Chapter 120. The Last Call
6. May 2417 AD, HSASV Normandy
As the large shadow crept up on Joker with impossibly quiet steps and stopped just out of sight, the helmsman decided to do what he'd done with Sovereign – just go for it without knowing if it'd actually work– and spun out of his hiding spot, fire extinguisher in hand. Before he did as much as identify his target, he used the force of his rotation to bash the piece of safety equipment against the head …
… of an armored, two-meter tall geth platform that didn't as much as flinch in reaction to the pilot's attack.
As a metallic clink echoed through the otherwise empty cockpit, Legion's singular eye spun and it tilted its head and the two of them looked at each other awkwardly.
"… whups. Legion. Buddy. I didn't even see you there," he started, hoping not to have kick-started yet another geth rebellion.
"Jeff-or-Joker, preliminary analysis suggests that a recalibration of your IFF-System is in order," the jet-black war machine simply offered in return. "We do however suggest that you delay any maintenance work until we've eliminated the hostiles currently attempting to infiltrate the Normandy."
Joker let the fire-extinguisher dangle by his side and only now noticed the spurts of a reddish-blue liquid that had spattered over Legion's new Blackwatch-issued chest-piece. At first he thought it was blood, maybe a mixture of turian and human and got seriously worried about the parts of the crew to which that description applied, but then he noticed that the texture was all off. No way in hell was that blood. It looked more like cooling-fluid, really.
At the same time as he drew that conclusion, Joker also noticed silver-colored metal-shaving marks on the left side of Legion's head. One of the flaps on the geth's face, the one on the right side, was missing entirely. Someone had taken shots at the Normandy's resident warbot and some of them had clearly hit.
Speaking of the Normandy's artificial intelligences.
The helmsman glanced at EDI. She still repeating the same line over and over again and not reacting at all to the geth's presence, which to Joker sort of suggested that the weren't in cahoots and currently plotting the synthetic apocalypse.
"Legion… do you have any idea what's going on?"
The geth's eye rotated and instead of answering, it faced the elevator that was once more starting to move.
"Fifty-three seconds ago, hostile platforms left the cargo crates that were just transported onto the Normandy. Their first wave attempted to breach the brig and neutralize this platform. Their second wave tried to interdict us on the way to the elevator," the geth took an entirely silent step forward. "Due to several design flaws, they have remained unsuccessful up to now," it extended its hand backwards as the number reached that of the CIC. "May we be handed your portable fire-repellent-ejection system? Data of our surroundings suggest that a third wave may be heading for us."
Joker silently handed the extinguisher to Legion and was about to ask the geth if it could pry open the weapon storage or maybe even the airlock to get them some proper help. But before he could voice either of those ideas out loud, the elevator pulled open to reveal a four digital-camoed figures carrying assault rifles. At first he thought they were human marines… but then he noticed that their helmets were actually heads with thin, red LED slits and that their movements looks distinctively inorganic.
Vanguard mechs, aka Hahne-Kedar's attempt at replacing the rifleman.
Joker was about to rejoice at the sight of the friendly mechs, but when they spotted them, they raised their Valkyrie rifles at Legion and Joker and before the helmsman knew what was happening, he was forcefully shoved behind cover by Legion.
After that he only heard what was happening.
First there was a loud whine echoing through the CIC that almost immediately turned into electronic stuttering. The stuttering itself was followed by the sharp whistle of something passing through the air quickly, several gunshots ringing out and the distinctive noise of metal hitting metal. For a moment it sounded like a hydraulic sheer was being applied to the stuck door of a vehicle and then there was a loud popping sound. Finally silence during which Joker wondered who'd just won…
"The danger has been eliminated, Jeff-Or-Joker," Legion's monotone voice announced. When he left his cover, the pilot saw torn-up mechs lying at the opening of the elevator. Their heads were tossed all over the CIC and their weapons were broken, or rather snapped, in half. Inside of the cabin one Vanguard was slumped against the wall, a fire-extinguisher-sized hole punched in what used to be its chest. Towering over him was the two-meter tall, jet-black geth platform and before Joker could do as much as blink, Legion's arm shot out and grabbed the head of the incapacitated Vanguard and crushed it with a single motion.
After they'd picked up Legion, Shepard had told the crew that the body it was using was an advanced prototype of one of several types of geth platform meant to be used as the new mainline of the Quarian Conclave's military. 'Project Kaziel' Tali had called it. The materials used to create these drones were apparently rare to come-by and the geth had only recently turned the foundries that could create them back on… so unlike the swarms of geth drones they'd fought during their hunt of Sovereign, Legion was by definition the product of an ancient weapons program meant to create dedicated war-geth. Basically the synthetic equivalent of an N7 or something along those lines.
Looking at what had just happened Joker was getting the impression that it might not have been the worst thing for the galaxy that Project Kaziel had never entered mass production…
"Holy shit, Legion… how did you… I mean … there were four of them and one of you and you just…" the pilot began to mumbled before gesturing at the broken bodies with open arms. "You're goddamn insane, you know that?"
The geth's eye rotated in response.
"Geth are incapable of suffering mental illnesses," it responded dryly before a blue hologram appeared around the arm that had just crushed the head. "Jeff-Or-Joker, do you have any information on human attempts at copying geth code?"
The pilot shook his head…
"No. Why?"
"After gathering enough sample code during the first encounter, we have managed to circumvent the cyber-security of these platforms. Their method of communication and fundamental coding mimic our own, albeit in a less sophisticated, distinctively inferior, human manner," did Legion just call their robots crappy? It sure sounded like he did. Furthermore, did Legion just say what Joker though he'd said?
"Just so I didn't mishear you… these guys," Joker said before pointing at the vanguard "are a rip-off of geth tech?"
Legion nodded.
"Affirmative. That is an accurate repetition of our analysis."
… oh shit.
"We gotta call help."
"We have already attempted to contact Callius-Lieutenant and the rest of the crew."
"And?"
"The intruders appear to have raised the Normandy's comms-barrier," that was the part of their stealth ship that prevented their signals from being detected when they were flying stealth. It did so by creating an impenetrable barrier where no signal could get in or out… "Until the barrier is lowered or another way to the outside of the ship is secured, we remain incapable of signaling allied forces."
Joker turned his head back to the airlock.
"Then you gotta open the airlock somehow. Hell, pry it open. There's hundreds of soldiers out there who could help us take back the ship and I'm sure I can make them not shoot you on sight by waving my hands real fast…"
"This platform lacks the sufficient level of strength to circumvent the magnetic locks of the airlock system. Additionally, we are not equipped to attack the cyber-defenses of the ship. Hence we cannot overwrite the locks."
Joker pulled his hat of his head and ruffled his hair.
"So what you're saying is we're on our own?"
"Until we manage to remove the intruders from the vessel or remove the means through which they have infiltrated the cyber-suite, that is the case."
"Great," he mumbled. A second later Legion's eye suddenly flashed red and since the helmsman had now learned that that color didn't mean anything good, he sighed. "Don't say it. Self-destruct activated?" he asked dryly.
"Negative," the geth retorted.
"Well that's something, at least… If it's not the self-destruct, what's going on?"
"We have managed to secure back-door access to the camera system. Observations made on the movement patterns of the remaining synthetic forces suggests that the enemy will attempt breaching the AI core."
"The AI core? You're sure?"
Legion nodded.
"That's on the crew deck, just behind the medbay…"
Legion nodded again.
The pilot swallowed.
"…Chakwas and Gardner-" he realised before glancing to the weapons locker. Escape was now officially of the table. "Legion, get over here and pry that damn gun safe open if you can. We need to help the Doc-" With as single hit against the locking mechanism, the geth broke into the armory cage by pulling of the secured panel and grabbed itself a Valkyrie rifle. "- and Gardner… Nice work."
Legion's eye rotated and then locked onto one of the floor panels.
"The main route is likely to be packed with many hostiles. We believe your platform will not survive a direct confrontation, Additionally, we fear that numerical superiority may offset the individual advantages of this platform. Jeff-Or-Joker, is your platform capable of navigating narrow spaces?"
Joker considered the panel. Legion wanted to move through the maintenance crawl space. He'd been in there once or twice back when the Normandy had been docked at Cronos Station while waiting for Shepard to wake up. It was hot, narrow and dark and you bumped your head every couple of meters on a pipe or a vent or something.
Also he'd definitely seen a spider down there last time.
It completely sucked.
… but it beat dodging bullets.
"Mmh… affirmative?" he guessed, trying to match the geth's style of speech.
Legion's remaining two facial flaps shifted upwards.
"Good. We should embark immediately."
Meanwhile, 2158 CE, Citadel, Presidium, Purgatory
"So anyway, that's probably the weirdest hook-up story I have. Shore leave, am I right?" Leng finished before sipping from his drink and looking at the four pairs of eyes staring at him. "Why are you all looking at me like that?"
"… I… you... how do you…why would… Keelah…" Tali, who'd previously dismissed partaking in Nader's challenge due to her 'immune system ensuring she lacked the necessary amount of experience to contribute' stammered. Meanwhile, Nader herself looked amused and Mordin seemed to be taking notes… or at the very least he was laser-focused on his omni.
Since none of them were talking in wake of what the male N7 had just explained in great detail, Garrus decided to break the deliciously awkward silence.
"I think you just broke Tali with your depravity," the turian detective offered dryly.
"That's gotta count as a win though, right?"
"Oh yes. Making the innocent virgin quarian speechless… that's definitely a challenge," the biotic lieutenant chuckled before looking at the Petty Officer. "I gotta say, Leng, I didn't think you had it in you. That story? Damn."
"I just told you how I had a knife fight with a krogan and you're still surprised that I lived a little back in my days?"
"You make yourself sound ancient."
"Well it was seven years ago…"
"You aren't even thirty yet."
"Then why do I feel fifty?"
