Saren's fall from grace can be traced to two significant points in his active history. He never grew to accept the Alliance's role in stabilizing the Traverse region, including the quarian's nomadic fleet, and he erred in the discovery what he believed to be an ancient artifact. The former can be understood; people will resist changing their preconceptions for many good reasons. Any species must retain a stable core, or else they will self-destruct.

The latter reason is a chance encounter gone wrong. There are artifacts and ruins spread throughout the entire Milky Way, remains left from when civilizations went to war and destroyed one another, the wreckage of past egos annihilating entire empires. Explorers almost never discover intact weaponry, only what time and environments leave intact.

But … there are exceptions.

On occasion, you will hear the rare story of ships found dead in space, filled with the lost treasures of some ancient culture. Many will recall the Lost Fleet of Kartoom, and the financial well-being it brought to thousands, or the intact Flowers-Dancing-Upon-Moonbeams, discovered and named by the hanar. The latter was used by accident, turning an arid planet into a blooming garden world, flourishing to this day, and providing xenophysicists endless headaches.

Those few incidents of pure luck inspire followers of nigh radical zeal, certain in the belief that they will be the next discoverer of wealth and prestige. Fools that they are. Entire fortunes have been lost in such ventures, bankrupting five of the most powerful asari Families, before investment controls were put in place.

Shepard is almost Saren's opposite in this regard. Whereas Saren discovered a living Reaper, Shepard encountered the remains of a dead civilization. Both embarked on their quests with opposing ideologies, and both used what many would call brutal methods to accomplish them. In the end, their discovered 'treasures' and respective followings arranged for their final meeting.

Dr. Arnold Pavenmeyer

~Project Ragnarök


Serpent Nebula, Widow System

Citadel

Preparations for a one-man war against the gathered forces of a self-made warlord were simple. On some level Shepard wondered if this normality would ever become uncommon, and if he should fear that eventuality. For the moment, he put aside such worries until their impact would prove more relevant. Life was too short for What-Might-Be's.

"There's a high probability that Saren will have synthetic troops," a familiar voice chuckled in his ear, masked through multiple levels of deception. His brother was no longer present, monitoring the situation from the lower Wards area. Still, his position as owner and outright Admin of multiple communication networks ensured constant contact, given the dire predicament. "With his clone tanks disrupted he'll have fewer krogan shock troops, too."

"Unless he has another cloning facility somewhere …" Shepard squinted at a list of the former SPECTRE's assets. "That takes specialized equipment; I doubt geth would deem an organic krogan army superior."

"Unless he just powers through the loss," James pointed out. "Brute-forcing it, knocking off some colony to be a host world. Not very elegant, but then shoving a twenty-foot spear through a live colonist isn't very graceful either."

Shepard's upper lip curled. "Machines can be manufactured faster than organics. At least for now. Saren has shown a tendency to rely on synthetics for his operations, when he doesn't use mercenaries. I'm leaning towards that trend continuing unless he's somehow arranged for an infrastructure capable of feeding, sheltering, and transporting an army of krogan."

"Fair," his brother agreed. Faint clicks of a semi-rigid keyboard passed through the channel. "Proton rounds, EMP grenades, and a top-tier hack module. If there's time, I'll get a few quarians to cobble together something, unless your, ah, silent partner has something?"

"Do it," Shepard decided after a moment's thought. "If he can get me something, good; doubling up is never a bad thing. If he can't, better to have it and not need it, then need it and not have it."

"Understood." More clicks emanated through the earpiece. "You have the cache list?"

Shepard knew he did, but pulled it up on his omni-tool anyway. His new omni-tool. It wasn't some cheap throwaway tool like the BlueWire models, or even one of the high-end Savant X series from the Serrice Council consortium. It incorporated elements outside the standard floor model, and while the license held a baseline format from the Savant line, the design itself expanded upon it with modifications to which the Council might object.

Flamethrowers were legal, for example. But to bring a powerful VI to bear, just to calculate identities and biosignatures from blood samples? The Council treated such a minor addition as if the Geth were hijacking a fuel tanker aimed for Thessia. But the improved VI did so much more than just assist in forensic analysis, it accelerated the entire device's processing power on par with a Turian frigate computer, another fact that made the Council nervous.

"Got it." The projection popped open milliseconds after requesting its presence, almost ten percent faster than STG standards. He'd have James optimize it even more if they had a free hour. "The locker in the Ambassador's office still using the same Ninety-Five Dee format?"

The eye roll made kilometers away could almost be heard across the channel. "Tax dollars at work."

He snorted. "Not funny, Jim."

"Of course it is. You're good looking, I'm intelligent. That's how it works, remember?"

This time the eye roll came from his side of the line, and he chose to change the subject. "Any news from the Tenth Scouting?"

"No," the other man lost none of his bonhomie. "It seems they did a good job winkling out any Intelligence assets. Not everything of course, but we already know where they probably are, and I don't think burning a contact is worth the update."

"Fair." Shepard's eyes narrowed as the floor gave a gentle shudder. Either a mega-tonnage star-liner had made an error on par with the spectacular accident caused by the crew of the Never Green,or something big had just latched on to the Citadel. "Something just happened."

His brother had the experience to go silent, letting him process information as it happened.

Another gentle rising and falling of the apartment's floor gave a slight sense of vertigo. No one knew quite how the Citadel's maneuvering thrusters were powered, except through the depths of the lower levels no one accessed without extreme care. What he did know was in the entire known history of the Citadel there had been only a handful of similar events. None were repeated within thirty seconds.

"Saren's making his move." Shepard began gathering equipment placed in rows about the room. "Going radio silent."

"Godspeed."

A brief smile crossed his lips at the brief closure. Of all the individuals in the galaxy, there were few that meant it with as much fervor. There were even fewer who could back him up with a level of skill corresponding to that fervor; the galaxy was filled with idiots, but very few who truly wanted to improve the galaxy.

Shepard's expression turned blank. 'If it goes down to him or me, then he has to survive. Little brother or no, he's still the better man.'

Pleasant thoughts aside, he had a good feeling about the upcoming events. Through tireless effort, equipment he anticipated needing rested in multiple points around the Citadel. Evidence of his most-recent familial call was already erased, a process initiated during the conversation's progress.

He took a moment to center himself, closing his eyes and breathing deep, lung-filling breaths of artificial air. 'It isn't fresh Mindoir morning, but it feels close. New beginnings. Potential. A chance to set things right and close the chapter.'

The moment ended when another gentle movement of the floor activated his boot's magnetic clamps. Setting his shoulders, Shepard moved into the hallway, once more ignoring everyone around him. Space station residents understood their environment like any other culture did, and the faint rumblings of instability caused the same level of panic a planetoid's earthquake could.

Shepard slapped the icon, sending the alert to Anderson and the rest of his hopeful backup. It was early, much earlier than anticipated. An old aphorism came to mind, as he watched the tiny indicator flick to the output confirmed ranking. 'Attacks come at two times: when you're ready, and when you're not ready. Hah.'

Anxious forms hurried alongside narrow corridors, avoiding his armored form by narrow distances, voices pitching higher as another rumble quavered the flooring. Parents seized children, hurrying towards destinations Shepard couldn't determine. By definition, a station hung in the middle of the Void, where only specialized bubbles of air and metal could permit survival. To where could one flee in an event such as this?

"Attention, citizens." A mellifluous voice echoed over the public address speakers. "The Citadel is under attack. Repeat: The Citadel is under attack. Seek shelter, and protect each other as you can. Repeat: The Citadel is under attack. Please stay clear from the main Docks C-Five through F-Five. For continued updates please connect to the Emergency Response Broadcast System."

It was fascinating to observe the various reactions. Turians among the crowd remained unmoved, although there were more than a few that looked ready to shed their plates. Salarians almost vibrated in place, hands weaving complex instructions to haptic interfaces before calming back down within seconds. Those seconds must have been spent establishing a collective hierarchy, as the individuals sprinted to perform tasks only a hyper-active species could fathom as being necessary.

The asari, however, seemed to react in the calmest fashion overall. From his hurried passage Shepard could see every asari turn, almost in complete synchronization, not even making eye contact that he could tell. Blue ripples of biotic energy rippled, asari with the bodies of teenagers acting like trained soldiers, more mature representatives taking command positions. He knew the body language of an officer, every species had it. It was an aura of authority, the inherent belief that orders would be given and obeyed. The strangest part lurked in how he didn't see communicators in use, yet observed the younger asari react to nigh invisible motions.

'Biotics inherent to a population over millennia can make for terrifying coordination,' he mused. It reminded him of the asari on Noveria, but better coordinated. 'Did Indoctrination confuse their sensitivity?'

Like a school of sharks, an asari squad charged past, dodging obstacles with consummate grace. It put Shepard in mind of the extra-sensory classes he'd underwent during his sixth iteration in the N7 courses; asari could detect each other through the sensitive membranes protected by their cranial growths. True precognition it was not, but an observer could be forgiven the mistake.

