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Reuploaded this chapter because for some reason it messed up and didn't send out notifications again.

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"Brotherhood is the very price and condition of man's survival."

(Carlos P. Romulo)

…

Shuttle Ranger, October 19th, 12:12 PM, 2184

…

I smiled as we broke the atmosphere, soaring towards Cairo Station. I carefully observed the station as we got closer, seeing the new addition attached to the portside docking section. It was about the size of a frigate, but wider all around. It appeared as if it barely fit in between the two docking arms.

I held my breath as we pulled into one of the various shuttles bays on the Cairo, something that I had always done reflexively despite the relatively small amount of danger it posed.

When I had just gotten out of high school, Dan and I had gone out to watch Interstellar in theaters. The scene where the docking maneuver isn't done properly and ends in an explosion instilled in me a deep fear of docking failures, and ship-to-ship maneuvering in general. It wasn't a crippling fear by any means, but it sat in the back of your mind, nagging you no matter how hard you tried to ignore it.

As we landed inside of the station with a gentle thump, I looked back at Miranda, Richard, and all the other scientists as I let my breathing return to normal.

"Well ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Cairo." I announced, popping the hatch to be greeted by the sight of a small five-man security team, led by Captain Keno's chief of security, Hana'Rei vas Cairo.

"Hello Captain." She greeted, giving me a firm handshake. "The entire module has been successfully linked to the station. I'll show you the way if you'll follow me."

"Sure thing." I agreed, falling in line behind her as the others followed me. "So, were there any problems getting the module between the docking arms?"

"It was a little hairy, but we got the job done." She replied, her team following up behind my group. "Personally, I was more concerned about whatever was inside the module doing damage to the station's systems, but your… "friend", Powell, assured us there were no hidden programs in the computers."

I brushed off her abrasive attitude towards Powell as my mind shifted to another, more important question.

"My orders that no one enter the lab were followed, correct?" I asked, looking back at Miranda for a second as we passed through Habitat Delta and into the docking bays.

"The farthest we went were the airlocks." She finished, stopping outside of an airlock that was guarded by a marine decked out in a Gen IV exosuit. "Would you like for my security team to wait here, sir?"

I thought about it for a few seconds, looking back at everyone before making my decision. While most of them still looked confused, Miranda had maintained her stoic, dissatisfied expression while Richard simply looked eager to get back in there and look at all the tech Cerberus had created.

Unable to come to a decision, I decided to do something different.

"Well, I'll let you decide, Ms. Lawson." I said, looking directly at her as all the eyes around us focused on her. "You want them to come with us?"

She focused on me with a raised eyebrow and minor confusion for a few moments before looking to everyone else then back to me.

"I believe our party is big enough as it is." She mused, softening her expression as she folded her hands behind her back.

"Very well." I nodded, looking between her and Rei. "Lead the way, Miranda. This is your domain, after all."

She pursed her lips for a second, exhaling through her nose before taking the front and going down the docking cradle.

After waiting wordlessly for the airlock to cycle over the span of a minute, we entered the inside of the lab. It was in the exact same state it was before we left, much to my relief. I could see from a cursory glance that I wasn't the only one who was relieved either. Miranda had the happiest face on that I could imagine, that being a small smile.

"Nothing was removed?" She questioned, walking over to the console Dan and I had listened to the logs on.

"We collected all the loose papers into those boxes, and all the computer data was left as is after being accessed." I answered, following her over as the others began wandering over too.

"Very impressive, I must say." Richard gushed, running over to us. "Tell me, did any of the artificial muscle grafting research come from reverse-engineered Geth platforms?"

Miranda looked at him in minor shock, obviously surprised by his enthusiasm. To be honest, I couldn't blame her. She wasn't used to him like the rest of us were.

"Some of it, yes." She said with some hesitation, typing away at her console as she accessed the module's status readings. "While we did learn a lot from the Geth during their incursions into the Traverse, most platforms destroy themselves after being sufficiently damaged. Work, as far as I still know, has been slow."

"Are the nanite breeders a Cerberus invention?" He questioned further as I looked between the two before we were interrupted by Mineko.

"Um, forgive me for asking, but what is all of this for?" She asked, looking very confused. "I see some things I'm familiar with, but most of this seems… experimental."

Miranda looked over to me, still looking very much reluctant to begin spewing information. I shrugged my shoulders, gesturing to them as she let out yet another sigh.