"That's just the booze. Speaking off…" Nader offered before pointing at the shot standing in front of the soldier. "You still gotta drink that."
"Nah. I'm done for tonight."
"Seriously?"
"I promised Em I'd keep an eye on you. I can't do that when I'm shitfaced."
"Didn't stop you the last four times."
"Three," he corrected before pointing at Garrus himself. "What about you, Vakarian? Handsome turian like you, living it out on the Citadel as a renegade cop… you gotta have a story or two as well."
Garrus briefly considered playing it like Tali to avoid telling something embarrassing, but then he sighed.
"Well there was the one time I settled a sparring match in the quarters of another Recon trooper…" he began before stopping when Mordin rose from his chair with a worried expression. The lightly amused grin that he'd seen on the scientist earlier in the night was washed away and in its place Garrus saw an expression similar to the one he'd had last on the salarian back on Tuchanka. "Hey Mordin… is everything alright?" he asked.
"Have been remotely monitoring experiments while out drinking. Just lost contact to equipment back on Normandy," the salarian stated in his rapid, STG-speech pattern. "Only logical explanations for sudden disruption of signal are either personal mistake with signal hardware or activation of communication barrier," he went on before looking at all of them
"So your tech failed, big deal?" the biotic offered before making a motion to take another sip of her drink.
Before the bottle could touch her lip, Mordin snapped the beer out of Nader's hand with a lighting-fast motion a salarian of his age really shouldn't have been capable of. It was at this moment that everyone stopped fooling around. "STG tech not prone to sudden failure. Something wrong. Suggest we check on Normandy and Shepard."
Leng and him shared a look. The human looked dead-serious all of the sudden, which was good because so did Garrus.
"You try Callius. I'm calling Shepard. Jack, you call Joker. Tali, try Samara, Mordin you're on Nagato duty. Tell them to pass the word and meet us at the docks," Garrus stated, to which the Petty Officer and the remaining crew nodded. They got up, stepped in front of Purgatory and made their calls…
Besides Tali reaching Samara, none of them got through.
As soon as he realized that a good chunk of their crew was unreachable in the age of instant communication across the galaxy, the turian marched towards the rapid transit and found himself back in a role he hadn't been in since Omega.
He wouldn't think about that now, though.
"Alright, here's the plan. We split up," he began before considering the people in front of him. First his eyes rested on Mordin, the arguably most experienced out of all of them.
"Mordin, you go find Samara and watch out for anyone who might follow you. When you got her, try and see if you can find Thane," the two of them were the only person who Garrus figured could track down a drell assassin, "if you don't find him in fifteen minutes, head straight for the docks, if you do, bring him," he told the salarian. "Jack, Tali," the two of them were comparatively inexperienced and while Nader was strong, this wasn't her type of fight and she was also the only HSA officer available. Additionally, sending Tali anywhere dangerous would be irresponsible given how little he actually knew about her, "you two go straight to the MPs at the docks and tell them that something's up. They need to get ready to board. Pull rank if you have to and get everything ready for a breach but wait with the go until you hear from me," finally he looked at Leng. He knew that there was only one assignment the N7 would accept and he was perfectly fine with that because it made sense. "The two of us will look for Shepard but we'll split up to cover more ground. You go to where she met with Nagato and I'll go to the Zakera C-SEC precinct. Everything clear on their assignments?"
All of the crew members nodded.
"Alright. Shepard and the Normandy need us. Let's move out."
Ten Minutes Earlier, 2158 CE, Citadel, Zakera Ward, Industrial Sector Level 21
After making her way to Thane's waypoint and arriving just in time to see a purple streak dance across the plaza they were in, Callius had almost expected the drell to tell her that there were some complications. She shouldn't have been surprised anyway. Since she'd gotten to the Normandy, things had never worked out the way they'd planned, why should they now?
After catching a glimpse of a blonde human who met the description Thane had given her and realizing that he was luckily headed one street too far, the lieutenant made her way to the alley where Thane's live-ping was coming from, ready to find anything ranging from a father-to-son talk to a fist fight. The alley itself was the spotless backside of one of the countless industrial businesses that lined this part of the station and besides two drell standing across from each other with weapons (!) drawn, the place looked pristine. Since this wasn't Lower Tayseri where people intentionally melted Keepers to try and get high from the fumes, the rigorous working ethics of the Citadel's keepers was showing.
After watching the situation for a moment (she knew full and well that without her armor either of the drell could probably kill her without her having a chance to react thanks to their little biotic-charge trick and the fact that swords didn't move fast enough to get caught by barriers or shields) Callius decided to announce her presence, if only to avoid a jumpy mis-reaction.
"Thane?" she asked before glancing behind her to check for the human. No sign of him. Good. "Is this your son?" she added, already knowing the answer. Ignoring the obvious resemblance between the two (barring the color), the fact that both drell wore a nearly identical trench coat sort of made it easy to picture them as father and son.
"Yes," the drell responded, still grasping his blade. His answer was sharp, short and quiet. A clear factual statement devoid of all emotion. The assassin's focus was fully on his offspring, who was carrying a silver handgun of a make Callius didn't immediately recognize. Given that the material looked similar to the handle of Thane's sword, she suspected it to be a hanar-made weapon, though.
"Kolyat, is it?" she asked, cautiously eying the gun in the teal drell's left hand. For a moment the assassin's son looked at her with his full-black eyes. Then he continued his stare down with Thane.
"Is this your idea of a joke, father?" he asked, venom in his voice. "You abandon me for years and when you show up it is with a turian of all people?"
Callius wondered why her species seemed to matter but before she could ask, the boy's father answered.
"You're about to make a mistake you can't return from, Kolyat. I brought the lieutenant her because I hope that she can do what I cannot."
"And what might that be? Beg for forgiveness in your place because you still can't muster up the courage to say out loud that you abandoned me after mother died?" the boy spat before lifting his gun at her, an action that resulted in Thane stepping into the path of the barrel with one confident step.
"I will not let you harm her, Kolyat. This is between you and me."
"If the last person you said that about wasn't dead, I might actually believe you."
Thane's son didn't just sound angry.
He sounded hateful…
Not good. Not good at all.
Right about now was the time where the Blackwatch officer figured that it probably would've been beneficial to have a plan going into this that went beyond 'Thane said I could do it'.
But she was here now, so there was no going back.
"Kolyat… I'm not going to pretend that I know you here or assume that I've got any idea what happened between you and your father…" the lieutenant started. "But if you're even half as good of a person as your father says you are, you must realise that you're about to make a decision that there's no going back from."
"The fact that my father told you that I'm a good person already speaks volumes about how little he knows me," the younger drell said, still tightly holding his gun. "I don't care where he found you or what he's paying you to help him… and I'm only giving you this one chance to walk away. Neither you nor he will stop me from fulfilling your mission."
Since Kolyat seemed fiercely determined, Callius decided to go for a more direct approach.
"Thane's not paying me anything … and even if you're his son, I can't let you go through with what you're came here to do," she stated, straight-forward, "You won't hurt Shepard. I won't let you."
Kolyat narrowed his eyes and grimaced. His face was unreadable. Despite Thane being around for some weeks now, Drell were still too alien for her to figure out. He looked to the wall for a moment, then at the gun in his hand and then he seemed genuinely confused.
"Who told you that I'm supposed to kill Shepard?" he asked, his voice cracking a little at the mention of the Commander's name.
"Your contacts are my contacts, Kolyat," Thane offered. "There for your secrets are my secrets. We know your target. There's no chance of success anymore."
"Except you clearly don't have any idea what's going on here," Kolyat offered before holstering the weapon with practiced ease. "I'm not here to kill Commander Shepard."
"Lying won't change this outcome, Kolyat," Thane retorted. Since this was clearly going better than expected, Callius decided to lean back for now.
"Who do you think I work for?" the younger drell offered.
"Quarn didn't say. He only told me the who, not the why."
Kolyat blinked.
"You talked to Rolan Quarn?" Callius recognized the name instantly. He was after all one of the most Hierarchy's most wanted terrorists…
"Yes."
"And he suggested that I was hired to kill Shepard?"
Thane paused.
"He told me to stop you, otherwise someone less interested in your wellbeing would," the drell replied quietly before glancing at the floor and narrowing his eyes.
The younger drell suddenly chuckled.
"And you just took his word for it… Believing in a con-artist's word… I thought you wiser, father," he offered. "I'm not here to kill Commander Shepard. Quite the opposite actually. I came to the Citadel because I'm supposed to stop the one who's trying to do so as we speak."
"… what's going on here, Thane?" Callius asked cautiously.
"I let emotion cloud my judgement, Lieutenant. And I fear I might have compromised Shepard's safety because of it," the drell stated before looking at her. "I apologize…" the two of them exchanged a glance, a moment that Kolyat used to jump towards his father in a mimicry of his signature biotic leap.
In an instant, the assassin's blade was at his son's throat. The reaction was most likely a reflex or at least it looked that way to Callius. Kolyat, despite what Thane had told her about him in regards to his unsuitability for this line of work, seemed unbothered by the immediate threat. He simply put a hand on his father's shoulder.
"This is not the first time that's happened, is it, father?" he asked before he allowed a black chain to dangle down from his hands. Thane glanced at the chain. It meant nothing to the lieutenant but to the drell it had enough significance to cause him to lower his sword instantly.
"Why would you choose this path, Kolyat? You saw what it did to me… yet you took the oath anyway?" Thane asked, sounding hurt. In response, Kolyat let go of his father's shoulder and formed a fist around the black chain.
"You weren't the only one who changed after mother's death," the teal drell offered in return. "My choice was made on her grave. The day you left me behind was the day I realized that I couldn't rely on you to protect the people we love from the consequences of your choices… I should've stopped them…"
"You were fourteen, Kolyat. Just a child… There was nothing you could have done to stop them."
