Chapter 14:

Date: July 29th, 2077, 5:21 P.M.

I awoke from my sleep and looked around. Apparently I had been moved from my previous location to Ithera's makeshift bench.. I rubbed my eyes and pushed myself up off the floor. I looked out of a window and saw Samara training Lyna in the use of her biotics.

Lyna flared her biotics and charged at Samara. I watched as Samara easily sidestepped out of Lyna's way at the last second. Lyna tripped over a branch and tumbled to the ground. Since I had just woken up, there was little that was able to do other than watching Samara lift Lyna into the air. Shortly after Lyna was picked up by Samara, she was thrown back into a nearby boulder by the Asari Justicar.

"You are weak, I thought Shiala trained you better than this." Samara's voice was muffled, but I could still hear it.

"Don't you mention that name to me again, Justicar!" Lyna yelled, and charged at Samara again. This time, Lyna hit her target. She impacted Samara with the force of a charging Krogan, and both tumbled to the ground.

As much as I enjoyed watching Samara and Lyna duel, I had much better things to do other than watching them fight for hours on end. I decided to force myself out of the bed and get a breath of fresh air. When I stepped outside, I noticed that Vodnik and Ithera were engaging in hand-to-hand combat. Vodnik was easily beating Ithera. Every time Ithera threw a punch, Vodnik easily blocked it.

Vodnik grabbed ahold of Ithera's arm in his right hand, then sent a swift jab into Ithera's ribcage with his left hand. I was able to hear a fairly loud thump from the strength that Vodnik put behind his jab. Ithera fell to his hands and knees, coughing from the sheer power that Vodnik put into the punch. Vodnik noticed me and waved me over to greet him.

"I saw a part of your fight with Ithera, you did well." I complimented and looked down to Ithera who was still clutching his ribs.

Vodnik nodded in return. "He challenged me to hand-to-hand combat."

"That gives me an idea Vodnik, not necessarily hand-to-hand combat, but something else. What if we held a competition against Lyna and Samara?" I smiled, and gazed over to where both of the Asari were training.

Vodnik followed my gaze, and stared at Lyna trying to charge at Samara again. "What do you mean by, 'contest?'"

"Basically, I want to see who has a better edge in combat situations, augmented Humans, Asari, or Quarians. I'm not saying that we walk up to them and engage in hand-to-hand randomly. I'm implying that we go through a series of courses," I finished with a smirk.

Vodnik followed my gaze. He looked at me with a slight grin on his face. "Are you suggesting that we engage in actual combat with them?"

I shook my head. "No, I'm suggesting that we face off with them in multiple situations, those situations being hand-to-hand combat, infiltration, counter-biotics, long-range combat, and survival techniques on an alien planet. I want this to be an annual occurrence, to train for the Reaper war."

"You still have yet to tell me what these Reapers are," Vodnik commented and looked down to me. For the first time since Vodnik and I met, I noticed that the man was about ten centimeters (four inches) taller than I was.

I pulled up an image from my omni-tool to show Vodnik. "This is a Reaper, a two kilometer long killing machine. It is armed with magnetohydrodynamic beams that will instantly vaporize anything in the beam's path. It is also near-invincible from the outside."

"Why not just disable it's drive core? Wouldn't that render it useless?" Vodnik asked.

I sighed and turned off my omni-tool. "I'm really getting tired of explaining this, but Reapers can indoctrinate you. They can use you as a tool, willing to serve them. Your mind slowly rots under their control, and you become nothing but a thrall to their command."

"So, you're saying they're basically invincible?" Vodnik asked.

"They're not invincible if we prepare. Hell, if we get a synthetic army to overpower theirs, we can beat them. Anyways, I'm going to discuss our plan with the Asari," I told Vodnik and started to walk over to Lyna and Samara.

As I was walking, I thought up of something.

Sirius, can you hold my tactical cloak up for an extended period of time?

'It depends on how long the cloak lasts.'

It lasts for about 30 seconds.

'I can increase that to a minute, what are you planning to do?'

You'll see.

I was about 15 meters away from Lyna and Samara when I activated my cloak. Both of them failed to see me before, as they were too busy fighting. I walked up behind Lyna who had summoned her yet again as she faced Samara.

I deactivated my tactical cloak and put my left arm around Lyna's waist. "I am disappointed you didn't notice me before now."

