Chapter 20. Critical Mass


2132 CE, Omega, Afterlife

"There you are," she heard the telltale flanging of a turian behind her. "Took me quite some time to find you," he chuckled as she turned around. "That's the risk of a blind date."

This was the Shadow Broker's agent, one of the closer one's as well. She had worked with him before. The turian, unlike her, was dressed rather casual, blue orange fatigues covering most of his green-plated skin.

"Would've been a lot easier on both of us if I had known who I was meeting, Dextra" Vasir countered as she turned towards the bartender and ordered two drinks, signaling the human field team that this was their target by giving one of them to the Broker's agent.

"Well, you know the Broker. He's big on secrecy," Dextra replied as he leaned against the bar.

"Some things never change, do they?" she asked as she noted the asari, a mercenary she had worked with some years back, walk up to her again. She was closely being tailed by a rather menacing looking, scarred turian who didn't even bother to hide most of the weapons he was carrying and a red-armored salarian had just made his entrance, the weapons on him not even hidden in the first place.

Great.

"You've changed though," the agent began to drink, lifting the tube to his mouth. "The Broker doesn't like to be played, Vasir."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Vasir asked. She knew exactly what it meant as she spotted two more people walking towards her. They were trying to cross her off. That they actually believed that they could sneak up on a Spectre was a rather amusing thought.

Aria would bound to be pissed. This would get very messy, very soon.

"Did you really believe that the Broker would buy your story?" the turian asked as he set down the drink and turned to look at Vasir.

"No, but I knew you'd come anyway," Tela replied. Her gamble had paid off.

"Wha-" the turian didn't get to finish as she grabbed the back of his head, slamming it into the bar and dodging the biotic swing of the asari merc behind her mere moments later. The mercenary stumbled, the momentum of her punch carrying her forward. Next the turian mercenary made a move for his gun but got interrupted as a member of the human field team, Redford if the hair was anything to go by, tackled him to the ground, allowing Vasir to shift her attention back to the asari who by now had recovered from her missed blow.

She might have been a mercenary with centuries of experience, she might have been a rather powerful biotic. Her next attack, a left, violently purple glowing hook, was executed with precision and the desire to kill. It would've made any commando proud. It would've hit most people.

Spectres weren't selected because they were most people.

The hook found nothing but empty air as Vasir leaned back just enough for the punch to miss, putting the mercenary of her balance and opening her left side up for an attack. Unlike her own strike, Vasir's didn't miss. The biotic blow, honed by four centuries of training, caused purple ripples to appear in the air as it cracked into the asari's rips, the body armor worn under her dress giving way to the force of the former Spectre's fist without taking out enough energy to make the blow less than lethal.

She felt the bones crack, fragments of the ribcage most certainly digging into the asari's lung. However Tela wasn't done. The blow caused the asari mercenary to lean forward, an opportunity she couldn't pass by. Slamming her knee into the unarmored face of the asari caused three kinds of injuries.

First it's force broke most bones in the asari's face, deadly in its own right. Secondly the blow was sure to create all sorts of internal bleeding but the third result made both of those things irrelevant. The whiplash of the strike broke the asari's neck, her head jerking back in a violent way before her entire body became limp and dropped to Tela's feet.

She shot a glance towards Dextra, the turian only now recovering from her surprise attack and caught the barrel of a gun at the edge of her vision, a single round out of the Tempest, a weapon favoured by Eclipse operatives, slamming into her biotic barriers before a powerful kick sent the salarian tumbling into the crowd who had only turned their attention towards her upon the first gun shot.

Bar brawls weren't a rarity on Omega after all.

People began to run away from the fight just as the salarian sat up and went for his backup weapon. A shotgun. He wouldn't fire that in here would he? Those thoughts crossed her mind mere moments before she jumped over the bar to avoid the screen of miniscule rounds rushing towards her. She landed on the ground as the rounds demolished the bottles which had previously been placed on a shelf behind her and pushed herself of the ground just as Dextra started to stumble away. Her attention however was drawn back to the salarian who now leaped over the bar himself, his shotgun once more pointing its deadly end at her. Tela, before the salarian could pull the trigger again, smacked the gun aside and threw a punch at him but whether through his training or his naturally faster reaction time, the salarian managed to dodge it. Now she was at a disadvantage, the orange glow of an omni-blade betraying the mercenaries intention.

He slashed out at her and Tela was only saved by the fact that she let herself fall backwards to the salarian's feet as his blow decimated even more of the bottles lining the shelves of the bar. The former Spectre decided to make the most out of the situation and lashed out at him with a biotic kick while she went for her Carnifex, a turian made 'side arm' which was able to cause damage akin to a rifle at close range. She managed to make contact with the salarian's leg and while the tougher armor of his lower abdomen had previously been able to protect him from Vasir's biotic power, the much lighter, less protective armor on his leg failed to do so.

The salarian collapsed with a scream of pain as the kick snapped his leg in half and dropped forward, allowing Tela to level the Carnifex with the salarian's head. While the mercenary had decided to forgoe a helmet, wearing one wouldn't have saved him from what was next either. The Carnifex, true to its reputation, unleashed a single round as Vasir pulled the trigger and reduced the salarian's head to a green mess, brain parts and blood spattering in all directions as it gave in to the sheer force behind the shot.

Paying no attention to the fact that some of the salarian's blood had gotten over her face, she once more got up from the ground, just in time to see Redford, a large talon-inflicted gash running across the left side of his face, smash the turian's head against the floor, causing him to stop struggling as unconsciousness overcame him.

