A/N: How we doing folks, settling back in the swing of things. Not much for me to say in this author's note, other than I am falling behind just a bit, but hey ho we are about to get into the last half of Mass Effect 1 actually, with Noveria, Illos, and, of course, wonderful, sunny, Virmire.
I have been writing parts of Virmire for the last year now, because when it hits, history will change definitively.
Anyway this part is all in bold because this story now as a jury-rigged cover, and art piece, all courtesy of LuzaitisActual on Twitter. It's a picture of Mai and JD obviously being not platonic, and if you look on the AO3 version of this story or go to their twitter, you can see a full-res version of it!
In speaking of Mai and JD being a thing. As I said at the beginning of this story, nothing is promised, and I maintain that. However you have to understand if you've read this far the definition of love, romantic love, is something special in this story. It is the culmination of experience and personal development, and it is not an end-all-be-all for the problems of people, especially JD and Mai; the journey, people, not the destination.
1-24
Jackals - Saddle Up
Mai's not sure what day it is when she wakes up on Altis, all she knows is that she's still on shore leave, and she still has orders to do nothing. Her eyes open in a lonely hotel room, barely perturbed. The only evidence that anyone has been using it is her duffle bag in the corner and the imprint of her body on a bed that barely fits her. An unfamiliar ceiling, the drone of the Normandy gone and instead replaced by the hum of the building's air filtration.
She opens her eyes to a plain ceiling and she has a craving for light and a cotton mouth that she recognizes as the afterwards of drinking the sweet elixir of a vodka and soda.
The glass of water she has pre-emptively left by her bedside is chugged immediately as she sits up, looking to the curtains on the window.
How naturally she flashes her omni, kept there by a tight flesh colored band on her wrist, to open up those curtains for sunlight that morning. The light pools in like smoke, and she tells herself she is awake as she rises and sits at the edge of the bed.
The bruises from her brawl with Hitman at the beach have faded, and she feels better for it. There are truths to her that she has to admit of course, however today, all she can reckon with is that she enjoys a good fight as much as anyone else. That is her conflict however, her contradiction. Her eternal fight must not be eternal on the basis of a new mission, and she has to let her enemy remain.
Even after a night, a sleep, Mai feels JD's hands around her own, confronting down the Covenant and telling her not to fight. It burns her, but its such warmth that gets through her skin and steel bones that she enjoys the thought, privately. If that was tough love, she starts to understand what that word means overall: love. However, it sits in her mind like a poison, a triangle trying to put through a circle hole. However, she's always been about the brute force of things.
Covenant Banshees and Spirits fly around, intermingling with Council and Alliance shuttles, and given where she is in the hotel it's about level with her. It's as if she could reach out, with her hand, through the thick glass and crush their steel.
She has to deny such feeling, down to her very core, which is why today Mai brings her desk chair to in front of the window, and looks out to the new world, at the new normal, until she starves.
When JD finally knocks on her door she is more than happy that he has brought burgers with him.
It should've been a momentous occasion. A baptism amongst the stars affirming that no amount of downtime could ever dull their blades: That much Usze Tahamee thought as he twists the blade of his sword through a Batarian captain as the pirates that have so foolishly challenged the Ardent Prayer in its tour of the galaxy twist around from the door they were all looking leading to the bridge only to see Sangheili decloak with their burning energy swords. It betrays them as the sealed door is burst through with the roar of the massive Hunter pair that has boarded that frigate, the flying pieces of steel taking out several of the pirates as all hell broke loose.
On the bridge of the Ardent Prayer, visual feeds of the boarding parties fill the air with their carnage. It is, as the Human says, another day on the job. "Damage reports?" Shipmistress Karonee swiveled with her hoverchair.
"Energy shielding holding steady, enemy fire is marginal."
"Any residual bleed?"
"No shipmistress."
Interesting.
Of all the things that she has missed of the old world they lived in, it is of being in command of an assault carrier and not the smaller frigate that is the Ardent Prayer. The power which she wielded, the ability to burn planets, she misses it. Although seeing the Ardent Prayer take on three rather similarly sized pirate ships and come out with nothing but a scratch, it fills her with wordless thoughts about what, exactly, the Covenant is still capable of.
"Heat dumped from the plasma cannons, ready for another volley if needed."
Karonee nodded as her bridge crew reported from their stations. "Bring us to mark three-four and hold for our troop transports." She ordered, and they all affirmed as the Ardent Prayer rose from the debris field of its own making and held position.
The battle was very typical, and it reminded her of Jackal pirates who had been so greedy as to break away and raid Covenant ships.
"Do we have any initial analysis?" She turns over from bridge member to bridge member, looking for reports for what has just happened:
What was to be a tour of a relatively safe area of space within Asari territory, the Ardent Prayer allowed to scan for stellar phenomena and rest from its whirlwind tour of the civilized galaxy, had turned into an ambush.
Not that it had been a particularly bad one.
"Enemy's secondary fire systems had minimal effects, main fire seems to be of similar concept as the Human's own ship weapons, albeit with a much-reduced mass. Overall faster projectile speed however… Main projectiles have traces of element zero."
"I see… Boarding parties I need situation reports?"
"One moment." It was Usze responding with that as he, with a Plasma Rifle in one hand, gunned down a few desperate defenders as his shields flared from gunshots he had long since ignored. There was no danger to him as people screamed, Hunters cleaning up those he didn't cut through.
Three attacking ships, three boarding parties sent out the second the Ardent Prayer brought its guns to bare and opened fire, disabling them all.
How easy they fell back into their roles of a military ship.