For the next hour, Miranda thoroughly explained the purpose and goals of Project Lazarus as we all sat back and listened. She didn't appear to hold back at all, explaining it all in its entirety. It was quite impressive, even as someone who wasn't that well versed in medical matters.

To bring Shepard back from the dead, Cerberus had invested over two billion credits into getting ahold of the most advanced medical technology available, most of which was still considered very fringe and untested. They were rebuilding Shepard bit by bit, restoring his body and making as many practical "improvements" as possible via the introduction of cybernetics.

When they had gotten his body, he was apparently unrecognizable. Shepard had died from suffocation in vacuum, and then went through planetary re-entry. While his hardsuit had saved him from burning up in the atmosphere, the impact pulverized most of his bones and left severe burn damage on the epidermis. Exposure to space had also burst his lungs and several major blood vessels.

I couldn't even imagine how painful his death must have been.

After Cerberus recovered his body, they got to work fast. They began rebuilding him from the inside out, literally "growing" him back. Everything had to be repaired cell-by-cell, and it was a time-consuming process. They were close to repairing most of the major bone and organ damage, and were about to begin "bio-synthetic fusion" which involved the slow activation of his new implants.

There were no replacement organs, limbs, or anything of the sort, the "Illusive Man" wanted him brought back in the same condition he was before his death. He, like Hackett, apparently saw something in Shepard that was possibly linked to our survival soon. It still seemed like a stretch, but seeing everything Cerberus had put into it gave me second thoughts.

Once she had concluded her long explanation, I walked back towards her with my hands folded behind my back. I have her a good, hard look before turning around to face everyone else.

"Having heard Miranda's explanation, I'm now offering you the chance to assist her and Richard in Project Lazarus or to work with me and my other colleagues at CASTLE Base." I announced, filling their expressions with equal amounts of confusion and surprise. "The choice is yours, and now is the time to make it."

I waited, standing as still as I could as I gave them a few moments to ponder their choices.

Slowly, Mineko and Hans stepped over to Miranda, while Johnathan and James stayed where they were.

"Well, that settles it." I said with the biggest, most friendly smile I could make. "From this point on, until the project is concluded, you will be a tight-knit team. Work together, work smart, and above all else… don't create a modern version of Frankenstein in here."

Much to my relief, the joke hit home, getting Mineko, Hans, and Richard all the laugh, and even managed to make Miranda smirk slightly. I flipped around to face James and Johnathan, now focused exclusively on them.

"So… what do you two have to offer us mechanically inclined folk?" I asked with the same smile, relieved to know that we now had some more people around to help.

The coming weeks would be interesting indeed.

…

CASTLE Base, November 22nd, 12:31 PM, 2184

…

I sat back in my office chair, listening to the small creaking noise it made with comfort. The sound was very much like the one the one my Dad's old wooden office chair would make back home. It was the small, little things that helped ease one's mind, the things that reminded you of time when things were simpler.

In the weeks since I restarted Project Lazarus and got our new colleagues working, things had progressed rather smoothly.

The two biggest things to happen on our end in the last six weeks was the completion of our second Orbital Defense Platform and the first of our Phantom-class stealth frigates, both named Mombasa and Ghost respectively. The Mombasa was almost a complete copy of the Cairo, but included several internal improvements. One of them was the inclusion of our refined MES system, which was twice as energy efficient as the one we tested on the Cairo. It also boasted the ability to adjust its own orbit using massive plasma thrusters located in key points of the superstructure.

The Ghost was a beautiful ship. According to Dan, the design was similar to that of the Gyges-class aerial warships from Ace Combat 6, a game he had played back in high school. It was shaped a lot like a manta ray, having wide swept "wings" that were pitch-black and a hull that was covered with sensor confusing paneling. Funny enough, the material was like the sonar-absorbing panels the Soviets used on the Typhoon-class submarines. It was armed with the best EW suite available, and boasted turrets and GUARDAN arrays on the top and bottom for defense.

The shakedown run for the Ghost had gone off without a hitch. It had traveled all the way through the Attican Traverse to Alliance space undetected, using only a fraction of the energy the setup on the Explorer utilizes. Compared to the Normandy-class frigates the Alliance were building, I'd say the Ghost was in a field of its own. A black wing that was indiscernible from the vacuum of space.

I looked back to my computer, checking the latest reports coming in from everyone around the base. They were numerous, but each one I had a near-full understanding of.