Then she spotted Dextra run towards the VIP section of the Afterlife, a badly bleeding human of the field team collapsing in his wake, several bullet wounds visible on his upper body. Their first casualty.

"He's getting away," she called as she climbed over the bar all the while seeing two more mercenaries push their way through the crowd fleeing from the brawl, coming form the way Dextra was fleeing.

"Go after him," Redford replied as he turned nodded towards the new foes, a batarian and a vorcha, while pulling a pistol from behind his back. "I've got them!"

She nodded her understanding and shot of into the direction, too fast for either of the mercenaries to make a move who, unlike her, had to fight the tide of people coming towards them.

Her eyes stayed focus on Dextra right until the door separating the normal part of the Afterlife from its more exclusive section shut behind him, a red hologram in front of it marking it as locked. Someone was giving him a hand. Cursing under her breath, she brought up her omni-tool, still geared out with all the tech programs from when she had been an agent of the Council, and began to look at the safety measures of the door. By the looks of it, someone had triggered a 'vacuum exposure' alert within the door's system. This was a rather easy fix.

She overwrote the warning and the doors, mere moments before she would've ran into them, opened once more to reveal a red plated krogan wearing Blood Pack armor and carrying a Claymore shotgun standing in her way. Behind him people were pouring out of the VIP section, a familiar turian among them.

Great.

The pragmatic choice would've been to sidestep the shot but the crowd of people behind her would inevitably be hit by the shotgun's pellets. Neither did they wear some of the best body protection money could buy in form of Spectre's armor, nor were they shielded by a military-grade kinetic barrier generator or a naturally generated biotic mass effect field.

She was rather sure her gear could take the blow. Rather. A few years back she wouldn't have taken the chance.

Collateral Damage was part of being a Spectre and the mission came above everything else. The Claymore was a weapon that could easily shatter both her biotic and kinetic barrier, putting her and the mission at risk. She would've simply dodged the shot and allowed the pellets to unleash their deadly force on the civilians that would be caught in the cross fire.

Now she decided that being on the right side meant to be willing to take that risk.

The krogan pulled the trigger with a smirk on his face and her kinetic barriers were shattered in an instant. However her biotic one held, the pellets destroyed upon impact with the kinetic shield which would need some time to reassemble itself. This had bought her enough time because for all its power, the Claymore had one flaw. It could only fire once before overheating.

Krogan short sightedness at its best.

While firing her Carnifex, she began to use her biotics to decrease her own weight, allowing her to accelerate right until she was on top of the krogan who frantically tried to pull the trigger of his shotgun again, the safety within the Claymore which kept it from exploding in his hand refusing to grant him another shot. As she closed the distance she began to fire her pistol, causing the krogan's kinetic barriers to collapse. Once that was done, she fixed her pistol to her hip and kept sprinting.

Then ,when she was just about to make contact, she stopped to decrease her own weight and focused all of her biotic potential, which was among the highest in the known galaxy, into a single punch.

Her right fist cracked against the krogan's softer facial structure and mere moments later her left hand unleashed a shockwave to the krogan's upper body that was sure to cause major internal bleeding, rupturing organs, blood vessels and everything else in its path.

Anyone else would've been dead or dying by now but her foe wasn't anyone else.

He was a krogan.

He wasn't dying, he was starting to get angry.

Blood rage was the evolutionary response to living on an irradiated Tuchanka. Formerly a rare condition, the gene triggering it had become incredibly common within the krogan population after the self-inflicted nuclear holocaust of their home world. It allowed an injured krogan to simply blend out pain while large volumes of adrenaline flooded their system, putting them into a state in which they would fight until their entire body was dead. It turned them into incredibly resilient, violent fighting machines. However all of that came at a price. Both their logic and their self-control took a turn for the worse once the blood rage began.

At this moment, the krogan didn't need logic nor self-control to be a danger to everyone inside Afterlife. He had to be put down and as Tela spotted a glimps of Dextra stumbling out the VIP exit she realised that it had to be fast.

Dodging the Claymore the krogan was now using as a club, which would've been ready to fire again, she stopped shooting at the krogan who was starting to tear the place around him apart. Summoning all of her biotic energy, she threw a warp, a rapidly shifting mass effect field that shredded everything it came into contact with, at the krogan's already injured face. It connected and the field started to tear away skin, tissue and muscle. Blood began to drip from the krogan's face as the mass effect field destroyed his eye but true to the condition he was currently in, he kept coming at Tela with animalistic grunting as the warp field dispersed itself, revealing a large wound in the krogan's face, his bones somewhat visible underneath layers of blood.

This was going to be messy.

A single round of her Carnifex wouldn't do the job quick enough and it was still close to overheating by now anyway. The number of shots she would require wouldn't be able to be fired in the time she needed them to be fired.

So her hand went for one of the salarian-made sticky grenades she had favoured ever since first working with STG.

She armed the small device and put all her faith into the stasis she threw at the krogan. It engulfed him in purple and if he hadn't been under the influence of blood rage, he wouldn't have been able to move at all. The adrenaline flooding his system was the only thing that allowed him to keep making small, slow steps towards Tela.

But she only needed him to slow down enough to be unable to react in time.

She jumped forward and before the krogan could grab her, she pushed the sticky grenade into the hole on the krogan's face that the warp field had created. Then she hurled herself into the direction of the exit all the while pushing her biotics to the limit.

The krogan's head behind her exploded in a mess of orange coloured pieces and dropped to the ground while a good fourth of his upper body, including his arms and both of his hearts, were destroyed in the blast.