To be fair to them, Karonee mused, what choice did they have when they emerged out of the black of space like that, responding to no hails and immediately going to flank her ship? How absurd the idea of hailing ships were in this universe, an idea that she had to get used to as she crossed into borders of different civilizations that belonged to the Council, such formalities were beneath her station as a Covenant Fleetmistress once, however she is the last of her kind in many ways now. It is, at least, nice to know that the months away from combat hasn't dulled her sense of command. Unlucky for whoever these pirates were that they had stumbled across the Ardent Prayer, not only as a frigate, but as what it was to this galaxy:
The Ardent Prayer was over 950 meters long, the size of most dreadnaughts, and just a shy touch shorter than the Destiny Ascension protecting the Citadel. Acting as a classical warship, its plasma cannons and laser batteries put it in the sort of combat that was non-standard in this galaxy. Whereas ship-to-ship combat in that galaxy had been developed into the doctrines of shootouts, the Ardent Prayer fought as a naval ship did: broadsides at a knife's edge. The fighter compliment and boarding parties it carried also didn't hurt. It was a ship like no other in the galaxy, and Karonee, upon seeing the Turian military demonstrate their own combat prowess to her during her visit to Palaven, she wondered truly if she could conquer this Milky Way with simple a flotilla of ships like the Ardent Prayer.
To think mere frigates on their standard were dreadnaughts to the Citadel, she understood what power the Covenant represented a little more.
The Ardent Prayer carried with it more than troops and firepower; it carried with it the best of the Covenant's technology as transferred from the Solace. The Solace had done its duty as a spaceship, and so certain components of it had been retrofitted onto the Ardent Prayer before its journey around the Galaxy. The controls to the most powerful tool in her arsenal remained in Karonee's holochair, keyed only for her biometrics. It was neither the time and place for it.
"Shadow Group A?" Usze's personal group was called for by Karonee. The Special Forces of the Covenant were always named after the shade of the dark.
Usze had nodded as he picked up his bloody boots off the head of a dead Batarian, pulling his sword out of them as he stared about this supposed bridge. No windows. All screens and electronics. It felt cramped, but not cramped enough to dissuade a fight as pirates lay dying of several different species. Mostly Batarians and Turians, some Humans even.
They all died the same.
The Jackals and Grunts moved up to finish the clear as the Hunters in their hulking shambling sat quietly, staring at the bridge tech.
"Group A has secured, Shipmistress."
"As has Group B." The Major Ke Nazhumee reported, the Elite Ranger in his silver armor and fuel rod gun a little less dramatic than Usze's own breaching technique. This ship he was charged to take over hadn't been as welcoming to inside-ship action, but he was a Ranger with a compliment of them, and their spaceborne, EVA capable fighting style had done well enough to simply space the ship's corridors by slicing holes in the hull and suffocating those within. Only now in the ship did anyone actually fire a shot, and he had been too old to not prefer explosives over a plasma rifle.
It was the last group, Group C, that did not answer. Not that it needed to.
Karonee doubted that the Prelate had much trouble after they were dropped in with a choice group of Honor Guard Liaisons. It was on that day she realized that pain was the same in every language, and that even Elites could be bested by a San'Shyuum in combat. The Prelate wiped down its hardlight staff silently, and one of the Honor Guards answered for them. Everyone had been killed.
No casualties.
None worth stating that is.
Grunts would always find themselves in a place to get killed, and Jackals, their over curiosity to pat down bodies would put them in the way of enemy fire unnecessarily. Even those numbers were no more than a handful.
By her side right now: The Brute Mercaius.
As a Brute Chieftain offered her solace a lifetime ago, so too would she offer her council to another of the Covenant, doubting her path.
"Do you know of the Ardent Prayer's original purpose, Mercaius?" She asked him as the bridge crew handled the rest of the situation: repose, report, and rendezvous. A message had yet to be sent to the closest Council force, but there was no need to unnecessarily burden them given how long it might've taken them to travel out here.
The Brute shook their head silently behind their blue Brute Major helmet, winged tipped lines on it making his face for him.
She was interested in this Brute, earnestly. Whereas others had been proud members of their species, warlike and deserving of their offhand name, he was something else. Reserved, inwardly thinking, like a pot of boiling water simmering over a fire. There was something to him that she could feel.
"This ship was an exploration vessel. It charted slipspace routes, fought lesser species, and did the work of the Covenant all the same as the Blood of Union, or the Long Night of Solace. Perhaps its place in the Great Journey will be better here, than it would've been in the War." Her gravity chair's communicator beeped, alerting her that there was a message in her quarters. "Mercaius, if you will?"
The Brute nodded, setting his clan's gravity hammer to rest on its side as Karonee stepped out and he replacing her. He was now in command of the Ardent Prayer, for he was its First Officer.
A radical choice by Karonee to be sure, but these were new times.
"Shadows, comb the ship for resources and then return to your respective staging areas for pickup." Mercaius growled out. "Tell the Jackals they only have a limited time to pick what they may from the dead."
Usze had nodded into his omni as he shut it off on his bracer. Useful tools, he thought. The convenience of such a computer having been designed for individual use at a whim like this was something he had enjoyed about this universe. Wartime left little for the usage of these smaller considerations. Every omni tool engineering firm had been scrambling to offer a free set to the Ardent Prayer's contingent every planet they landed at within Citadel space, and who were they to not accept them?
An Engineer brought along with the boarding party looked at him expectantly, and he had nodded. Jackals weren't the only to touch upon the dead. He moved asides the Batarian whose skull he crushed, and the Engineer had with its many tentacles didn't mind the blood, looking over the pirate's weapon, gear, and even body itself.
With an urgency that even Usze noticed, it lifted the man's arm up, and it was his omni that was activated. The Engineer's watery head had looked up at Usze. He was never good at understanding the intentions of these creatures, but he didn't need to as he looked at the omni.
