabilize themselves. Damn headaches. Always popping up unannounced. "And turian Cruisers are half their size. Five-hundred meters. Their Frigates are small, only a hundred-and-fifty meters."
"Should I…should I call Chakwas, Commander?"
Yes, she supposed she wasn't making sense. She had made a promise that she would keep this stuff a secret, for now. "Look at the Chief's weapons. They're tough, but reliable. Overpowered, but simple. Even his pistol fires high-explosive armor-piercing rounds. What on Earth were they fighting?"
Now that they were getting back to his favorite subject, Jacob seemed to relax somewhat. He still didn't take his dark eyes off of Jane for a second though. "That ehm…that depends. They can put down a lot of rounds. That Sniper? Semi-automatic. A quick shooter can empty the mag in a second, maybe two with the recoil. Maybe they encountered the krogan during the Rebellions?"
The Covenant must have employed really tough soldiers to warrant the training of people like John. That, or they were incredibly advanced. "Not the krogan…something else. If you compare the total amount of rifles with other warships, Cruiser-sized. Does it match up?"
Jacob fell silent as he checked the numbers and ran the calculations.. "Roughly. We need to take into account that we only scoured half the ship. The other half is gone, remember? The derelict might have contained even more gear."
Very interesting…she had initially thought the Master Chief to belong to some new, scarcely-developed species, with weapons and armor made specifically for a single conflict with other members of their kind. One colony, two at best, and a massive civil war.
Now she knew better. She had been picturing the wrong scale, the wrong war. It was nothing like the fueling krogan Clans and much more like how a full-blown war between the Council species and the Terminus Systems would look like. This wasn't the armory of some young species that had accidentally overdesigned, this was the result of a massive but crumbling war machine.
"Guess time will tell. Goodnight, Jacob. Thanks for the talk."
Jacob scratched the back of his head, confused. "You're welcome, Commander. With respect, where are you going now?"
Jane shrugged. "Private quarters, I guess. Gonna grab some sleep. Why?"
"You really pushed yourself, down in New Campton. Are you sure you should be up and about?"
"A good suggestion. I'll ask EDI to keep me company. Nightie night, Jacob."
Mister Taylor didn't further pursue the subject, which was for the better. Jane really didn´t want to have her crew look at her like something they needed to protect, like someone who needed help. She had been helpless once, and that would never happen again.
As she made her way towards her private quarters, she checked her omni-tool to see if the Consort had sent her any new messages. The first one had come as a bit of a surprise, declaring that she didn't feel quite safe anymore on the Citadel, and that she wanted to talk.
Nope. Still only the second one, describing how Sha'ira felt like she was being watched at times. Sketchy business. Few people could get away with making the Consort feel threatened. With the entire Normandy crew taking a break at the Citadel, there would be plenty of time to investigate those problems.
Jane suppressed a yawn and glanced at her bed. So warm, so comfy…
Time to do what her body had been telling her to do for the past hour. Figuring out what massive civilization could scorch a hundred and fifty worlds in two decades would have to wait a few hours. Well, she had to be honest with herself. More than a few hours.
~0~
Medical Bay
15 hours later
It took the Master Chief a long time to fully recover from his injuries. He had many hours to spend in the medical bay and at times, he didn't know what to do with them. Sure, reading up on the various alien species he was going to face in the future took up some time, but he had already encountered most of them.
And there were only so many hours he could spent on cooking up ways to kill a krogan.
Eventually, he shifted his focus from the art of killing to history. Cortana was suffering from the same massive problem of boredom as he was, but it was much worse for her. She literally did everything she could to keep herself amused, and more often than not the Chief was forced to listen to her many theories on how this universe made sense. She talked about the Forerunners, about Shepard, about the name Normandy and its cultural significance, about Shepard and even about a thing called Sovereign.