Aria would have to replace most of the furniture in this place.

Not wasting any more time on thinking about the mess she just made, Vasir sprinted out of the VIP section and was greeted by the sight of a small crowd of people frantically running away from the club.

Fortunately the turian agent had decided to wear orange and blue. While the colours may have looked casual and most certainly hid body armor underneath, they were also incredibly easy to spot.

She saw Dextra make a run for it and began to follow him. Biotic energy manifested itself around her as she reached for her Carnifex and fired off a single round to disperse the people in front of her.

Once they were gone she launched herself at the turian. Normally the point of the attack was to massively increase your weight and reinforce your barriers before impact. This time she did neither.

As her non-lethal version of the biotic charge was realised, Tela smashed into Dextra and caused him to stumble forward while dropping his own gun, bloodying his face even more than before. She got to her feet and turned the turian around with a rather forceful kick, casually swatting away the knife he had pulled with her armored boot the moment she spotted it. Then she leveled her Carnifex at him.

"Dextra, you always were a moron but did you seriously think you could run away from a biotic?"

The turian offered nothing but silence as he was held at gunpoint by the former Spectre. Mere moments later she heard someone run up behind him.

"Friendly," Redford called as he stepped past her and began to restrain the turian. "We best get out of here, Aria looked pretty angry when I booked it."

"The agent that got shot?" Tela asked.

"Didn't make it," the specialist replied grimly. "The rest of the team grabbed his body and they'll meet us at the evac point."

"Let's get off this rock," Tela said as Redford lifted the turian to his feet, his bloody face displaying a mixture of fear and anger.

"Agreed. You better be worth it, you hear me mate?" the specialist said as he began to shove the turian in a way that, if the change of facial expression was anything to go by, was rather painful.

"If you think I'm talking you're delusional," the turian spat back.

"We got our ways," the specialist ensured him as they hurried towards their extraction point.

"Of co-"

The sarcastic reply of the turian was cut short as a round fired from somewhere in front of them caused a blue mist to shoot out of his head as silvery bits of the turian's brain stained Reford's face. The shot, which had only missed the specialist due to pure chance, destroyed most of Dextra's head in a gory explosion and both Redford and Tela shared a look before reacting.

True to their training both the specialist and the former Spectre herself darted to the sides the moment they realised what had happened, trying to escape the snipers field of vision in the process. Dextra's nearly decapitated corpse fell to the ground as Redford let go of it and a blue flow of blood swiftly started running through the dirty streets of Omega.

"Bloody hell," she heard Redford curse as she risked a peak, seeing the alleged killer jump across the gap between two roof tops, disappearing in the smog that lingered in the distance.

"No way we're catching him," Tela commented.

"The Broker shot his own guy," Redford said with disgust as he left his cover and glanced at the corpse. "He was our only lead."

"We have to get out of here," she reminded him as she turned around to see one of Aria's enforcers walk towards them with a fierce glare on his face. "Now."

The specialist turned away from the corpse and began to run, Tela following close behind.

Today they had lost.


7. April 2390 AD, Cronos Station

"Another dead end," the chancellor muttered through the projector as the director of Section 13 finished their private briefing. "Or rather dead turian."

"The Shadow Broker as evaded capture at the hands of the Council ever since they became aware of his existence," she replied. "There are reasons for that."

"What do we do now?" Noé asked as he leaned back in his chair.

"Not much we can do right now, Sir," she stated dryly. "We wait until we get another opportunity to get to him."

"I don't really like the idea of waiting for the Shadow Broker to take another shot at us."

"Neither do I, Sir," she said. "Harper already informed me that Cerberus is being 'ever vigilant'," she quoted with a chuckle.

"Here's to hoping that he finds the bastard," the chancellor said as he raised a glass of liqour with his blue, holographic hands and took a sip of the beverage. "Moving on to more pressing matters," he began, "tell me you got something on Kamarov."

"Nothing major," the director replied gravely, "the raid on his Cobalt dump certainly bought us some time but IFS activity as a whole remains dangerously mediocre."

"What's that supposed to mean?" the chancellor replied, apparently confused at the phrase.

"Elysium was always a major separatist hub but recently the local cells have grown more passive. In the past not a month went by without some arrests but the last few weeks? Nothing," she explained. "Multiple separatist cells simply went dark, our insiders were cut out of the picture, regular meeting spots are deserted and known associates of the IFS have vanished of the face of Elysium."

"They are planning something," Noé said.

"They are always planning something, Sir," the director corrected him. "This one might be bigger."

"You think Kamarov will blow up another one of his bombs?" Noé said with worry in his voice.

"Kamarov's a deranged lunatic with a sense of perfectionism. He won't build a bomb that doesn't include Cobalt-60. He needs his 'signature'," the director argued. Having been in charge of hunting the Butcher of Elysium meant that she was the leading 'expert' when it came to understanding Andrej Kamarov. "I'm afraid his cells are going to something more conventional."

"Unification Day is coming up," the chancellor spoke and he took another sip. "Fantastic," he added sarcastically.

The day was the only holiday universally celebrated on all human worlds, since every colony mankind had founded up to date was part of the Human Systems Alliance. The day, first celebrated on 5.5.2151, would have its 239th incarnation in less than a month with preparations on major colonies and Earth itself already well under way.

However it was a sad reality that Unification Day, the day which had marked the first time all of humanity had been rallied under a single government, had turned form an idealistic holiday into a tempting target for separatism. After all, if one wanted to strike out against a government they considered to be 'oppressors', why not do it on the day it formally claimed as its birthday?