The few krogan present seemed overjoyed, ignoring everyone and everything in their path towards the Docks. A handful of humans scattered in different directions, the mental opposite.

Shepard frowned. The few humans present seemed lost, some collecting in a full-fledged retreat, others freezing in place while still more moved with military purpose. He relaxed as the more professional-seeming examples began chivvying the frozen civilians into order.

Ignoring the rental skycar terminal, Shepard keyed a summoning override. One of the innumerable taxis populating the Citadel's aerial routes obeyed the call, diving from beyond the atmospheric barriers into position. Shepard ignored the opening rear access, and tapped a second command, popping open the front seat panel, where he could reach the controls. Yet more tinkering with the security recognition software ensured he had full authority to guide the vehicle's path.

'Look at me now.' The thought ran through his mind, noting the worn seating in back. It was a worn machine, well-built and older than the two salarian generations that had designed it. But the skycar was in essence a taxi, carrying one of the best soldiers of the Alliance into battle. 'Beggars can't be choosers. Oh the irony.'

Under his commands the taxi soared upwards, bypassing the containment barrier. Outside the restrictive atmosphere, sound cut off, long-distance sights became clear to the naked eye. If one were to focus visual aids, such as an eyepiece, towards the more critical areas ….

"Holy-" He cut himself off. At the far end of the Presidium, the tower where the Council made its deliberations and rulings, hung a familiar object. Massive, oversized limbs clung to the extension's pinnacle, moving in slow, unstoppable motions. An abdomen-like fuselage protruded from the angled landing position, larger than a dreadnought. Just looking at it made the weight of his omni-tool seemed greater than normal, even as he triggered a delayed timer for the signal.

A direct broadcast from his location could be detected, indirect would have to do. With luck, there would be an expedited process for the Conduit's activation.

'Hope Anderson gets here soon.'


Serpent Nebula, Widow System

Citadel

Presidium Level; twenty minutes later

Shepard worked the heat sink, sending a jet of superheated air away from the initiation coil. Excalibur was a custom-made rifle, designed for anti-material actions. Modifications increased its output to a level reserved either for the more extreme asari Huntress specialists utilizing artificial limbs, or a tactically minded krogan.

He ignored the redundancy of the thought. All krogan possessed a form of tactical awareness. Some even paid attention to it.

Through the Nightstalker armor's aid, he could fire the overpowered rifle with ease, blending the advantages of human vision with biotic-enhanced durability. A second trigger pull launched another shard of aerodynamic metal. It exited the small atmospheric envelope, arced through air-less void for two hundred meters, re-entered the Citadel's atmosphere once again, and obliterated a geth Destroyer's central processing unit. The angle of descent made contact with a smaller unit just behind, penetrating the output control for its pyrotechnic weaponry, resulting in a firebomb.

Shepard rolled back from the edge. Any geth unit was a ballistics' forensic specialist. A single kill could be misidentified, but two impact points provided a direction. True to form, a geth dropship hove into view, angling for his rooftop.

'Wish I had a spotter. Just one.' Shepard was halfway down the side already, propelling himself in eezo-assisted bounds. 'Computers go only so far.'

Two minutes later he was a long stretch away, breathing easy as he sighted in another monstrosity. His trigger finger stroked back, and he was off again before the Juggernaut's main sensor array blew apart.

Prothean-implanted instincts hummed a quiet warning, bringing Shepard to a halt. Off in the distance, he could see the Relay statue – which one of the data caches unlocked by the Cipher in the depths of his brain had identified as an actual Relay – surrounded by geth. Yet they were not focused on the statue itself, but in everything past in in his direction. It was the sort of mindless concentration that made sensor arrays superior to human senses in many regards, unrelenting concentration.

He cast a quick look relative up. It was hard to conceptualize for planet-dwellers, but his position was essentially on the side of a massive tower, with the Presidium relative up in relation to himself. 'Can't fly, can't go under them. Can't go around them – unless I can go through the shopping district?'

For a moment he longed for the prototype cloaking device, a copy of which resided in his personal treasure trove.

He frowned. There had been three prototypes, but after he'd diverted his own copy, a second copy had been reported as missing. 'Not your problem, not now. Focus.'

Far above, the Ward arms were closing once more, further evidence of Saren's involvement. The Destiny Ascension was under way, visible to the average eye, carrying the Council to safety. Or at least, that was the intended goal. More geth vessels were incoming from the direction of the Serpent Nebula Relay, hidden from sight by the gas cloud's depths. It boggled his mind at times, thinking about clouds of plasma and dust stretching thousands of lightyears in diameter – yet there it was. A perfect lure for neophyte civilizations.

"It's a trap," he muttered to himself. Smothering the amusing memory, Shepard resumed his climb, picking out the most essential geth processing units. Eliminating just a few would improve the chances of newcomer survival.

Pressure on the back of his mind caught Shepard's attention. The dropship was circling his way.

Grumbling to himself, Shepard focused on the ship. In theory there was a thermal exhaust port just aft of the main cargo hold. A sniper shot into that port would have the same effect as targeting the cranial stalk on any bipedal unit, in theory. But the angle was poor, and he doubted even a sniper rifle as good as his own would accomplish the task. 'Gunship, sure. Dropship … maybe.'

Debating his options, he elected to hunker down and observe. 'Saren has to be here. Up at the top? Probably. But he's got an army. Anderson has to have the signal by now. What's keeping him?'

He waited longer, keeping an eye on everything humanly possible, then pushing his limits to exceed. Passive receptors fed a constant data-stream across the HUD within his helmet, tapped into the C-Sec network. He could see through the SPECTRE channels that the two other SPECTRE's on station were moving through a civilian locale, obliterating geth opposition with relative ease.

Overhead, out in space, he could see the protective fleet withdrawing between the Ward-arms, avoiding being trapped inside with the Reaper and its guardian vessels. The ships themselves were distant, but highlights and macroscopic enhancements in the faceplate helped differentiate between turian cruisers and geth analogues.

Subtle movements drew his attention back down to where geth snipers were repositioning themselves to focus around the miniature Relay. It was a kill zone, focused on everything approaching from below.

'Not good. Very not good.' He gauged the probability of an attack coming through the Relay against the geth units stacked against it. Geth needed neither air nor water, and could be packed together like sardines in a can. Still more were arriving at every moment, bringing ever-increasing levels of firepower to bear. 'I'd get murdered.'

This hadn't been part of the plan. 'Need to improvise. Options?'

He checked over the motionless units. If he worked fast, overloading each shot, he could eliminate half a dozen of the largest units. There had been heavier targets during a brief rebellion on Sumter IV, although perhaps not as many.

'No.' If he tried that, there would be instant counter-sniping. The six armored units would fall, but at high cost. 'Take down the snipers, then the heavies? No, too many.'

A virus, uploaded to the geth platforms would take minimal time, but would incapacitate critical units. Add the four targets he could then eliminate, a superior alternative. In theory.

Sounds of combat reached his auditory sensors once more. It emanated from an oblique angle, HUD portraying echoes from further down the block.

Easing his rifle down, Shepard managed to sneak a look. It was somewhat vague, but he could see people in black and white armor. They seemed well-armed, and better yet, highly disciplined. Still, all they had were light arms and biotics. The latter could serve for heavy weapons for a time, but organics tired faster than synthetics.

A bright flash overrode the filters in his faceplate, blinding him for a moment. When the transparent material cleared, he could see a Colossus unit lying crumpled on the ground, half of it missing.

He shifted the scope over, scanning for the source. When he found it, his eyebrow lifted.

Further down, taking cover behind a thick metal stand, he could see movement. His visor amplified what was visible.

'Black hair, very precise movements. Walks like a predator – that woman back on the Presidium? What's she doing there?'

Her hand flashed a bright blue-ish white, nearly as bright as his own artificial biotics. He memorized the motion, noting the twist in her wrist as the energy was released.

A reciprocating flash detonated on a Prime unit's carapace, leaving the massive bipedal creation to stumble sideways. Despite himself, Shepard had to acknowledge the woman's technique – geth possessed a major processing unit inferior to the right medial pectoral joint. While armored, it was vulnerable to precision strikes, or biotic attacks specializing in degrading effects.

'Help a soldier out.' Shepard made a decision. Shifting aim, he targeted a Destroyer-class unit further back. An easy trigger pull sent his own version of a precision attack into the geth's abdominal motivator. The impact broke something inside, sending the machine tumbling.

The woman didn't flinch, turning her own focus onto a collection of troopers. One went still, surrounded by a biotic stasis. The surrounding troopers scattered, wise to the tactic, but unsuccessful. A secondary attack from another biotic landed on the stasis field. True to its nature the internal portion was unharmed, a feat accomplished by physics no one understood. Yet the external portion detonated with the equivalent force of a vehicle-mounted mortar. The devastated group lost intelligence with such a reduction in numbers, leaving the rest vulnerable.

'Gestalt mind,' he noted a geth detachment break off the main group. It headed down the same avenue the combat group occupied. 'Good and bad.'