She guessed that the Forerunners must have committed themselves to a massive restoration project, but she had no idea how the Protheans and the Reapers fitted into the picture. After all, the war between the Forerunners and the Flood had spanned the entire galaxy. How had the Reapers survived that conflict, if not by hiding in dark space for several cycles?
The Master Chief didn't know. Eventually, as Cortana went to work with dark energy and the Mass Effect technology, he prioritized learning up on the Alliance´s history. Everything from its foundation to the First Contact war. Then, he delved deeper, enlightening himself on the past wars. The turian Unification War, the Krogan Rebellions, the Rachni wars. This galaxy was no newcomer to war but, much to his confusion, there was not a single scrap of info detailing the Human-Covenant war.
The Covenant Empire had spanned hundreds of worlds, with thousands of warships at their disposal. Yet, in the thousand years of Citadel history, the destruction of an entire planet remained a rare occurrence. An asteroid deliberately crashed into a garden world, or WMD's detonated in major population centers. Nothing that indicated the Covenant had been warring in this part of the galaxy as well.
Space was big, as Cortana put it. Very big. The Human-Covenant arm had taken place primarily in the Orion arm, or the Forerunner Cluster, since the Alliance technically hailed from their version of the Orion arm as well. It was confusing, and coincidences only ran so far.
As the hours slowly trickled by, the Spartan started taxing his muscles and testing his limbs. His injuries were grave, but they were slowly starting to heal already. Most of the superficial bruises and scrapes had already healed, and the internal bleeding had mostly been stopped. The advanced medical technology accelerated his already-impressive healing to impressive levels.
At one point, Shepard dropped by and supplied Cortana with the drones she needed to strip the rest of the MJOLNIR armor.
"There," said the Commander. "I don't know if we can find a way to fix it on the Citadel, but we've got to try, right? I'll have Grunt and Garrus deliver it to the cargo bay. We can set up a dummy, or neatly pile it in a chest."
The idea of a securely-locked container was more attractive to the Chief, and he agreed with the latter option.
Jane flashed him a smirk that wouldn't be out of place with a little girl. "Good. After Cortana finishes stripping you and if you're feeling well enough to walk around, you can test one of our hardsuits. It doesn't come in green, unfortunately. We do have a tasteful combo between hot-pink and bright white, if that suits your tastes?"
The Chief glared at the Commander, who suddenly didn't seem to find the idea that entertaining anymore.
"Ah yes," said Cortana, popping up from the MJOLNIR's omni-tool. "Pink, an impractical shade on the red spectrum, allegedly a tasteful option. We have dismissed that claim."
"Please don't!" the Commander begged with a hurt expression. "Anything but the air quotes!"
As Cortana dismissed Shepard's Spectre-hood traumas with air quotes, the Master Chief said, "It made sense when they didn't believe you the first time. The second time was a strategic blunder."
Shepard had to recover from a fake heart attack before replying. "What can I say? Maybe I'll present the Council with a second humanity. I'll watch them dismiss you and laugh."
"So I take it we're approaching the Citadel then?" Said Cortana.
The Commander glanced at the AI with a hint of suspicion. "Yeeees…" she carefully said. "And how did you find out, young lady?"
Cortana proudly crossed her arms over her chest. "Oh please. I may be stuck between the Master Chief's neural interface and an omni-tool, but Joker's flight reports aren't exactly secure."
"She does that when she gets bored," said the Chief.
Cortana performed a cliché evil laugh. "Haha, no system is safe!"
Jane merely smiled, as if she found the AI's behavior endearing instead of inconvenient. "You two are in a much better mood today. Good. Listen, you have to know that the Council takes illegal AI cases very seriously. You really don't want to reveal that you're sentient."
Cortana snapped off a mock salute. "And we'd hate to anger the Council, wouldn't we?" She said in that same mischievous tone she used as when she was poking around sensitive Covenant intel.
"Now, I'm not saying that. Anyway, you two should get dressed. Once on the Citadel, you've got a few hours to address your needs. I'll be in the CIC if you need anything."