The IFS had made it a point to outlaw the celebration of Unification Day under its own occupation and ever since losing the Fringe Wars multiple attempts had been made to commit acts of terror during the celebrations.

Precisely because of that reason they couldn't simply call of the celebration, it would play into the IFS's hands even more, reinforcing their picture of a weak HSA.

"Special Forces and HSAIS resources on Elysium are already on high alert," the director assured him. "We're keeping our ear to the ground, Sir."

"Keep me posted."

"If there's nothing else, I need to attend another meeting," the director spoke.

"Don't let me keep you from your other duties," Noé chuckled as his hologram vanished.

"Now, tell me about this report," the director spoke once the line had closed itself.

"We shouldn't keep him in the dark about this any longer," Tao Rei urged her as he emerged from the shadows of her office, the light of Anadius revealing him to the director. The specialist, besides his other duties, had been put in charge of investigating the true origin of the two Object Omnicrons that had been encountered in 2379 and 2388 and with hunting down any other that may exist. He was here to summarize the latest findings of the task force. In his words there had been an 'interesting development'.

"Report," she reminded him.

"Cerberus received footage shot by an STG team deployed to a world in the Hades Gamma Cluster. Attached to it was a batarian report that the team retrieved on its mission." The Hades Gamma, the area of space it belonged to, was a region bordering both batarian and human space close to the Attican Traverse.

"STG? How," she demanded to know. The agency wasn't exactly known to make mistakes. They had been at this for far too long to make such trivial mistakes.

"We have reason to believe that they wanted us to see this."

"Why?"

"We don't know. We only know the source that sent it our way was most likely salarian. So was the attached encryption code."

"Which planet?" the director asked, not lingering on the fact that the salarian Special Task Group wanted them to get this.

"Jartar," the name rang a bell. It had been under batarian lockdown for some time now. "What did they find?"

"See for yourself," the specialist said as he handed her the tablet. What it displayed was eerily to say the least.

"They are calling it the 'Leviathan of Dis'," the specialist spoke.

If one managed to look beyond the damage caused by the crash and the environment and the difference in size and shape it shared the same general design of an Object Omnicron. Purple, sleek metal was covering its surface in an almost organic looking design and there was a certain sinister feeling to. The scorch marks and something that resembled mass accelerator impacts did well to hide the similarity at first but once someone had made the connection, it was obvious.

This thing and the objects shared a common ancestry.

"I think the similarity speaks for itself," he added. "They found it inside a crater and as far as the report goes they believe it to be 'genetically engineered'."

"So it's organic?" the director asked with a hint of doubt in her mind.

"Partially at least. They aren't so sure about it either."

"Does it share the cybernetics found insome exposed to an Object Omnicron?"

"No the batarian's would've been able to figure out simple implants. They just managed to reconstruct a partial DNA sample. Unknown DNA. They have no idea what exactly it is that they found, they just know that this 'Leviathan' has traces of Eezo on it. Eezo doesn't naturally appear on Jartar."

"So its a ship," that would explain the scorch marks and weapon impacts. Most likely this 'Leviathan' had sustained damage in form of mass accelerator fire in a skirmish above Jartar that had proved critical enough to cause it to crash, hence the scorch marks and impact crater.

"It's a ship of whoever built the Omnicrons," the specialist corrected. "But that's not the worrying part."

"What is?" she sighed. This day was getting better by the minute.

"It's at least one billion years old."

"Come again?"

"The batarian scientists who wrote that report were equally confused by that detail. In fact they ran the test thrice. All three times resulted in that age," the specialist said as he remembered the report. "Whoever built that ship has been around for at least one billion years."

"And that means the Omnicron's creators are most likely at least as old," the director concluded. "We both know what this implies about Harbinger."

"Ma'am?" the specialist asked.

"The Omnicron on Shanxi wasn't close to one billion years old. Carbon dating put its at only 100.000 years," she explained with a hint of frustration in her voice as she recalled the analysis of the small fragment she had given to a science team. The piece of alloy had survived the Omnicron's destruction and had been studied for a few days before being sealed in the HSA's vault which also served as a storage location for other alien artifacts found during its expansion into space, some of which were slowly being sent to the Citadel Council for study, according to the laws dictating prothean technology. However 100.000 years wasn't close to one billion years although it was far older than the ruins of Mars, which were estimated to be 'only' 48.000 years old.

"You're afraid that they've been deployed before," Rei concluded. "Multiple times."

"Track down whoever sent you this. Don't reach out to STG itself, this might be a leak after all. Exposing our source would be counter-productive," she replied, not really answering the question. If the specialist had just spoken the truth, the implications about galactic history would be disturbing and unveiling at the same time.

"Yes, Ma'am," the specialist acknowledged as he waited to be dismissed.

"And Rei?"

"Yes, Ma'am?"

"I think the time for revelations is slowly closing in on us. Dismissed," the Widow Maker spoke as she considered his advice.

The agent shot her a quick salute before turning on his heel and walking out of the door, most likely to execute her orders. She returned to looking at the star Cronos Station was orbiting for a few moments before getting back to work herself. She couldn't take care of 'Harbinger' for now but she could ensure that Kamarov would be taken care of before he got another chance at sharing his 'art'.


2132 CE, Aephus, Turian Naval Rally Point

Desolas sat in the office, his XO Melion already well asleep, and once more looked over the recordings of his run in with the artifact, a habit he had tried to kill time and again, unsuccessfully. He always found himself returning to that fateful day and its implications, the visages of the creatures it had created still flashing through his dreams every other night.