Lyna's reaction was unexpected. She turned around and punched me in the stomach. I doubled over and clenched my stomach in pain. Turns out, Asari can hit really hard when they combine their biotics with their punches.

Lyna paused for a moment after hitting me, then arched an eyebrow after noticing that it was me who she punched. "Do you mind not interrupting my training with Samara, Kyle?"

"Well I'm sorry! I thought you would like to know of a little plan that Vodnik and I came up with," I raised my hands above my head as if I was surrendering, looking into Lyna's eyes with mock-innocence..

"That doesn't change the fact that you interrupted my training," Lyna seethed.

I put my hands over my head. "Hold the hostility, I came over here to propose that all of us start training together."

"In case you haven't noticed, Samara and I were already training. Go ask Vodnik." Lyna motioned towards where Vodnik and Ithera were talking.

"Not that type of training. I mean, we split into three groups, you and Samara are in the first, Vodnik and I are in the second, then Daro'Xen and Ithera'Lyik in the third. We face off against each other in a series of events. Those events being marksmanship, hand-to-hand combat, counter-biotics, infiltration, and survival with minimal resources." I explained to Lyna and Samara.

Samara walked up to me. "That sounds childish, why should we waste our time for a simple event? You forget that I have to hunt down Morinth."

I glanced to the Xer-21 shuttle before replying to Samara. "It will only take a week to do, and I still have to bring Xen back onto the Bermuda. Who knows, we may find something interesting on Rannoch."

Lyna had a confused look on her face. "Rannoch is in Geth space, and the Geth are incredibly hostile to any organic life.. Why would you even suggest training on Rannoch?"

"Er, have you forgotten that I allied both the Quarians and the Geth?" It was my turn to be confused, as I clearly remembered telling Lyna about the Geth-Quarian alliance.

Lyna stared at me and arched her eyebrow. "You… You allied the Geth and the Quarians? You stopped a war that went on for two hundred years?"

"It was much harder than I thought. I found out that a Quarian admiral was either highly unstable or indoctrinated," I explained to Lyna, who was still very confused.

"How the hell…"

Lyna stared at me for a good minute before turning to Samara. "Are you okay with this?"

"Someone has to watch over the Humans other than you. I'll follow for now, but don't expect me to be around for long. Though, I want to know something from Kyle first," Samara turned her head to me. "Can your AI help me hunt down Morinth?"

"Uh. I actually don't know if that's possible. There's a small possibility that it can search the extranet for traces of her."

Samara let out a long sigh, then pinched the bridge of her nose. "At least that's something. I should go converse with Vodnik about this plan that you spoke of. I want to hear his opinions on it."

I looked at Lyna and shrugged at Samara's departure. "I guess we should start our journey to Rannoch."

Lyna stared at the shuttle. "Yeah, I guess we should."

"I'll start loading some food onto the Xer-21, while you should probably get some rest," I told Lyna and examined her face. Her scalp crests were darker than usual, which made me think that was the Asari variation of exhaustion.

Lyna nodded and walked away to the Xer-21 shuttle. She stopped after walking for a few meters. She glanced back at me. "Before we head out, I want to see this 'Inusannon' structure that you spoke of."

"I'll make a deal with you, if you and Samara turn out to be the victor of our competition, then I'll take you there, after that we'll hunt down Samara's target. If Vodnik and I win, we're going to Feros," I grinned at Lyna.

It took me about two hours to load food onto the shuttle. I was not able to load the food onto the Xer-21 in a short time period. I knew that at some point, Lyna would have to head to Omega for food again. I didn't trust Aria T'Loak in the slightest, so when that time came, I would be accompanying Lyna.

I had asked Sirius to start searching for traces of Morinth on the extranet. According to Sirius, the extranet is a big place, and it is similar to the internet back on Earth, but much bigger. Approximately 2,000 petabytes take up the surface section of the extranet, and that's just the surface. Sirius estimated that all of the sections of the extranet combined is five billion petabytes.

While the final preparations to leave Aite were being made, Ithera approached me while I was sitting on a log and searching the extranet. "Terrah, you have done more for my people than ever imagined. Why did you decide to help us out of all people?"

"I'm not a racist. Unlike most of the galaxy, I'm trying to unite nearly everyone to face the Reapers," I quietly said.