While Commander Shepard left again, Cortana and the Chief glanced at each other.,
"You're going to be wearing a helmet the entire time, won't you?"
The Master Chief sighed. "Potentially hostile territory- "
"The hardsuit has kinetic barriers that protect your entire body."
"Enemy combatants recognizing and assessing- "
"You're a Spartan without MJOLNIR. Nobody knows your face."
"Chemical attacks."
Cortana's figure shimmered with a green tint as she crossed her arms. "Really? On the Citadel?"
"The Prothean superstation where the most important politicians in the galaxy gather to discuss the fate of billions?"
"…so what kind of helmet were you thinking about?"
The next few minutes, Cortana carefully directed the various engineering drones to properly remove the MJOLNIR. To normal and experienced engineers, the process was a tedious and difficult one. However, as Cortana was capable of throwing Alliance-tonnage Frigates around like Fighters, those issues were basically nonexistent.
Before soon, she had fully stripped the Master Chief of his suit and neatly piled the various compartments next to the bed.
The Spartan flexed his muscles. The MJOLNIR was like a second skin to him. Going on an operation without it made him feel uncomfortable. Naked.
Still, he knew not to depend on equipment to survive. Every piece of equipment was expendable, and every piece of equipment could break. He had long thought that humans didn't break either. Not in that way, at least.
The next order of business was to try on one of those hardsuits that the Commander was talking about. The Codex about those sets of armor didn't lie; they were more advanced than the standard Marine armor was now. Kinetic padding and sheets of ablative ceramics were featured within the more advanced models of Marine BDU as well, but as the Human-Covenant War started reaching the inner colonies and major production centers, the many total losses had become increasingly difficult to replace.
And when Reach fell…the standard BDU became a model decades old. Obsolete in every way to the what the UNSC had once produced and definitely inferior to what professional soldiers in this section of the galaxy wore.
The Master Chief still frowned at the kinetic barriers though. He had outwitted those systems in past conflicts by simply employing attacks that didn't trigger the barriers, such as melee strikes and booby-traps. Would they be enough to protect him from biotics?
"We've got a message from the Commander, by the way. Says we need to meet Zaeed Massani, the man in charge of maintaining the crew's personal armors."
The Chief nodded. He had underestimated Shepard; this ship might run on a ragtag group of combatants, but it was still being run military. It seemed that every member of the crew had their own task.
There was only one problem. He was wearing a medical gown. Walking around the ship like that was not an attractive prospect.
Cortana smirked when he relayed his situation to her. "That's what you worry about? Everybody aboard the ship knows you pretty much defied odds they didn't even know were possible to defy, so nobody's going to be asking questions. Besides; Zaeed Massani is a professional mercenary. He knows better than to ask questions."
The Chief rolled with his eyes. He then removed the omni-tool from his wrist and retrieved Cortana's chip from his helmet.
And then he left the med-bay, hoping that he wouldn't be finding anyone else in the meantime. It wasn't often that he wandered around the interior of a ship without his MJOLNIR. The last time had been during the augmentation process.
He did not recall that memory fondly.
The elevator was slow, too. Much to slow for his preferences. It took half a minute for the elevator to reach the Engineering level and when it did, the doors soundlessly slid open, allowing him access to the deck.
Cortana had briefed him on the residents of this deck. At least, those he hadn't met already.
The krogan Grunt, one of the few aliens that would pose a threat to him in close quarters without his MJOLNIR. Shepard seemed to regard him with more responsibility than she should feel for her subordinates.
The convict Jack, the only human on the Normandy that could rival Shepard in Biotic prowess. A dangerous, unhinged, violent woman that had no business on any military vessel. Yet she seemed to be equally as loyal, if not more so than, professionals like Jacob Taylor and Miranda Lawson.
The engineer Tali'Zorah, the quarian woman who had helped remove the components of his MJOLNIR. Cortana seemed to like her as well, even though Tali was supsedly extremely hostile towards all artificial lifeforms. Seeing her history of the Geth, this was at least somewhat justified.