He was strongly tempted to eliminate one of the two Armature's proceeding with the detachment, but held back. The woman was already pulling back, enfilading the detachment while withdrawing at an oblique angle – an Australian Retreat if he was not mistaken.

Faint whirring caught his attention. He rolled aside half a second before a laser-style sniper shot impacted where he'd paused.

Cursing, Shepard continued his roll, dropping Excalibur in the process. The geth sniper leapt to another vantage point, clicking and hissing in binary. A rough translation skimmed across his visor – encrypted, but parsing between the lines suggested his location being shared.

He pulled Mercy from its holster, executing a snap-shot that blew apart the sniper. 'Lucky. Too lucky. Don't rely on luck. Not lucky to do that.'

But what one geth knew, all knew. He executed a one-handed forward flip, seizing his rifle, and decamped. The geth were blocking his path to the Presidium. There was no path he could see, so he could either wait in a secure location, or go on the offensive.

Reaching new cover, Shepard considered options. 'Dig in, make a last stand? Earn a statue out of it. Like I need another one. Idiots, hero-worship focused wrong.'

Another Prime unit stomped past. The geth were surprisingly deft for constructs weighing multiple tons, yet mass still carried weight in every traditional sense. Even had the unit possessed the servos allowing ballerina-like maneuvers, it would still make the floor shudder.

Massive feet paused, giving the impression of uncertainty. Two seconds passed, then three, while the massive automaton deliberated – years of consideration, when incorporating the raw processing power of a full-networked Collective. A single Prime was capable of serving as a battle-coordinator for two squad-size groups. A gunship analogue turned a geth company's fighting effectiveness into triple their number.

'Don't need to out-think the entire fleet. Just the ones down here.' Shepard eyed the rough headcount accumulated by his scanning hardware. 'Huh. Couple thousand units … something like a quarter million brains. Give or take.'

A faint sensation of danger wafted over the back of his neck. Obeying his instincts, Shepard overrode the safety measures of a nearby window, leaping into an abandoned apartment.

The intense, crimson display of a geth sniper shot washed through his prior location. Then the chittering, deep-level growl started up, the binary, data-dense method of audio communication geth used.

Shepard held onto his long rifle with one hand, loosening the blade kept at the small of his back with the other. When a frog-like unit landed, peering into the window, he uncoiled, extending the ul'fberht in a stab, penetrating the geth's ocular unit. Eezo-hardened steel smashed through mass-produced alloys, severing the unit's connection.

Outside, a cacophony of metal feet erupted, thousands of units moving – in what appeared to be his direction.

'Crap.'

Shepard checked with one of the cameras placed around the Presidium, able to make a quick scan before the geth discovered its presence. The brief glimpse he caught was chilling: almost half of the geth were leaving the plaza in front of the Relay statue, and were making a bee-line in his direction.

'What happened?' he checked two other cameras, confirming the results of the first. The same images of a countless hordes appeared. Without thinking, he smashed open the apartment door, finding a stairwell close-by. 'No. No time to worry about that. Survival. Need heavier hardware. Nearest cache, C-Sec? No, they're holding out, can't pull more on them. Wait – Hydra-rockets in the Ambassador's office. Good.'

Reaching the relative ground floor, Shepard popped open a maintenance hatch. A Keeper looked up at him, its face as expressionless as its kind always seemed. There were faint markings of a once-intelligent race, if one knew where to look. The nonexistent orifice markings along the head's mandibles, or the opposable digits still present on the thing's quadruple forelimbs all pointed at eating, working sapients.

Its current blank visage bore no sign of independent intelligence. From where he stood, Shepard could see into the Keeper's soulless black eyes, emotionless depths lacking any form of animation. Even animals reacted to their environment, dilating their pupils at perceived danger, but the Keepers were incapable of the most basic of survival instincts.

'Well I am.' Shepard slid to his knees, pulling the hatch shut behind. The maintenance passageway would lead to the Ambassadorial apartments, which in turn rested alongside the Presidium's most prestigious locales. 'Saren has to be around here somewhere. Where there's mass murder, there's Saren.'

Another thought bounced around the recesses of his mind as he scuttled through the tight confines. 'Hope Anderson gets here soon.'


SR-1 Normandy

Serpent Nebula Relay

The open void of deep space filled the screens in every direction. Anderson could see multi-colored stars shining, scanners working out their physical properties, updating the Alliance databases with every passing second. It was one of the functions the Normandy was built to perform, analyzing everything in its vicinity and transmitting the data back to the Alliance. But here it chafed, knowing that the battle was under way both too far away and yet so close it would take but a brief movement to become involved.

"All ships report." The hoarse voice of the fleet coordinator linked to the Normandy, relaying to the other vessels.

Anderson stayed where he was, standing behind the Command Center projection aboard the Normandy's main crew deck. Ahead was the long walkway to the pilot station, behind lay the stairs down to the sleeping pods and medical station. But just before him hovered the projections representing every fleet element present.

One by one the fleet elements reported in. Small, 3-dimensional images of each group's supervising figures acknowledged their orders, fading out of sight. It had the feel of a well-oiled machine – which made his well-practiced nerves relax.

"Everest to Normandy. Begin your countdown." Admiral Hackett's flagship held some of the largest weapons in the Alliance fleet – but the Normandy carried sensor arrays and communication equipment only a little less capable, in a smaller package.

"Roger Wilco," Anderson watched the chronometer display. Its readout pulsed a steady beat, ticking off fractions of an hour in precise, usable components. "Beginning run … now. Stand by for targeting data."

The Normandy accelerated, surrounded by an array of smaller scout craft. Behind loomed the backbone of the Fleets, the dreadnoughts, battleships and destroyers at a slower rate. Lighter craft, the sensor and missile cruisers, kept to a safe path within the fleet, but all following the Normandy into the Mass Relay.

"Handshake accepted," Joker's voice came over the ship's intercom, his normal, jocular tone absent. "Keying in coordinates … hitting the Relay in five. Four. Three."

Anderson took a calming breath, timing the exhalation so it occurred as the reality-bending transition occurred.

"Reversion complete. Inside twelve-hundred kay." It was a telling sign that self-congratulations were missing from the flight officer's mannerism. "Stealth mode engaged."

Around Anderson, technicians were hard at work. The ship itself seemed to reflect their intensity, sliding through the nebula surrounding the Relay like an aquatic predator.

He could see the other scout ships on the main board, scattering in pre-planned directions, but his own focus was locked on the immediate surroundings. The Normandy's sensors soon picked up the expected targets, confirmed by the flanking scout vessels.

"Normandy to Everest, confirmed drones. Beginning countermeasures," he leaned past the projection, giving a significant look to Pressley, before leaning back. "Ether Protocol engaged."

A constant stream of data flowed past his fingertips, real-time information sent to the Relay, and onward. Code phrases in his message ensured the next vessel to proceed would –

"Incoming." Pressley keyed a new command. "Contact relative up, zero-mark zero-one-five. Profile suggests geth fighters."

"Good ideas and great minds," Anderson murmured. "All weapons stand by."

He could sense the gunnery officers relax. Fighter craft were easier to destroy, but harder to hit with projectile weaponry. The quarians had taught them about the pitfalls of such a fight. But humans had a great deal to teach the galaxy about war, it seemed.

Without warning, the Relay spun up, incandescent streams of pure white energy streaming away from it in a cone-shaped fashion. Cruisers became visible, shedding supra-luminal energies at prodigious rates. For a brief moment they paused, systems identifying targets, and then pushed hard for the outer edges of the Relay's immediate region.

"Move us away, Joker." Anderson gestured at the smaller map, down and to one side of the large regional projection. "Let's clear a path to the Citadel."

The Normandy's engines took on a deeper thrum, driving the frigate deep into the heart of the Serpent Nebula. He could feel the difference in his bones, as if the ship and crew were eager to strike back at long last.

Behind, the cruisers scattered, sending long arcs of actinic light to make jagged streaks across the void, striking geth drone units. The sparks faded, allowing crumbled bits of hardware to tumble free.

"Stay focused," Anderson had to wrench his own gaze further ahead. "Maintain radio silence. Geth weren't expecting that one."

It seemed he was correct. The geth fighters remained in position, out of range from the Relay's location, rather than engaging the Alliance craft.

Four massive signatures appeared on the projection, blurred masses until the processor updated their resolution. Dreadnoughts were the backbone of any fleet, but the Alliance had maintained what other races seemed to neglect, battleship-class vessels. Boasting similar spine-mounted weaponry, the Wrath and Martel class craft occupied more volume than all but the three Armageddon-class battleships, and the carriers. Immediate reactions upon their reversion to real-space saw the three battleships spread out, Hawking-Engine powered shields powering up to full defensive capacity.

Then, a dozen smaller destroyers erupted from the Relay, taking up formation around the battleships. Small bursts of light sparkled on their flanks, and the geth fighter images vanished from the screens.

"Thirty-Second fleet present, geth fighter presence destroyed." one of the communications officers adjusted the map on the wall. "Seventh Fleet incoming."

