…
"I am a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
(Hoban "Wash" Washburne)
…
Standing at my left waist gunner position in our B-17 Flying Fortress, the Natty Boh, I stood in cautious anticipation, knowing that any moment now, the German fighters would arrive, trying to stop our formation from getting through. Our target today was the city of Mainz, and we were now in the front of our combat box after the Baker's Dozen went down two days ago. We'd have our escort of P-51 Mustangs to fall back on if things got too hairy, but I'd prefer a day where the Luftwaffe wasn't trying to shoot holes in my ass.
"Here, you can f-finish this one off." Dan offered over the roar of the four engines, leaning back from his right waist gunner position to offer me his cigarette. "I don't think th-this air is agreeing with me today."
"Thanks." I accepted in a dull tone, taking it from him with a smile and putting it in my mouth, puffing slowly to savor the slightly warmer air it filled me with.
I knew these things probably weren't that good for me, but the stress of doing this every few days had taken its toll on all of us.
"You think we'll actually hit our target this time?" I asked, checking the large, round sight on my M2 Browning machine gun.
"I'll just be happy when we're ba...back at base." Dan remarked in a shaky voice, shivering slightly at the air around us. "This damn cold air is going straight to m-my bones."
"Ten minutes to target." Our Captain called out on our headsets, jolting us into position. "Deploy the chaff and keep an eye out for enemy fighters."
We flew in relative silence for two more minutes, having thrown the packs of aluminum strips out of the plane as we neared our target. As we passed through the edge of a cloud, I spotted something in the distance, closing fast.
"We've got krauts at 9 o'clock high!" I shouted, racking my M2 as I tracked the silhouettes in the distance. "Seven… no, ten approaching fast!"
The gunners in the plane to my left, the Lady Killer, began firing at the planes as they flew above us, close enough that I could identify them as Focke-Wulf 190s. They dove towards us as I opened up with the M2, sending rounds flying into their direction as our Mustangs moved to intercept.
"They're not all g-going after them, are they?" Dan questioned with confusion in his voice as I shook my head in disbelief.
As the 190s veered off and our Mustangs followed, abandoning the formation, flak started exploding around us, three minutes from target. After several detonations, one exploded next to our left wing, peppering one of the engines with shrapnel. It burst into flames for a few moments before it was shut down, leaving us with only three engines and a trail of smoke.
"Two minutes to target." The Captain announced as I looked back down at the Lady Killer, seeing it had taken a direct hit to its fuselage, filling the rear compartment with holes.
I hoped they were alright.
Appearing almost out of nowhere, seven 190s appeared on our 8 o'clock, coming straight towards us. They strafed the Lady Killer, blowing apart its pilots and bombardier compartment with 20mm rounds. It lurched downwards as it lost control, the 190s flying over us as I attempted to shoot them down.
"You sons of bitches!" Dan yelled in frustration, firing at the planes as they moved to regain altitude over our formation. "Richard was on that plane! Were there any chutes?"
"I don't know, damn it!" I shouted back, quickly reloading my M2 with another box of 50s as I prepared for them to make another pass.
Before I could finish, several 20mm rounds zipped through the fuselage above us, one of which struck Dan in his left leg, severing it instantly. As he shouted in pain over the roar of the engines and machine gun fire, I abandoned my waist gunner position to try and help him.
"Dan! Dan! Bite down on this!" I urged, putting one of the shell casings between his teeth to keep him from biting his own tongue off.
As I tried to apply a tourniquet and bandage what was left of his leg, another volley of gunfire ripped into the plane, hitting and killing our tail gunner. On the other end of the compartment, cries of pain rang out from the ball turret.
"Stay with me!" I urged, panic setting in as I realized what was happening.
As Dan's eyes rolled into the back of his head, I was suddenly engulfed in flames as an explosion ripped our bomber apart, shooting a fireball through our compartment as everything went black.
…
I gasped for air like a fish out of water, leaning up in my bed as cold air made contact with my sweat-soaked skin. I shivered for a few moments, wiping sweat from my brow as Mara turned to look at me.
"Sean? Are you OK?" She asked, looking very clearly worried as I fought to ease my heart back down.