And then there was Zaeed Massani, the mercenary Shepard had put in charge of most personal armors. Apparently, they had turned the starboard cargo hold into a makeshift armor locker. The mercenary veteran was tough, hard and unfettered, but the Chief didn't trust him.
Which was problematic, because he would be dependent on the mercenary to equip him. Still, he was confident that he could take Massani on in close quarters combat.
The Master Chief opened the door to the starboard cargo hold and stepped inside.
~0~
The first thing that Zaeed Massani noticed about the bastard entering the cargo hold was that he was big. Very big. Towered over most other members of the crew, too. Even with that medical gown covering most of his body, the man´s muscles were clearly visible. He musta really liked working out while kicking Collector ass.
But Zaeed was not impressed. This was the son of a bitch what had snuck past him on the derelict then? Didn't look as impressive without the set of power armor.
Pale bastard though. Didn't like to go without the power armor? Massani couldn't blame him.
"So," said Zaeed. This so-called "ultimate soldier" as the crew now called him needed some new gear. His old suit got messed up from his fight with a legion of Collector troops, falling from orbit and kicking batarian ass.
Alright, so maybe Zaeed was impressed. First the young Commander had laid a verbal smackdown on his head with all the authority of a deity, and then this bastard had broken Zaeed's crash survival record in one attempt. His time on the Normandy was getting more interesting with each passing day.
"Zaeed Massani?" Said the man. His hair was short and dark, just like all those military saps, but his eyes were a different story. Goddamn bright and blue, like they were artificial. Damn. Those rumors might be true after all.
Massani nodded. "You the Master Chief? Figured you'd be dropping by. Shepard told me you'd need a new hardsuit."
"Right."
"Guess Shepard foresaw that. Got the armor lockers right here. What are you lookin' for?"
The Master Chief entered the room and glanced at the various hardsuits. "I prefer heavy armor. What do you recommend?"
"Hah…figured as much. Look at this. The Predator L/M/H Armor sets, from Armax Arsenal." Massani took out the only heavy model of the Predator that the Normandy had. "It's a rare sonofabitch who can use this baby effectively. Most lack the training and guts to wear heavy armor on the front lines, but I guess that's not an issue with you." He chuckled at the joke. "Goddamn disavowed bastard nearly throttled me to death while wearing one of these. But in the end, lune forgot to wear his helmet… nailed him right between the eyes."
"What sort of protection are we talking?"
"You won't find better shields than this thing. Won't do you much good if an Overload nails you, but the V model can shrug off quite a few rounds. Don't expect your armor to save you if you're caught in a crossfire; armor's meant to last till you get your ass behind cover."
The Master Chief observed the suit for a heartbeat. "And the helmet?"
"The visor polarizes, but won't protect you against a headshot. Not like that bucket of yours did." Massani chuckled, remembering how he had once blown open the helmet of a krogan Battlemaster with a shotgun. "Some people forget about thst."
The Master Chief nodded, apparently approving of the suit. The next few minutes were spent actually suiting the big guy up. The Predator model was green, like Shepard had recommended. But Massani had seen the vids and read the reports of this soldier in action. Hell, he had even seen the bastard walk around the cargo hold and the crew quarters a few times. He was even bigger in that power armor of his.
Really impressive.
Zaeed watched the soldier suit up and then nodded. "Whaddaya know? It fits."
The Chief took his helmet and then promptly polarized the visor, to that Massani was only faced with a dark, golden reflection. "Thanks."
Massani nodded. "No problem. You might wanna run by the quarian down at engineering to get the software fixed. The suit's internal computer won't do much good otherwise."
The Master Chief nodded. Not much of a talker. Zaeed could appreciate that, too. The Commander was all charming and charismatic, but she was far too fond of…chattering…for his liking.