This time Anderson kept his full attention on the sensors reporting from ahead, watching the hazy outlines of the titanic, alien space station grow more solid. "Steady as she goes."

"Contact," another point of light flared to life on the board. "Scout Jay-Two. Drones painted."

"Contact confirmed. Responding." One of the missile cruisers brightened as its cargo ignited. A tiny swarm, almost invisible even on the Normandy's high-resolution hardware, flickered through space. The sparks made from blunt force response to the small observation units was more visible, sparks in the cloudy void. "Salvo delivered. Confirm receipt."

"Sir, contact ahead." Anderson's attention snapped to the officer's excited tone. "Geth cruiser bearing seven-mark three-one-three."

"Helm. Alter course zero-one-nine, same heading." Anderson barked.

The Normandy dove, lowering itself beneath the geth vessel's plane. A tiny data-pulse from the Normandy's IFF system altered the contact's coloration from neutral tan to ominous red, painting it as a target for the fleet proper. Anderson could see the first Wrath-class battleship reorient itself, swiveling its mass in a line to their direction, and shuddered.

An empty trail coursed through the nebula's gaseous path, following in the wake of a mass accelerated round. The unintelligent object impacted the geth cruiser amidships, obliterating its structural integrity as if struck by an angered giant.

He noted the designation marking the target change from enemy to navigation obstacle, fading from crimson to neutral tan once more, with no small amount of satisfaction.

"The Fifth Fleet is present," Pressley reported. "All ships reporting readiness, and moving on schedule. Seventh Fleet standing by for transition."

Anderson gave a wolf-like grin. The Fifth Fleet held some of the fastest vessels in the Alliance fleet, including four carriers and three battleships. His projection blurred as dozens of fighter craft emerged from the carriers, obscuring the ship's signature while they began evasive maneuvers. To date, no Council race had developed a successful counter to the carrier tactic; there was a good chance the geth lacked one as well.

Given their digital nature, and the fact that human history was available for anyone on the Extranet, he didn't give it as high a probability as his peers. The adage 'Plan for the worst, hope for the best,' made an uncomfortable tap-dance routine through his mind.

"Whoa."

Anderson turned an attentive eye to an ensign's screen. The young man had a shocked look on his face, eyes wide, pupils dilated. It made his youthful features seem even younger, bringing a mournful thought to mind. 'So young. And we throw them into war.'

Then the main projector received the relevant data, sending a flurry of red shapes into view.

"Sir," Pressley's hands danced across the boards, "Sensors are targeting three thousand enemy signatures."

"Three thousand?" Anderson questioned, staring at the crimson mass surrounding the indeterminate shape that had to be the Citadel.

"Correction," Pressley shifted, staring at another screen. "Three thousand three hundred. Five hundred. Seven hundred. Over four thousand contacts, sir."

He could feel the atmosphere shift, bridge officers growing tense and paying attention to him despite the demanding nature of their own duties. Nervousness filled the air like the nebula outside the Normandy's hull, thick and obscuring.

"Over four thousand, eh?" he made sure to lean back, and shared a significant look with the young ensign. "You know what that means, right?"

The young man blanched. "Sir?"

Anderson nodded. "Yeah." He sighed, shaking his head in mock sorrow. "We're going to have a lot of scrapped toasters to clean up after this."

A chuckle worked its way around the bridge. Tension relieved, the officers resumed their labors, greater focus than before.

"Paint the largest targets on this side of the Citadel," he pulled up a screen himself. "Engineering. How are we doing?"

A tinny sound responded, followed by the voice of the Normandy's head engineer. "Heat sinks are barely touched, Captain. The bole's taking it all just fine."

He suppressed the grin. Official protocol required the Hawking Engine be referred to as such, or even 'black hole'. Abbreviating it into something less formal would raise eyebrows, but seemed to be catching on elsewhere. Truly rumor flew faster than even the Normandy.

He resumed his scan. The other scout vessels had made a complete circuit around the Relay, and were expanding their pattern, using more active sensors now that their immediate safety was assured. There were still things he didn't understand about space combat, but this example of controlling essential bottlenecks made all too much sense for a ground-trained soldier like himself. Carefully, he took another look at the cleared map, and nodded.

"Normandy to Admiral Hackett. The Relay is clean. Ether Protocol results pending." He keyed off the comm, and waited.

A few seconds later he had the answer. "Hackett to Normandy: Well done. Now get in there and show us the way."

The Relay began to spin up once more, silhouetting the Fifth Fleet as its formation widened. But this time there were rounded shapes exiting the Relay, alongside the more angular Alliance vessels. One of the largest ships Anderson had ever seen appeared in a flicker of pseudo-motion, accompanied a heartbeat later by an angular twin. Both were longer than the Everest by nearly a third, every part broadcasting a design to destroy anything that drifted too close to its guns.

"They brought the Muspelheim?" He heard Pressley whisper in an awed voice.

He quite agreed. "We're protecting our allies with everything we've got, Mister Pressley."

"Sir," the older Navigator's eyes remained fastened to the super-battleship's form. "They must've gotten the Gargan shipyard up to full speed now … or they're a lot more concerned than Shepard thought."

"They don't hand these out in cereal boxes," Anderson growled, one finger tapping the N7 marking on his battle gear. "When one of us says there's a problem, people listen. When two of us agree, then the right people start to take action. Take us in towards the Citadel, Mister Pressley. I want to see everything we can before they start the barrage."

"Yessir," the older man's fingers began stabbing at the board once more. "Council fleet in sight, Destiny Ascension is intact and under way, headed towards the Relay, under attack." He paused, checking one of the boards. "Targeting solutions calculating now. Optimal firing range on geth targets in ten minutes, sir."

The bridge air itself felt warmer, the result of every primary computing system on the Normandy being used to its utmost capacity. Even its secondary systems were online, taking some of the work load off the primary arrays, processing sensor data from the officer's positions and calculating appropriate trajectories.

"Sir," Pressley's voice grew urgent. "Sovereign's signature has been detected." He found Anderson's gaze, looking almost panicked. "Sir, it's inside the Citadel."


Serpent Nebula, Widow System

Citadel

'Idiot. Fool. Who died and left you king of the hill?' Shepard heeded a twinging instinct, rolling right instead of left, a full second ahead of a geth Colossus shot. The heavy plasma ball soaked into the floor where he'd rested. Bare fractions of a second after that, a sniper's pulse energy shot scored the terrain to the impact crater's left. 'They're testing me. Why?'

The entire exchange felt clinical, as if the geth were experimenting on him. It didn't matter how many units he felled, more came from above in endless waves.

His blade came out, decapitating a trooper that had the misfortune to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. By now the geth appeared to be sending their smallest bipedal units as either overwhelming hordes, or sentries – the three or six unit groups were no longer patrolling the areas beneath the Presidium. Instead they'd begin sending Primes, Juggernauts and the infrequent Destroyer in the general areas where their multi-limbed variants couldn't access, and even now they were withdrawing the Destroyer units.

Shepard winced. Perhaps he shouldn't have been quite so enthusiastic about using the flame-throwing geth as impromptu explosives. But it had been an efficient use of resources.

Another plasma round hit the wall from the other direction, suggesting the geth were now using thermal imaging to seek him out. Apparently they still lacked the true definition necessary to determine the difference between the man on the other side of a thin wall, and a man on the other side of a sheet of structural-grade baffling. Given their past improvements, it wouldn't be long before they modified that particular issue.

'Change tactics,' Shepard flipped a mental coin, selecting a random direction. 'Go on the offensive. Again.'

The geth had followed him up the Presidium, groups of the synthetic forms tracking down every step he took. But he managed to reach the Ambassador's level, and blew out a window into the void. The resulting explosion had sucked out the lightest geth, leaving him with an airless hall to employ, which had been an interesting exercise in thermodynamics and pressurized hydraulics.

He slid to a stop outside Udina's door and punched the override. The door hesitated, then slid open. A hail of mass-accelerated rounds whistled through the space, stopping when there was no target.

Shepard ensured his shields were at full power, and stepped around the corner, one hand raised. "Human coming in."

"Stop right there!" a trio of heavily armed security guards pointed an assortment of weapons in his direction. "How did you get in here?"

"Shepard, En-Seven Plus. Code-Ident: Alpha-Omega Six-Six-Six." If he got his hands on the code designer, he'd ensure their next 'random' sequence included frequent references to their utter lack of humor. "Stand down."

The trio hesitated, then backed away. The far right guard didn't put away his rifle, but kept it pointed at the ground. "Sir. What's going on out there?"

"Trouble." Shepard moved fast, to the back of the entry office. "Udina here?"

"No sir, he went off with some friends of his, just before the sirens went off. Are you sure you can go in there, sir?"

Shepard finished punching in Udina's personal access code to the personal office behind the general public office. "Yes. Get ready to run, the geth are chasing me."

The three looked at each other. "Geth. I told you they were geth! Not even Hahne-Kedar has stuff that good."