DOWNLOAD COMPLETE.
Kneeling down, taking the dead man's arm in his own hand, he had simply looked at the data packet downloaded into the omni as the rest of his boarding party did their business.
Back on the Ardent Prayer, Karonee wanders into her utilitarian quarters. Sleeping and quarters on Covenant ship has never been the most comfortable of things, mostly relegated to drugs and coffins, not unlike the human cryo tubes, however the Ardent Prayer offers her a little more creature comforts. A bed, a view outside to the battlefield, some shelves and a table that is currently beeping by its holo emitter.
Only one person has the authority to directly contact her like this.
"Noble Hierarch." She bows her head as she activates it, standing before her desk as an emitter made the image of the Prophet of Destiny before you.
"Have you missed me, Shipmistress?"
A chill through her spine. "I'd be against my pride to admit, Hierarch." The relations of power between those who have it, and those who do not will always be the same. It is the same now. She can see his smirk as she raises herself up. "What is thy bidding?"
"Efficient as always, Shipmistress." More and more he assumes the image of Truth, and she has no complaint. Memories of the way things used to be are always welcome. "How goes your travels?"
A piece of a blown off turret from the pirates passes by her window, and she regards it as one does a leaf in the wind. "We've just finished an engagement. Pirates. The same in every galaxy it seems."
"Oh my. Any issue?"
"None. Your prelate will surely address it in his reports have they any more insight… What is their name, if I may inquire?" Karonee drops the air of her addressing for a moment, she and Destiny have always had a working relationship that was of certain discretions, so she is allowed to reach out in this moment.
"None, truthfully." Destiny nods, regarding the closest thing to a Demon that the Covenant has. "He gave up his name long ago, in service to the protection of us Prophets on the Solace. He comes from the Prophet Regret's own cadre."
"I see, Hierach, forgive my inquiry."
"Oh Karonee, when will you learn that we do not stand on this formality."
Sexual relations between Sangheili and San'Shyuum are not unheard of, as much as Karonee derides and secretly detests the fact and Destiny yearns for it. Perhaps the propriety of it, of his harassment of Karonee for as long as she was in command of her fleet in the Solace's battlegroup, was warded off by the wider Covenant. Now he IS the Covenant, and she is glad she is away on the Ardent Prayer.
"We're dealing with the pirates now, but, otherwise, there is nothing pressing, everything is going smoothly and much data is being gathered regarding this galaxy."
Important data such as homeworlds, culinary diet, information nets and social norms. Everything they need to adjust to this galaxy to exist and live in it. She can't be help think that it is for the sake of war, but no such plans are in pace save for that against the Geth. There is no war here for them to embark on, no great crusade.
They are simply beings adrift in a galactic community now.
"Good, Shipmistress. There is another directive by which we must pursue… A somewhat pressing matter."
"Of course, my Hierarch." She bows her head and her half cape flutters, head piqued for orders.
Destiny does not have the pomp or the faithful garnering of the once higher prophets. He was a prophet of minor importance compared to the whole Covenant, who still had duties of his own to attend to that read of book keeping and minor sermons. So even now he gets to it, explaining to her directly instead of a subordinate. "A Jackal we had originally assigned to assist the Alliance has gone missing; his duties allowed him a certain amount of freedom that he used to gather up a small portion of forces, mostly Jackals of his ilk, and take off in free flight from Altis. They are missing."
Pirates are the same in every galaxy. "Jackals are up to their baser instincts as usual, it seems."
"As it appears, shipmistress." Destiny empathizes. He knows how much, even now, the Jackals of the Solace still approach matters with a mercantile skew. Converting the Covenant's own private idea of currency into the galactic standard has made even his bulbous head ache. "We will forward you more information when necessary, but in the course of your voyage if you are able to approach this situation, we expect them to be dealt with as you have the heretics in your long service."
"Your will shall be done, hierarch."
"Very good. Be sure to keep this among your officers, no need for help from the Council. Our relations with everyone seems to be very quaint now, does it?"
An Asari child approached her on Thessia. On a planet that was matriarchal, she felt at home, admittedly, and they had given her an echo of authority and respect that she could get used to. The child approached her, the child of a diplomat meeting them for tours and discussions on the Goddess Athena and her temples, and it did not know better than to grab Karonee's claws. One claw could only be held at a time, but the child played with them as Karonee, out of a wordless impression, let them before the diplomat took their child back, muttering apologies that Karonee simply shook her head at.
On Palaven, the Grunts, somehow, found common ground with the Volus for reasons that perhaps rely on height more than anyone would admit, while her Elites sparred in training with the best of the Turian military. For the first time since the War, they felt alive, and surprisingly even Turians had their own sense of honor that the Sangheili understood.
She heard one Turian call one of her Elites "brother" after a match of sparring, and for that she wonders if the Sangheili can stand alone in the galaxy.
Sur'Kesh, the homeworld of the Salarians, is a little different. They have been advised amongst their own and every other species that the Salarians are inherently spies in the matters that bring them to that planet, however the Covenant is greeted in a rigid formality and speed that is refreshing from all the others trying to instill greatness and awe. For the first time in her life she has heard a Hunter pair speak a conversation outside of their duties with a Salarian engineer at the Ardent Prayer's dock.
"Very quaint indeed." She affirms, and she dreams, and she wonders who she might've been if she was born in this universe.
"It's quite a shame I can't be assigned to two assignments at once." They talk with a casual air that betrays who they are because they both, or, at least she, is already a completely read book to the one that gives her orders. They both stare out to the sun outside of that vast viewing screen, out from that glass floored office that is almost as incomprehensibly deep as a black hole. "The Covenant certainly would provide a shake up to almost every contingency we have regarding our contingencies with the Citadel. How could we have planned for this?"