Some things you just couldn't shake, no matter how hard you tried.

While TNI had made little progress on the matter in the last year, mostly spending its time chasing the trail that had led the pirates to Jartar in the first place and revisiting known prothean sites, STG had delivered the most important piece of evidence as of yet. In a daring operation they had managed to infiltrate Jartar, its lockdown somewhat loosening in face of the effort the batarian navy placed on blockading other planets. On the planet, hidden inside a crater only recently mapped by a batarian survey team, they had discovered the remains of a large 'corpse'. Neither the STG team nor the report they had acquired from the batarian research outpost located near the site were quite sure what exactly they had recorded but that didn't change the importance of the event.

Not only had the footage of STG resulted in the Primarch of Palaven himself once more returning to the case, previously dismissing its importance compared to more present threats like slavers or the Batarian Hegemony's questionable blockades of seemingly random worlds. It had also resulted in him hearing out his plan in the first place. Now subtle steps were being taken to ensure that the Hierarchy would be able to gather knowledge about this Harbinger.

Furthermore the fact that he had decided against sentencing Desolas for treason for sharing this information with an STG agent had been a nice addition as well.

After facing the Primarch of Palaven, TNI and the salarian 'councilor', the proxy through which the Hierarchy was working with parts of STG, had agreed that the time to pool together their knowledge with the other group they knew to be aware of the artifacts had come.

The bleeping transmission of his omni-tool informed him that his friend on the Council had made sure that the footage of this 'Leviathan' had reached the human group working on the matter.

Contacting Cozek had been the right move. This much was evident.

However there was also another part that was important to his plan of preparing the galaxy for whatever Harbinger was.

Saren.

His younger brother would soon finish Blackwatch training, his aptitude scores even better than Desolas had expected them to be at this point, and apply to become a Spectre. Once Saren had obtained the rank, Desolas and him could make preparations for a human Spectre, an important step to becoming a member of the Council and in turn keeping their dreadnoughts.

Once the matter of maintaining the galactic naval power was taken care of, the groups and politicians aware of this matter could decide on how to act from there.

For now Desolas's simply had to assure that they'd get there.

As curiosity got the better of him, the general decided to look into the training schedule of Saren's class and a chuckle escaped his mandibles as he read their next station.

Survival training on Kruljaven was generally known as one of the hardest parts of Blackwatch training. The world, strangely similar to Khar'shan for a very political reason, was infamous for forcing the trainees to apply everything they had learned, wildlife, native and seeded by the Hierarchy alike, and rough weather only adding to the task.

Normally he should be worried about his younger brother but he was confident in his Saren's ability to handle this challenge as well. It was a pity that he'd have to let such a promising operator escape Blackwatch's claws. The young turian was breaking records set centuries ago for reasons only the legion's spirit truly knew.

Furthermore the mental image of Saren sitting out one of Kruljaven's famous rainfalls while questioning why the mechs that they were supposed to hunt for training purposes had batarian faces painted on them was a rather amusing one.

He couldn't really blame the Hegemony for calling everything about Kruljaven a 'provocation and insult to the batarian people', it was after all simply true.

Contraty to believe, the Turian Hierarchy had a sense of humor,be it a rather morbid one.


10. April 2390 AD, Citadel

"I won't be able to make it, I'm sorry. Something else is getting in the way of it," Alec sighed as he spoke to his wife through the use of the embassy's communication network. Normally he had gotten into the habit of saving his leave for holidays and birthdays. This year the recent events had resulted in all leave of Section 13 personal being canceled. It was part of the job.

"Work?" Hannah asked, the simple question included if he could talk about it or not. It was something they had agreed on very early. In his line of work, he simply couldn't share most of what he did with his family. For their own safety.

"Yeah, it's been a few busy days."

"At least your present made it on time," his wife joked. "Don't beat yourself up about this."

"It's just, I feel like I'm missing a lot of things," he muttered. "First steps, now birthdays."

"Once Emily's old enough, she'll understand. For now we should just take what we get."

Looking to his left, he looked at a file that reminded him of his secondary assignment on the Citadel. Keeping track of the Shadow Broker's agents, Barla Von being one of them. He pinched his nose and forced work back into its compartment within his brain. Not now.

"Although I have to say, I'm getting the feeling you're using our daughter as an excuse to buy things you normally couldn't buy without being laughed at," Hannah chuckled. "You have to stop with the oversized stuffed animals, Alec."

"Running out of places to put them?" he replied with a smug tone. "Don't worry, I'll switch to model ships once she's old enough."

"As I've said, using our daughter as an excuse to buy stuff you actually want to play with."

"Now I'd deny that, but that sweat Kodiak to my left kind of reinforces your theory," he said as he lifted the model into view. Originally it had begun as a way to kill time and to silence Goyle about how empty his room looked, then he had started to enjoy it.

"You're unbelievable," he heard her chuckle.

"It's part of my charm."

"Is it?" she mocked him. "Guess I missed that memo."

"You'll be the death of me, woman."

"It's getting late on Arcturus," she said. "I should go."

"Same on the Citadel."

"I love you."

"I love you too."

Being married slowly showed him parts of his job he didn't enjoy. He shut the terminal down and dropped on his bed, exhausted.


4. May 2390 AD, Elysium, New Illyria

"The preparations have been made, Surgeon," his assistant informed him. "As you've asked, the most devoted members of our cause are ready to act."

