Arc 1: The Return

Chapter 4: It Has Begun

'The pipe wrenched itself loose from the bridge's steel framework. Wrapped in darkness, it floated in midair, twitching spastically. For a moment, I didn't understand what I was looking at.

The Heavy object lurched at me with impossible force. I threw myself out of the way, but just barely.

When I turned my flashlight on it, it shook in a dark rage, before it flew at me again.'

Shepard set the collection of ancient papers down in the grass beside her, taking a moment from reading to both enjoy the sunset and take some time to digest what she'd just read. The book was… unsettling, to put it mildly. The words on the pages, the phrases written so long ago in this work of fiction… they rang out in her mind, eerily similar to the dream she'd had shortly before landing back on Earth.

This 'Darkness' was written in such a way that it nearly perfectly matched and mirrored her dream. How… coincidental…? In Shepard's line of work, coincidence didn't exist. Was there something going on? Was this some type of foreshadowing?

Shepard laughed internally. What kind of delusions was she entertaining? A suspense-horror fictional novel coming to life, mirroring a senseless dream she'd had just this morning? What a joke; a bad joke. Yet, there still remained a small part of her, considering the possibility, no matter how outrageous it may be.

Jennifer thought back to her companions, who were likely sucking face behind the tree to her left. They'd described their encounter with Monica at the Museum, and what little they'd learned of the town. Apparently, much of what happens in 'Departure' also exists in the town's superstition.

Had the novel inspired the myths, or the myths inspire the novel?

Regardless, it just left her with more questions, one of which being the sanity of the townspeople and the 'Lady of the Light' back at the museum…

She was shaken out of her thoughts by her omni-tool going off, signaling a message.

"Shepard here."

"*Cough* Hey Shepard, it's Agent Burke… I'm… I'm not feeling so good…"

Shepard raised an eyebrow, which he obviously couldn't see through the audio-only call. "What happened? Food poisoning?"

"Absolutely not!" He said, outraged at the thought, "I just… I think I'm coming down with something. I let my superiors know, so someone else will meet you by the lakeside. I think they may want to meet a bit earlier, if you wanna get going sooner…"

"Alright, thanks, I'll do that. Get better soon."

"Thanks… Bye." He mumbled across the line, before hanging up.

Shepard sighed, before calling out over her shoulder, "Alright, fun times' over." Unfortunately, it was time to go to work, and meet up with this new agent, whoever he or she may be…

Jordan Burke laid on the ground by his hotel room's bed, agony flooding his senses. Sweat smothered his face and made it stick to the carpet, making the act of getting up even more outlandish to his feverish mind. To say he wasn't feeling well would be a colossal understatement.

'What could have caused this?' He pondered silently, unable to speak after informing Shepard that he wouldn't be making a reappearance.

The edges of his vision clouded over and appeared dark, despite the overhead lights he knew for a fact he had turned on. In fact, the entire room looked a bit overly dark, as if the lights had chosen to dim themselves. Slowly but surely, he turned to the sound of footsteps on the soft carpet, each step he could faintly feel vibrating through the ground.

Looking up at the intruder in his room, Jordan couldn't even muster the energy to ask who they were or why they were in his room. His gaze must have been understood by the individual, as they… or she… decided to finally speak.

"Now, now… no need to overexert yourself, Agent Burke… just sleep, and let the cool, calming darkness take you away…"

'Sleep… sleep sounded really good right now…' He thought. An extremely irrational part of him warned him against this, however. As if the act of going to sleep would be a point of no return. His subconscious warned him that succumbing to the darkness would be the final free act of his life, but that meant nothing to him.

He was tired.

Finally giving up, he closed his eyes as the pain began to grow dull and fade away. He felt airy and free…

"That's a good boy…" The unknown woman whispered. It was the last thing Jordan heard before his body and soul were consumed by the Dark Presence. He was now, simply put, Taken.

The final rays of light over the horizon were no more, and darkness began to settle upon Bright Falls as the shuttle approached a cliffside to Cauldron Lake. As the shuttle flew quietly, the three Normandy Crew listened to the local radio station, hearing the last few bits of a conversation, before cutting to a song request.

"…which is why Shepard is in Bright Falls. There's no other reasoning behind the Commander's appearance."