After we had finished reverse-engineering the Hammerhead IFV recovered from Cerberus, running it through tests and breaking it in, we set about building a newer, more balanced version called the Whitetip. The first change off the bat was the replacement of the eezo power core with one of our Mk.4 NM reactors, the same one the Cobra, Python, Viper, and Dragoon all used. This allowed us to reintroduce kinetic barriers, which had been omitted from the original design due to power draw reasons. The extra power also allowed for longer use of the boost and jump mechanics.

Both the Viper and Python had gone into full production, and pilots were being trained daily for them. We had six squadrons in production, with twelve more planned by June of 2185. Eighteen vessels per squadron, split up between nine fighters and nine interceptors. These squadrons, depending on the situation, could be augmented with two to four Cobra gunships. Plans were underway for the creation of a carrier that would hold all these ships.

The Dragoons were progressing well. We had finished building two full lances of walkers, four mechs per lance. Things had kicked into gear after concerted efforts were made to salvage scrap from the debris field in orbit. Now, our focus was the development of the Desant-class transports that would transport them over long distances. Once we had ironed out all the deployment problems, the Dragoons would be our ace in the sleeve when it came to ground engagements. Nothing would be able to match it in pure destructive power, and we would be able to deploy them as fast as we could retrieve them.

I leaned over, picking up Darcy in my hands and laying her in my lap. She was already starting to get big fast, and I wanted to enjoy her while she was this small. She stood up in my lap, laying herself on my chest as she began to lick my face.

"Ooh, you're just a crazy little dog, aren't you?" I remarked with a big smile, rubbing her nose against mine. "When we get home, I'll give you and Finny a nice treat."

The quiet moment was suddenly cut off as I heard several knocks against my door, causing my eyes to immediately shoot up.

"Come in." I said out loud, putting Darcy back to the ground as I sat up straighter in my chair.

The door slid open, revealing Admiral Gerrel. His sudden, unannounced presence surprised me, causing me to immediately go on guard.

"Hello Captain." He greeted, walking in and closing the door behind him.

"Admiral." I replied in as calm of a tone as possible as Darcy ran up to him, smelling his leg.

"What is that?" He exclaimed, backing away from her as she stood in place and tilted her head.

"Oh, she doesn't bite." I reassured, whistling to grab her attention. "She's a dog, a domesticated Earth animal."

He simply shook his head, walking over and taking a seat across from me as she sat down in front of Gerrel and stared at him.

"Sean, I have a matter that I wanted to discuss with you in person." He began, leaning forward slightly as I cocked one of my eyebrows. "It's important, something I want kept between us."

"Lay it on me." I agreed without hesitation, leaning back slightly in my chair as I attempted to mentally prepare myself for whatever surprise he had for me.

"Alright… two days ago, one of our exploration groups came across an old probe near turian space. We picked it up, finding it to be of Alliance origin, from sometime around the First Contact War." He went through, pausing for a moment before going further. "The thing that surprised us was that there was a nuclear device built into the probe, one that was still armed."

"Jesus Christ." I exclaimed, unable to think of a better thing to say. "You're not asking me to disarm a nuke, are you?"

"No, no, we've already disabled the device." He reassured, calming me down slightly. "It's being moved to the base's storage area as we speak, I just wanted you to be aware of what's going on."

"Wait a minute, if the nuke belongs to the Alliance, don't you think we should return it to them?" I asked, standing up from my chair. "Why are we taking possession of it?"

He stared long and hard at me for a few solitary moments, tapping the edge of his helmet before standing up himself.

"Captain, why should we give it to the Alliance when we can keep it for ourselves?" He argued, genuinely worrying me. "If the Alliance had the gull to simply fire unmanned nukes into deep space, then, how do the humans say it… "keeper's finders?"

"Finders keepers." I corrected with crossed arms, not at all happy with his decision. "Look, I don't think it's a good decision to have anything that's stolen from the Alliance, especially a nuke of all things. If anyone ever caught on to the fact that we were in possession of an undocumented nuclear device, it wouldn't end well for any of us."

"Well, in that case, it's a good thing only we know about it." He shot back, arms folded behind his back. "As far as I'm concerned, only you, Rael and I know it is here. The device will be stored on Sublevel 9 in the vault. I trust there won't be any problems with that, right Captain?"

"No sir." I grudgingly agreed, letting my shoulders sag.

"Good. I'll expect the reports from your teams tomorrow at twelve." He finished, trotting out of the doorway without a care in the world.