A painting fell to the floor with a crash. Hiding weapons on a space station designed to have open access to an alien species no one understood was the height of irresponsibility. But hiding access keys was a different matter. Shepard swiped the data spike from the frame's inner lining, and went straight to the filing cabinet.

"Sir?" one of the guards ventured. "What are you doing?"

Shepard didn't answer. He inserted the data spike in the standard lock, then shoved it in deep, far deeper than the usual key could. There was a metallic clunk inside, and the entire bank of filing cabinets shuddered.

Using the key as a lever, Shepard pulled the front half of the cabinet bank to one side. Behind, a rack of exotic objects could be seen, packaged in vacuum-sealed containers, proof from organic and inorganic sniffers alike.

Shepard had the first set out and half-assembled before the guards managed to react.

"Sir, what is that?"

He shoved the power core into what would normally be a battery slot, locking it in place. "Prototype particle accelerator. Average damage output, but hell on electronics."

Next was a new addition to his omni-tool, or rather, a compact fabricator that could be set in place on his armor, connected to the Savant implement. "EMP grenade fabricator. One new unit every forty five seconds. Immediate blast radius two meters, disturbance radius ten meters."

The final bit had caused a great deal of argument between the Shepard brothers. Providing a power supply for what was essentially a handheld mortar device operated in the budget extremes habituated by top-tier art firms, catering to The Thirty. Wrangling enough space had been problematic as well, but essential. He'd given up on three other weapons just to make sure there'd be enough space for the current tool.

"L-359, Levin Launcher." Servos in his armor whirred, working to master the new demands placed on their service. "Only one of its kind."

The second guard's attitude seemed focused solely on the weapons Shepard held, with an occasional shifting motion towards the opening where Shepard's rifle and pistol were being restored. It was an eager look, almost greedy, if Shepard had to make a guess. The close inspection of the hidden weapons vanished when the massive, solid cylinder pointed in his general direction.

Shepard gave the grounding rod an affectionate rub. "I'm headed out. If you stay here, the geth might ignore you. Or you can take your chances getting to C-Sec. Their office is pretty well secured. Lots of civilians to protect there, too."

The trio exchanged a look of what seemed to be understandable reluctance. The one with the most gold decoration on his uniform turned back. "We'll go to C-Sec. We're good, but we aren't in your league when it comes to fighting."

"Sir," the guard Shepard had noticed eyeing his weaponry seemed nervous. "Remember what the Ambassador said about Cord-Hislop? We might be able to –"

"Not now." It was interesting how the lead guard's body language shifted to aggressive secrecy. "We don't have time for that. Sir," his focus changed to Shepard, shoulders straightening. "It has been an honor."

"Sure." Shepard filed away the company name in his mind. "Good luck."

'Now what?' he watched the trio make for the front door. Given the lack of geth presence on the Ambassador's scanners, they would likely be able to make it to safety. 'I'm retiring. Not following up on Udina and his sticky little fingers.'

Something rammed against the blast-glass screening the Ambassador's office from the Presidium proper. The hyper-dense material blackened, smoke marks curling away from the far side.

Shepard paused, holding onto his Pioneer sidearm. The pistol rested in his hand, dull metal gleaming even beneath the grime of combat. For a long moment he looked at it, thumb tracing over the insignia stamped into the grip. 'I'm sorry, father.'

Resolved, he shoved the pistol into the cabinet with the sniper rifle. After a moment's further hesitation, he pushed the sword back into place at the small of his back, and followed that up with the energy rifle's collapsed form on his right thigh, where the pistol had once occupied. In the more compact mode, the weapon occupied the same volume as his pistol, which left enough room for the oversized prototype weapon on his back.

Filling both hands with plastic explosives, Shepard looked at the slow-bending barrier. Half a dozen Colossus units stood on the other side of the semi-transparent material, alternating cool-down plasma bursts.

He set to work.

'Prototype ship,' the explosives needed semi-precise placement, but not so much that he couldn't complain in the confines of his mind. 'Prototype weapons. Everything is cutting edge. Why can't it be old school once in a while? A shootout in a food court, or an open desert. Something where I can pretend everything is the same?'

He ducked back behind Udina's desk, and squeezed the detonator.

Thermobaric charges erupted outwards, consuming the oxygen in the room. Pressure differences, plus the concussive force on both sides of the barrier crumbled its remaining resistance. High-energy plasma continued out of the Ambassador's office, enveloping all six Colossus units, obscuring their sensors, and more importantly, overriding their targeting protocols for a single, crucial moment.

Shepard dropped the L-359's targeting reticle on the open hole, and stroked the activator.

A low-pitched hum vibrated through the his helmet resting against its stock, climbing up the scale until the extended rod launched a burst of energy so bright it overwhelmed his helmet's flare protection for a moment. The crack of thunder came less than a heartbeat after the eye-searing illumination.

The aftershock shook the floor, testing the grips of his mag-clamps. Tilting the weapon's business end, he selected the furthest standing opponent, repeating the activation sequence.

This time the effects were more devastating than before. Apparently the first blast had eliminated shields, evaporating the articulated tanks protections; without that defense, he could see miniature electric storms boil around their joints, arcing out of the monstrous creations to ground themselves against the floor.

Three of the six Colossus units collapsed, making distressed buzzing sounds as they sank. The other three seemed in partial states of debilitation, limbs in disarray.

Shepard looked down at the weapon in shock. "Where have you been all my life?"

The prototype failed to respond, except for a quiet beeping sound that suggested its heating capacity was at maximum.

"Right. Tradeoffs." Shepard let the heavy weapon drop, hanging around his back. The Prothean-based energy weapon came up. "How about this?"

He hated relying on untested equipment, which had led to endless simulations. But nothing had prepared him for live subjects.

'Relatively speaking.' Shepard played the energy beam across the frozen forms of infantry units, shuddering under the after-effects of the heavier weapon. Its effect was like no other weapon he'd ever seen, seeming to heat up the less metallic regions to their melting point. At the least, it seemed to exacerbate the effects of the prototype monstrosity hanging from his back.

The sudden movement of a geth gunship caught his attention. It swiveled to face his position, yet withheld fire. Hanging out of the cockpit region – if a geth gunship could've been said to have an actual cockpit – he could see the less angular lines of something organic. The modified elements in his visor identified the individual without trouble.

"Saren." The word was more of a growl than an actual spoken term.

Overhead, the gunship swayed as if waggling its wings. Then the construct rotated midair, and swooped away, hanging figure declining to duck back inside.

Shepard checked the ground. More geth were incoming; their movements were hesitant, as if uncertain how to approach. It made sense, in a certain point of view, he'd acquired new weapons not in their database, which threw their prior calculations out of synch. Given they shared a gestalt mindset with not only each other, but the fleets above, which were hopefully engaging with the Alliance, there was limited processing power available.

He pulled out the L-359 once more, and selected his Nightstalker armor's more athletic settings. The gunship was vanishing in the direction of the massive Reaper that seemed content to wriggle its tentacles on the Presidium's highest point.

'Fact.' The heat sink on the L-359 was cool enough to fire again, but Shepard held off in favor of bounding down the Embassy's external wall to the main floor. During the exercise, he spared a glare towards the gunship's former vector. 'Saren is nowhere to be seen.'

Two civilians ran past, screaming. He took a moment to play the Prothean particle rifle's beam across a drone hovering over them. 'Fact: There are multiple reactionary forces coming to bear on the geth.'

Evidence for that could be heard from the direction of C-Sec's headquarters. Heavy weapons belted out a screaming backdrop to the lower-pitched small-arms fire. Now and again, a basso thrum of biotics could be heard.

'Fact: Udina is nowhere to be seen, or his entire human contingent.' That irritated him. Over five thousand Alliance soldiers were dedicated to the defense of the Embassies. Where had they gone?

'Fact:' Shepard paused as a full squad of Huntresses angled past. Their biotic assault cut a swath through the attacking throng. Behind them anti-aircraft fire rose from the Citadel Wards like fat beads of light, impacting geth air support. 'Fact: no one has made a push for the Council chambers. It's like they're being herded away from that area.'

He checked his omni-tool. Its connection to the Council's Tactical-Net remained unbroken, confirming his concern. 'A dozen in the Chambers. No eyes on the other embassies, nothing from this level upwards. That's where he has to be.'

'Fact.' The L-359 made an eager sound, heat sink at full readiness. 'I'm going to cut my way through every bloody last clanker if it's the last thing I do.'

Shifting tactics, Shepard made for the main hall, where the Prothean Relay statue resided. 'Need reinforcements. But if that falls through, take as many of them down with me as I can.'


SR-1 Normandy

Serpent Nebula Relay

"This is Admiral Hackett of the Alliance Joint Forces." The Admiral's harsh voice echoed through the Normandy's speakers. "As per the Intergalactic Accords, Section Five, Mutual Defense Clause One, we are hereby offering assistance to allies."

A slight delay crackled through the empty speakers, then the voice of an older asari became audible. "This is Matriarch Lidanya, of the Destiny Ascension. The Council authorizes allied military force. And if you don't my saying, damn it's good to see you."