"I had… another bad dream." I recalled, focusing on the thoughts in my head as hard as I could, fighting not to lose the details. "Dan and I… we were in an old WWII bomber, a B-17. We were attacked, and… well… I don't know."
Mara sighed, leaning up and giving me a hug as I held my arm against her.
"It's just a dream, honey." She reassured as I felt slightly ashamed of myself. She then laid back down and pulled the covers over. "Come on, try and get some sleep, we've got a lot to do tomorrow."
I nodded, getting myself comfortable as I stared into the dark space in our bedroom, thinking quietly about what I had just dreamt.
It all felt so real, so… visceral. I couldn't decipher any meaning behind it, but that didn't stop me from trying. I stared into that empty corner for what felt like hours, thinking over every little detail from the planes, guns, even the thin air I had seemingly breathed.
As I wore my mind out, I slipped into a restless sleep.
…
CASTLE Base, April 3rd, 10:29 AM, 2185
…
I yawned as I walked through the hallway linking all our multi-purpose lab spaces together, feeling tired after last night's… dream? Nightmare? I wasn't really sure anymore.
After giving Orontid the official tour of the facility, Camp Dolor, and a few of the nearby settlements, I left them to Dimitri for a while, hoping to get some work done on my projects here with what time I had left. Before I could do that though, I had to meet with Richard and Powell, who had informed me they finished building the "Snooper" detector.
Walking down the hallway, I spotted Daro'Xen with two technicians moving what I assumed to be the recovered server bank on a cart. It was carefully secured with straps and a protective cloth, and they were moving it slowly as to minimize any jolts or other kinetic forces. While the two of us did make eye contact, neither of us acknowledged one another. That suited me just fine.
If I could get away with it, I'd smash that server with a hammer.
Brushing the image from my mind, I walked into Richard's lab and was immediately greeted by a new image, this one being Richard with some kind of… headgear on, with David Archer watching him intently. He looked like he was already building another Snooper from the looks of it.
"I'm starting to think you've made your home here, Richard." I joked, trying to keep my own spirits up as I walked over to the open work table.
"Did you forget about the cot and the mini fridge?" He immediately shot back, shooting up one of his eyebrows as he returned his attention on the device.
I couldn't help but smile, he could be a quick little bastard when he wanted to.
'Well, you called me down here. What do you have to show me?" I refocused as he pulled his head back up, looking as if just remembering that he had called me, and not the other way around.
"Oh yeah, here!" He exclaimed, picking up the Snooper from the cart next to him and handing it to me. "We finished it, though I'm not happy with it."
"Why's that?" I questioned, looking it over as David stared at me.
"Well, its a pretty amatur design to be honest. While I may not be an accomplished engineer like you or Dan, I can see that this could be better." He critiqued, looking annoyed. "Its entirely too bulky to be of practical use, it's like carrying around an old desktop computer."
"I've improved power efficiency by twelve percent, and managed to code a far more stable and precise search routine into the onboard computer." David stated with his normal, blank expression. Though his face didn't express it, I knew he was proud of his contribution.
"Good work, that'll help a lot in the long run." I nodded, looking back at this "new" device he was building. "Seems like you've really cut down on the size."
"It's still not perfect, but I'd imagine carrying around something the size of an old ammo can is easier than the alternative." He nodded, closing the door on the side of the device and picking it up. "Feel the weight difference?"
I hefted the two Snoopers in each arm, immediately able to feel how much lighter the new one was.
"Very nice." I smiled as Powell walked into the room carrying two large boxes under his robed arms. I was happy… no, thrilled with his progress.
"Anyways, there's something else I've got to show you." He smiled, immediately changing the tone of the conversation. "Remember our little talk about Lydia and a body?"
"I recall the conversation, sure." I nodded, setting down both Snoopers carefully as he smiled.
"Well, I've got the surprise." He went on, waving me towards the back of his lab. "Before we left for Turviss, I set up a fabrication pod programmed to run on auto. Six days ago, I got the automated message telling me the project was complete."