Ithera shook his head and sat down next to me. "That must be hard, trying to prepare all of the species in the galaxy for the up and coming war with the Reapers."

"Yes, it is hard trying to prepare an entire galaxy for a mass genocide. Every species needs to work together to even have a chance at defeating the Reapers. Even if that means sacrificing billion in one system to save five billion in another system."

"Wouldn't that just be helping the Reapers? Eliminating a billion people for them?" Ithera asked, and stopped what he was doing.

"Sometimes you just can't save every single life, we'll have to learn that the hard way," I stood up, and walked away from Ithera, leaving him alone in the night cycle of Aite.

The preparations to leave Aite were complete. Sirius would pilot both the Xer-21 shuttle and the Bermuda to ensure that we got to Rannoch in a week. I had made sure that Samara had a room to stay in, along with Ithera and Vodnik.

I walked towards the shuttle, where Lyna and Samara were talking. Ithera was sitting alone, and Vodnik was nowhere to be seen. I heard soft footsteps behind me as I approached the shuttle. I stopped in my tracks, and turned to face whoever was behind me.

I was met with a fist connecting to my abdomen. "You won't be able to defend yourself against the competition if I am able to attack you in the cloak of night." I identified my attacker as Vodnik, as his Slavic accent gave it away.

I had known that Vodnik was of Eastern European descent since I talked to him in late 2076. His personality was always aloof, and he didn't talk much, even less when he was talking to the Asari or the Quarians.

On instinct, I threw a punch with my right arm at Vodnik. I felt two hands grab onto my wrist as I was throwing the punch. My arm was twisted to the right, nearly snapping the bone from the pressure that Vodnik was putting onto it. "Neither of us know what we're up against. We've only seen the Asari fight each other, there is no telling what they will do to us."

"You know I'm not proficient in hand-to-hand combat, and you also know that I'm not a soldier," I said through gritted teeth.

Vodnik released my arm. "I know that you can do much better than what I just saw." Vodnik grabbed my shirt collar and I found myself hanging an inch off the ground. "Do something, Kyle. The Asari or Quarians will not act like four year olds in a playground fight. They will absolutely destroy you."

I tried to breathe in, but Vodnik's grasp was blocking my attempt. I kicked forwards, landing a hit onto Vodnik's stomach. He let go of my neck, and I fell to the ground with a thud. I quickly pushed myself up and backed away from Vodnik. "I may be a civilian, but that doesn't mean that I don't know how to defend myself."

Sirius, activate my tactical cloak.

'Done.'

"Where have you hidden yourself, Kyle? You can't hide from me forever," Vodnik yelled. He assumed that I was hiding behind a rock or a nearby tree, but that was obviously not the case.

I crept up behind Vodnik, careful not to make any noise as I approached. I was inches away from making my attack when Vodnik turned around and attempted to roundhouse kick me. I leapt back just in time, before my cloak deactivated. "I'm right here, you're going to have to try harder than that if you plan to beat me with brute force."

"Good to know that you can turn invisible. You're doing better than I expected you to do, a normal person would have gone down in the first hit," Vodnik smiled, and returned to a neutral stance.

"I'm not a normal person, and neither are you. Both of us are augmented with some foreign types of technology."

"What has happened is in the past, and I am not able to change it," Vodnik told me in a very flat tone. He nodded his head in acknowledgement and walked towards the shuttle. Leaving me in the cold night sky of Aite, alone. I headed towards the shuttle, where Lyna, Samara, Vodnik, and Ithera were waiting.

Lyna was still talking with Samara, and Vodnik and Ithera were both loading supplies onto the shuttle. "Samara, do you honestly think that the Fleet will give us weapons to train with?" Lyna asked as I silently approached the group.

"To answer your question, they owe me too many favors for them to refuse." I appeared behind Lyna.

Lyna quickly turned around to face me and angrily flared her biotics. "Stop sneaking up on us, that's going to get you killed some day."

"Or it could also save his life one day. If Kyle can sneak up on any of us while he is in plain sight, then it will be useful in the time to come," Samara interjected.

"Apparently, we're going to be training in stealth in about a week," Vodnik butted into the conversation.

I put my hand up, and Lyna ceased the flow of her biotics. "I want to set down some rules about our training. One, we can't kill each other. Two, if one of us gets seriously injured or poisoned in the training, then we must stop the competition and help them. Also, whichever team wins the competition will choose one of four options."

