Chapter Forty Five: The Secret of Cybernetics
"Wait, you're staying?" Shepard was pretty sure his eyes were lying to him. He and Rosebud had entered Liara's room expecting another painful goodbye. Instead, the room he thought Liara had decided to temporarily use was full of monitors and the little drone that thought everyone was the Shadow Broker greeted him.
"Well, yes I am," Liara sat at her desk, and looked up. "Is that a problem?" She looked towards him worriedly. Colt hoped that he didn't sound disappointed she was staying.
"Of course it's fine. I just didn't think that you'd stay. In fact, I came here expecting to say goodbye," Shepard shifted uncomfortably. His voice had cracked a little.
"Nope, I'm staying. You'd get into too much trouble without me. Besides the great Commander Shepard needs a trusted advisor, and the Shadow Broker's resources. Also, I think Colt Shepard could do with some moral support," she flashed him a such a mischievous smile that his heart skipped a beat. "Plus, I crashed my old ship into Cerberus," she said that last line quickly, and gave him an innocent look.
"Wait...what?" Shepard liked the sound of this story. He settled on her bed, even though Rosebud took up most of it.
"Well' Cerberus came looking for me and Feron. So we loaded up your fish, hamster, Rosebud, and ourselves into a shuttle, and I controlled the ship remotely. When the Cerberus ship was in range I crashed mine into it. That reminds me, I keep forgetting to tell you that Feron has the space hamster and your fish still," Shepard was happy to hear that the rest of his growing posse of animals was with Feron. He would go to Feron's ship either today or tomorrow to pick them up.
"That's badass. My girlfriend crashed a ship into another one, while escaping dramatically. Couldn't have done it better myself," Shepard gave her a wide smile. "Now that you're on the Normandy we can do a ton of stuff together. We could watch vids, have lunch, kill things, blow up things, dance, watch the seasons of Fleet and Flotilla I've missed, and that's just some of the list I've compiled" Shepard tried to lay back on the bed, but the runt of a baby Varren he had bought was now a hundred pound bed stealer.
"I would enjoy the rest of the list, but later. I need to analyze a few more things," Liara turned from Shepard to her monitor. Reluctantly he started to leave, a very tired Varren trailing him.
"One more thing, do turians have beaks? More specifically does Garrus?" This question had bothered Colt for months. Who better to ask then the person whose degree count was higher than words Shepard knew.
"Hmm... well-" Liara was cut off by the lights suddenly going dark, before emergency lights powered back up.
"Joker, what the hell just happened?" Shepard yelled at the ceiling.
"EDI just went offline," Joker's voice sounded panicked. Shepard charged out of Liara's room, with the asari just behind him. Garrus and James were looking around like they were startled. Other crew members looked around worriedly.
Shepard ran towards a panel that he could manually use to lockdown his ship. Red lights started flashing, and doors were completely sealed after he typed the code into lock her down. A voice that didn't belong to EDI kept saying emergency lockdown over and over again.
Commander Shepard assumed that going to the room that housed EDI was probably the best idea. He tore off one of the mess hall's seats and found no small number of guns. He had been informed of the secret armory only hours before. He handed a gun to Liara, Garrus, James, and two Ensigns before getting himself one. When he turned towards the med-bay he saw smoke coming from where EDI was housed in the med bay. Shepard also pulled out the only oxygen mask he could find and pulled it over his face. He would be the only one going into the dangerous room.
Luckily, Doctor Chakwas was in a sleeper pod, and no one else was in the med-bay. He over rode the lockdown codes on the med-bay door, and walked cautiously in. Not a lot of smoke had escaped into the med-bay. He grabbed a fire extinguisher on the wall, and approached the source of the danger. Garrus, James, and Liara hung close behind him.
"All of you stay outside," Shepard pulled the straps on his oxygen mask tighter, and started the flow of the precious gas. He made sure his gun was loaded, and over rode the lock into EDI's room. A part of his mind registered that Liara used to stay on in this room on the SR-1.
When the doors opened, only a small amount of smoke drifted out. He could see the blaze of a fire, so he grabbed the extinguisher and walked in.
The environmental controls had kept the smoke from leaving the small room, so a thick haze had developed in it. The visibility was less than a foot, but Shepard could hear movement. "State your name and come here with your hands up! If you don't, I reserve the right to use deadly force!" Shepard shouted. He increased the biotic barrier around himself.
"Sorry Commander. It's EDI, and I've taken control of Eva Core's body," the mechanized Eva Core stepped in front of Shepard with her hands up. He lowered his gun, and let his biotics dissipate.
"Alright. We'll talk in a sec, after I get these fires out," Shepard turned towards the crew waiting outside. "Stand down, we don't have a security breach," he could hear guns being lowered. Then he grabbed the fire extinguisher and set to work on the small fires.
Shepard walked out of the smoky room into the med-bay. EDI followed right behind. He pulled off his oxygen mask, and put codes into a panel to lift the lockdown. When Garrus, Liara, and James saw Eva Core, they raised their guns at her. "Guys, it's okay. This is EDI, and she's taken over Eva's body," Shepard looked her over once more.
"I'm sorry about all the commotion. Taking control of her body was slightly harder than I realized. I did not mean to start fires," EDI held her hands behind her back, but still seemed a little awkward.