Inhale. Wait. Drag. A cloud of smoke. The two of them look not at the sun, but a screen of real time footage from three pirate cruisers, paid off to be in an area to intercept the Covenant frigate doing its tour of the galaxy. Certain accommodations were made, and people paid off, and the bounty is about worth it as years of researchable footage and data reels back into the hands of Humanity's self-anointed guardian organization.
"This same situation would've happened if, say, we came across an isolated race who had access to Prothean technology and information. It is not an outlandish scenario, Miss Lawson." He says in a smoky voice. "Difficult, yes, I recognize that, but not that disorienting to Cerberus."
She walks through one of the holographic screens in front his chair as he sits, arms crossed, still annoyed at the thought. He could only grin as he takes another drag. She's always been about control and competency. "They pose more than just a threat; they are the proof that what we're doing is completely justified."
They know. Of course they do. Too many admirals in the Admiralty talk, and all they needed was one to see it their way.
The Covenant was a genocidal alien empire who came here during an extermination war, and had they landed anywhere else they would be continuing that war. It is a realization of the ideals of Cerberus: that a threat like the Covenant exists against Humanity, that the person they call the Illusive Man cannot help but think that this is not a pain, but rather a blessing.
Nothing to say of the ODST and the Spartan.
"Between the Covenant and Shepard's special assets, we know what we have to approach first Miss Lawson. This was all just foreplay, mind you." The Illusive Man waves his hand with the cigarette in it vaguely, and the recordings shrink away, analyzed left to the labs and scientists he has hired to do such a thing. Destroying the Ardent Prayer would do no one any favors when the opportunity to do more than that was plausible, down the line. Miranda looks at him with a skepticism that he always appreciates of her. With who he is, many of his underlings are liable to worship, but at least Miranda holds no such fanciful fealty. To do so would get in the way of a perfect job done. "Oh Miranda, do remember I'm sending you on vacation for once, you've earned it after all this time." He's coy in his older age, what he does is dark and what he manages is a great weight upon history and the future. He's still Human however, and Miranda swears he flutters grey eyelashes at her over blue cybernetic eyes.
His type of humor is always dry.
"Right, wonderful, cheerful Noveria…"
He is as he is most days, that final few hours on Altis: sleeping. A lonely tree has sprouted up above the endless beaches of Altis, in his duty uniform as if he had just left the Normandy, duffle bag of his belongs still tucked beneath his arm. His back is against the trunk, arms tucked into each other as his head dips off to one side.
That's how Mai finds him: a man totally at peace. Maybe it's the two week difference between him napping on the Normandy and him napping planetside on a planet where death, despite the Covenant presence, is very far away. He looks calm, his hands and legs and veins aren't as if he is in combat. She has seen him nap on the Normandy and knows that in his minds are the memories of the War. She has those same dreams. To her, they are dreams. To him, they are nightmares.
Right now, JD looks like he is dreaming. About what, she cannot know, but she hopes its of something good, something peaceful.
She has used her stealth training for things more than combat recently, and as she silently climbs up that quiet hill JD does not stir as she approaches him and, before she opens her mouth to wake him from his slumber, she instead crouches down.
Tali had tried texting her one night as she slept in bed. It was deep into midnight and it came in a flurry.
TZNRayaa: SOOOOOO MAI
TZNRayaa: WHAT TD OD YOU THINK OF JD'S BEARD?
TZNRayaa: HUMAN BEARDS ARE FUNNY BUT HE CAN GO FROM CUTE FACE TO VERY HANDSOME JUST BY GROWING IT OUT ITS AMAZING
TZNRayaa: I'M SO ENVIOUS OF YOUUUUUU AND WHAT YOU HAVE ITS I DON'T KNOW HOW TO DESCRIBE IT ITS JUST SO GREAT
Mai watches the messages roll in on her omni and she gets a separate one from the Turian:
GVak: She's drunk. Sorry Chief Gul.
Master Chief Petty Officer Mai Gul: OK.
She doesn't know whether or not to blame Tali for how she crouches in front of the man she knows best in this world and look at his face with his guard dropped. It feels as if trespassing, but she has done this before on the Normandy. The Normandy however does not offer the serene lighting that Altis does now with JD. His skin is bright, and his beard came in all at once it seemed, which was an odd thing, but it rolls over from his sideburns over his mouth and jaw like a fluffy brown envelope that is whipped like his hair. It's not there yet, but it would soon be. Mai knows the look from the most entrenched Insurrectionist who have waited for her, or someone like her, for years on lonely outposts.
Though she knows of herself perhaps not the best understander of objective, aesthetic senses, she looks and tries to see it in JD.
He has good skin, olive in the sun, but pale because of his time in the armor; she makes that note. Scars of the battlefield that crater her own body are missing from his head, and she is glad for it. He's always had a face that betrays his experience, he's a young man by definition, and she has seen many young men in her wars, however JD's is finally coming into focus for her: The flat curl of his lips, the circles beneath his eyes, the way his cheeks are just soft enough to not be bony or angular.
In that moment, Mai recognizes JD as handsome.
He sleeps deeply, and for that she is thankful as her hand betrays her control and cups his cheek. She feels his skin on her hand, and she feels the warmth of it all spread through her arm, into her chest, spooling in such a way that makes her struggle to breath. It is a type of coiling inside of her that she does not know, some foreign something in her lungs that tightens her breath, spreads to her face, and makes her wonder how much more there is to her.