He pulled a tarp off a large tank, one of the pods used in Project Lazarus. He opened a hatch on the front, revealing a glass shield with nothing but condensation on the other side. He fired up the fans inside using the panel on the side, revealing a greyish, vaguely female figure. It had the same "skin" as Richard's arm and Powell, though it was shaped in a way that mimicked a human female's muscle structure. In an odd way, it looked a lot like one of the unfinished robots from Westworld, but much more alien, with "nodes" in between several of the muscle fibers, just like Richard and Powell. The face was the biggest standout, featuring much smaller fibers that gave it a much more uniform shape, though still lacked what I'd call a "human" look.
"That's… is it fully functional?" I questioned in surprise, looking back at the two of them.
"It will likely take some getting used to once occupied, but it ready for habitation." Powell spoke, opening the pod with a sharp hiss, revealing the body in full. "Lydia will require bi-yearly fluid flushes to maintain proper performance, though she won't need to eat, drink, or sleep."
"Not to say she can't do those things, of course. Unlike my arm, it comes equipped with a full nervous system, something I had previously implemented on Dan's leg. Her body also comes with a basic digestive system, but it only exists as a means of giving her a sense of normalcy in her day-to-day." He further explained as condensation built up on the body. "And obviously she'll be completely immune to vacuum, disease, and other basic ailments."
"Well, I can tell you one thing, and it's that she's not going to be able to walk around here without drawing a lot of unwanted attention." I pointed out, getting Richard to smile as he folded his arms over his chest. "And that's IF she decides to accept it. Any plans?"
"What, do you take us for amateurs?" He joked, walking over and pulling down another one of the tarps, revealing a customized quarian envirosuit. It was fitted with several advanced features, including the latest armor, kinetic barriers, cloaking system, and even included a lime green color scheme, her favorite color. "Later I plan on fabricating an artificial epidermis that'll cover her whole body, but for now this should help keep any prying eyes away."
"Even with all the security around here?" I questioned, not sure if even this would be enough with all the tighter measures we had taken. "Hell, if the five-fingered hands aren't a dead giveaway, then I don't know what is."
"I'll take care of it. Trust me." He reassured, giving me one final smile as I nodded and smiled too.
"Alright then, I'll have her brought in once they've arrived." I decided, giving him a pat on the shoulder. "I'll save the champagne and fireworks for now. Once we know for sure this works we can celebrate."
"Oh, there's only one catch." He quickly pointed out, holding up one of his fingers as I spun back around on my heel.
"What would that be?" I questioned, a look of uncertainty slipping onto his face.
"Well, due to the way we've built it, Lydia would have to be transferred into the body via a custom, "man/machine" neural interface. It doesn't support the card readers I originally built." He stated with a slightly harrowed look on his face. "She'd still have all the functions available to her, including new ones both obvious and not-so-obvious, but she'd be… hardwired, in a sense."
"So, you're telling me this is semi-permanent?" I remarked, narrowing my eyes.
"No, it's not so much permanent as it is… less forgiving." He clarified, still looking quite aloof. "If something were to happen here I'd be able to pull her back out, but in the field… well, aside from the enhanced physiology afforded to her, she'd be about as vulnerable as the rest of us."
"Hm… that is quite the choice." I nodded, knowing that this would be quite the conversation down the line. "I'm impressed though. For now, start rolling out a small-scale production line of these Snooper detectors."
"But uh… what about the signal? I still need to know the frequency to look for." He called out, looking more than a little distressed.
"Its funny you should mention that." I smiled, motioning with my hand for him to follow.
…
CASTLE Base, April 3rd, 10:59 AM, 2185
…
Walking into one of the many secure storage rooms buried in the depths of CASTLE Base, I turned on the lights, revealing several specially-shaped storage containers. None of these were of any use to me, however. The only thing that interested me was the vault in the back of the room, the one that held many items. The most obviously dangerous of these was the nuclear device recovered by one of the survey ships, ordered into storage by Gerrel after being disarmed.
That was only one item, however. Physical backups for all our research were also kept here, updated every week. There were also some other secure containers, only one of which I still had any direct access to.