"Is that so? Tell me, what would you have done at my age? Watched as they killed her? Or dragged your sword through across all of their necks before the first of them ever hit the ground?" the younger Krios spat before his demeanor cracked. "If you'd just trained me, I could have saved her! I was there. Right there!" he yelled before giving the older Krios a shove that forced the aged assassin a step back. "I don't want you to become like me, Kolyat. You're too kind for this kind of life, too pure to step into the shadow. Your purpose lies elsewhere, with the priests. That's what you told me, only you didn't really mean kind and pure and pious. You meant weak. You thought I didn't have it in me, that I wasn't like you that I couldn't be … you…"
"That's not true, Kolyat… I didn't want this life for you because I saw so much of my old self in you…. I was kind once too. Pure. Pious… but serving the Primacy and repaying our debt … it corrupts you down to your soul and even if you separate yourself before each deed… you lose a part of yourself with every drop of blood that you spill," Thane sheathed his sword. "I wanted to protect you, Kolyat. You must believe me. That's all I ever wanted..."
"And you failed me just like you failed mother," the teal drell offered before looking at Callius. "I know you demand answers about Shepard, turian, but there's no time to for a lengthy explanation. All you need to know for now is that the hanar sent me here to make sure that the one touched by the Enkindler's blessing isn't ripped from this world again and that while we talk, the plan of the ones looking to hurt her has most likely already been set into motion."
"I understand," Callius nodded. "But I still need you to explain how Quarn fits into this." If he was involved, it wasn't just Shepard that was at stake. It was the Hierarchy…
"Quarn might say otherwise but he's ultimately nothing but an opportunist with a love of chaos and his own arbitrary brand of justice," Thane muttered … "Weaker. Older. That's how he described me and in that moment, he probably decided that I wasn't as useful as an ally as I used to be. He probably figured that by setting me against my own son he'd get a better deal out of whoever let him know what was going on," the green drell closed his eyes. "He wished for us not to meet again. I will make sure that his wish is not granted after we are done with our mission."
Callius looked at the assassin.
"The Hierarchy would probably be very grateful if you'd turn him in."
"… I don't like having my trust betrayed, Lieutenant," Thane offered in return, letting the statement stand for itself.
Callius meanwhile brought up her omni just in time to dismiss an incoming call from Leng. Whatever he wanted right now, it was probably related to the drinking episode they were having, was certainly not as urgent as warning Shepard. As such the N7 needed to wait.
"I have nothing to add to my father's assessment," Kolyat offered while Callius was hailing Shepard. "Except maybe for the fact that there's always a chance of Quarn having been deceived as well by whoever wanted you to stop me from protecting Shepard," Kolyat looked at Thane. "He is after all one of the few associates of yours cocky enough to seek you out on his own volition."
"Hmm," Thane murmured. "Quarn doesn't strike me as the type to fall for false information. You don't become wanted galaxy-wide by believing misinformation"
"If you want to run a sword through him to feel better about getting played, I won't stop you," Kolyat offered. "I'm just saying that he can't be as much of a criminal mastermind if he got caught for running a stop-beacon next to a hastati skycar …"
"Shepard's not picking up," Callius noted. "Where'd you last see her?" she asked both drell.
"The last time I saw the commander before engaging Kolyat, she was with Lieutenant Nagato," he explained to Callius.
Kolyat nodded.
"Yes. Shepard was with the other officer and they were about to go into the store with the rocket-riding salarian, at least before my father attempted to tackle me."
"Attempted? I chose not to make contact with you, Kolyat…" the older assassin retorted, meanwhile Callius mandibles pressed against her jaw.
"Of course you did."
The CIC officer would have full access to the Normandy's comms, right?
And Nagato most certainly knew where they were going at any given time…
She dialed in the contact of the human officer and when he didn't pick up either, she drew up two possible scenarios: He was with Shepard and about to walk into the same trap as her … or he was with Shepard and about to lure her in…
Either way, they needed to hurry.
"Down in that store," Callius eyes darted to where Thane was pointing. "That's where she went, right?"
"Yes," Kolyat nodded.
"Then that's where-" she started before watching two slightly delayed blurs of purple shoot towards the entrance on the lower level…. Smashing through a window in the process… so much for subtlety. For Thane's sake, she'd assume Kolyat had launched first to fulfill his mission and he'd followed to stop his son from getting himself killed. "-we're going," she finished for herself before subsequently looking down the railing. The drop was probably three units long, but not 'break-a-leg' kind of deep, at least not if she aimed properly.. After throwing a look at the sign showing that the next set of elevators and stairs was easily a minute away, she grabbed a hold of the railing. "Screw this," then she jumped.
Twelve Minutes Earlier, 6. May 2417 AD, Citadel, Zakera Ward, Industrial Sector, Level 22
"You probably think I'm the most disorganized person on the Citadel right now, don't you?" Nagato asked all of the sudden while switching between checking his watch and his omni. He was frustrated and it made him appear almost human…
After leaving behind the rest of her ground team and reaching the Normandy's CIC officer, Shepard had learned the reason she was needed: Citadel bureaucracy.
While military officers could normally act as the business representatives of their COs if they had the necessary paperwork, the fact that she had been listed as 'KIA' in a certain set of documents had apparently thrown a wrench into finalizing the delivery of the replacement parts. Considering that none of this had been an issue on the Presidium back when the Council had told her about the missing pieces of Sovereign and she'd let Gardner buy provisions in her name, Shepard found it a bit weird… but then again these were the Wards and not the Ring, so maybe news just traveled slower around here.
Either way. The problem was straight-forward. Nagato couldn't get the parts needed to fix the damage Cerberus' IFF upgrade had caused and now they needed to verify her identity at every single involved franchise down to the guys providing the thermal paste…
"Why would I think that?" Shepard retorted as the two of them followed the nav points on Nagato's omni. After asking her question she glanced behind her to check for the C-SEC special response officers that had been following her for some time now. They were still there, and they still had to realise that while it had been over two years for them, she still remembered their faces from Anderson's funeral and the accompanying memorial service for those fallen in the defense of the Presidium as if it had only been a couple of months back. After all, their asari team leader had given one hell of a memorable speech about her SIU comrades.
"Because we've been going from one store to the next one for the last hour?" the asian man offered before pointing left to where a shop with a holographic sign of a cartoon salarian riding a missile was located. Unlike Shepard he clearly hadn't been keeping attention of their alternating company and since she didn't want to make him even more nervous (she assumed Nagato was already at the breaking point since things weren't going his way) she had up to now neglected to mention that they had a couple of C-SEC shadows.
"You didn't mark me as dead in the documents, did you?"
"No."
"And you also couldn't have known about me being marked as KIA beforehand either, right?" she asked as they entered the store.
"Not really, no."
"So why would I blame your organization skills for this?"
"Because good naval officers consider all possible obstacles before setting out on a flight," he said, probably quoting from a manual or something.
"You can't plan for an obstacle you don't know you'll run into, Nagato. Don't they teach you that at Luna?" the redhaired N7 wondered out loud before remembering the salarian on the holo-sign and wondering why a burly middle eastern woman with a shaved head and a bluish eye-prosthetic and a wiry pasty-looking guy with a short mohawk were standing behind the front desk of the final shop. With automated kiosks and VI employees it was rare for shops on the Citadel to have more than one employee, wasn't it?
"Hi, I'm-" Nagato began, probably about to give the same explanation about how they were there to verify her identity.
"First Lieutenant Nagato and Commander Shepard," the woman said before her companion reached below the counter and produced a terminal projector that unfolded into a hologram upon his touch. "You just went by my cousin's place. This is about the order and the little KIA slip-up, isn't it?"
"… yes," the naval officer stated before rubbing his neck. "Word travels fast down here."
"Only if you've got the company of a Spectre," the woman stated before giving her a nod and turning her wrist to show her a tattooed '17th' alongside the sigil of the HSAMC. "Big fan of your work, Commander," she added with an easy smile.
"17th Marines?" the N7 asked.
"Yes, Ma'am."
"Eden Prime?"
"Damn right."
She'd been with Ashley's unit then. Right in the middle of the worst fighting on the planet…
The commander gave her a subdued smile and briefly considered asking if she knew Williams. But then she decided against it. Knowing her luck, she'd just open old wounds and that wasn't why she was here.
So all she said was, "rough one."
"Hell of a ride indeed," the woman with the cybernetic eye nodded before putting a hand over her silent companion's terminal. "Don't bother with the verification crap, Cotyar, it's her," she offered. "And waive the transport and delivery costs. It's just thermal paste. They can go in the back and take that stuff with them right away."
"You know you really don't have to this. The HSA's paying for this."
"… with all of our taxes," the woman retorted with a laugh. "I appreciate the hell out of what you did for our people, Commander, but this discount's purely in my self-interest. Besides. Delivering to a warship's a bitch. You'll be saving both of us time if you just take it to go," she gestured to a door behind her. Cotyar can show you while I do the rest with your LT here."
"First Lieutenant," Nagato corrected almost mechanically.
"Sorry. Right. First Lieutenant," the woman responded amused before Shepard walked behind the counter and through the door of the storage room.
"… 'was on Eden Prime too… " he suddenly said. "We were havin' the combined-arms exercise for N-4," he added with a bit of slur and a heavy accent as he flicked on the light to show rows of storage racks neatly lined with containers. "Took 'em two days to dig me and ma squad outta the rubble … then they said our brains was scrambled … TBI or some shit like that … so no N-5 for me after that. Could've just left me there then as well…" he added somewhat resentful before walking to one of the containers and digging through in search of the item. Given how organized this place was Shepard found it weird that he had to search at all but considering what he'd just said she figured that he maybe wasn't the fastest anymore…
"I'm sorry to hear that," Shepard stated while looking at what could've been a comrade of hers...
There were sadly countless of stories like his. After Sovereign hat hit the place with his initial barrage, a ton of soldiers and marines had been buried under the rubble of the Cooper Wells' base or the rubble of Navi Bhopal and for most of the one's they'd found, all help had come far too late.