"Good," Kamarov replied as he added the latest piece the benefactor had sent him to his masterpiece. The signal booster would ensure that none of the HSA's jamming technology would keep him from setting off his work. They had developed quite a lot of counter measures against his methods over the years. They had prevented him from acting before, now he had a work around.

He had been ordered to act as a distraction, keeping less important operations going while putting off on dealing major blows against the HSA.

He had decided to ignore that order and it had worked.

In preparations for his grand comeback, he had ordered every IFS cell to go dark and rid itself of all members who didn't agree with his own views while hiding the most important one's, drawing the HSA's attention towards Elysium in the process. His fellow colleague was sure to disapprove of his 'disobedience' but the results spoke for themselves. The HSA's attention was focused on Elysium while he worked on whatever he was working on.

Not that his opinion really mattered. He'd put a bullet into the guy once the HSA was toppled. No one kept the Butcher of Elysium in the dark, let alone put him on a leash. After that he'd have a little 'chat' with that benefactor of his.

"Surgeon?" the voice tore him out of his thoughts and back to reality.

"What?" he replied as he fixed the device in place.

"I asked if I should give the go-ahead for the operation now."

"Yes, tell them to execute the plan," the HSA would bleed and all those who were obedient to it would bleed with it. Sure, this operation would decimate the cells on Elysium but new recruits would flock to them afterwards. The propaganda regarding this event had already been created, the posters were printed, the transmissions filmed, the statement written.

This would send a clear message. They would either join the IFS or they would die alongside the HSA.

He had even decided to star in one of the clips, reading the statement. It was after all time to give the insurgency a face again. He was tired of being dead. The red flag with a white heptagon printed on it, a reminder of the original Separatist Seven who had first dared to rise against the HSA, still hanging on the wall behind him from his recording session. Given the importance of this day, he almost expected his assistant to say the next words.

"For the Fringe."

"For the Fringe," he repeated the words that had stayed with them through years of oppression.

Even the HSA couldn't kill an idea, no matter how hard it tried.

The communicator deactivated itself and he once more began to hide the pieces of his scrambler.


5. May 2390 AD, Elysium, Colonial Watch Garrison 'Fort Barker'

"We should be outside getting wasted," Cosmo spoke as he leaned against the wall, his cap firmly placed on his head, covering dark brown hair, "or outside shooting Iffys."

"This may be the only time I agree with you," a deeper voice replied from above.

"What have you done to the real Basilisk, you bastard?" he said as he turned towards the dark-skinned man sitting on the top bunk.

"Killed him and buried him in a shallow grave," he chuckled.

"I like this Basilisk more."

"How about you do something useful with your time?" the third man in the room said as he pushed his body of the ground again, completing yet another push up.

"Not all of us have a PT-fetish, Icer," he said as the blonde man shot him a glare with the steel-blue eyes that suited his nickname. Icer turned on his back and began to do sit-ups, not yet satisfied with his training.

"Maybe if you had one, you wouldn't need to get drunk to have a chance with woman."

"It's just more fun that wa-"

The sudden blaring of the garrison's alarm and the sound of their commanding officer bursting through the door interrupted his snarky comment and the three of them turned towards the asian man now standing in the doorway.

"Get your asses in gear. Now," Predator said before shooting of into the direction of the armory, his squad close behind him.

"What's happening, boss?" Basilisk asked as they stormed through the door of the room housing their armor and weaponry, swiftly beginning to put on the modular pieces of the green armor as other members of their unit were doing the same.

"Command's mobilizing ASOC. A stolen shuttle ignored the no-fly zone, got clipped by a Hornet and flew straight through two skyscrapers," the soldier said as he strapped on his right arm guard.

"Sounds like a job for the fire department, Sir," Basilisk argued while shoving a SIS-8 into the holster on his left leg.

"The shuttle served to divide our attention, IFS began attacking New Illyria's suburbs the moment the shuttle crashed. Forces of the 24th Armored Division are busy securing the city centre while the 101st and 212th Infantry Regiments are reacting in the suburbs. We're deploying to react to critical situations,"

"Damn," Cosmo commented while fixing his chest piece in place.

"I thought you wanted to shoot Iffys?" Icer asked while attaching a DMR-7 to his chest rig.

"Not like this man," the man with dark brown hair replied as he tossed his cap on the desk and put on his helmet. "Not like this."

"Do we know how many Iffys?"

"Hundreds, multiple districts are under attack."

"This is what they've been planning, isn't it?" Basilisk said as they rushed out of the door and towards the airfield. They ran through the corridors, now abuzz with activity as the alarm caused people to rush to their assigned posts, and soon enough the four men burst out on the air strip, the engine's of a green Kodiak already warming up as the co-pilot waved at them.

They jumped into the transport, this one a new UT-90A, and the craft shot up to the sky, its doors closing and the outside camera's turning on, the screens that acted as windows showing them what was happening beyond the shuttle.

"Five minutes," the Kodiak pilot informed them as the shuttle added itself to a formation of nine other Kodiaks. While most of Elysium's Colonial Watch was stationed near New Illyria within the units headquarters, ASOC had been quartered in Fort Barker which was located further away from the capital. Therefore the Kodiak would require some time to reach New Illyria.

Once they got closer to the city, the damage became evident. Large pillars of smoke were rising from multiple locations and an inferno was raging from two medium sized glass giants in the center of the city, gushing wounds within their superstructure clouding the sky with black smoke as Elysium's fire department was trying its hardest to evacuate the higher levels of the building through the use of its own modified shuttles.