This container held the chunk of Sovereign sent to us by one of Hackett's research teams. We had run every conceivable test known to man on it, but in the end, we still knew very little about it other than it being some kind of bio-polymer, somehow "combined" or "fused" with other, denser materials. There is currently no way for us to reproduce this material, let alone properly study it without outright disintegrating it and analyzing it on the atomic level.
Knowing what we know about the Reapers now, I'm happy with my original decision to keep it in a sealed, radiologically-rated hazard container with a secondary, electromagnetic "buffer" field. Even still, the Reapers were powerful enough that I had no way of knowing if this was really enough.
"Volia." I exclaimed, picking up the case so Richard could get a better look at it. "One Reaper fragment."
"You've had this down here the whole time?" He questioned, getting my eyebrows to shoot up.
"You didn't already know about this?" I remarked, a little confused. "We ran tests on this over a year ago. It's the twenty kilo sample the Alliance sent us."
"I must have been busy with something else at the time." He shook his head, fear slipping onto his face. "That thing might not be safe, and you have it just laying down here?!"
"I doubt without any kind of energy source its a threat." I chastised, trying to calm him down somewhat. "However, I do have an idea for how we can possibly get the frequency we need."
"What do you have in mind?" He crossed his arms, still eyeing the case with suspicion.
"Well… if we put the sample in a magnetically-sealed chamber and subject it to an electrical current, perhaps we can "charge" the material and get a reading from it we can use." I theorized as his eyes lit up, the cogs in his head turning.
To be honest, it wasn't my idea. Old Dan had sent me an encoded message the night before to my surprise, under the alias "Calvin Nomad". He stated that he had lost the original frequency, instead recommending that we do the experiment I just rattled off. He said an eighty volt electrical current should allow it to broadcast enough of a signal that we could isolate it for testing the Snoopers.
As reluctant as I was to interact with him after last time, I was in no position to turn down his assistance.
"That might just work. If what the Geth have told me is true, every little piece of the Reaper has the potential to generate a signal." He nodded, rubbing his chin as he blinked rapidly. "Let's get this to Lab 3, there's a large vacuum chamber there we can use."
With that, I sealed the vault back up again, stopping for a moment to eye up the nuclear device in the corner before turning off the lights and sealing the room with a loud, pressurized hiss.
…
CASTLE Base, April 3rd, 11:35 AM, 2185
…
As I made the final connection to the oddly-colored Reaper sample, I leaned back to take a look at it. From an outside glance, it looked as if we had simply attached jumper cables to a piece of metal. In reality, they would be almost entirely correct. Even though it had taken us half an hour to set this up, I still wasn't sure if it would work or not.
Either way, we had to try. The alternative was waiting until the Reapers were breaking down our doors, and I wasn't going to even suggest something like that to my friends.
"That should do it." I nodded, looking back at Richard as he brought both devices into the room, activating both and putting them down on the floor in front of the device. "You got those things configured to ignore the electrical frequency?"
"Yes." He confirmed through his helmet's speakers, turning the large knob on the side of the "older" Snooper, creating an electrical hum as it powered up. He then attached two, thick wires to the devices, running them to outlets in the wall. "Come on, let's get out of here."
We left the vacuum chamber, sealing the door behind us and taking our helmets off as the magnetic field was engaged inside, sealing the room. Powell and David watched us from the other side of the room's observation window, occasionally speaking with one another as we prepared for the experiment.
"I hope this works, I'd hate to ruin a perfectly good sample." Richard mused, opening up the interfaces. "Any ideas?"
"Ideas?" I repeated back to him, not sure he was getting at.
"Sorry, what I meant to say is should we gradually increase the voltage, or jump up to one more specific?" He clarified, getting me to stop and think for a second. "I'd imagine gradually increasing voltage might be safer."
"Alright, in that case, let's start at forty volts and bring it up from there." I began, "turning on" the metal as I raised the voltage in ten volt increments. Richard monitored the two Snooper devices manually, using the wires directly linked to the room's control terminal to observe any changes.
"No change, increase voltage." Richard ordered as I raised it another ten volts. "Still no change."
"Let's try sixty then." I nodded, turning it up again as I observed something odd.
The Reaper sample looked as if it was now glowing as we pumped electricity into it, almost as if it had some kind of Cherenkov radiation being emitted off of it like the fuel rods of a pool-type nuclear reactor.