"What would those options be? What will happen to me? Will I be returned to the fleet?" Ithera inquired and looked nervously at Samara and Lyna.

I turned my gaze towards Ithera. The young Quarian asked too many questions for me to answer in a short sentence. "We do a task for the Asari, a task for the Humans, a task for the Quarians, or a task for all of our benefits. I'll explain more when we're en route to Rannoch."

Vodnik finished loading supplies onto the shuttle, and wordlessly stepped into the Xer-21. Ithera boarded the shuttle after Vodnik, followed by Lyna, then Samara. I activated my omni-tool and boarded the shuttle. "My AI will be piloting us to Rannoch, I know everyone but Vodnik aren't on good terms with artificial intelligence, but bear with me."

"You know I could pilot the Xer-21 and the Bermuda perfectly fine. So why the hell are we trusting an Artificial Intelligence to pilot us to Rannoch?" Ithera asked, growling like some form of animal. Ithera wasn't a very menacing person, even though he tried to be.

I closed the remaining space between me and Ithera. "You have yet to give me a reason to earn back my trust. I haven't forgotten that one time when you thought it would be funny to lure a Varren into our camp!"

"I can deal with you having an AI in your body, but I will not tolerate having one take us to Rannoch, no matter where it originated!" Ithera yelled and pushed me into one of the walls of the Xer-21.

I heard the shuttle's engines starting up, and everyone else heard it. "You don't like Artificial Intelligences. I get that, but if you continue to disobey my orders, I'll make sure you never see the light of day again."

Ithera growled at me, and I saw Vodnik stand up. "I recommend you calm yourself, for the rest of our lives, Kyle will have that AI in his body. You can either deal with it like the rest of us, or we will drop you back off at Omega." Vodnik threatened.

Ithera sat down on a bench, fuming at the fact that he was unable to have his way. Xen mentioned that he was only 17 years old, so Ithera's actions only confirmed that he was not fully matured. Vodnik calmly sat down on another bench next to Samara.

Lyna was sitting in the cockpit, so I sat down next to her. Sirius engaged the Xer-21's thrusters, the shuttle lifted off of the surface of Aite and sped away from our colony. The shuttle broke atmosphere and I felt a loss of gravity for a split second, then the gravity generators turned on.

The Bermuda was just outside of the orbit of Aite, where Sirius had left it. I spotted the docking bay open as we approached it.

We entered the docking bay of the Bermuda. A soft thunk was heard as we landed on the flooring of the docking bay. Lyna turned to me and spoke. "Wow Kyle, do we really have to land as hard as possible?"

"And you could be less sarcastic," I said as I stepped out of the shuttle.

Lyna was about to speak when the Bermuda started up on its own, thanks to Sirius. "So it can transfer itself to the main systems of the Bermuda from the Xer-21?" Samara inquired and stepped out of the shuttle.

I nodded in Samara's general direction. "Yes, Sirius can transfer itself to any electronic system within half of an astronomical unit. It can hail anything within an astronomical unit."

Samara looked at me. "Do you have any rooms that look out into the void of space?"

"Yeah, we have a floor right below the bridge that is used for observation purposes. I've been down there a few times, it's a bit cramped," I answered and motioned for Samara to follow me.

I walked away from the shuttle with Samara trailing behind me. I headed down the Bermuda's secondary hallways, where the observation deck was located. While taking Xen to get medical treatment from the Migrant fleet, I had explored the Bermuda. That was when I had found the observation deck, and a few hidden compartments.

I originally assumed that the hidden compartments were used as shelter if enemies boarded the Bermuda. When I looked inside of the hidden compartments, I had found some weaponry, Such as a Phaeston V, a Naginata VII, and a Disciple IV. I closed the compartments after finding them, as I didn't need them at the time.

I waited for Samara to find her place in the observation deck. The Justicar sat down before me, and began to biotically meditate. A blue orb formed in her lap. "Thank you, Kyle Terrah. I'd recommend that you get some rest."

A/N: Another cutoff, as always. For the people just now reading this story, I really like leaving people hanging. I may be called an ass for that, but it's the truth.

I also have something I want to ask. Do the readers of ME: B want me to do alternate chapters for things that other readers might want to see in the story, but I can't quite put in due to story restrictions, want those chapters to be put into another story document, or be put into a compilation of one-shots?