After a quick check-up to see if the kinetic barriers were working, the soldier was ready to go. A good thing, too. Massani had worked with all sorts of creeps and thrash, but this Master Chief felt wrong. Hell of a soldier, but wrong. No man could hold off a batarian slave raid on his own, not for that long. And that Collector ship had fallen apart for a reason.
Goddamn super soldier crap had him on his edge. He had been nervous.
Zaeed Massani didn't get fucking nervous.
It was time to have a little chat with Shep´ about who she let aboard the ship, sooner or later.
On the other hand…he could use some shore leave. Maybe he´d have a chat after they finished their business on the Citadel.
~0~
2 hours later
Normandy bridge
The Master Chief walked up to the cockpit, giving the slightest of nods to Joker when he greeted him. Garrus did the same, but the Chief couldn't be bothered to greet an alien.
Jane sat down on the co-pilot's chair, threw her legs over one of the chair's arms and brushed a strand of blood-red hair out of her eyes. "Such a beautiful sight," she commended. "Shame it's a Reaper doomsday device."
Joker was far too optimistic. "Come on Shepard, it's not like the Citadel can actually kill us. It was just meant to release hordes of mechanical monstrosities on us:"
The Chief merely glanced at the windows, wondering why the cockpit was at the literal front of the ship. A single well-placed shot could leave the ship crippled. The same was true for some UNSC ship classes, but at least those bridges weren't placed at the very nose of the ship. Facing the incoming enemy fire.
At least there were bulkheads.
The Normandy drifted through a giant, purple cloud, a nebula most likely. It reminded the Master Chief of the altered Slipspace battle, on Ascendant Justice's hull. Where he had lost Li and Anton. The cloud´s haunting beauty did not help either.
A few moments later, he saw the Citadel itself. He had read up on the station, prepared himself for what was to come, and yet the station still disappointed him somewhat. After his time on Installation 04 and Delta Halo, his rampage across High Charity and the critical victories on the Ark, he had expected the hub of these galactic civilization to be…bigger.
At more than forty kilometers long, it was of course a very impressive fortress. And, he was glad to see, it looked a lot more peaceful than High Charity. The five arms that spread out from the Citadel´s center ring was covered with clear lines of light, which represented entire cities on its surface.
"I wager shooting your way out of that station is contingency plan C?" Said Cortana. The hardsuit still allowed him to mute his comm so that others wouldn't hear him converse with a voice in his head, but it felt different somehow.
The Chief frowned. How much damage would a salvo of mass accelerator rounds do to the Citadel? How many people would die if a single ship unleashed its main weapons on the Citadel's surface? What if the batarians dropped by for a suicide attack run? "Plenty of maneuvering options. As long as they don't send in air support."
"Nobody in this galaxy plays fair, Chief."
The Normandy drifted towards the Citadel, until Joker pressed a button on the holographic display and asked for clearance. They were referred to one of the docks and granted clearance to board the Citadel. The Master Chief knew that most of Shepard´s squad was itching to get aboard the Citadel and get about their business, but he wasn't very keen on wandering around a station where the aliens outnumbered the humans. He had armed himself with an MA5 and ammo to spare, as well as two sidearms for emergency situations.
When he actually got to the Citadel though, he was in for a surprise. Garrus almost immediately took the Commander with him for a personal assignment, leaving the Chief to ponder how it was possible for aliens and humans to interact with each other on a scale like this.
He saw humans chatting away with asari, comparing weapons in a store, working with interactive entertainment in a different store and even patrol the halls with aliens. As the various crewmembers of the Normandy dispersed and went about their business, the Master Chief took the earliest opportunity to break off from the group and head out on his own.
"Penny for your thoughts, Chief?" Asked Cortana.
"It's so different," he replied after a moment's thought. "Not like the Normandy."
"The aliens?"
As the Master Chief walked past the Citadel's various markets, shops and walkways, seeing aliens everywhere he looked, he realized that he had subconsciously been tensing up. Ready to strike at a moment's notice. "They're too close."
"Easy. They're not hostiles."