Her thumb feels the cheekbone of his beneath his eye as she strokes once, and his growing beard pricks her palm in a way she can't help but be amused with, though she is distinctly aware that she shouldn't be doing this.
She draws her hand away, and simply continues to stare as she signals JD as she has been taught to: She taps his elbow gently, and his eyes, slowly, flutter to life.
He smiles, seeing her first in wakeness. "Mai."
"JD." She says softly.
"About time?" She draws her hand away from his elbow as he stretches his body like a cat, even in his position. There's such a complacent look to his face that Mai regrets waking him at all. All she can do is nod silently at him, and he is up, duffel bag over his shoulders as he looks out at pristine waters one last time. "Ah, uh, well. These type of shore leaves never really sat well with me. Shore leave, doesn't really sit well with me."
"I never had one before."
JD snaps his head at her as she looks out against the waters as well. "Oh why didn't you tell me, Mai? I would've done something special."
"There is no need, for me."
"Course there is." He shrugs back, quietly. "Would've loved to spend a little more time with you, outside of this all."
Their shuttle back up to the Normandy is back at the Alliance FOB in the city, however there is no rush as they simply just stand there in each other's company. It's nice. It is in every single form of the word: nice.
"Are we getting used to this galaxy?" Mai asks the wind, the air, the sun and the sky. JD answers her.
"I hope so. I hope so."
Shepard lugs her duffle bag over her shoulder as, once again, three Spectres and a doctor occupy the same room.
"We'll see about getting some funds over to that orphanage you mention," Avitus is more than sympathetic. She's glad that he is. "Spirits know I'm sitting on quite a bit of funds that aren't doing any good."
Vasir tsks her head at the younger Spectre. "There's a reason why some of us have the bank accounts we do."
"I'm sure Illium appreciates the interest they pick up on yours, Tela." He shoots back, and Mordin can only do focus on bottling the last of his pills for Shepard, handing them to her.
"Best supplement for you from what I've put together. Easily created on most standard medbays if needed, so be sure to advise your own ship doctor. Is there anything else Shepard?"
She looks at the pill bottle, small enough for her to hide, good enough for her to have slept well recently, they are a god send. "No, thank you Doctor Solus." She takes them into her hand, only to shake his hand as well. She has not known many Salarians, but Mordin is a good one. "I hope we meet again down the line."
"I have a feeling we will, Commander Shepard. You are very popular topic amongst people on our level it seems." He looks out to the two other Spectres and they are guilty of the same sentiment, so she goes to them, and she hugs them, which is a very odd thing to do. Her love language is of physicality however and so sooner, rather than later, they all melt into Shepard.
"You're not what we expected, you know." Avitius whispers, but everyone hears. She pulls back from him holding his shoulder. "We thought you'd be different."
She looks at him, green eyes kind, but face older. "I can be many things. I have been many things. It makes my life a little busy, but I don't mind really."
"I see."
"Now, if you don't mind, I've got a galaxy to go save."
She leaves as storms do: with hope, drawing the dreariness of a place with her and replacing it with light. All three remaining can only look at her leave and see the future of the galaxy in each of her steps. Mordin however does not live long enough to linger too long as he is just back to it. He's cleaning up shop, putting his things in order. He too is leaving soon, called back to Sur'Kesh to report on what he has found of the Covenant. Though that's for a little bit down the line.
"Do you think Saren can be stopped?" Vasir asks, long after Shepard has disappeared into the daytime crowds.
Avitus takes a moment, staring out, looking up to the skies and the ships above. "He has to be."
"Precursor." Mordin says, interrupting them all, typing into his omni about a report he's crushing about Grunt blood. "Saren echoes the coming of the Reapers. Presupposes that they exist outside of Saren's influence. Galaxy will have to fight them eventually, whatever they are."
It's a cheap guess, perhaps: that there will be another great war at some point, but Mordin was never wrong by his technicalities. Saren prophesized their coming, not their existence. Their existence was already a precondition to this galaxy in the same way the planets or time was; they always just, apparently were. Everyone who had been curious in the Reapers had the resources to see that there might have been such a power in that galaxy once; the evidence had been plain as the relays or the Citadel: what happened to the Protheans? What happened to planets like Feros?
Mordin is there in his memories: Tuchanka, watching the Krogan tear themselves asunder over fertility and children. They are symptoms to him, and people like him that room right now.
"Saren is a symptom, not the cause."
Two weeks beach vacation is perhaps a little insane to think of when chasing a galaxy ending conspiracy plot, but they're only, mostly, Human. Days blur together as Shepard organized away mission after away mission, a hundred different side-tasks for her to dig through that would help either her resource pool or finding Saren in the end.
Surprisingly the Normandy herself has been rather complacent with its duties so far.
"I'm telling you Shep, put me in a position to use those guns, I'm a crack shot, honest." Viewing out of the Alliance space station and dockyard moved over Altis, Joker can't help but speak for his ship as the Normandy's crew all waits in an ops room for a briefing.
"I'm sure you are, Joker… Not too upset about the upgrades?"
"Ah, nothing that the gearheads didn't keep me filled in about throughout our trip thus far. I knew this was coming. Not really surprising seeing as the Geth are around the corner, with or without this Reaper shit. I'm sure you'll find some of them more useful than others." Joker's always had back slapping permissions with everyone on the ship, and he avoid the fire back if only because a slap would very much fracture his spine, so he simply grabs a front row chair and chats it up with Hitman.
The Normandy hasn't had much changed to its body, save for a new coat of paint of Alliance blue trim and some extensions along the underside of where the well deck would be. She had read the details, but she wasn't much interested in them as she was the Quarian fleet maneuvers happening far enough away from Altis to not impede normal traffic. Battle lines are made and kept and simulations done all underneath the direction of Covenant advisors, the Quarians getting used to a new way of fighting that will soon be used in lockstep with her actions. Whatever happens with Saren, the Quarians will more than likely use it to springboard a campaign the Galaxy has never seen before.