"Still nothing. Keep going." Richard said with apprehension in his voice as both of us stood cautiously.
"Seventy volts." I announced, looking up at David and Powell as they continued to speak to each other, unable to be heard by us.
Now the sample glowed even brighter, very clearly excited by the electricity we were pumping into it. I had no idea if this kind of "reaction" was normal or not, and from what I could gather from the expression on Richard's face, neither did he.
"Let's try eighty." He urged, nodding to me as I turned it up one more time.
"We're now at eighty volts." I remarked, suddenly feeling an odd sensation in the pit of my stomach as I looked at the sample, followed by nausea. "Hit...hit the alarm!"
As Richard smashed the alarm panel on the wall, I leaned forward in pain, screeching noises all around me like nails on a chalkboard. Richard, too, was doubling over where he stood, trying and failing to brace himself on the wall. Before I could reach for the controls and shut it off, my vision cut off as I hit the floor, everything going dark for several seconds before new images shot into my mind.
I saw "snapshots" of an alien race flash through my mind, advanced, but appearing almost tribal in nature. I watched from the perspective of several of them as Reapers descended from the sky, destroying all around them as their world was burned. They were collected… no, harvested by hideous abominations, thrown in tanks that… melted them down to nothing. As they were reformed… into a Reaper.
The last image that flashed through my mind was that of the Reaper itself… it was Sovereign. Its last moments as it was destroyed at The Battle of The Citadel by the Fifth Fleet.
As it exploded, my vision suddenly returned to normal, seeing Powell above Richard and I as several marines scanned the room for possible threats. I had a massive headache, and every light source felt like a hot ice pick poking my brain.
"Dr. Michaels, are you alright?" Powell asked, holding out his hand to help me back on my feet. I accepted it, shakily getting back up.
"Ugh...no, I'm not alright. Far fucking from it." I exclaimed, pushing my palms into my eye sockets as I attempted to relieve the pressure pushing on my head. "What the fuck happened?!"
"It appears the magnetic field in the chamber wasn't strong enough." David theorized, walking up to us. "A signal was able to broadcast despite the precautions taken beforehand."
"Turn that god damn alarm off before my skull splits open." I yelled, one of the marines shutting it down moments later. "Did we get the signal, at least?"
"It appears so." David nodded as I cracked a reluctant smile.
Looking into the chamber, I saw the sample, lightly smoking with fused, burnt wires stuck to it. The sample itself had gone from the bluish, black color to completely black, scorched from some kind of heat.
I could barely see straight as my head pounded, alternating between hot pokers and jackhammers. Richard wasn't much better from what I could gather, as he groaned, leaned over, and vomited on the floor.
"Marine, help me move these two to the medical level." Powell ordered, picking up Richard as one of the marines moved towards me.
"Don't fucking touch me, I can move just fine." I immediately rejected, getting a worried look from David as I followed Powell, doing my best to walk in a straight line.
As I made my way to the elevator, I could still "see" the images that had flashed through my mind, like the slides on an old projector. Trying to visualize each in my mind caused significant pain, as if just the thought of it caused stress on my brain.
For the sake of my sanity, I had to relegate the images to my memory. I didn't need any more problems on top of what we may have already had from this… experience.
…
CASTLE Base, April 3rd, 5:20 PM, 2185
…
After several hours of examinations and tests, Richard and I had been given a clean bill of health. At least, that was the "official" way of looking at it. Powell and David had determined that due to the slow "charge up" period we had put the sample through, it had enough of a built-up electrical charge that, by the time we reached eighty volts, it could broadcast a strong enough signal to overwhelm the room's own magnetic field.
It was my own damn fault. We should have started at eighty volts from the beginning instead of building up its charge. In fairness, we had no idea it was capable of doing this, but that didn't make my mistake any less stupid. Due to our lack of understanding when it came to the Reapers, we had no idea what kind of lasting, long-term damage this may have caused.
At least the headache was gone. For now.