Part of me wished I could be as blissfully ignorant as him. It could have made my job much easier, but at an obvious price.

…

Serenity Valley, November 29th, 6:34 PM, 2184

…

I sat down at the dinner table in Dimitri's unit, allowing myself to sigh before forcing a smile onto my face. Heart's "Barracuda" played softly in the background as Dimitri, Mara and Sira finished up the large batch of Spaghetti we were having for dinner. This was the first time everyone was eating together since the arrival of our new colleagues, and part of me still felt very tense about the whole situation we had found ourselves in. While I felt better about Hans, John, Mineko, and James, I was still very worried about Miranda.

While the other four sat around one another and spoke casually about their projects, Miranda sat quietly by herself, examining her datapad seemingly without a care in the world. Her disposition over the last few weeks had hardly changed, and she was still all buissness. Once again, she brought back memories of Mara and I's early working relationship back on Aldrin Station. At least back then we were all on the same side, but I felt there was more going on in her head than she was letting on.

It genuinely worried me.

"Hey Miranda, what are you looking at?" I asked, catching her slightly off-guard.

"I'm still working on the proper regulation of Shepard's protein synthesis. The balance between his body and his implants must be perfect." She answered quickly, narrowing her eyes back onto the datapad.

I cocked my eyebrows, unsatisfied with her response. I decided I had to take a more aggressive route.

"Can I ask you a question that's been on my mind?" I inquired, crossing my arms as I put both elbows against the table.

She looked at me out of the corner of her eyes, the usual unamused expression crossing her face before she sighed and looked back to her notes.

"If you want to, go ahead." She agreed with obvious resignation, not even looking at me.

"What's it going to take to convince you that Cerberus are the bad guys here?" I asked with nothing held back, narrowing my eyes slightly as she stopped scrolling through the notes and stared into space for a few seconds.

"What's that supposed to mean?" She shot back, clearly caught off-guard.

"You know exactly what it means." I pushed harder, lowering my head slightly. "Despite everything that's happened, you still think that later down the line you can get back into The Illusive Man's good graces."

"Are you trying to insinuate that I plan on defecting?" She said, not sounding at all happy with what I was saying.

"The thought had crossed my mind." I replied, sitting slightly taller in my seat. "I can see it in the way you work, the way you act, even in those blue eyes. You believe there's still a future for you in Cerberus. You think they'll take you back."

"Let me tell YOU something, Captain." She rebutted quickly, raising her voice slightly. "You know nothing about me, my motivations, and my ideas. Don't go around treating me like some snake in the grass backstabber. If you want the truth, I'll tell you right now!"

"By all means, go ahead!" I yelled back with an equal amount of force as everyone stopped what they were doing and started watching us.

"You're right! I originally did plan on rejoining Cerberus!" She spat out in a disgusted tone, standing up out of her seat as she stared daggers into me. "I figured that if I offered myself to the Alliance, there would be a chance I could keep the work on Shepard intact. That was until they tried to have me killed! Is that a good enough answer for you? Does that answer any of your questions?!"

I continued to keep my angry gaze focused directly on her as everything in Dimitri's unit became deathly quiet. I held that same look for what felt like half an hour before I calmly stood up and offered her a handshake. She stared at my hand with immense confusion before slowly grasping it.

"I want to officially welcome you to our team, Miranda." I said in a calm, relaxed tone, shaking her hand firmly, but not too tight.

"What do you mean?" She questioned, still not understanding what I was doing.

"I was testing you. Now I know you're capable of really being part of our happy little family here." I admitted, letting a smile cross my face. "I want you to feel welcomed here. We're not some group that you just happened to get saddled down with, we're friends. I just want you to understand that."

She had no response for me other than a confused, almost flabbergasted expression. It had been the first time I completely saw the woman's disposition completely change. For a second she looked like she was going to say something, but caught herself at the last moment.

"Don't worry about anything, just sit down and join the conversation." I urged, gesturing towards her other colleagues as they smiled at her. She made her way over, slowly but surely joining in with everyone else.

I think I had done it. I had gotten through to her.

Still, her confession meant I'd still have to keep an eye out.

…

Camp Dolor, December 1st, 12:31 PM, 2184

…

I ran across the flat, scorched field into the observation bunker as rain poured down from the sky, turning most of the ground to mud. This was the worst kind of weather to do a live-fire demonstration in, but then again… that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. If our test goes well, the fact that we did it in bad weather makes it look even more impressive.