Why was she specifically mentioning the ones who's remains had been found you might ask?
Because hundreds of servicemen who'd fought on Eden Prime were still MIA to this day.
In between getting vaporized by Sovereign's weapon or being turned into husks by the geth, not every casualty of the battle had been accounted for to this day.
Cotyar was one of the lucky ones, even if his statement suggest that he probably saw that a little differe-
-hold up.
The instant her eyes spotted the sprinkle of dried-up green liquid on the man's sleeve, Shepard's mind stopped thinking about the dramatic aftermath of the Battle of Eden Prime and instead recalled the salarian riding the rocket on the billboard. Salarians had green blood…
… goddammit.
Her eyes narrowed and she shifted her feet into a fighting stance while thinking about the on-going mole situation on the Normandy.
"So I take it you and the marine outside started working for the guy who owns this place some time after Eden Prime?" she asked while moving to a more favorable position further in his back
"… ye," 'the half-baked N7 recruit with the mohawk muttered before looking at Shepard over his shoulder. Next she saw the muscles on the part of his forearm that poked out the sleeve visibly tense up. He was grabbing onto the box tightly and unless he intended to gift her the entire container, it wasn't for a good reason.
"You got what you're looking for?" she asked just as her omni buzzed from a call of Callius, reminding her of the one weapon she'd managed to bring to the Citadel, albeit accidentally and only because Garrus had insisted that she install the function. If she got out of this in one piece, she'd thank him for it.
"Mhm," Cotyar responded as his eyes narrowed.
He knew that she knew.
"And you're sure you wanna do this?" Shepard went on coldly. She'd already figured out what was going on here, she just hadn't gotten behind the why or the who… Nagato, maybe? If he was, she'd at least not have to worry about his wellbeing. But if he wasn't... no time for that.
"… yup. It's the only way I'll think straight again… Nothing personal, Ma'am…" Cotyar murmured.
"Listen. We don't-"
Before she could finish or think about what he'd meant, the wiry man grabbed the box he'd been searching and tossed it at her with full force. She managed to dodge it by ducking down but as she came up, she realized that Cotyar and her had a similar idea.
Omni-blades.
As her omni-tool flash-forged the blade, Cotyar's did the same. While she swung hers up, he swung his down and when they clashed, a crack of electricity sprung alive. Shepard continued the pressure upwards and Cotyar, clearly surprised by the fact that Cerberus had given her muscles a bit more bang for their buck, answered by turning sideways and jumping backwards. When he did, the door of the tight storage room opened and the woman came walking in… with Nagato in front of her and her sidearm leveled at the side of his head.
"Drop the omni or his brains get spattered," the former marine stated before tightening her hold on the taller officer who was staring at Shepard.
"Don't do it Com-" he began only for the woman to smack him with the grip of her weapon.
"Shut the fuck up, navy," the middle eastern woman instructed. "Omni down. Now."
Shepard stared at both of them and while she definitely didn't want Nagato to die, she also knew that the logical consequence of her surrendering her one weapon was that she'd be listed as MIA or KIA alongside him. It sounded cold and it was probably not what people would expect to hear from someone with her reputation… but it was a truth drilled into her at Rio.
Never surrender your weapon. It just ensures that you'll die without a fight… and that was embarrassing, especially if the HSA happened to invest billions into bringing you back from the dead once already.
"What's your gameplan here? Kill two HSA officers, one of them who's a Spectre, and just slip away?" the N7 asked. "There's a squad of C-SEC officers out there waiting for us to walk out of this shop. What do you think they'll do when we don't come out in five minutes? Or if god forbid, they hear a gunshot?"
"Backup or not, this won't take five minutes," Cotyar muttered before pacing sideways like a hungry predator.
"You willing to bet on that?" Shepard offered in response before turning towards the woman with the gun who'd taken a step towards her. They were trying to corner her and they knew she was playing for time. This wouldn't end well…
Meanwhile, 6. May 2417 AD, Citadel, Zakera Ward, Industrial Sector, Level 22
After getting his excitement up in anticipation of duking it out with a drell hitman, Lancelot had spotted something that had quickly curbed his enthusiasm at a challenge and refocused him on his number one priority. Shepard's turian XO, Lieutenant Callius, had passed him in the crowd.
Since they'd never met face to face, she hadn't noticed him. But just by seeing her Lancelot had realized that something was going to go down and as such, he'd abandoned his usual, proactive hunting in favor of going back to keeping a direct, close eye on the commander.
Not a moment after seeing Callius, he'd darted down the stairs to Level 22, an action that had probably drawn the attention of C-SEC's observation group, and followed Shepard's position as it was being shown on his HUD glasses. She'd stopped moving for the better part of two minutes now, which wasn't all that strange considering Lieutenant Nagato had been stopping every five meters because the dumbass had somehow managed to lose his way despite just going in a straight line… but even so, Lancelot didn't like her being static. Static could mean a lot of things and while most of them weren't bad, some were. Captured, unconscious, otherwise incapacitated… dead…
Lancelot had developed a very accurate gut feeling over the years and right now he was positive that the real threat here wasn't with the drell, but right behind Shepard. He looked up at the store the commander was in and then glanced at one of the C-SEC officers sitting on a bench opposite to him. The salarian pretended not to meet his eye but Lancelot knew he'd seen him. He was after all looking right at the front entrance.
On paper the priorities of his assignment were clear: stop any and all threats to Commander Shepard and remain undetected while doing so.
The wording of those two priorities was intentional because when push came to shove, the success of his mission was deemed more important than the integrity of his cover.
While Section 13 obviously didn't want him to get burned and HSAIS had no interest explaining why one of their covert operatives was operating on the Citadel, there were circumstances where they could justify it, at least if C-SEC didn't figure out how many people Lancelot had iced in their jurisdiction. As such he was about to go over to the salarian and tell them that he was embassy personal and suggest that they go in there and check on their absent mark… but before he could do that, two slightly delayed streaks of purple shot past him and impacted the tinted window above the hologram. On instinct, Lancelot jumped backwards and rolled sideways, an action that allowed him to see a tall female turian with reddish-brown plates jump from the level above them onto the ground.
Lieutenant Callius and the drell.
Shepard was in trouble.
As he jumped to his feet, losing his HUD glasses and cup-of-weaponized tea in the process, the specialist could see the C-SEC agents pull out their firearms and run into the store after the drell and in front of Lieutenant Callius, ensuring that a perfect combination of chaotic circumstances were about to come together. If there ever was such a thing as excellent conditions for a case of blue-on-blue to occur, this was it.
He glanced into the shattered window just in time to see two figures in trench coats slip into a halfway opened door. Right behind them, a salarian with a hastily applied yellow armband that read 'Citadel-Security' and two turians came charging into the store, guns drawn and yelling 'C-SEC!' before stacking up at the door the drell had just entered. Behind them, more officers of the observation team were making their moves and somewhere in between them, he spotted Shepard's Blackwatch XO. When he saw the turian, he made a decision that (in retrospective) was probably quite stupid.
He got in her way in an attempt to stop this from turning into an even larger clusterfuck.
Lancelot wasn't a small guy by any manner of the definition.
He stood at the 25th century average of one point eight-six meters and last time he checked, he'd weighed in at ninety-four kilos of mostly muscles. That kind of mass usually needed a lot of force to be moved aside and he figured his chances of preventing the Blackwatch officer from entering the four-way fight probably about to go down inside (Shepard, her assailants, the drell and C-SEC by his count) and turning it into a five-side shootout were actually quite high.
When Callius collided with him, he remembered a crucial detail though…
Turians were tall, turians were heavy … and turians were literally as hard as metal.
He felt his shoulder pop out its socket the moment they hit the ground and before he could do as much break their fall, he was staring up at a turian with a glowing, raised fist about to shatter his skull.
.. what had he said about blue-on-blue again?
"Blue! Blue! Blue! Stop!" he called, raising both of his arms and grunting in pain when his injured shoulder reported its still occurring dislocation. "God- ah- Fuck!" he cursed, his Horizon accent slipping out as the pain made him break cover. He didn't care right now though and instead grabbed his left shoulder with his right hand before realizing that the turian didn't speak human-military code and was still considering whether or not to mince his head. "That means I'm on your fucking side, spiky!" he explained quickly, meeting the amber eyes of the turian with his own brown ones and realizing that now maybe also wasn't the time for slurs, even if they were meant friendly…
"Stay out the way," the turian stated coldly before trying to rise up and enter the store where various people were now screaming at each other, an action he met by kicking her against the leg. The action really only hurt him though because again … metal-plated skin.
The former cabal threw him a deadly look and her biotics flared up again.
"You do that again, you lose your leg," she threatened while pointing at him with her claws before once more trying to walk away.
This time he decided against hitting something much harder than him and instead opted for a verbal approach.
"Lieutenant Callius, right?" he called before rising to a kneeling position and smashing his shoulder against a nearby wall to re-locate it again… it didn't exactly work like he planned it though and his reward was another sting of pain. This day really had gone to shit in a matter of minutes, hadn't it? "You go in there now, Callius, you'll just make them shoot each other even faster. I know you wanna help Shepard, but this won't do. Let C-SEC do their jobs," how utterly hypocritical coming out of his mouth. He never let them do their jobs…
"Why should I listen to-" the turian stated before a lone gunshot rang out.
… fuck.
"Don't!" he started, but it was much too late now, hence he simply followed the sprinting turian…
This was quickly becoming an utter shitshow…
Drell hitmen, turian commandos, C-SEC agents… why couldn't it just be mercs?