Easy for her to say. To him, it felt like he was constantly being watched. Asari, turians, salarians. Even some krogan and other alien forms he hadn't seen in combat before. It was unreal to him, watching non-humans go about their daily life, doing…civilian things. Wandering around aimlessly, buying trivial thing like groceries or devices for amusement, chatting with other aliens.
They were getting too close to him, and he had to consciously keep from lashing out. The volus looked like Grunts, the turians looked like Elites. Even the krogan reminded him of Brutes. It was difficult to discern between them.
It was a world he couldn't accept. Wouldn't accept. Aliens living peacefully with humans? Impossible. The Elites aiding the UNSC in the final push on the Ark was one thing. But actual peace and coexistence? Impossible. The First-Contact War had been a clear sign of that; humanity would always be targeted by those that deemed themselves better, or morally-superior.
"C-Sec is filled with these things," the Chief replied. "They're armed."
Keeping himself calm and under control proved to be a taxing experience. Every movement they made, every random, non-coordinated gesture they pulled just screamed at him for a lethal response.
At least they weren't glaring at him. They just went about their daily business, not caring for the larger-than-average human that strode in their midst.
The Spartan had been spending roughly twenty minutes walking around these so-called wards when Commander Shepard contacted him. He immediately recognized her frequency and accepted her hail, secretly hoping that she had something more interesting for him to do than squander time amidst civvies.
"Master Chief, we've got a situation!"
"Copy that," replied the Chief. He was eager for a change of pace, though the gunfire on Shepard's end of the line was odd. "What are your orders?"
"I need you to take a sky transport to the Presidium! I was supposed to meet an asari called 'the Consort' there, but -Garrus, cover Thane! – we spotted someone's ass we couldn't afford to miss."
The Master Chief did not copy that last one. "Shepard?"
"It was too valuable an ass to lose! I need you to fill in for me. Someone's been stalking her. Did I mention I'm being shot at?"
"Commander, with respect, a firefight on the Citadel seems like a more urgent matter than a stalker."
Soldiers always stayed calm when faced with possible death, but Shepard sounded like she belonged on the battlefield. "It's not that uncommon, actually. Garrus, nail that mech! But Sha'ira being stalked is bad, Chief. You don't stalk the Consort. Not if you want to have any shot at a successful life. Whoever is after her, is serious business."
"How do you know that?"
"What can I say? Biotics have a feel for Biotics. Her secretary won't let you through unless you challenge her. You can arm-wrestle her, or reply to "Azure" with "Varren pack". Now would you kindly go and save her blue butt?"
"Copy that. Good luck, Commander."
As soon as he cut the link, Cortana chimed in. "So, that sounds ominous. I did some research on this Consort. Apparently, she's a big deal in the Presidium. Not quite a working lady, but definitely one with connections."
His omni-tool flashed with new directions and the Spartan immediately booked it. "What do you mean?"
"Sorry, it appears such subtlety is in part lost on you without your helmet. She brings comfort to people, but also advice and spiritual guidance."
"So, she's important?"
"More than you realize. Jane´s right; someone stalking the Consort would be comparable to someone stalking a high-ranking ONI officer."
The Master Chief reached the navigation point and was faced with an autonomous X3M skycar. "Whoever is after this asari is either a fool, or very confident."
"And you don´t need an Artificial Intelligence telling you that either one can cause a bloodbath."
The Spartan made a connection via his omni-tool and, instead of uploading credits to pay for the ride to this 'Presidium', let Cortana upload an IOU.
"So how do you plan to stop this person?"
The Chief stepped aboard the vehicle and allowed Cortana to control it. "Spartan plan A."
"Ah, the famous Spartan plan A. Shoot the problem until it disappears. Got it."
And with that last remark, Cortana substituted the "VI" that normally controlled the skycar for her own programming and drove them straight towards the Embassies, the political powerhouses of the Citadel. It seemed like a beautiful place to John, who was surprised at the soothing aspects of the stark white floors and walls of the buildings. The place even had a lake, though Cortana seemed adamant about telling him that there weren't any fish inside of it.