Quarian propaganda messages are sent off through the extranet: calling all Quarians who have not returned from their Pilgrimage home, and for the galaxy to support them in what they are now calling the Final Journey.
"They are puppets and agents to a galactic wide conspiracy to end all organic life!"
"The only answer to the Geth is a massive offensive for their extermination."
"A thousand generations ahead of us now rely on our decisive action. Keelah'Selai."
Rannoch-Sanghelios will be reclaimed, and the galaxy waits patiently.
There is a word in the Islamic faith that Shepard thinks about whenever Quarians speak of reclaiming the homeworld: Jihad.
Shepard is not unfamiliar with caliphates and the idea of religious crusades. She had spent her time in the Middle East in her travels, and she had seen ancient wars rear their heads in forgotten places of Planet Earth in the name of faith. The closest the Quarians have to a god is Rannoch, and they are going to reclaim her.
All around their resident Quarian, Hitman looks her up and down, and she is more than willing to show off her utility cloak and new suit. The floral design of her hood and suit clashes against the utilitarian neutral of the cloak which goes down to her chest; when she flaps it up she reveals a set of battle instruments and tool kits.
"Tons of grenades too." She says, and Hitman uproars with her in delight as she is caught up with the Marines that cheer her on to become who she thinks she needs to be. How could she not become of them? Supersoldiers and Marines and well-intention renegade cops and mercenaries?
In the corner, in their own dark place as usual waiting for the processions are the two chiefs: Gul and Durante.
Durante has a beard now and damn doesn't he look fine.
The beard is the first thing she notices and not the combat visor which she has seen before, mirrored in the Turian that walks up to them, as always wary of Mai, but he is becoming used to it.
"How's it fitting so far?" He asks with a hint of pride.
JD taps the metal side of it. "Went plinking with it. It's actually pretty neat."
"Oh just wait till you get used to playing music in your ear every fight."
"You do that?" JD is halfway through a soft laugh at that realization.
Garrus rolls his head around. "Little bit."
They are ex-Cerberus. That is what the spooks told her, and even as Mai stands in shadows as JD and Garrus chat, keeping a very close eye on him, Shepard cannot believe it. She has chased truth all her life. She knows when she stands on a lie. Though why would the entire command apparatus of the Alliance lie to her?
Garrus leaves them be, for even he needs to meter his exposure to Mai's presence as much as anyone else.
"You said you usually don't grow a beard." For Mai, warmth spreads on her hand thinking about holding his face.
JD shrugs, running hands through the growth. "I dunno. Maybe not being stressed helps out."
"Hm." Mai makes a sound. Maybe she really should've spent more time with him on Altis.
The door opens to Ops and all of Hitman, and all of the attached, spring to attention.
Even Wrex, who has returned out of nowhere having stated that he spent the last few days "sleeping". Even Shepard can't quite coax anything else out of the Krogan, but to be fair he might literally have just done that. Liara is nursing a hangover in one of the front seats as well, and she, a little clumsily, stands as in walk in two familiar figures, and a third.
Sunglasses, Cleft-Lip, and the permenantly twisted face of Admiral Mikhailovich.
Kaiden had been closest to the door for such the occasion: "Ten-hut!"
Even in the back of the room JD and Mai rendered attention as Mikhailovich entered flanked by Sunglasses and Cleft-Lip. He rendered salute promptly, dropping his data pad on the table in front of Ops. "At ease." He caught the eye of Shepard. "Commander."
"Admiral." She nodded in recognition. In another life the Normandy was to be assigned beneath his flotilla as a forward assault and infiltration ship. "Were the inspections of the Normandy to standard?"
"If you could have a seat, everyone," Mikhailovich answered first. "Then I'll get into the nitty gritty."
Marines and crew settled into their seats, the aliens dispersed among them. "Now, Commander," he had pointed her with verbal jabs before she even sat. "I believe that these… civilian specialists have been given the full rundown and clearance on what and what they are able to do while assisting the Alliance?"
She hadn't done that.
"Yes sir." She answered back. "They've been operating beneath guidelines as presented by the chain of command."
Not a lie, technically.
All of the "civilian specialists" had been of course the aliens. Wrex had been too old to not know what people really meant when they spoke, and Garrus was a cop: he knew the slickness of language even through translation software. Insulting, yes, but not unwarranted given what the Normandy was.
"Well see to it you maintain them." Mikhailovich sternly put down, Sunglasses and Cleft-Lip off to his side. JD and Mai had enjoyed admirals and officers like this. They reminded them of home. Not so did the appearance of the two Alliance intelligence agents. "Now, I know you and the crew of the Normandy have pressing matters to attend to, but be aware that, at the end of this, when Saren is held to justice and you save the galaxy from this "Reaper" nonsense, the Normandy will be assigned to me. So this is introductions." Even when the end of everything might've been coming, the infinite wisdom of command always looked to the future. "Now, my two friends here will fill you in on how else they're ruining and overdesigning the Normandy."
Sunglasses stepped forward first. "Hey, howa doin' Normandy. Had a nice vacation? Didn't think too hard about the end of the world?"
"Was alright. Altis has a weird sun though, you can't really tan in it." Joker had always been one to comment. "That and the constant Covenant shuttle craft blocking the rays."
"Yeah well that's just how things are. Least you're leaving now." Sunglasses shrugged, letting down his Sunglasses and revealing his own cybernetic eyes. "Anyway, as you know the Normandy has been going through a quick refit based on data collected from its systems and user input. It is now, officially, in a Block II configuration."