Snickering sounds emanated from the part of the bridge Anderson couldn't see. He frowned; asari/human relations weren't the best, but there was no sense cracking down in the middle of a fight.

"Focus …." He waited until seeing the telltale twitch of a guilty mind, and fixed the corresponding faces in his memory. "How are those targets?"

"Largest ships are spotted, sir. Should we send to the –" the officer caught herself just in time. "Uh … other ships?"

"Leave that to the Admiral." Anderson enhanced his personal screen's view of Sovereign. "Get me anything you can on that monster. Weapons, landing hardware, an open access hatch. Give me something to drop a planet-cracker down."

The crew bent back to work, fervor increasing as the ominous signals grew ever-larger in the main projector's field. They all knew that Shepard was on the Citadel, although the full details were not public knowledge. Even now Anderson could see them hesitate whenever he gave an order, unconscious eye movements checking to see if Shepard concurred with his orders. Then they'd remember where Shepard was, and who was in charge – but the unrealized show of loyalty was impressive all the same.

"They've noticed." Pressley directed Anderson's attention downwards, on the enemy symbols. They moved with eerie synchronization, consensus achieved it appeared.

"We must've missed one," Anderson frowned. "Or we took out the drones a few seconds too late."

Pressley offered no criticism. "Updating targeting data. Dedicated battle computer is receiving … transmitting."

He grimaced. There was no helping it, but sending a live feed made his skin crawl. Two decades of Intelligence operations and the same duration for more standard combat missions gave one a healthy respect for operational security. "Hackett broadcast in the clear. Not my choice, but he is in charge of the big picture."

"Morale is an intangible factor," Pressley moved a screen, studied it for a moment, and moved it back. "And he is paid a great deal more."

Anderson barked out a laugh. "True."

The unwitting repartee helped the bridge crew relax – which in turn improved their efficiency. Anderson made a show of stretching his neck, popping the vertebrae back in place, and resuming concentration. Around him other officers emulated his more relaxed stance, and the following single-mindedness.

"Sir." Pressley made a hand gesture, pointing at the audio frequencies. "The quarians are here."

"I know," he gave the man a curious look. The more rounded vessels of the Migrant Fleet's Heavy division had been visible well before then.

The older man shook his head, and tapped his earpiece. "Sir. They are here."

Anderson adjusted his own audio plug, twisting the dial on his omni-tool to the right frequency. "Oh. Good … heavens."

Through the earpiece came the sound of an unusual broadcast technique he'd almost never observed in use. A strong, leading voice sang in a tongue untranslated by modern machines; it was a powerful singer, emotion filling every syllable. Anderson could almost feel the sorrow, a somber regret for memories alien to his mind. Then the chorus filled in the underlying structure like an ocean wave, swelling up in grim determination.

"It's … the War Dancer battle song." Identification came to mind after a few moments thought. "I've heard their squads sing it in training. But … how many?"

"All of them, sir." Pressley gave a meaningful nod at the projection. Behind the Normandy spread the united might of three Alliance fleets, and the entire force of the Quarian's most combat-capable vessels. At the moment it showed the broadcast origins of his current frequency, highlighting the two dozen ships bearing the twisted insignia of the Quarian Heavy Fleet.

"Amazing." Anderson listened to the music again. The leading voice had been joined by another, their duet weaving a heartbreaking melody to soar over the chorus. Inherent buzzing, the trait quarians retained from their early history on Rannoch, sounded far less amusing when the group as a whole sang at once, generating a definite, inhuman quality. He was just glad they'd refrained from using the ultrasonic cry that was another hallmark of their history, akin to the turian battle screeches – hadn't those been a surprise in cross-species training exercises.

He made a decision. "Normandy, this is Captain Anderson. Now hear this."

With a flick, he attuned the ship's PA system to the quarian music. It resonated off metal decks, filling the halls with a somber, yet enraged quality.

If he listened carefully, he could hear voices not in the broadcast, singing from below decks. 'A few quarians still on board. Good.'

He waited a few moments, then another handful of heartbeats. "We are the Alliance, and this is the sound of our allies. They have waited three hundred years for this. Let's give them the best shot possible. Anderson out."

An approving nod from Pressley caught his eye. "Well said, sir."

"Thank you." Another blinking icon met his gaze. "Targets locked. T-minus thirty seconds."

The next thirty seconds were nerve-wracking. Outward appearance demanded he show no emotion, but even for a veteran of a thousand fights, this was a pivotal occurrence.

"Geth ships are accelerating," Pressley murmured.

"Steady …." Anderson responded. "Steady …."

Behind, closer to the Relay, the entire combined fleet had assumed formation. For the inexperienced it was a formidable sight, battle lines kilometers long and high. In space there was no true limit to placement possibilities, but there were practical considerations. Here, the suicide tactics of the autonomous opponents rendered the more creative possibilities dangerous. But there were certain techniques humans had developed over an entire civilizations lifetime of war.

Anderson kept those formations in the corner of his eye, while watching the enemy fleets. As expected, the geth were expanding in an umbrella formation, the perfect defense when defending a single target. Miniscule dots moved around the geth vessels, fighter craft, too small for true FTL drives thank Heavens.

"Now." The word came at an almost-whisper.

Fiery blooms of reddish-orange light bloomed from the bows of every vessel large enough to mount a spinal gun, save the Normandy. Another bank of processors hummed to life, tracking the solid-state projectiles across the three-dimensional image hovering before the bridge crew.

"Tracking." One of the deck officers, primarily responsible for less-important duties, became the most important officer on the ship for a few brief moments. "Full spread launched. Second barrage away. Missiles away, successful launches reporting."

Brief seconds crawled past as the tiny lines traced their way across the map. Then the longest line terminated at the outline of a geth cruiser, one of the closest ships.

"Contact." The officer's fingers flew. "Good hit. Barrage three away. Barrage one full contact, ninety-seven percent success. Two shots missed, tracking."

Anderson nodded. It was only responsible that known projectiles were noted and broadcast through civilized space. To the unwary they were death incarnate – but when treated as another meteor, it was just another piece of junk flying through the void. "Status?"

Another officer checked his board. "Council ships are inbound, five minutes until we can shield them. Geth vessels are shifting – missiles are now in range, ignition achieved. On target."

A wolf-like smile spread across his face. The only viable tactic the geth could use in the face of invisible, incoming shelling was to use the Council's own ships as shields. 'Not this time. Dodge this.'

"Everest to all ships. They are in range. You have your orders. Godspeed."

Anderson leaned forwards, as if the simple weight distribution would help the Normandy arrow forwards towards the Citadel, towards both the monster and the man he considered one of his oldest friends.


Serpent Nebula, Widow System

Citadel

The Citadel's Presidium floor was a war zone. Pits in the deck made new entrances to the lower floors, far below. Wreckage littered the landscape like bad public art in one of the more progressive colonies Shepard had seen; bent figures made of steel and ceramic were positioned in intriguing poses across the levels, if one could ascribe such anthropomorphic attributes to the digital geth.

Shepard flicked an EMP grenade through a handy opening, and followed it up three seconds later with a burst of particle-accelerated fire. Electronic screams emanated from beyond, bringing a grim smile to his face.

Elbow-crawling, he moved back down, away from what was once Barla Von's front door. The volus was long-since gone, and seeming quite well-armed for a mere volusian stock broker, even if he did trade in information as well. One unopened gun safe had been left behind, which had given Shepard another mid-grade assault rifle, or at least the parts of one.

'That was a good explosion,' he smiled again. A sufficiently creative mind could make anything into a bomb. His smile soon vanished as the sound of marching feet reached his ears. He froze, letting the metal monsters clank past.

Just as he was about to start moving again, he felt something push against his right elbow. Turning his head as far as it could go under the circumstances, Shepard sought the source of disturbance. 'Not a geth, I'm still alive. Keeper? No, not independent enough. Wait … what?'

A small hand clutched at his armored elbow. The fingernails were dirty, streaked with grime and clear markings. He followed the hand back to the shoulder and body of a small girl. She couldn't have weighed more than a half-grown varren, a comparison that must have jumped to the forefront of his brain due to the pastel hued stuffed toy shaped like the same.

"Mister … Geoffrey … just wanted … to play …." Her head tilted in his direction. For a moment Shepard could make out a pair of eyes, wide and fearful. "We didn't … mean to … honest!"

Another stamping of metal, hulking feet made the girl huddle around the stuffed toy once more. Then Shepard saw the wristband, markings often given to children suffering a bad reaction to gene therapy. Not all benefited from genetic modification; this one looked to have suffered nerve tissue damage in multiple areas.

"Papa … please?" her hand touched his armor again.

Shepard froze. Memories of Mindoir, Eden Prime, and far too many other battlefields flickered through his mind's eye. With effort, he shut them down, but not before one last image cemented itself in the forefront of his mind's eye, a small, stuffed bear sitting in the wreckage that would never again know its original owner's touch. The place he'd once dreamed of raising a family of his own, before monsters came out of the dark and stole that, along with his mind.