There weren't any guards inside of the Consort Chambers, despite this Sha'ira seeing clients like Spectres and politicians. The entrance to the chambers seemed to turn into a lounge, which in turn led around another corner.
There was just one person standing in the Master Chief's way and luckily, she was just an asari. Humanoid and relatively non-hostile.
She wanted to greet him with a long speech about how busy the consort was, but the Spartan had no patience for that. "I'm here on Commander Shepard's behalf," he said.
The asari didn't change her behavior, but the Chief still detected some changes in her expression. She seemed to tense up. "Ah, Commander Shepard. I remember the Consort speaking of her antics in the Azure hotel."
"Varren pack," replied the Spartan.
"Just when I thought you couldn't get any blunter, you go ahead and mount a Gravity Hammer on a Hunter's shield."
The asari was taken aback by his sudden response, but she quickly recovered. "I am glad to see you passed the challenge. The previous one was unable to and-"
At that, all of the Chief's alarm bells started ringing. "The previous one?"
"Ah…yes. An asari visited here just an hour ago, claiming that she was here on the Commander's behalf. She was unable to pass the test, however."
Then this stalker had already made his move. Or hers, if it was an Asari. "Where is the Consort now?"
"Still in her quarters. I implore you to hurry; she grows more restless with each passing minute."
The Spartan nodded and immediately headed down the lounge, past the various clients and towards corner, which turned out to lead up to a pair of stairs. Another short hallway with unnecessary decorations led to a door.
Which was locked.
The Chief slammed his fist against the metal door. "Sha'ira? I'm with Commander Shepard."
No response. Of course not, anyone could just barge in here and claim the same. She would be smart to show a little suspicion.
"Challenge is "Azure"," the Chief then added. A minute trickled past, then two.
When the Consort failed to give her response after the third minute, the Master Chief told Cortana to hack the door to let them pass. Something didn't feel right here; if the Consort knew that someone would be coming to help her deal with this stalker of hers, why would she refuse to even answer the door? There was paranoid, and there was stupid. He had given her secretary the required challenge, which the imposter had failed to do.
"Hmm…the security override takes longer than expected. Who would place military-grade encryption on a door in a place like this?"
"Sounds like the Consort liked her privacy," replied the Spartan.
"Yeah. Too bad I don't do "private". Opening in three, two, one."
The door slid open and the Master Chief immediately barged inside, his rifle at the ready to take care of any potential hostiles who might be holding Sha'ira hostage, or attempt to stage an ambush.
He analyzed the tactical situation in an instant. The room was medium-sized, roughly ten by ten meters. There was an odd, purple pod with a bed in it positioned at his left, which might contain enemy combatants waiting for him to turn his back. Small pieces of furniture were positioned to his right, which could be used as cover. At the far end of the room, opposite of the Chief, a large, wide window had been installed, granting a bird's eye view of the surrounding wards. Or would have, had the curtains not been closed.
The Spartan held all these factors into consideration as he spotted the prone, lifeless form of an asari, lying on the couch in the center of the room.
"Looks like we're too late," said Cortana.
He could see the small puddle of blood that had formed on the ground, dripping from the couch. And after he had secured the room, making sure that nobody would be jumping him as he investigated closer, he verified where it came from.
It wasn't hard to miss, and there was no use checking for a pulse. Someone had assaulted the Consort and torn out her throat, leaving behind a massive, gaping wound in her delicate neck. A thin stream of purple blood was all that remained of the asari's struggle for life. The wound was very deep and ragged around the edges, obviously not the work of any bladed weapon. This was done by an animal, viciously biting down with pointed teeth designed for tearing and shredding flesh.
Sha'ira would have bled out within moments.