"Looks the exact same." One of the Hitmen droned in the back, gesturing to the window and the docked Normandy.
"It's still the SR-1, not the SR-2 yet you jar head." Sunglasses had been more than comfortable grilling a Marine. "The Normandy Block II has some incremental upgrades in regards to its systems, none that need to be really accounted for in new training, however there is one thing that should work toward its purpose as a deep insertion ship."
Mikhailovich grumbled. "And one that might actually be worth how much money we sank into this committee designed abomination."
Sunglasses steeled himself, looking at the Chiefs in the back. The gut feeling of warning imparted between the two of them couldn't have come fast enough.
"The largest addition with the Block II upgrades is the addition of these Fast Reaction Engagement Pods. Drop pods for short."
A holographic image is sent up front like a classroom, and a hundred drops flash before JD's eyes as his entire body tightens and he remembers who he is: an ODST.
Shepard raises her eyebrows immediately as she sees the angular, tear dropped shaped objects, a diorama of them shown.
"In short, they drop from the Normandy from orbit and deposit you safely onto the battlefield, like a shock trooper."
The Commander can't help but glance at JD. Shock trooper is a term used with him almost explicitly when he described his training. Hitman murmurs around them, some are flabbergasted, some are earnestly intrigued, while others are pondering this question:
"Deposited…?" Kaiden, for once, speaks for Hitman.
A graphical demonstration of them is put up on the holographic: As simple as it is, it depicts these pods in waves just dropping from the Normandy like bombs onto the surface, and, upon hitting land, the pod popping its door and the visual aid dummy comes out shooting.
JD knows drops are never usually that simple, but it is a dead simple concept inherently.
Cleft-Lip speaks out finally. "These puppies are going to be installed on Normandy-class frigates from here on out, and indeed most other fast reaction ships. One-time use only, but we're shipping out replacements to port of calls for the Normandy out in the Traverse. You'll be forwarded reading material, but, rest assured, men and women of your fitness should be able to use these no problem."
"Uh, sir," Emerson speaks up with a raised hand, albeit a little weak, still hurting from Mai's beach beatdown. "I've been involved with a lot of spooky shit for a while. I've never heard of anything like this before."
Sunglasses goes on to answer, motioning to the window again and Altis's special guests.
"One of the many concessions that the Covenant acquiesced during their time here is data regarding such theories. They have similar fast troop deployment methods, and, given our own Mass Effect technology, we've only been able to improve it. That's why there's such fast turn around to it… besides, it's not like we've not been looking into this. I believe Chief Durante was integral to their development."
Like a classroom the entire population of that room turns and looks to him, and he has nothing to say but to shakily nod his head once.
Those pods that the Normandy are using according to the holographic are ODST drop pods in all but name. SOEIVs. Single Occupant Entry-Insertion Vehicles. They're meant to be made quick and fast, and if what Sunglasses says has any truth to them, they're upgraded, put with research and designs from not only this galaxy, but from their own; from the Covenant. Both he and Mai know that the Covenant have had their own similar concepts of fast insertion for infantry, and, generally, the Covenant has always had that technical advantage.
There is the part of him that is a gung-ho ODST that wonders what these new designs are really capable of.
There is also another part of him that is cold: even a universe away he is being told to be an ODST.
Orders are orders.
JD gathers himself but it's not terribly convincing. "I'll- I'll uh… Fill you all in when we use them."
Mikhailovich looks awfully pleased with the idea of drop pods. Hard and fast are always what Marines need, not the stealth of the Normandy. For a moment he forgets that the two interdimensional travelers from another Humanity are present.
There are times, admittedly, where Shepard forgets the Normandy is a warship. As Joker just told her, it is a ship capable of great destruction, and she has been using it no more than just a glorified transporter across the galaxy. It's stealth drive has done great in keeping it hidden away from the many pirates and third parties who shoot on sight, but it is a warship, with guns and cannons and the propensity to kill, and perhaps it is not the only asset of hers not being fully utilized.
"There is one more big thing that the Normandy will have available to it. Cash?"
Mai and JD's heads pick up immediately as the holoprojector emits another image, this time, that of a paper-white glowing cowboy in all of his swagger.
"Howdy."
"What is that?!" Tali is to her feet despite her place. It is something innate in her to feel when something is off.
"Calm down, Miss," Sunglasses's voice is stern as Cash is frozen. Those who had been familiar with the Citadel feel a certain familiarity. He stands there, like Avina, ready and waiting. "Now, currently, the Normandy is operating beyond its means given its complement and position in how it operates, however Cash will help relieve the that workload."
Cleft-Lip finally steps forward. "Cash here is the first of many tactical VIs we are deploying. A step up from the current VI which the Normandy currently hosts. You know how it is: Pre-recorded responses to common inquiries and procedurally-generated dynamic answering prompts tailored to the Normandy and her crew. Cash? Report?"
Mai and JD look deeper, seeing Cash stand there, however he does not budge, as if a frozen image until Cleft-Lip does say something. "Tactical VI Prototype Charlie Sigma Triple Zero. Today is November 1st, 2183, and the stars are cloudy with a chance of artificial intelligence." His voice is a little more rigid, a little less smooth than how the two had last heard of him.
JD taps Mai's elbow, and she looks down at his right hand, coming flat to his chin before slicing across.
LYING.
She agrees. It would've been impossible for the Alliance to have copied Cash this fast.
Tali still stands, unsure, not knowing what she is seeing as the image of an AI and how they are usually seen stands before her. To her even Avina was a bit much: an artificial being mimicking a life form. Cash had stood and looked all so Human, even in his cowboy garb.
"A VI?" Shepard asked again.