Two Minutes Earlier, 6. May 2417 AD, Citadel, Zakera Ward, Industrial Sector, Level 22
"Final warning, drop it Comman-" the woman with the cybernetic implant began before quite suddenly, the sound of glass shattering echoed from the storefront. The second she spun away towards the distraction was all the distraction Shepard ever needed. With a fast step forward, she launched herself at Cotyar and slid the topside of her omni-blade across that of the former N-4 operative until she reached his wrist and could slice downward, effectively separating the weapon from its wielder by taking away the arm it was attached to. With Cotyar taken out of the equation, Shepard turned her attention to the hostage situation on her left, halfway expecting to be shot in the face the second she faced the woman.
Much to her surprise however, she instead found her on the ground with blood pooling out of her mouth … blood coming from a stab wound at her neck inflicted by….
"Thane?" she asked in confusion at the sight of … two drell, the unknown of which had just walked over to Cotyar and by the looks of it had snapped the N4's neck with a simple kick of his biotic-glowing foot. Before the question 'who's that with you and why are you here?' could even form in her mind, several turians, salarians, asari and a human came charging into the narrow room with weapons drawn. Whereas it had already been tight before thanks to the storage shelves, now nearly no one could move more than a meter in any direction.
"C-SEC! Everyone on the ground!" the salarian at the front of the formation stated before aiming a handgun at her and the stunned looking Nagato. "Turn of the omni-blade!" he yelled while looking at the bloodied omni-blade on Shepard's wrist. His colleagues meanwhile seemed to be focused on the two drell and were yelling at them to let go of their own weapons. They seemed reluctant to comply, though.
"Just do what they're saying, Thane," the redhaired N7 offered cautiously before deactivating her omni. "I can explain," she said towards the salarian officer. "… I think," she added before glancing at Thane, who was still holding his sword and murderously staring at … Nagato? The man was sitting on the ground and rubbing his throaat where he'd just been held hostage.
"Drop the sword or you'll get shot, drell," one of the turian officers threatened, Carnifex in hand.
"You'd be better of keeping your eyes on him, he's with them," the drell with Thane replied before gesturing at Nagato. What was he talking about? Nagato had just been a hostage which in Shepard's mind sort of ruled out the possibility of him being in on it…
After throwing the statement in the room, the teal drell discarded his mass accelerator and stared at a black-plated turian. "My name is Kolyat Krios. I'm here on a diplomatic mission with the hanar embassy. I demand that you inform them at once and since I know how you usually act, I'd like to remind you that you do not have the jurisdiction necessary to detain a diplomatic envoy…"
Krios?
Thane's son?
Shepard let go of that line of question for now and instead looked at the deceased pair of humans and Nagato.
"The hell I am," the Asian man coughed. "Don't listen to him, Commander. You saw what just happened."
With two conflicting stories, she looked at the green assassin.
"Thane?"
"My son speaks the truth, Shepard," Thane stated before slowly raising his sword at Nagato. "He lured you here for them to finish and through my own blindness, I let it come this far…" what was he talking about? "With your permission, I'd like to correct my laps of judgement…"
"Final warning! Drop the fucking sword drell!" a C-SEC officer yelled to Shepard's left. While her eyes should've been glued on Nagato and she should've started to ask questions, like for example why he'd brought her to this store in particular, she instead glanced at Thane, worried that the assassin was about to end up at the bad end of a C-SEC shooting.
"Just do it Thane, we can talk about all of this after," she pleaded, hoping to avoid the inevitable consequence of the assassin's stubborn refusal to follow C-SEC's commands.
That moment of her looking away from Nagato and making Thane the point of focus in the room appeared to be all the invitation the officer laying on the ground needed.
"Shi- Gun!" she heard from the salarian officer. On instinct, she turned her head to see a SIS-10 mass accelerator in Nagato's hand, leveled squarely at her face…
Every part of her body was screaming at her to move out of the line of fire, try ducking maybe … but before her brain could send the impulse to move to her muscles, it was already over.
She heard the shot snap right by her head just after a streak of purple shot through the room and for a second she thought she'd been hit and was just to stun to notice yet...
Then she snapped herself out of the adrenaline-fueled tunnel vision and saw Nagato's corpse pinned to the wall by Thane's sword. The blade was run clean through his head and the drell was standing right in front of the now deceased traitor, a hole ripped into the back of his trench coat. Red blood was pooling out of the injury and after making sure to twist the blade and rip it out sideways, Thane let go of the weapon. It clattered to the ground alongside him.
He'd taken a point-blank shot for her and killed Nagato, all in less than a second.
And now he was rapidly losing blood because the barrel had been behind his barriers…
This had gone from bad to worse to holy shit really quickly…
"Father!" she heard Kolyat yell just before Callius of all people came barging into the door with a biotic glow. Behind her seemed to be a blonde human who only briefly peaked into the room, but Shepard wasn't really paying attention to him so she didn't care much when he vanished as quickly as he'd appeared.
As everyone hurried towards Thane, the turian grabbed Shepard by the shoulder.
"Are you alright, Commander?" she asked.
"Better than him for sure," the redhaired N7 stated before looking at Thane. "What are you doing here?"
"Looking for you," Callius explained before glancing at Thane. He was still breathing… that was a good thing. But he also seemed to be … smiling? That was probably good, right? "It's a long story," the turian added.
Shepard listened to the flanging of her voice and then snapped out of her confusion and remembered her position and their current situation. If there was someone were coming after her, they might also come after someone else. Thane and Callius were here and safe. Minus one bullet hole at least. But what about the rest of the crew?
"You can tell it to me when we've got this sorted out. Radio the crew, tell everyone to assemble at the Normandy. I want a full headcount," she ordered. "Thane, I can see you're still smiling," she stated while watching as the green drell put his hand on the arm of the teal drell that had rushed to his side. "Please tell me that's a good sign."
Thane showed her a teethy grin. His straight, normally white teeth were covered with red blood but he seemed to still be in good spirit.
"He missed everything vital," the drell said before spitting out some of the red blood and looking at the dead body of Nagato. "He also missed your head from close range," he commented dryly. "What a poor excuse of an assassin."
"Thane, you just saved my life," she stated factually. "Thank you. Sincerely," while this probably wasn't the right time or place, she still needed to get that out instantly, just in case Thane's assessment of his own injuries was wrong.
The drell simply nodded before gesturing for his blade which was currently in the hands of an asari C-SEC officer. "You can thank me by making sure they don't take my sword in as evidence. Unless we find a drell smith-" he coughed, "- it'll be sort of hard to get a replacement in time … for our mission…"
She turned to the plain-clothed turian who judging by all the people looking at him seemed to be the scene commander. He was black with white markings and overall looked rather similar to Executor Pallin of all people… he was also the guy who'd just threatened to kill Thane.
"Since we're not in cuffs, I take it you know who I am?"
"Naturally, Spectre Shepard," the turian confirmed somewhat frustrated before sighing and looking towards the sword-carrying C-SEC officer. "Not that one, Julara," he offered, clearly having overheard their conversation. "Listen. Spectre or not, I'll have to ask you to come with me to take a statement. I've got a dead human military officer with what sounds like a charge of treason, two dead unknowns who tried to kill a Council agent, one drell envoy calling for his ambassador and another drell who just took a bullet for you… There'll be questions."
Shepard nodded. "I understand and we'll answer them when we can. But for now I'll have to pull the Spectre card for me and my crew," she offered before Callius raised her hand to get Shepard's attention.
"I reached Vakarian, Commander," the Blackwatch officer said. "Him and Leng were already on their way here. They apparently figured out that something might happen to you," she started before her plates flicked outward.
"How so?" Shepard wondered.
"… because we've lost all contact to the Normandy."
Shepard's eyes narrowed and she passed a glance at Nagato.
"Tell them-"
"- to meet us at the ship," Callius finished. Shepard nodded again. "Vakarian already gave the order. Mordin's collecting Samara and Tali and Jack are already at the docks talking to your hastati- I mean military police." Good. She knew she could count on Garrus.
After giving her the run-down on her crew's whereabouts, Callius waved for Shepard to come outside.
"There's one more thing though," she said while leaning in. "There was a man outside the store, he was following Thane's son already just before I got here. Yellow hair. Big guy. White shirt, stupid glasses," she described quickly. "When Thane and Kolyat attacked the store and I came running in after, he tried stopping me."
"So you need me to explain to C-SEC why he's dead?" Shepard guessed while looking around.
"Wha- No, no," Callius offered while raising her hands. "The idiot tried tackling me," not a good idea, "and when we hit the ground, he yelled that he was friendly, then tried to stop me from getting to you again and then finally followed me in the store. He was actually right behind me," she said while pointing at the door, "and now he's just … gone."
"So?" Shepard asked. Maybe she wasn't seeing the problem right now because her mind was spinning at a hundred miles per hour trying to figure out how someone had gotten onboard the Normandy and why they were even there to begin with…
"He knew my name, Shepard and he knew that you were in the store… it was weird…"
Shepard looked behind the turian to the blown-out store window.
"We'll talk about it after we figure out what's going on with the Normandy."
Five Minutes Later 6. May 2417 AD, Citadel, Tayseri, C-SEC District Command
"Captain Bailey? Mister Attrako?" a young turian officer he didn't recognize asked from the door frame of the command center just as the human C-SEC captain was following the perspective of one of the officer's who'd been assigned to the observation of Commander Shepard and who was now briefing a pair of detectives on the three corpses at his feet.
Things had gone to shit and they were nowhere close to figuring out what had happened to the guys down in Tayersi … but at least he didn't have to answer for the death of humanity's second Spectre. As much as he hated to admit it, Attrako had made the right call with sticking some officers on Shepard, albeit for the wrong reasons….
"What is it?" both the turian and Bailey asked in sync.
"… my name is Detective Leandra Kalkri… I usually work on missing people cases concerning Tayseri's twenty to twenty-seven layer but I was drafted into your new Ripper Task Force," the turian introduced herself. Bailey looked up at officer. Her plates were pale green, her skin light brown and her facial tattoos amounted to as set of vertical stripes running down his face.
'Oma Ker', he concluded.