It reminded the Master Chief too much of the bite of a Jackal. For a brief moment, he was back on Jericho VII, glancing down at the dozens of viscerally-slaughtered marines and civilians. Dismembered, mutilated, burned. The stench of burned flesh, feces and blood was thick in the air. The Grunts and Jackals had made them suffer, for sport, for entertainment. Genocidal cruelty.
"Hellooo? Chief? You're staring off."
The Chief snapped out of his thought and banished the memory of blood on his gauntlets. "What did this to her?" He asked, gently reaching out for the body and closing her eyes. It seemed like such a trite thing to do, but what else could he do?
"Analyzing codes from the door now. Save for us, the room was only opened twice this day. Nothing useful there…patching you through to Shepard."
The Master Chief nodded, taking note of how the body was positioned on the couch. Something felt wrong. "Shepard?"
"Chief."
The Spartan waited for the Commander to continue. When she didn't, he decided that her firefight must be over by now. "Sha'ira is dead. We were too late."
After a small moment of silence, Shepard sighed. "I promised her…fuck. Did you catch the killer?"
"Negative. The door was locked. No sign of forced entry or a struggle. The killer is gone."
"That's just great. A murder mystery. Stay there, I'm on my way."
"Copy that. I'll…"
That was when the Spartan glanced at the window again, noticing just what was wrong. There was a small trail of blood leading from the floor at the window leading to the couch.
The Chief raised his rifle and slowly approached the window. The curtains had been closed alright, but the window was a flat sheet of glass and the dark fabric should have tightly hugged its frame. There were even some weights at its lower points to ascertain that.
So why was there a small bump in the curtains?
"…I'm belaying my previous comment. I don't think the killer left just yet."
"What? Chief, be very careful! Your injuries haven't healed yet, and your shields won't protect you against anything that isn't gunfire!"
The Chief copied her last and then disabled his private comms. "Hands behind your head and come out from behind the curtains," he sharply ordered the figure hiding at the window. When the person didn't comply, the Master Chief clicked off the safety of his assault rifle and fired off a three-round burst at where the culprit's legs had to be positioned.
The rounds tore through the thin curtain and found their mark, but there was no audible or visible reaction to the gunfire.
So the Spartan immediately closed in on the figure and pulled the curtains away with one hand, preparing to spent an entire magazine with his rifle in the other-
- there was nobody there. A small, spherical hole had been burned through the glass right where the bump had been, allowing the wind to blow past the curtains.
"This seems to be the spot where the killer got in."
John frowned and observed the hole more closely. It looked like the work of a professional with breaching equipment. But who-?
Shots impacted on the already-weakened window and it finally collapsed, shattering into a thousand pieces. The Master Chief instantly decided upon the most reasonable thing to do when faced with a scenario like this.
"Oh, you have got to be kidding me!" Cortana all but screamed as he leapt through the screen of falling pieces of razor-sharp glass and into the incoming storm of mass accelerator rounds.
~0~
[SECURITY ACCESS GRANTED. UNSC TECHNOLOGICAL INFORMATION CODEX UNLOCKED]
SUBJECT: M12Z FORCE APPLICATION VEHICLE – "DELTA FORCE" VARIANT
Unofficially nicknamed after a famous pre-UNSC special operations unit, The M12Z Combat Guard Vehicle is a four-wheel all-terrain light truck capable of going over any obstacle without difficulty; under the hood is a forward-housed low-profile liquid-cooled hydrogen-injected ICE I/C plant, coupled with an infinitely variable transmission (IVT).
While initially meant solely for scouting and reconnaissance duties, multiple total losses during the Human-Covenant war forced the "Warthog" to take up increasingly- active roles in ground combat, where its open nature has led to a large amount of casualties.
After the Human-Covenant War, the UNSC recognized the need for a more protected M12 and AMG Transport Dynamics developed the M12Z, an armored M12 designed to both withstand as dish out impressive firepower. Its Light Armored Car chassis has already been used for several models, including one carrying the rotary six-barrel M343 Saber machine gun.