I was satisfied with the setup Dan had gotten out here on such short notice. It was a full sensor suite already calibrated for the test. He had even taken the liberty of setting up one of his enhanced TLs on the roof of the bunker for even more accurate readings.

Today, we would be observing a test of our Desant-class dropships in a simulated combat run. Both would be deploying a lance of Dragoon mechs, eight in total. All the mechs were matching E2 series, meaning that all the minor problems we encountered with the E1 should be fixed.

If all went right, the dropships would swoop in, launch the mechs from their maximum rated height of 600 feet, and speed off without a second thought. After the mechs had "cleared" the hostile targets, the dropships would return to retrieve our people on the ground.

Luckily for me, it would just be Admiral Gerrel in attendance this time around. Rael was busy doing god-knows-what in his team's lab, which suited me fine. I had gotten sick of his attitude the last few weeks, especially in regards to the Dragoon development and my "lax" treatment of our other science team members.

If he had his way, they'd be locked up in a cell and would never see sunlight again.

"Fleet Actual, this is Captain Michaels. Please confirm test scheduled for 13:00, over." I asked into the primary comm line, wanting to make sure everything was properly set up.

"Standby, Captain." The operator on the other end held, creating a brief pause in the transmission. "Please send test access phrase, over."

"Copy that. Code is… Dog Easy Sugar Able Nan Tare." I quickly said, nodding my head after I was sure I had said it all correctly. "Please confirm, over."

"Roger that, standby." He replied, creating another pause before coming back. "Test confirmed and logged. Over and out."

I allowed myself to sigh as I took a load off on the nearby stool, silently praying to myself that today's test would go off without a hitch. Our last drop test ended with two of the Dragoons blowing out their hydraulic actuators, and according to Dimitri they all ended up needing to be replaced after further examination.

"I see you've managed to get t-through this me…mess unscathed." Dan announced from the doorway, covered in a drenched raincoat.

"Now what kind of educated man would I be if I couldn't get through a rainstorm." I playfully mocked, smiling as he hung up his coat and kicked the water off his own boots.

"I don't know… people like us always seem to p-profess in one field and lag in oth…others." He shot back, allowing a small smile to creep into the corner of his mouth. "Kind of like how the G-Germans are brilliant people, but l-lack common sense."

"The Tiger H will always be my favorite World War Two tank, and nothing you say or do will convince me otherwise." I shot back in a semi-serious tone as I pointed at him, knowing exactly what he was getting at. "Just because it was over-engineered doesn't mean it was a bad tank."

"Yeah, all t-that dirt and mud getting fro…frozen into the Schachtellaufwerk sus…pension worked well." He sneered back at me as I felt my eye twitch. "The armor being a flat as a p-pancake didn't help either."

"I still can't believe you memorized the name of its suspension just to spite me." I shook my head, allowing myself to chuckle. "If we put half the effort we put into spiting each other into our own work, we'd already be in the Andromeda galaxy."

"We haven't even explored a fr-fraction of our own galaxy." He shot down, shaking his head. "Going for another o-one seems a bit far-fetched."

"Yeah… you might be right about that." I agreed, thinking a little harder about the whole thing before going on. "Hey, only four billion years until Andromeda comes to us. Think we can wait it out?"

"If I'm still around in four b-billion years, I'll need more than a whe…wheelchair to get around." Dan replied, smiling after a short pause as I cracked a sharp laugh.

Before either one of us could go on, my omni-tool began beeping loudly. Opening it, I saw it was a text alert from CASTLE Base and was broadcasting on the administration channel. As I started reading over it, Dan walked over with a worried look on his face.

"What happened?" He asked as I closed my omni-tool and reflexively bit the knuckle of my index finger. "Well?"

"We've had some kind of security breach in the facility." I began to explain, throwing my raincoat back on as he did the same. "Someone attempted to access the facility comm network before being cut off."

"Where did it or…originate from?" He followed up, looking harder at me.

"It came from Rael's lab." I answered in an exasperated tone, zipping up my coat as far as it would go. "Come on, we need to get on top of this situation before it gets any worse."

We ran through the rain, making our way through Dolor as we focused on getting to the hillside. Whatever had happened at the base had reached here, and squads were gearing up and running for the hill just the same as us.