"Hey, it was fun. Reminded me of my younger days," Shepard said, patting EDI on the shoulder.
"How does this remind you of your younger days?" Liara asked.
"You guys didn't know? Well before I went to officer candidate school on Arcturus, I was an Alliance firefighter. I left because it was so boring. Ships have great fire control systems, so basically I just sat around. I think I only was an official firefighter for like three months, and then I enrolled on Arcturus," Shepard explained. Their faces showed that they hadn't known that.
"Anyways, EDI do some tests on the body, see what it can do. Maybe you'll be able to join the ground squad," he smiled at her hopefully. Then a thought crossed his mind, "No one tell Joker what happened, I want to see his reaction when he sees EDI," Shepard could imagine some bouncing, and some high-pitched squeals.
...
"So, you just want to run some tests on me?" Shepard was suspicious of Chakwas' 'tests' after The Great Needle Debacle of '85.
"Yes, and no needles this time. We don't want to repeat the Needle Debacle of '85. I'm just gonna put you on a treadmill, and put some sensors on you. I just want to find out more about your cybernetics. Unfortunately, the med-bay is too small for the treadmill, so we'll have to do this in the mess hall," Chakwas was fiddling with something on her desk. Probably something that would provoke Shepard's fear of needles.
"Great, I'm gonna be on show for my whole crew," Colt grumped.
"It only gets better. The only thing I'm letting you wear is running shorts, and shoes. I have to put sensors on you, and clothing will make the readings less accurate," Chakwas smiled in such a way that he knew she knew how uncomfortable this was going to be for him.
"Fantastic. Let's get this over with. With any luck everyone will be doing their jobs, and no one will know what's happening," Shepard said hopefully. All of his hopes, and dreams were dashed, however; when he walked into the mess hall, and tons of people were there.
Chakwas' assistant was setting up a treadmill. Shepard would have to check the shipping manifests more often. If Chakwas could somehow get a treadmill aboard, what was Garrus getting?
Shepard had changed into shorts and his N7 hoodie. He didn't plan on revealing his chest until he absolutely had to. By now everyone had heard that something was in the mess hall and his crew was milling about. Liara had come out of her room, and was watching him carefully.
Only when Shepard started stretching did he notice how gloriously white his legs were. When you saved the universe, you didn't have time to tan. Besides, his legs were covered in armor most of the time. Those were his excuses, and he was sticking to them.
"Come here, Shepard," Chakwas had a suspicious box in her hands. "Alright, I'm going to put sensors on you now. So take off your hoodie," Shepard slowly took it off, painfully aware of how many eyes were on him. Chakwas opened the box, and started attaching things to his arms, chest, and legs. Then she brought out this embarrassing helmet thing, and strapped it on his head and then connected this tube to his mouth. She explained that it was to monitor breathing patterns. "Go ahead, and get on the treadmill. Just do a slow walk at first," Chakwas opened her omni-tool, and started doing something on that.
Colt walked slowly on the treadmill, eyeing the people watching. He couldn't speak, because of the tube, but if he could, he would be yelling at everyone to get back to work. "Alright, Commander. I'm getting readings from all your sensors. So let's increase the speed a little bit," Chakwas did something and the treadmill moved him into an easy jog. Liara was watching him with eyes raised. Was she swooning?
"Alright, finally we're going to do a sprint. The treadmill will keep up with you. Start when you're ready," the good doctor turned back to monitoring him. Shepard took in a few breaths, and launched himself into a full sprint. He went on for what he thought was a few minutes, and then slowed down.
"Shepard, I have the data I need. Let's get those sensors off," Chakwas was able to get the things off quickly; relief flowed through him when the weird cap came off. "Let's talk in my office," she started into the med-bay.
"Sorry everyone shows over," Shepard grinned at his crew before following Chakwas.
"Congratulations, it looks like you're the fastest human to ever live. You're top speed was just above twenty-six miles an hour," Chakwas took a moment to look at him.
"Well, I'm mostly robot, so it doesn't really count," he replied.
"Still impressive. Here's what I found out. Your head is only about three percent cybernetic, so basically any injuries there will have to be treated normally. Your lungs are about eighty percent organic tissue, so they'll be treated normally, with maybe a few modifications. The rest of your internal organs, including your heart and stomach, are over sixty percent cybernetic. Now that's good and bad. You'll heal a lot quicker, and probably won't need medical attention for a lot of injuries. For example, if you were to get shot in your stomach without armor or shields, the cybernetics would heal you nicely. You would easily survive that. The drawback is that you cannot handle extreme temperatures. Anything below fifteen degrees would freeze your cybernetics. Anything above ninety degrees could easily fry your systems. Also, your threshold for electricity is a lot less. So don't get shocked. The only thing that's acceptable is a shock to restart your heart, but hopefully we'll never have to do that. Your legs are ninety five percent cybernetic. One hundred percent from the knee down. Your arms are about fifty-fifty," Chakwas sucked in a huge breathe after that speech.
"I'll get my armor modified so it has some heating and cooling abilities. So you'll be able to treat me better with this information?" Shepard asked, his mind still reeling from her explanation.
Doctor Chakwas looked at him critically for a moment, "I hope so, there's still more data to go through."