"HSASV Agincourt is breaching atmosphere," they heard the co-pilot speak as a large, green frigate slowly crept out of the sky above New Illyria, the white writing 'Agincout' clearly visible on its hull. The frigate had most likely been ordered to descend and enforce the no-flight zone with its point defense systems, preventing any interruptions of the rescue process.

"Ghost Squad, this is command," a female voice spoke within their helmets. "You're being rerouted to Kirk Country."

With that the shuttle took a sharp turn to the right as other Kodiaks broke from the formation as well, no doubt ordered to different suburbs.

"Elements of the 101st Infantry Regiment are requesting your assistance," the woman went on. "Insurgents fleeing from one of their patrols have withdrawn into a clinic, overwhelming its security," the projector within the Kodiak displayed the building, four stories and roughly ten rooms per floor. The small building served as the medical hub of the neighbourhood, treating minor injuries and less serious accidents locally. "They've got hostages," she added, confirming their fear that it was occupied. "The clinic had at least twenty people inside it, staff and patients."

"Hostile numbers?"

"Unknown but at least ten, more likely twenty."

"Going in blind then," Cosmo frowned as the shuttle began to slow down and its doors opened to the sound of gunfire, blue and orange flashes identifying who was friend and who was foe as they exchanged fire down on the street.

"Drop us on the roof," Predator spoke as he walked up to the pilot compartment, getting a good look of the neighbourhood. The stealth engines of the UT-90A would allow them to land on the roof undetected.

"101st is getting their teeth kicked in," Icer observed as a soldier was dragged behind a badly shot up APC by his comrades below, blood leaking from his leg as the machine gun team of the unit poured rounds into a store up ahead, blue flashes coming from its windows as the insurgents returned fire.

"Can't use our heavy ordnance here, civilians aren't fully evacuated. Some are still hunkered down in their houses," Cosmo observed as he spotted a group of soldiers leading a family to another, intact armored vehicle. "The Iffys don't give a fuck about that though," Cosmo reasoned as an explosion sounded in the distance, causing the soldiers to shove the family into the back of the vehicle before its driver stepped on the gas to get them out of the crossfire, leaving the fireteam without vehicle support as it rushed into another house.

The IFS cells on Elysium had a reputation for being particularly ruthless. In their mind anyone who didn't fight for them was a legitimate target, soldier or not. They were radicals even by the standards of the IFS. The sight of both civilians and armored figures laying dead on the street once more confirming their mindset.

"How did this happen?" Basilisk questioned as the shuttle touched down on the white building towering over the small neighbourhood.

"Someone fucked up," Icer offered as he jumped out of the door, scanning his surroundings.

"No, they've been planning this for a long time. Take a guess why they laid low the entire time," Predator explained as the Kodiak shot of into the sky, no doubt ordered to help with evacuating the two burning skyscrapers in the distance.

"They've been storing up on weapons, laying the ground work for this. Get the door, Basilisk," he ordered as Basilisk tried the lock before forcing it open with a single kick.

"Optical camo," Predator said as their armor slowly turned invisible, reducing them to mere flickers of light only the keenest of observers would be able to spot. The technology, made much more efficient ever since first contact with Council, was the telltale gear of ASOC. Unlike their naval counterpart, they operated on a much smaller scale, relying on the element of surprise and near invisibility to achieve their goals. Previously fast movements would've caused the camouflage to fail but technological advances now allowed them to move much faster.

Sneaking through the corridors, the first thing he spotted on the ground was blood.

Loads of blood leading into a room.

Basilisk began to walk towards it as he blended out the sound of gunfire coming from the level below them. Then he heard the voices.

"If he dies, I'll put a bullet into your patient over here," a voice threatened. At least one insurgent in the room then. By the sound of it he was forcing the clinic's personal to treat one of their injured.

"He's lost a lot of blood," another voice, most likely a doctor or a nurse, argued as he took a peak into the room. Raising two fingers, he informed his unit of the number of foes and spun around the corner.

Inside the room one insurgent was arguing with a doctor about the state of the second Iffy lying on a blue flatbed, a large bullet wound causing blood to leak from his leg´as the doctor was trying his best to stop the bleeding. Meanwhile a third insurgent was pointing a mass accelerator at a patient sitting on a chair, a half finished sling around his arm indicating that the man had recently broken it and had come to the clinic looking for help.

"At least let me get some medigel!"

"I ain't falling for that, you have that stuff somewhere around here. Get it," the insurgent said as he poked the doctor with his rifle.

"This is a room treating fractures, not a gunshots. There's no medigel in here. Let me get it from the sup-"

The doctor was interrupted as a round of Basilisk's rifle shot clean through the first Iffy's head, mere moments before he double-tapped the second one holding the injured patient at gunpoint. The insurgents collapsed and both him and his dead comrade started to add to the blood that had already collected around the insurgent lying on a red-stained bed.

"Lock yourself in here," Basilisk spoke as the doctor jumped, taking some moments to realise that someone was actually standing in front of him, the hovering pistol of the dead insurgent being handed to him while the soldier reached for something on his chest rig. "We'll sent someone to come and get you once the area is clear."

"This man will die," the doctor said as he composed himself and pointed at the paling insurgent, apparently familiar with the concept of optical camouflage and not grabbing a hold of the pistol. "He needs blood, medigel and a real hospital."

"We can't let you walk out of here. Take this," Basilisk spoke as he pressed a pistol and a syringe of military-grade medigel into the doctor's chest. "Try your best but don't leave this room. If an Iffy gets in here, point, aim and shoot. We will come and get you once everything is safe."

His gesture seemed to have an impact on the doctor as Basilisk stepped outside of the room and heard the door lock.