I didn't know who was in Rael's lab, but they had done something serious if extra forces were being called in to reinforce our pre-existing marine detail. After spending twenty minutes running through pouring rain we finally made it to CASTLE Base's interior. Before I could even bother to ask for more information, I ran into Raan and Gerrel who were now overseeing the situation.

"Captain, I'm glad you're here." Raan greeted, speaking quickly as the four of us walked as a group.

"What's happening in my base, Admiral?" I asked, throwing back my dripping hood as I focused on her faceplate. "What's gone so wrong that we've got guys from Dolor coming here?"

Raan stopped in her tracks, looking at Gerrel before nodding.

"Geth have taken over Rael's lab." He answered with a completely straight face, hands clasped behind his back as my eyebrows shot up. "Come with us."

He quickly and quietly let us to a vacant storage room, opening his omni-tool.

"The last transmission we received from the lab was from one of his team members." He explained, going through and finding the file. "Its… not pretty. Here."

He opened said file, showing a quarian woman. Her envirosuit was splattered with blood, and her movements were quick and panicked.

"We've locked down access to the rest of the base. Our mistake won't endanger the rest of the facility. They're burning through the door. I don't have much time." She said quickly, looking to the door and back to the console. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. Jona, if you find this, be strong for Daddy. Mommy loves you very much!"

She was then cut down by a hail of gunfire as several strange looking Geth burst into the room. The feed cut out a few seconds later, leaving nothing but static.

I had no words for what he had shown me. I was horrified.

"We've already sent one team in to investigate. They haven't reported back." Gerrel explained further, closing his omni-tool. "We're bringing in our marines to set up defensive positions around the blast door that leads to Rael's lab. If they try to get out, they're going to be in for a big surprise.

"We're considering the possibility of detonating the emergency demo charges buried beneath his portion of the base." Raan admitted as I focused on her with disbelief. "It'll destroy all of his work, but we'll know the Geth won't be a threat any longer."

"I'm s-sorry, but aren't you forgetting about all the pe…people who were working in th…those labs?" Dan shot out, not looking at all happy with what Raan was suggesting. "What the f-fuck are you thinking?"

"Dr. Nemo, please control yourself." Raan said in a clam tone, holding one of her hands up.

"We're pretty sure the Geth have already killed everyone inside." Gerrel added, crossing his arms. "Trying to go in and search for survivors seems pointless at this juncture."

Once more, my mind was racing as I struggled to process all the information going through my head. Possibilities, outcomes, possible solutions to this very dangerous problem we now faced.

"Wait a minute… just wait a minute!" I stopped, raising my voice as I held out both of my hands. "This doesn't have to end in any more bloodshed. What if we send Richard and Powell in to try and defuse the situation peacefully?"

"Peacefully?" Gerrel repeated in a tone that was both mocking and dumbfounded. "Captain, they've already slaughtered Rael, his staff, and a fully armed squad of my marines!"

"None of us have any idea if there are survivors in there or not!" I yelled back, putting my foot down. "I'm not willing to take that chance!"

"He does have a point." Raan agreed, sighing before going on. "If what the two of them told us when they first arrived here is true, they've had peaceful contact with the Geth before."

"I didn't believe any of it then, and I don't believe it now." Gerrel dismissed with spite in his voice, shaking his head. "What a bunch of nonsense."

"Captain… we don't have the time to convene on this. If you really wish to take the risk, it's up to you." Raan said, holding both of her hands together in front of her.

I closed my eyes, breathing in gently through my nose as I came to a decision.

"I'll do it." I agreed, quickly nodding my head. "Hold your men. Keep them stacked outside of the entrance while I go find Richard and Powell."

"Time is of the essence, Captain." Gerrel finished as Dan and I ran out of the storage room.

He didn't have to tell me that. If there were any survivors in there, I was going to get them out, even if it was just Rael's sour ass. Seeing the footage of that woman being gunned down brought back painful memories of Aldrin, and I didn't like it.

Someone fucked up big time in Rael's lab, and I was about 90% sure I wouldn't like knowing the specifics behind what caused all of this.

…

A/N: Allegiances are tested and problems are afoot in CASTLE Base. What'll happen next time? Who knows, you'll just have to wait until next time!

It's been a while since my last chapter, I must admit. I started a new job that's been syphoning away my life force, and the upcoming finals aren't helping at all. I made this chapter a little bit longer and tried to focus more on character interaction than usual, so hopefully I hit the mark on this one.

Sa always, I'd love to read any reviews, and I'm always up for suggestions or constructive criticism. Stay tuned!