He'd had a thing with an Oma Ker working down in Zakera shortly after coming to the Citadel… she'd been a bit too blood-thirsty to walk the beat, in his opinion, and he'd been proven right when she'd left policing the wards behind for a stint with the Final Wave…
"That's nice for you and all, but if you're just here to introduce yourself, Detective Kalkri, I'd ask you to come by later. We've got a bit of situation developing here and now's hardly the time for niceties. So unless you've got something relating to the case," Bailey murmured while fixated on the screen in front of him and cursing the fact that C-SEC policies ensured he was in charge of this mess until someone with a higher rank than him decided that hits on Spectres, treacherous military officers and drell diplomats were a bit too intense for a regular-old Captain.
"… the thing is, I think I do," Kalkri stated after a second of being put-off by Bailey's stand-offishness. He'd apologize later. Maybe. "I assume you both know that general procedure with missing people cases is to regularly check for mentions of them in report within a reasonable timeframe and see if their DNA popped up somewhere-"
"Detective. Like Captain Bailey just said… we've got a major homicide case that we're working on right now. I don't want to be rude… but could you please get to the point quickly?" Attrako interrupted.
Kalkri nodded, activated her terminal and showed them an image of one of the mercs they'd just found murdered – allegedly by the Ripper. It was one of the ones who'd caught a bullet into their T-box, a thirty-something Caucasian male with dirt-blonde hair. If Bailey's memory served him right, he'd been the one with the assault-and-battery charges and a history of narcotics. Then again, all of them had had those kinds of charges…
"This man can't be who you think he is, you IDed him wrong. And if you didn't, you've got to start ask questions at the embassy," Kalkri stated plainly.
"What do you mean?" Bailey retorted.
"Your guy, Alekszander Zilasoglu… he's been listed as missing, presumed KIA for twenty-eight months. Ever since the Battle of Eden Prime, to be precise." she walked over to Attrako. "Here, Sir, have a look."
The barefaced turian took the tablet from the Oma Ker with a thankful nod. "Didn't you say that the embassy verified the IDs?" Attrako asked while looking at the picture.
"They did," Bailey stated before walking over to look at the picture of the man. It was a snap from his military days. In it, he wore a HSAN uniform and stared at the camera with piercing black eyes.
"… and they just forgot to mention that we asked them to ID a dead marine?"
Bailey shrugged. "Don't look at me, I wasn't the one doing the ID-ing." He turned to the Oma Ker detective. "How do you know about a missing human sailor who died during Eden Prime?"
"Because I worked his case two years ago, Sir."
"You worked a missing case of a human KIA?" Bailey asked for confirmation.
"Yes. Initially at least."
"… You'll have to explain that."
"Chief Petty Officer Zilasoglu was a Citadel resident, he was living down in Shalta and had just started a relationship with a turian at the time," she looked at Attrako, "an Elaprian serving with the archivist corps at the Krogan Rebellions memorial," she elaborated, probably in the assumption that Attrako gave a hint of a damn about where someone came from or how they were currently serving the Hierarchy. Bailey knew for a fact he didn't and it was one of the few things about the guy that he could actually claim to like. "Anyway. Archivist-Captain Larix Inlorax reported the Petty Officer missing after the battle in the belief that he'd been there on his free time and gotten caught in the attack as a civilian. That wasn't the case though. You see, CPO Zilasoglu hadn't been entirely honest with his new girlfriend. He'd told her he was posted with a logistical unit when in reality, the CPO was part of an N7 outfit. First Platoon, Blue Team," she explained to Bailey, this time falsely assuming that he gave a shit about the service record of some military-douche running merc-jobs on the Citadel.
"This asshole was human spec-ops?" Attrako murmured.
"Yes," the Oma Ker detective nodded.
"He has three assault and battery charges... How's this guy still serving? Don't you have disciplinary courts in the HSA?" the barefaced turian commented.
"We do," Bailey shrugged. "Maybe someone forgot to inform the embassy? Or Zilasoglu didn't parade around the fact that he was human military when he was talking to our officers? Seems like the guy liked keeping secrets…" Besides, it wouldn't be the first time some rookie cop working a shore-leave beat forgot to ask their perp where they worked or overlooked the little checkmark 'foreign military personal' when writing their report in between the bar brawls.
… he also wouldn't put it past NSOC to ignore a few Citadel misdemeanor charges, though.
N7 NCOs weren't exactly something you found on the beach.
"… anyway. I was working the case because a Citadel resident happened to report her short-term boyfriend missing and I kept the case until the Archivist-Captain called me to let me know that she'd been notified by a friend of Zilasoglu that he'd been listed as KIA in wake of the geth attack," Kalkri offered. "So to get to the point," she stressed that sentence in particular, "I just thought you should know that one of your victim's officially been dead for two years…"
"And you were right," Attrako stated. "Thank you, Detective."
"I'll be outside if you need me," the Oma Ker nodded.
When she left the room, Attrako threw a final glance at her rear (some things never changed, apparently) and then he turned towards Bailey.
"The detective's right, Armando," he hated it when he used his first name, "we need to start asking your embassy some questions," then he pointed at the screen where the IDs of the other two humans had just popped up. 'Cotyar Klein' and 'Ilona Amar', both were flagged as 'foreign military personal' and had a small HSA flag next to their names…
"Yes we do," Bailey began before his omni buzzed and he closed his eyes, wondering what he'd done to deserve this sort of string of events.
"What is it?" Attrako asked.
Bailey simply turned the omni towards his former turian partner and let him read the headline that had just popped up on the human news app he'd subscribed to.
'Breaking news: Restrictions at HSA docking bay on the Citadel. Military segment locked down, Spectre Commander Shepard spotted in the crowd!'
"Ah crap…"
"Crap indeed."
Meanwhile, 6. May 2417 AD, HSASV Normandy
The crawlspaces of the Normandy were tight and dark and Joker was only not getting lost because he was focused on following Legion right now. Unlike his synthetic companion, who was still perfectly silent without the hint of effort, the Normandy's helmsman was trying his hardest not to make a sound or accidentally bump into something that'd give away their position.
After the choice had been made to use the crawlspaces, Joker had made the deliberate decision to not grab a gun he didn't know how to use and bring it into a tight space and instead simply followed Legion down into maintenance shaft armed with nothing but his trusty hat and wits. Ever since then, they'd been very slowly making their way through the insides of the stealth frigate.
If the mental map he'd drawn of the Normandy SR-2 was accurate, they should currently be somewhere above the crew deck, so near the AI core located behind the doctor's medbay and next to Gardner's kitchen. However since this wasn't the movies, they weren't separated by a thin sheath of metal with holes inside but rather half a meter of solid Martian-Naval-Yards steel. As such they couldn't exactly see what was going on below them, a fact that was unnerving Joker the tiniest bit considering there was a decent chance that a bunch of bad guys would be waiting on them the moment they found a way down.
Sure… he had Legion on his side and the geth had made short work of the Vanguard mechs upstairs (which he now knew weren't Hahne-Kedar originals but rather geth tech) … but since Legion had gone out of his way to reassure Joker by saying that the exploit he had used during the two encounters he'd had with the wanna-be geth most likely would not work a third time due to the likelihood of the mechs networked intelligence now being prepared for his trick … the helmsman wasn't actually all that optimistic about their odds.
There was one upside to this entire crawling-through-barely-lit-maintance-tunnels-because-Nagato's-probably-a-fucking-traitor-or-a-straight-up-idiot-who-shipped-deathbots-onto-the-Normandy shtick he found himself in right now, though.
It gave him time to reconstruct the events of the last couple of hours and start working on his lengthy apology to Shepard for (hopefully only temporary) losing a second Normandy when (or if) they saw each other again.
Since Legion had pretty much confirmed that the Vanguards had come from the cargo-boxes Joker had signed off on, the first question that the pilot was trying to wrap his head around was who was behind this. Just as before, he figured that it was easy to answer that inquiry.
They'd had some weird run-ins ever since Illium and while Shepard and the rest of the crew hadn't said anything explicit to him, he had enough awareness of his general surroundings to understand that someone out there had a big problem with the commander being back from the dead and that there was a decent chance that that someone had an inside source.
And while it was tempting to blame Samara's daughter for the events of Illium and the clash on the quarian science ship and consider the deal settled now that she was dead… Joker somehow doubted that a gun-for-hire like Morinth could do that level of organizing.
… also the Normandy was currently being boarded by a bunch of geth-rip offs. That sort of also suggested that the ordeal wasn't over…
Either way…
To Joker it was clear that whoever was trying to kill Shepard had to have known that they were coming to the Citadel in advance, otherwise they wouldn't have had time to ship their black-market robots to the station. Sure, you could say that the mechs could just be from one of the dozens of HSA ships currently docked to the station but somehow Joker liked to think that the military wasn't disorganized enough to miss the fact that someone had spontaneously stolen their advanced robo-marines. (… then again the IFS had nicked a ton of stuff during the Fringe Wars without anyone knowing for months… so maybe….)
Speaking off the Iffies…
Those guys had been strangely silent for years now, barring the little 'incident' aboard the Makalu that he technically shouldn't even know about.
Could they be trying to kill Shepard? Maybe for something she'd done in the past?
As he ducked below a pipe, Joker paused at the thought.
… had Shepard ever actually been deployed against the IFS?
He knew he hadn't … but space battles against a non-existant navy were sorta hard to be a part of … but Shepard? Being an N7 and what not?
She had to… right?
Anderson definitely had… before and during his Spectre days… so maybe they were coming after Shepard in his place? In a sort-off 'no HSA Spectres allowed' kind of policy?
He turned the corner with Legion and remembered something crucial…
When it wasn't about taking guns from a corrupt asari councilor and her salarian sidekick, the IFS usually didn't work with aliens. Unless he'd missed the monthly newsletter, the separatists still had that whole xenophobia gig going from way back during the First Contact days.