"It will be all right," he shuffled over to bring his hand down on the girl's back. She leaned into the contact, seeking reassurance as best as he could tell. "You take care … of Geoffry. He's scared."

Both thin arms clutched the toy varren to her chest in response. He could hear a sniff, tears being fought back.

"Be brave. I'll make them go away." Shepard extracted a tranquilizer from his belt with the other hand, palming it behind the child's back.

"No! Don't … go!" The girl clutched his hand, smashing the toy varren between them. She twitched as the injection took hold. "Please … no … stay with … me …."

Shepard waited a moment, then tucked the girl into a more comfortable position. For a moment, just a brief, selfish moment, he let a finger smooth back the curled hair from her forehead. Sticky with sweat, it still responded to his touch, sliding back away from her face.

He watched the face for a moment, trying to see it for a single instant. But the usual confusion blended the nose with the rest of the face, blurring features in an unrecognizable morass.

With care he pulled back. The heavy L-359 on his back made a soft vibration, cooldown complete. That put this mindset back where it should've been, but with a critical addition.

"James." His comlink clicked on, and he began a new route.

"I'm here," the calm voice of his brother responded. "Go ahead."

"Found a package under the stock broker's office on the Presidium. Left a tracker. You safe?"

Hoarse laughter met his words. "Safer than a volusian's bride-price in the First Galactic Standard Vault of Irune."

"Right." That meant some trouble, but not much. "Can you get to the shipping area?"

"Not far now. What's up?"

Shepard felt his inner restraint crack. 'Monsters needing killin', can't waste time.'

"James. Look for locker See-four Ay-nine-one-one. Use my birthdate on the lock. Sit there and set it off if you think the station is lost."

"Wait. What?"

He checked the Prothean particle rifle; it only gave a few seconds burst now, the battery would need updating. The L-359 likewise needed longer to recharge, something to put in the report if he had time.

"Karl. This is a thermonuclear warhead."

"And an FTL-capable escape pod, yes." Shepard checked his sword. Like everything else on his armor, it looked worn, but would serve for the next few hours. If he had that much time. "Look, you know what will happen if the Reapers come through here. The civilians will all be turned into infantry. Or killed. Or experimented on. Or worse."

"Karl … I … I don't know."

"I do." Shepard followed up with a quick spot-check on his armor. Its systems were all in the green; geth were less accurate than experience suggested, or he was just getting better.

Then his brain caught up – there was a reason he'd taken over ten years to activate the viral component in Hegemony space. The batarians may have damaged his brain, but that did not make it right to become a monster.

More of a monster, at any rate.

He turned to the man whom had listened to his every thought. "What do you think?"

A long moment of silence held between the two. He waited, patient as the sounds of destruction emanated from ahead.

"I think … it should be a last resort, Karl. Maybe the Reapers will get here, and maybe both sides won't blow up the Citadel. Is there a remote detonator?"

"Yes." He had to hesitate before answering. It had been so simple to smuggle weapons of mass destruction into the Council's capital station. It made one wonder how many others were there, aside from his. But there had been one thing clear to him: someone with a grudge shouldn't have the trigger in reach. "The code is in the escape pod."

His brother's voice became firm. "Then I'll sit here and wait. If things go pear-shaped, I can get the hell out of Dodge … and we can reconsider the matter then."

Shepard's mind went back to the unconscious form beneath the stock broker's floor. "No. Get yourself out. Go home, James." His self-control began to break down, battlefields starting their relentless march across his mind's eye. "You're a better man than I, you know that. Hug your kids for me, will you?"

Before his brother could respond, Shepard shut off the comm and closed his eyes, ignoring the sounds of his brother's attempts to reach him. He took a breath. Then a second. And a third. His heartbeat slowed, but the underlying rage built into an inferno somewhere beneath his rib cage. He'd have to change tactics again, the geth were adapting to the exotic weapons already, which meant getting into the right mindset.

It wasn't hard.

'Bastards.' The thought of metal spikes on Eden Prime became clear in his mind's eye, toys scattered around their bases. 'Weak. Saren will pay for this. He will Pay.'

With a whine his Nightstalker armor kicked into overdrive, enhancing his mass. Shepard opened his eyes, and focused on the far end of the short hall. With effort, he forced himself into action, a slow jog that turned into a run, clearing the narrow side path in a few steps and surprising a small group of infantry units.

Their guns came up, spitting hyper-accelerated metal pellets at him. His increased mass ignored such minor annoyances – but the geth troopers were not so easily capable of ignoring his own charge. While built for ranged combat and bipedal interaction, none had been constructed for actual melee combat.

Shepard flattened the first one, crushing its flashlight head underfoot. The second two were hurled into the hallway walls, breaking important parts as they made impact. The fourth unit found itself being dragged along by its neck analogue. Shepard yanked, snapping the data cables with one hand, making the unit go limp.

Bursting into the main Presidium gave him more room to maneuver, while making it easier for the main body to find him. With a long throw, Shepard launched the geth trooper frame into the air, targeting its internal power source with a quick particle beam. The resulting detonation blew apart the closest standing geth, gaining the attention of the entire host.

Shepard kept going. A Prime unit moved to intercept – and went flying off the Presidium's limited atmosphere, escaping the localized gravity field.

A sense of fatality came over him as he took in the view. The entire Presidium floor was filled with geth. Bipedal units, multi-limbed heavy units, several gunships, even a pair of drop ships and a low-flying cruiser could be seen. Every unit turned to face his direction, glowing circles brightening until resembling an array of spotlights.

Deep within the anger, Shepard felt at peace. 'One thing left to do. One man left to kill. One more big fight.'

Each running footstep hit the deck plates like a sledgehammer; dents trailed back towards the small alleyway, geth parts strewn around it. A roaring sound filled the air, seeming to come from everywhere at once.

He didn't realize the sound came from himself until after carving his way through the nearest squad, and halfway into the second.

A prickling sensation warned him of incoming plasma rounds, from the larger geth heavy units. It was an easy matter to sidestep them, or move another geth unit into place as a shield.

Shepard began to lose count of how many opponents he felled. His particle rifle was fired so often its barrel began to glow, overriding the heat sink safeties. Again and again the artificial opponents came at him – just as many times he cut them down, manipulating his mass, altering their own mass, ducking, lunging, throwing everything he had into the fight.

Out of the corner of one eye he could see the Prothean Mass Relay statue glowing a soft white. It looked like a number of geth surrounded it, tinkering with its internal workings.

'Great,' he ducked a charging Juggernaut's arms, delivering an eezo-enhanced kick to the back of its artificial knee. 'Either they, or I, am getting reinforcements. With my luck? Not me.'

A rocket clipped his left flank, spinning him sideways into a plinth. The impact felt like being kicked by a horse, if the horse were twenty feet tall and weighed as much as a garbage scow.

Howling his rage, Shepard turned the blow into a spin, dropping under the rapid-fire suppression fusillade the geth were channeling his way. The eezo-wired portions of his gauntlet glowed black, then white as an overpowered Nova technique obeyed its programmed arrangement.

It was very satisfying to see two dozen geth go flying. Even more so when he noted their lower extremities were shattered beyond repair.

The L-359 sputtered a final blast, lightning dying as it scrawled a half-hearted path over geth shields. It fell, useless deadweight, allowing Shepard to duck yet another plasma ball, and stab upwards into an armature's exposed ventral surface. Eezo-hardened steel sliced through lightweight sheet metal with all the grace of an elephant's instep.

A bipedal geth was getting close, and Shepard turned to deal with it, only for it to detonate its own power core. The resulting blast hurled him out from beneath the falling armature, into a pair of trooper-style geth. They fell, and he rose in a burst of power, only to be thrown again as the two self-detonated.

Helpless rage threatened to override what little control he had left. 'Not fair. Not fair at all.'

He landed against the base of the Relay statue, rose again, and charged back into the fray. The particle rifle was useless now, barrel shredded by the suicidal mechanical monsters. That too was discarded, leaving Shepard with just his blade, and his armor.

"I'll – kill – every – last –one – of – you!" Shepard managed to batter down the closest geth, but was knocked into the air by yet another explosion. "Cowards!"

It was then that the Relay statue reacted. The luminous sphere growing in its center flared a blinding white; everything not locked to the deck somehow began to float into the air as gravity began to fluctuate.

Through the center of that sphere, an oblong shape formed, charging out of nothingness like a conjuror's trick. As it eclipsed the shining whiteness, its form could be made out, a modified Mako mobile troop transport, armored and armed.

The geth reacted without hesitation, pivoting in a smooth transition to target the new threat. Shepard felt himself thrown to one side; refusing to obey, through almost superhuman effort, he twisted in mid-air enough to jam his blade into the joint of a Prime unit's cranial module and its shoulders. The shock of impact made the towering opponent stagger, just enough for Shepard to get a footing with the mag-clamps in his boots.

The incoming Mako landed, six tires spinning on the floor. It jerked to one side fractions of a second before a second Mako made an appearance through the Relay. As the second vehicle landed, the first realigned itself, miniaturized Aitan cannon making an audible zapping sound as it built up a charge.