"Of course." Cleft-Lip nods. "Go ahead, Commander Shepard, ask it what its purpose is."
"Alright, uh… Cash, what is your purpose?"
There is a straight forward smile to his face, staring right on ahead, unbreaking.
"This cowpoke will be looking forward to serving the Normandy and its crew."
There's a whole movement of things, a fake formality: each of them are told to stand in front of Cash to register themselves for his queries, but before Mai and JD can get in line Cleft-Lip motions for them to step asides.
"Registering, Lieutenant Commander Jane Kennedy Shepard, acting Captain of the SSV Normandy." Cash rattles off in his western tone. She is the last one.
"The Normandy is waiting for you, Commander Shepard, I'll give you another briefing on the way as my compatriot here and Admiral Mikhailovich have a chat with Chief Gul and Chief Durante." Sunglasses is clearly the more amiable of the two agents, and as he shuffles the Normandy crew out the door, it leaves Mai and JD standing before Cash. As if he had muscle pains to worry about, now standing with a hologram as big as any regular Human, we drops his shoulders.
"Now this takes playing dumb to a whole new definition." Cash tips his hat to the two of them. "Jonny boy, little lady."
He's been called worse, and she definitely hasn't ever been called "little" as a Spartan. There are bigger things on their minds other than nicknames however like-
"He's coming with us?" JD looks over to Cleft-Lip and Mikhailovich, who have come to stand besides Cash.
"Oh why do you sound so upset that's the case." Cash feigns insult as he generates a log beneath him and sits on it, fanning a fire with his cowboy hat.
Cleft-Lip is the first to reveal an item from his back pocket, a portable connector of sorts with the signature data chip of UNSC smart Ais plugged in. "Might as well put all of our eggs in one basket as this point as we try to plan out what's going to happen from here on out."
"Is the AI going to serve in a tactical capacity with the Normandy and Shepard?" Mai asks, her voice dead.
Cash and Cleft-Lip nod as Mikhailovich takes the opportunity to witness the spectacle before him: Supposedly there are three Humans from another reality before him and he can only really identify one.
Licking the gap of his lip Cleft-Lip explains as he looks out to the Normandy. "You two more than anyone else in this galaxy know what these AI can do, and what they're made of. He's just like you, Chief Gul."
"What?" Her thin eyebrow curves up.
"Whether or not we want to pursue the design of yourselves is irrelevant. It is such an undertaking we don't know if we ever could bridge that several century difference… Quite frankly it's the decision of the Admiralty," Cleft-Lip motions to Mikhailovich. "That Cash will be most effective serving you and the Normandy in some capacity than sequestered in a deep cover lab or the Savannah."
"Please I'd rather be up and about Chiefs." Cash is almost begging with his sarcasm. "But how about this buddy? How about you tell them that I haven't cracked worth shit any info. Less than you two."
It's not everyday that Mai smirks, but she does now as JD's leg is shaking in anxiety. Yes, he trusts UNSC AI explicitly, but he would be the only one who does. Just now Tali had at the very sight of him, without explanation, jumped to alarm. How much can they afford to hide beneath Shepard's nose?
"When this is all over," the strong voice of Mikhailovich speaks now. "When Saren is defeated, when we are allowed a breath in order to reorganize the duties of Shepard with her role as a Spectre, we will finally let you two rest. However, you have to understand that the direness of what Shepard might be defeating and stopping renders it a necessity that we have you two in support. It is not a decision we make lightly, however from mission reports, you two have been integral to her mission duties."
"Paperwork." Cash shrugs. "They'll have me on paperwork and streamlining systems of the Normandy where necessary. You know, help out Kaiden too as he fills in the new acting XO slot."
"All from there?" JD motions to the device he is currently plugged in. Cash shakes his head, instead knocking against his nogging once before pointing at Mai.
"From there, partner… Or at least her helmet… you get the point."
A Spartan. An ODST. An AI.
That's it. That's a microcosm of the UNSC as a whole, and they have been all shipped together beneath a captain that doesn't know, and perhaps deserves to know. They stand there as equals to each other, and yet giants to those native. Cookie-cutter pieces of history carved out and thrown into a new book. Comrades in arms they are, and their great struggle still remains. The weight of a Covenant War was once carried by millions of men and women, and now it has shrunk down to three.
"I promise," Cash nods with as slow and gentle a look he can muster. "Won't get in the way if you don't want. I'll just sit inside Gul's helmet and keep to my awful lonesome. Chances are you're used to AI being around perpetually anyway, I reckon."
"That's ah… That's kinda hard to just do, you know."
"Perhaps, but I am a master of being discreet. I used to be a lot like this asshole, 'member?" And Cash thumbs to Cleft-Lip, and it hits them all at once. He was an ONI agent in another life, but yet that wasn't him.
Though perhaps he's just further along to the "second life" thing that the two of them both are going through all the while.
"You're putting a lot of secrets on us." Mai says, and for the first time she really is worried about her ability to keep her confidentiality. "It could get… complicated."
Cleft-Lip looks out to the Normandy again, this time to see all that it represents. It represents the future, common bonds, cooperation, secret wars, conspiracy, tragedy, and, most of all, Humanity's best shot. "As I told you before, Chief Gul, this galaxy is built on corrupted foundations, and the spider web of lies that we all spin is one of the very few things that is holding up. What's a spider's web to Commander Shepard?"
What is the price of the status quo?
JD has a thought, but he does not say. Everyone in this galaxy wants to hold onto the status quo, but they cannot. Not with the Covenant, not with the Reapers, not with people like Shepard and Saren.
The more things change the more they stay the same, and here they are becoming who they once were.
One Humanity is as good as another.