… they were also hardcore anti-Arcturus, weren't they?
So they probably wouldn't hire an Ardat-Yakshi to do the job.
… or use Hahne-Kedar gear to do the job…
… unless of course that was the whole plan-
As Joker bumped the tip of his hat into Legion's stealth-alloyed backside, the pilot was snapped out of his conspiracy spiral and realized they were now in front of a sheath of metal that was projecting a hologram at Legion's face. The camera of the crew-quarter access-port, a feature built-in to avoid hitting your colleagues in the head with a sheath of metal that would now save their butts from being shot to hell.
Bless the designers of this ship for their foresight.
Seriously.
He peaked past the silent geth and looked at the screen.
When he did, he had to hold in a gasp.
… they already had Gardner.
The mess sergeant was kneeling on the ground in front of the Normandy's medbay. A squad of eight Vanguard robots (identifiably by their general robotic-ness) and a noticeably smaller, distinctively human-looking figure, probably a guy judging from his outlines, clad in grey body armor were standing behind him.
Joker squinted as he looked at the human down below and once more nearly mistook him for a marine. Sure, the camo-pattern was missing and the helmet looked like it had been modified with a narrower, dark-blue visor instead of a T-shaped black one … but other than that, he was definitely rocking HSA gear.
Speaking off HSA gear.
In addition to wearing their body armor, the guy was also holding an old-looking powder-based handgun to the head of the mess sergeant and currently talking to what seemed to be a pitch-black medbay window. Joker looked at the gun, it was a short-muzzled pistol with a laser-light module mounted just below its barrel and its magazine looked a bit bulky at the bottom.
A modified SIS-8.
While he'd like to claim that he knew this because of his intrinsic knowledge of all weaponry used by the Human Systems Alliance Armed Forces, he wasn't a gun-nerd like Vakarian and only recognized the damn thing because he remembered pissed-off-basic-training Joker silently cursing about the fact that the marines and army recruits were already getting to train with mass accelerators that needed little to no hands-on cleaning after a range day while him and his naval pals still had to oil up SIS-8's that were probably older than most of the people using them…
"Jeff-Or-Joker," Legion's voice suddenly whispered into his ear. "Do not be alarmed, we have patched into your omni-tool and are about to activate exterior sound."
Not a second later his earpiece came to life.
"… the way I see it, it's easy, Karin," the figure with the gun stated, still talking to the blacked-out medbay windows. Joker assumed Chakwas - or 'Karin', as the guy was unsettlingly calling her - had turned on the medway's privacy feature usually reserved for operations to disguise her movements to the attackers. Smart. The figure continued. "You open the door and give me what I want …" the voice of the fully-armored figure suddenly changed a few octaves to the higher and Joker realized that there was a voice modulator at work, "or you violate your oath to do no harm through inaction and Rupert here pays the prize. Should be a simple choice, no?" … why did this guy know all their first names?
After all he got in response to his threat was silence, the man in grey put his second hand on his firearm. "I know the window's one way and I know you can hear me through the intercom," he said before aiming his gun at the leg of the mess sergeant and quite suddenly pulling the trigger. Gardner screamed as the bullet perforated his leg and blood started to spurt, as expected, but much to Joker's surprise, the shooter instantly knelt down on the older man's groin. For a second the pilot figured it was to make the whole act more painful and get a rise out of Chakwas … but then he saw the blood flow slow down and remembered a first-aid class. The guy was squeezing off the artery he'd just perforated and the ease with which he was doing it made it look like this definitely wasn't the first time he was pulling this move. "Looks like we got a femoral bleeding out here. We need you Doc!" the figure called while calmly collecting the shell casing off the ground next to Gardner and stuffing it into a pouch of the honest-to-god tactical vest he was wearing over his hardsuit… (who the hell was even wearing tactical vests anymore? Hadn't pretty much all kits been moved on to webbing or integrated pouches?)
Gardner meanwhile cursed until he was out of breath, hurling various insults at the unimpressed shooter.
After collecting the shell-casing, the figure simply made a hush-gesture at the growling Gardner and stored his weapon in the holster attached to the middle of his breastplate. Then he turned his left arm and revealed a red-glowing digital clock integrated into the piece of armor. "You're the medical professional here, Karin, so I don't have to tell you that if I need to get up, the bleeding starts again and your friend's unconscious in thirty seconds and dead in less than a hundred twenty…" he paused and looked at the injured man. "So for Rupert's sake … please don't make me get up," he finished. Then he waved his hand through the air twice and knocked the back of his helmet. In response to the signal, two of six mechs broke off from the central formation and positioned themselves on either side of the large medbay window and got into what even Joker recognized to be a breaching position.
'What the hell are you waiting for?' Joker's inner voice suddenly snapped. 'We gotta do something, otherwise Gardner's dead and Chakwas is next!'
Motivated by his conscience, Joker looked at Legion.
"Psst. Hey," he whispered, as quiet as possible. The geth's head turned in place and the earpiece.
"Jeff-Or-Joker. If we are to avoid detection, we suggest the temporary deactivation of your auditory emulators," did Legion just tell him to shut up in geth-terms?
"I know, I know. But we gotta do something. They'll kill him."
Legion's eye snapped back to the hologram and then back to Joker.
"Combat analysis suggest that this platform cannot win in a nine-to-one encounter. If we want to reach the AI core and open the way for reinforcements, stealth is our only option."
"Stealth is gonna get Gardner killed. Just disable the mechs again like you up top and go full-Rebellion on that asshole," Joker figured before pointing at the figure that was currently staring straight up at the camera … probably not good. "It's now or never."
"As we've already explained on the way down here, based on the previous encounters, the response time to our attacks has decreased by three hundred percent with every interaction. As such, the time-window for neutralizing eight hostiles will be anywhere between one-point-one and one-point-five seconds," the geth stated. "Even without accounting for the unknown combat capabilities of the human hostile, this platform is not capable of movements fast enough to dispatch nine targets in this timeframe by itself. If we expose ourselves, we will be terminated. Our termination will result in a failure to recover the Normandy. If we do not recover the Normandy, we drastically lower the chances of stopping the Collectors. If we fail at stopping the Collectors, the likelihood of stopping the old machines sinks significantly. And since a low likelihood of a successful resistance against the Old Machines will result in the deactivation of all known life, organic and synthetic …" the geth paused and his facial flaps (at least the left and top one still remaining) shrunk closer to his face. "A consensus has been reached, Jeff-Or-Joker. Even if we attempt an attack, there is nothing we can do for Gardner. We are … sorry."
Joker looked at the cold rationality for the geth and wanted to leap down there himself … but then he recognized the hard truth staring at him right now: Legion was right and he wasn't saying this because he didn't want to risk his life (?) for Gardner … but because he knew that it'd kill a whole lot of more people than just himself and the three humans left on the Normandy…
"You know my leg's getting a little tired out here, Karin," the figure called, sounding almost bored. "Rupert's probably got another thirty seconds or so before I decide that I need to shake it out and start looking for your helmsman Jeff…" the armored human threw another look at the watch before his voice modulator once more changed the octaves of his speech. "Fifteen … teeeeennn …. Fiiveee-"
Before Joker knew what was happening, the window of the medbay became transparent and Chakwas became visible … an assault rifle in her hand.
"If you do as much as lift that leg, I'll take your head clean of your shoulders," the doctor declared fiercely.
The figure only let out a chuckle in response to the threat.
"Alright. Let's play this game. You shoot me," he tapped his chest, "my synths kill you," he nodded towards the two Vanguards at the window and then pointed down… "and all just so your friend still bleeds out… Come on Karin… who wins in that set-up?"
"Not you. That's what matters."
"Feisty," the kneeling figure replied before whistling and gesturing to a pouch on his vest marked with the green logo of the Sirta Foundation. "Medigel," he explained before slowly lifting his hand and pulling out a syringe. "If you want me to put that on Rupert here," he patted the downed sergeant on the leg. In response Gardner hurled a 'sick bastard' at him, "then all you need to do is open that door there and grant me full access to the AI core…"
Chakwas adjusted the rifle in her hand and narrowed her eyes.
"I'm the medical officer. I don't have access to the ship's AI-"
The man suddenly pulled his SIS-8 and pointed it at Gardner's head.
"Okay. I'll stop you right there," the figure stated. "All things considered, I've been really nice to you up to now. But if there's one thing that I hate, then it's being gaslit by assholes in fancy uniforms," he explained, forcefully driving the gun against Gardner's temple. "I know for a fact that you're one of three people on this ship who has full access to the EDI installed on this ship. The other two are Shepard and her Blackwatch tag-along. I also know that you've been trying to reboot that synth-bitch ever since I got here using that exact security access," the previously calm tone of the figure had changed. He turned his gun on Chakwas and tilted his head. "Finally, I know that the glass of all medbays in the fleet has been bullet proof for the last two hundred years, so you couldn't blow my brains out even if you had the guts to go through with little trade you just outlined," he stated before firing off a single shot that impacted on the medbay window right between Chakwas' eyes, producing a noticeable crack but not shattering the glass outright. The doctor, clearly shocked by the sudden action, took a step back but then regained her composure.
"Why are you doing this?" Chakwas muttered through the intercom.
In response to the question, the figure tossed the medigel towards Gardner's feet, got up from his kneeling position and let the blood squirt out of Gardner's leg. "I'm not here to show you my hand, Karin," he said with a shrug before kicking the mess sergeant in the ribs as he was trying to reach for the medigel. "So. What's it gonna be, Doctor?" he pronounced the last word venomously before taking a step back after a glance at his watch.
"… god fucking dammit…" Joker cursed as he watched Gardner reach for the medigel a second time only to pass out just before he could grasp it. That dramatic asshole had timed this perfectly. "Legion, I can't let this happen… we gotta-" he started, the sinking feeling that this was all his fault (just like the first time the Normandy had been destroyed and parts of the crew had died) settling in. Before he finished his sentence however, the pilot realised that the geth had moved further down the shaft. "What are you doing?" he asked. He had been so focused on the hologram that he hadn't even noticed Legion's movements and while he realized it was improbable given what the geth had just said, a part of him was wishing that Legion was on his way to a Hail-Mary kind of plan.