Shepard's eyes bulged – lightening his own mass, he pushed off the geth Prime, sending himself back to the floor. It was a fortunate decision.

The Mako's weapons opened up, sending arced lightning across the short distance, evaporating geth shields like soap bubbles. The second Mako performed the same in the other direction, electrical discharges winding around the metallic enemy combatants like amorous snakes.

Figures piled out of the second Mako, slight in build but aggression evident. Small-arms fire started up in an angry fusillade, the continuous chatter of Avenger assault rifles and rapid triplet chunter of the Vindicator line.

Groaning into the safety of his helmet, Shepard picked himself up. His back was sore, there were at least three cracked ribs of various levels of importance, one of the eezo circuits in his left thigh was getting uncomfortably warm, but he was alive. The last viable weapon he held was a simple sword, but he was alive.

"Shepard!" A familiar voice called. It sounded young, somewhat hesitant, but confident all the same. But that couldn't have been right, all non-combat personnel were supposed to stay behind.

He stayed low, and scuttled for the second Mako. More soldiers dropped clear as the Relay's glow intensified once more, reaching out to pull him into cover.

"We have to hurry," a familiar blue face pushed close, supporting his weight. "Ashley is coming through."

"Wha -?" he started to ask. But the Relay's rotation finished, cutting him off.

Dozens of power-armor soldiers dropped into sight, hitting the ground running, some landing off-center, but rolling to their feet in smooth movements no machine could match. The Menelaus power armor had been invented for initiating assaults, armed with chain gun attachments and grenade launchers. Each stood over eight feet tall, protecting their occupant with both tank-grade armor and shield generators.

"For Eden Prime!" a savage cry emanated from the lead soldier. The rest caught up the call, forming an assault formation spreading across the battle field.

A wordless shriek joined them, warbling up and down across the audible range, dipping into regions human ears couldn't detect. The slim figures in the first Mako were just a hair behind the armored soldiers, triggering electronic attacks and firing shots as if on some form of drugs.

Shepard winced as the ear-piercing scream hammered his ear drums. Then he looked up. "Watch above!"

Liara didn't spare a look, reaching upwards with one hand – the falling gunship shuddered, then twisted in midair, compacting into a much smaller version of itself.

It was not often that Shepard was surprised by his teammates. But this was unexpected. "How …?"

Her head twitched in his direction. "Practice. Vigil had excellent translations for what the Prothean instruction guides said. Apparently the Beacon understood human physiology, but some of the information was undefined for my own."

Shepard managed to stand under his own power. A fresh pack of medigel was handed to him, and he inserted it into his armor's support slot. He breathed a sigh of relief as the painkillers kicked in, nanites beginning their repair work. "Saren?"

More Mako's entered, skidding to a stop, then roaring to what seemed to be pre-determined rally points. One missed the ground portion, skidding into the central lake. Two collided with already parked vehicles, rockets flaring luminescent blue, struggling to roll back onto their wheels; geth artillery took advantage of their confusion to launch heavy plasma into their depleting shields.

He winced as a parked Mako exploded, the heat cooking off ammunition within its main weapons bay. One survivor escaped the inferno, joining with another crew to focus fire on the opposing geth.

"Lieutenant Alenko is directing the assault, until you can relieve him," Liara informed him. As they approached the back end of the Mako, the tall, dark-haired Canadian stepped out, one hand over his ear. "Here he is now."

The biotic ducked behind one of the Mako's tires, hand still clutched to the side of his helmet. "I said it's clear! Go! Go! Go!"

Shepard felt a moment's commiseration with the man. Running a frontline assault was not for the weak hearted. It helped to have subordinates one could trust – or at least rely upon to a greater extent than civilian volunteers. But it was obvious that Alenko hadn't been in command long.

"Sir, am I glad to see you!" Alenko looked up, shoulders relaxing. "One moment." His usually kind demeanor turned stiff as his focus resumed. "Do you want to live forever? Do you see the Admiral giving leave? You get the Makos moving or I will come back over there, and throw you through the Relay without a Mako. Do you understand?"

Shepard took advantage of the break to assume cover behind the Mako, almost dragging the asari with him. "Thank you, Liara."

She seemed surprised for a moment, then laughed. "You're welcome. I believe I still owe you four rescues, yes? We shall count this as one."

"Aye." Shepard looked out, and his eyebrows lifted. "Is that … Wrex?"

Liara leaned past, and then pulled back. "With the hammer? Yes. He found it in a supply office, and … I believe the quartermaster termed it as 'essential procurement'. "

He had to chuckle. "It's effective. Very effective. Geth aren't designed for CQC."

"Close Quarters Combat?" Liara gave a knowing nod. "Understandable, since conflict after the Krogan Rebellions rarely devolved into melee range for them."

Shepard almost snorted at the matter-of-fact statement. "It always comes down to knife fights. Whether it's in back alleys or mud pits, or too close to enemy cover. There's always room for a good drubbing."

"For the geth?" she shrugged. "Geth have not needed to enforce rules in their own territory for three centuries."

He had to think about that for a moment. "Point."

Another wave of vehicles swept through the Relay, releasing their load of infantry, and moving into assault positions. Already the geth had been pushed back to the main Council Tower, which they seemed to be defending with manic intensity. Additional fire was coming from C-Sec headquarters, where they'd been landing sniper shots the entire time, increasing the number of variables for the geth to incorporate.

"Sir, if you and Doctor T'Soni are done with alien culture comparisons," Alenko had a tilt to his hips that suggested smirking was involved. "Captain Anderson is on the Normandy, leading the attack I'd guess. Your orders?"

The Relay rotated yet again, launching four Makos in quick succession before slowing its spin. Shepard nodded towards it. "Cycling them through?"

"Yessir. The Relay has to stop every forty-five seconds; even the big Relays can't launch ships constantly. But it can handle a half-dozen APC's at once … we think. It handled the first one anyway."

"Fair enough," Shepard eyed his sword. The edge was still sharp, but dented in places, chipped and scarred with the work it had been forced to complete. "Have a spare rifle, soldier?"

Liara shifted. "Take mine. It has been of little use to me."

"Thanks," he took it, checking it out of habit. "Avenger Mark Seven. Clean. Been taking good care of it, well done." His mental condition prevented the perception of a dark blush dusting the asari's cheeks.

"All right, break's over." He brought the rifle to semi-ready posture. "Saren is hiding up in the Tower, doing heaven only knows what up there. Can you reach the other side of the Relay, Alenko?"

"Vigil said he's trying to open the Relays, for the Reapers, sir." The Canadian raised and lowered a shoulder. "And yessir. It's a Relay. Whatever they did with it, they included the communication link design."

"Good." Shepard slapped the rifle's stock to his right shoulder, and tracked across the battlefield. A short burst terminated one of the few drones left flying. "Tell them to head for the Council Tower. If Saren wants to open everything up, we don't want him to do that. Let's end this thing, here and now."

"Sounds good, sir. The squads will be glad to have you back in charge. Me too," he gave an exaggerated shudder. "Command never told me how much hand-holding you officers have to do."

It was an odd statement to make, Shepard had to stare at the other man for a moment. "Alenko, you're a Lieutenant."

"Biotic Lieutenant, thank you sir." Alenko corrected. "Small squads of specialists only."

"Well today you're in the big leagues," Shepard checked the rifle's action, and found it favorable. "Plug me in."

There was a moment of audio pain before the networks meshed. Then he could hear the organized chaos that spoke well of the traffic controller. He tapped his earpiece, hearing the reciprocating thump in the localized audio. Satisfied, he adjusted his command privilege frequency override.

"This is Commander Shepard. Thanks for the rescue boys, I'm obliged. Now let's find that honor-less, backstabbing traitor and give him a little good ol' fashioned Colonial Welcome!"

The echoing roar of approval sent ripples through the Presidium Lake. He smiled, feeling the unfamiliar action strain unpracticed muscles. It was good to be back in action.


A/N: I published some of my first Mass Effect works on Memorial Day. I am pleased to release my longest chapter yet on the same day! It's gone through five revisions, including sections chopped from the prior chapter, and while I'm still a bit dissatisfied, I am of the opinion that my current view is not going to improve the quality. This chapter highlighted all the technology Shepard's been collecting, and his training, and putting together the various pieces ... and it's not done yet!

Thank you Guest, for your excellent points. Your review is precisely why I leave this story open to member comments. The story does jump around a bit, and that is my fault; there are a number of passages that most Mass Effect gamers know, and I chose to skip them for the sake of brevity. I love telling stories, but most of the stuff skipped is, while character-building, not as essential as what I do include. Or so I believe; I am still learning how to tell stories, and as you pointed out, have improvements.

Special thanks to Nightstride for his beta superiority. He caught a number of critical errors, and indicated potential future story plots that might work. As I am in the process of outlining ME2, this is good.

Have a great Memorial Day out there, thank you Veterans for your service, and I hope you've all enjoyed the story thus far.