The four man unit pressed on through the building, clearing each room of the upper level one after another but not encountering any more patients or insurgents. Once the level had been swept, they moved down through the use of the stairway and quickly cleared the entry to this floor as they spotted a large group of clinic staff and patients kneeling on the ground behind the glass window of a waiting room, several separatists watching over the hostages inside while at least five others were firing out of the windows further ahead, no doubt gunning for the forces of the 101st Infantry.

"That's where everyone went," Cosmo observed. The separatists had gathered the rest of the clinic's staff and patients in one room. It made sense, this way they could limit the number of people they had to dedicate to guard duty, allowing more of them to fight.

"Icer, Cosmo, you take the guys on the left," Predator ordered. "Basilisk, with me."

The group divided itself and while two of them began to position themselves to swiftly dispatch the two separatists pointing their rifles at the group of hostages, the other two snuck closer. This was a rather risky situation. They had to take all for of them out at the same time but the sound of their comrades dying could easily draw the attention of the Iffys currently engaging HSA forces outside of the clinic.

They would have to dispatch these four and immediately turn their attention to the rest to ensure that the civilians wouldn't be caught in the cross fire, these insurgents didn't care if they killed the people held hostage. They were most likely just looking for an excuse to do so.

"In position," Predator whispered as he leaned around the corner of the door, the barrel of his gun pointed at the chest of an insurgent wearing body armor and carrying a kinetic barrier generator underneath casual clothing. Apparently they had wandered the crowd before attacking.

He'd have to put a few more rounds into him to take him down.

"I got mine," Basilisk informed them.

"Targets in sight, boss." Cosmo said as both he and Icer waited for the go.

"Execute."

The four soldiers opened fire as the bullets shot out of their rifles, shattering kinetic barriers and armor in less than three seconds. Almost simultaneously the guards slumped to the ground and the squad spun around, hurrying towards the insurgents at the window, one of which was already turning around.

The ASOC team got the drop on them as well.

As rounds tore through the air, only one of the Iffys managed to get a shot into the general direction of them, the round impacting the ground near Cosmo's feet before the insurgent's chest exploded as one of the DMR-7 rounds punched through his heart. He collapsed against the wall, leaving a smear of blood as he slumped to the ground.

"This floor's clear," Predator said as they hurried back to the hostages. "Is everyone accounted for?" he roared as he disabled his optical camouflage."

"Doctor Simmons is missing," an elderly nurse replied with a calm voice. "But the rest of us were forced into this room."

"You're save now," Icer assured them as Predator turned away.

"Ghost Squad to elements of the 101st Infantry in the vicinity of Kirk County Clinic, we've got the hostages. Breach the first floor and work your way up to the third, we'll stay with them."

"Copy that Ghost Squad!" a voice called back through the radio, gunfire in the background suggesting that he was fighting outside the clinic.

Sure enough the sound of SR-7 fire soon erupted below them, drawing ever closer as the infantry unit fought the insurgents still holding the lower floors of the clinic.

With the advantage of their hostages gone, the army regulars soon overwhelmed the remaining defenders and a bloodied but alive sergeant walked through the stairway some five minutes later.

"We'll take them from here, Sir" he spoke as he saw the captain insignia's on Predator's armor.

"Copy that Sergeant," the leader of Ghost Squad replied. "Command, we've cleared the clinic, no casualties among the hostages. Over."

"Prepare to move, insurgents have barricaded themselves in Kirk County's police precinct. Over."

"Acknowledged, we're on our way. Ghost Squad over and out."

This would be a long Unification Day.


Codex: Army Special Operations Command

The Army Special Operations Command of the Human Systems Alliance, commonly referred to as ASOC, acts as the first responding military special operations force in all human territories. Unlike the Naval Special Operations Command, N7, it is not attached to individual space vessels but instead maintains a presence on selected human worlds with sizeable populations that require a unit capable of completing assignments too dangerous for regular army units.

The unit, unlike N7, operates in smaller teams below platoon size and acts mainly as a counter-terrorism force in times of peace, defusing situations that would result in civilian casualties through the use of their optical camouflage, a technology that has been vastly improved ever since contact with the Citadel Council. The unit therefore places less emphasis on the brutal speed N7 favours, instead opting to remain silent for as long as possible.

Drawing most of their recruits from the army's elite reconnaissance units, the 26th Airborne Brigade stationed on Terra Nova, ASOC relies on skills already present in the people they recruit to complete their missions. However rumors suggest that the most promising recruits of Terra Nova's multiple military academies are fast-tracked into the Army Special Operations Selection Course 1, a process some have called 'questionable'.

ASOC's exact strength is unknown but it is generally believed that every developed human world, Earth and other core worlds aside, has access to at least one platoon of ASOC forces.

It should be noted that a member of ASOC, Lieutenant [redacted],played a major role in defending Mindoir from a batarian slavery raid in 2401.


A/N: So chapter 20. That's quite the milestone.

Right now we're at 143 reviews, 326 favorites and 405 follows, not much of a gain since last time but I guess that happens sometimes. Can't really change it. Still appreciate the lot of you guys.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter, a bit more action than last time but since there was basically no action last time, that's not really hard to do.

Also the plot moves on! Haha!

I'd appreciate reviews to know what you think about this chapter and where the story is going, I'll be honest, I'm way slower than I expected, I wanted to be in ME 1 by summer and yeah... nope, that's not happening. This is turning into a bigger project than I ever anticipated but that's cool, I enjoy the world I building and the plot that I've created.

See you around next time.