Mara had come to check up on me the moment she heard about the accident. Even though I assured her it was alright, I couldn't help but doubt my own assessment. Even without the headache around, trying to recall the images from before caused sharp, acute pain in my temporal lobes. It was as if Andre The Giant was crushing my head like a beer can. The doctors had no explanation for this as of yet, but Richard… he had his own theory.
He apparently saw the same images as me, and suffered similar pain trying to recall them. He believed we may have, somehow, seen the genetic memories of whatever race had come before us. Namely, the Protheans. The images also answered a question that I no longer wanted to know the answer to.
The Reapers were indeed made of biopolymers like we had originally theorized. The "bio" part of it consisted of people. Thousands and thousands of people, melted down into what I could only guess was a "genetic paste" of some kind. When the Geth described them as "living starships", they were being far more literal than I could have predicted.
Sitting quietly in my office with Orbital's "Halcyon On and On" playing in the background, I tried my best to relax after the events of the last few hours. Luckily, no one had bothered me with any reports or "orders" as Gerrel liked to call them. Unfortunately, I still had to prepare for the Conclave tomorrow. It would be a busy day, that much was certain.
As I reclined in my chair and listened to the beats, I heard a familiar knock at my door. It was Dan.
"Its unlocked." I said, still leaning back in my chair as he opened the door, coming in with a worried look on his face.
"I heard what h-happened." He immediately started, coming over and sitting down across from me. "What was that ass Richard thinking?"
"It was my idea." I corrected, holding one arm over my eyes as I lowered the volume on the speakers.
"If that's the case, th-then you won't mind if I call you an idiot." He immediately insulted, getting a reflexive smile out of me. "Why'd you guys do that?"
"We needed to know the frequency of the Reaper signal for his Snoopers to be worth anything." I answered, sitting back up straight. "Nevermind that, you're obviously not here to complain about my lack of judgement and safety procedure. You could have done that at any other time."
"You'd be right about that." He nodded, pulling out an OSD. "I've got something here I'd like to pass by you before I present it to the Admirals tomorrow. Just a little something I've… cooked up the last forty-eight hours."
"Must be important." I deadpanned, plugging it into my computer and viewing its contents. The project names alone made me suspicious, labeled "Caprica" and "Dradis" respectively. "Daaaaan?"
"Now hear me out, I think b-both of these could be very good in the l...long run." He immediately defended as I opened up both project files, seeing this madman had "designed" an up-sized cruiser and a dreadnought, based on the Adamant-class frigate and Jupiter-class respectively from Battlestar Galactica: Deadlock. "You had a good po...point back on the D-Discovery, this would be a great way to deploy our fighters."
"Are you insane? This would be beyond daunting just for one of these, let alone both." I criticized as Dan rolled his eyes. "Besides, the Citadel would be all over us if we started building dreadnoughts."
"Even if we WERE subject to the Treaty of Farixen, we wouldn't have to w-worry about any of that." He redirected, leaning over my desk and blowing up the schematic. "It has no dreadnought-grade w-weapons, only these dual 508mm mass accelerator turrets in addition to se...several other weapon systems."
"Oh, only 508mm? That's a larger caliber than the guns on an Iowa-class battleship." I chastised, not getting how he thought this was a reasonable idea as I sighed in an attempt to calm myself. "Dan, I'm not going to lie, I don't understand how we went from a joke to this."
"I never took it as a j-joke." He defended, giving me a sly look. "Tell you what… let's make a b-bet. If I can convince the A-Admirals to build these ships, you've got to announce to the entire facility that I w-was right."
"You're. On." I spoke in a lower tone, standing up and putting both hands on the ends of my desk. "I dare you to convince any of them."
"Oh, you'll be eating t-those words." He promised, taking his OSD with a smile as he walked out of my office, leaving me shaking my head.
I really couldn't ask for a better, crazier friend than Dan. Even so, I couldn't help but think of that dream again as I watched him leave.
My mind really was going to dark places.
…
A/N: Hello again. Got bitten by the writing bug once more, so you guys get a new chapter ahead of schedule. I don't have much more to say than that, only that I hope you enjoyed the chapter.
As always, I'm always up for suggestions or constructive criticism. Please leave a review telling me what you think of the story so far, and stay tuned!