"We are attempting to circumvent cyber-defense suits and access the fire-repellent system. A new consensus has concluded that the optical obstruction caused by a sudden activation should buy us enough time to dispatch of all threats," the geth explained through the earpiece while silently going about its business. "Despite a low probability of success, we concur with your assessment Jeff-Or-Joker. We can't let this happen."
As the geth started to work on that, Chakwas, who was probably feeling just as helpless as Joker right about now, showed that the quality of her character was much higher than that of the passive helmsman and proved that she was a doctor at heart and a comrade Gardner could actually rely on.
She tossed the Valkyrie to the ground, smashed her hand against the locking mechanism of the door and came charging out the medbay.
Joker saw her got shot then and there but much to his surprise, the man in the grey armor did nothing but watch.
He let the doctor grab the medigel, watched as she knelt down next to Gardner and didn't interrupt when she started to apply it on the injury. Meanwhile, the pair of Vanguards standing by the window moved in to secure the bay.
"Wasn't so hard, was it?" the figure asked while standing behind Chakwas. He holstered his weapon on his breastplate and glanced down at the injured man. "Now… about that access to your EDI…" he started before the doctor leaned back and looked at the leg injury of Gardner and then towards the ceiling, probably unknowingly staring straight at the miniscule camera…
"I told you. I don't have access…" Chakwas said slowly, all the while folding her hands or rather … reaching into her left sleeve.
"… come on. What did I just say?"
"Do you know how long I've been with the HSA?" the doctor responded.
"… I know I don't care," the figure retorted.
"I've been wearing this uniform for nearly forty years now…" Chakwas muttered. "Do you really expect me to betray what it stands for that easily?"
"Considering you opened the door… yeah… probably?" the armored figure stated all the while taking a step back, playing it cool all the while clearly assessing the threat the person in front of him posed.
Joker looked at Chakwas' posture and felt his jaw tense and his heartbeat accelerate.
She wasn't going to-
… ah shit of course she would…
"Legion whatever you do, do it quick!" Joker yelled, probably a bit too loud because the armored figure stared up at the ceiling and pulled his gun.
That moment of distraction was all Chakwas needed…
"Someone's in the maintenance tunnels. Find a way to flush 'em out!" he yelled in the same moment that Chakwas spun around, a large scalpel in hand. Just from its size the thing looked like the ones naval ships kept to operate on the odd turian casualty they might receive and as such it probably could probably punch through the soft weaving on the neck that Chakwas was aiming for …
"Legion-!" Joker started to yell, hoping for the geth's plan to kick into action just as Chakwas was making her move and to give all of this a good endi-
Before he could finish his thought, two shots echoed through the crew deck.
Joker's eyes widened and he tried to comprehend what he'd just seen:
In one moment Chakwas had been going for the throat of the distracted figure with a knife that could cut through metal plates.
In the next, the figure had noticed what was going on and reacted with a lightning-fast set of motions. First he had let himself fall backwards, a motion that resulted in the knife scratching across his dark-blue visor instead of burying itself in his carotid artery. After he hit the ground, he had kicked both of his legs upward, against the doctor's hip. The move had blocked her from reaching her and increase the distance between themselves … and finally … he fired off his gun twice.
Joker closed his eyes but it didn't undo that Chakwas had just gotten shot in the heart.
He heard the the knife fell out of her hand and when he forced himself to open his eyes, he saw her fall against the legs of the man who'd just put a pair of SIS-8 shots through her heart. Her white medical uniform was stained crimson and a pool of blood was collecting under her feet.
Joker stared at the screen in shock, not even registering that Legion had announced he'd be 'ready to engage in fifteen seconds' … He could only stare at what had just happened.
He knew he shouldn't look, for his own sake … but now that he had force dhimself to look, he could not even blink. Every detail was burning itself into his mind the second it happened.
As her killer removed his stabilizing legs and rose to his feet, Chakwas dropped to the side next to the still unconscious Gardner, eyes wide open.
"Why would you do that?" the man asked with an audible sigh before jumping to his feet with an agility his armor probably shouldn't allow. "Why the fuck would you do that?!" he repeated much louder before first stepping on top of the knife with one foot and then kicking Chakwas hard enough to turn her face up with the other – right at the camera. The doctor didn't show a reaction to the kick, probably because her heart had just been perforated twice by SIS-8 ammunition and she was already just a second away from death … that thought hurt Joker more than he could put into words …
As he was forced to watch and wait for Legion to do something – anything – the armored man stared at the dying doctor for a second and then, much to Joker's horror, fired off a third shot straight into Chakwas' head.
Jocker fell backwards, at least as much as the narrow crawlspace allowed him to, as such he could only guess that the two pair of shots that echoed out after what he'd just seen were meant for Gardner and that the white fog rapidly filling what little he could still see of the room was Legion's fire repellent plan kicking into motion.
He felt catatonic and didn't care much about what happened next, nor have any concept of how much time passed.
Only when a familiar turian voice called out to him from the opened shaft of the crew deck did he start consciously registering things again.
"Spirits. Joker. You up there? You alright?" the helmsman stared straight into Garrus' face and could only stammer out his name and the start of a sentence.
"Garrus… I- … Chakwas… she's … -"
The turian lowered a Carnifex Joker was only now realizing he was aiming down the shaft and hung his head.
"… I know," he extended his arm before looking around at the white mist settling ont he ground. "Joker... we have get you out of here. The repellent fumes are probably poisonous …"
Joker stared back at the turian, not caring much for his own safety right now.
"Did you get him?"
"Who?"
"The guy who … did it," he wanted to say murder but couldn't
Garrus glanced down.
"No. But we will."
Codex: History of the Terra Novan Hardline Part 4. (Darker Sides)
While the TN-Hardline is generally recognized as a respected, small-time political stream localized on Terra Nova and fiercely devoted to its core values, one cannot talk about the Terra Novan Hardline without mentioning the connection between its ideology, some of its members and a portion of the organized crime structures found near and around Terra Nova's equator.
Whereas most people who are drawn to the Hardline are generally upstanding, honorably discharged veterans and HSA patriots who don't view the Systems Alliance Foundation human-focused policies as far-reaching and national enough, a small fraction of people that can be placed within the politically influential part of the TN-Hardline have proven connections to criminal elements.
Ranging from members who are affiliated with localized 'private security services' that are suspected to partake in mercenary operations in and around the newly formed CIP to individuals with proven ties to the 'combustion-engine clubs' (a type of single-occupant automobile based gang tracing their origins back to criminal structures that first surfaced during Earth's twentieth century that runn large parts of the narcotics trade in and around the basalt desert regions surrounding Maguires, one of Terra Nova's largest cities), several figures of the Terra Novan Hardline have in the past been placed under scrutiny for their connections to people – who on the surface – do not represent the values that the movement strives for.
To name a particular example, there have been several occasions of security outfits such as the 'Asgard Risk Assessment' and members of C-E Clubs like the 'Basalt Desert Devils' and 'Cat-6-United' providing protection for Hardline affiliated concerts around Maguires, an action that ended not with a public distancing from the group in regard to the gangs but rather an on-stage declaration thanking them for their services.
At this stage it should be mentioned that a considerable portion of C-E-C members is made up of either dishonorably discharged HSA service personnel or honorably discharged soldiers who became involved with the criminal underworld after failing to reintegrate into civilian society.
Additionally, it needs to be mentioned that several outspoken supporters of the Hardline such as Kristian Kulberk, owner of the Hardline-affiliated '4Claws' extranet magazine and known associate of Mors Ad Alto drummer Silvia Jasinski, have publicly express the view that the 'loyalty' part of their creed weighs heavier than social concepts such as criminal offenses and that they'd rather have 'one patriot with a record' by their side than 'one hundred squeeky clean Fringers'.
Therefor, and despite the official position of respected Hardline figures such as Britton Wells that criminals have no allies within the Hardline, it is reasonable to claim that the Terra Novan Hardline has at least questionable ties to local criminal elements.
A/N:
Hi.
... in case you couldn't guess, this was SV's version of the ME2 Normandy boarding.
I'm not gonna lie, I feel sort of bad ending things on THAT note... but I did tell you that people were gonna start dying the closer we got to ME3, didn't I?
Well.
You can now consider the ball rolling.
I won't lie to you, I've been looking forward to this chapter mostly because it gave me the chance to finally remove one of SV's countless plotlines from the equation, namely the whole mole subject. Like I mentioned in another A/N, slowly but surely plotlines need to start ending or rather meeting and as such you can consider what just happened as a taste of what's to come now that we've concluded the second-to-last ME 2 sequence of Shepard. I'll also admit that this was one of the more challenging segements to write because I had to do a lot of 'who is where and when are the there' and 'what do I show, what do I imply' calls with this one (which is why you didn't get to see Shepard and Co boarding the Normandy and instead got Joker helplessly watching the mysterious bad guy sorta-accidentally-kill Chakwas. (Speaking off, I look forward to seeing if any of you are ready to make guesses as to what character this is going to be. Now don't take this as me saying you actually have a chance of figuring it out... but I still wanna hear your theories :P)
Okay. Enough of that.
Looking back, I realise that we've spent the last three months looking at no one but Shepard and as such I think it goes without saying that next chapter won't focus exclusively on Shep. Naturally there are still things that need to be adressed... but we still have Haugen and Morneau and Desolas and Liara and Javik and Vega and Redford and Yo-yo and Harper and everyone else out there who've been itching to get their turn!
... I think I'll actually leave it at that.
For the record we're at 892 reviews, 1450 favorites and 1535 followers.
See you around next time.