"Thank you, Doctor." The host said, "Now, we have a very special request from Bright Falls' very own Lesini N'Sinna. She has requested quite an unusual and old song for you folks tonight, and I hope you enjoy it. Here is: It Has Begun, by Starset."

"Even a well-lit place, can hide salvation.

A map to a one-man maze that never sees the sun.

Where the lost are the heroes,

And the thieves are left to drown.

But Everyone knows by now

Fairy-tales are not found.

They are written in the walls…"

The rest of the song was ignored as the radio turned off in sync with the shuttle door opening. The sun dipped fully behind the trees as Shepard and her companions stepped out of the shuttle and into the active investigation site.

There were over a dozen Alliance Officials and Officers running around as they tried to figure out everything they could about this event. Stepping into the shadows cast by the setting sun, Shepard looked around for whoever was in charge of this operation. Unable to deduce this immediately, Shepard turned toward the nearest officer and tapped him on his shoulder.

The young man looked fresh out of training in his neat, crisp uniform. The moment the man spun around, he stood at attention and saluted Shepard with wide eyes.

"Commander, Ma'am!" He answered. Shepard could virtually feel the rolling of her associates' eyes, and had to suppress her own eye roll.

"At ease, soldier." She replied, to which he immediately relaxed.

"What can I do for you, Ma'am?"

"I'm looking for the man in charge. I'm here to help investigate." The last part was only partially accurate, but Shepard wasn't a woman who would simply sit back and watch others do the hard work. If the Alliance brass wanted her here, and the Council did too, she'd be putting some sort of effort in.

"That'd be Admiral Hackett." He replied quickly, causing Shepard to raise an eyebrow. The man quickly added on, "He's the man behind this whole investigation, but he's too busy to be down here with us. He said he'd sent an Agent from Alliance Intelligence to lead the investigation, but he's late."

"Agent Burke?" Ashley asked from behind Shepard.

The agent nodded, "Yeah, that's him."

"He won't be coming." James answered, "Called the Commander earlier, said he's too sick."

"That's too bad…" The officer replied, "He seemed to actually be one of the few down-to-earth agents, if you know what I mean. Actually seemed human… That being said, he's too far up the food chain to not be here, someone's gotta take charge."

"He did say he'd get the Alliance to send someone else to take his place." Shepard said.

The agent nodded at that, "Makes sense. I heard rumors another shuttle was on its way from the fifth fleet in orbit. Maybe that's him… or her, ma'am."

Shepard shook her head, "Thank you for the information."

"Of course." He said, before saluting one final time and returning to whatever task he may or may not have had.

While waiting for the shuttle to arrive, Shepard walked around the site, trying to get a firm grasp on the situation and investigation. She stopped by a group of agents taking pictures of an area of blackened grass down the hill, closer to the lakeside.

The area was several feet wide, with burnt-black grass. Closely examining it as she got closer, Shepard could see the burnt remains of a hand… the hand of a husk. She frowned upon seeing it. Proof beyond a doubt that some Reaper tech had survived the Crucible Purge.

One of the two agents noticed her, and turned. They saluted, and the other quickly followed suit, "Ma'am."

"At ease." She replied. "What's the situation?"

The first one answered Shepard, who was clearly a woman, "Just documenting the area. This was where Miss Dreamer reported that she'd encountered the husks."

The other one, a man, added on, "No offense, but I doubt a civie like her could have fought off a husk, much less the half-a-dozen she claimed to have found."

The former shook her head, "Regardless of the absurdity, she wasn't lying about the husks." She turned toward Shepard, "We've locked away the remains of four mostly-intact husks. Those along with the hand found here prove beyond a doubt that some husks somehow survived the Crucible."

"You seem awfully concerned about this husk hand." Shepard commented, motioned toward the burned grass and hand, "What's that all about?"

The man replied first, "Look at it, Commander. The hand was cut clean off. It lends further evidence that maybe Miss Dreamer wasn't lying about everything."

"There's also the fact that the four retrieved husks had both hands still attached to them." The woman added on.

"So that means there were at least five?"

"Exactly, but where'd the rest of it go?" The man asked, "Furthermore, someone attempted to burn the hand away, but couldn't."

"Not surprising, knowing what we do about those Husks." The woman added, "They're resilient bastards. Only actually burning and disintegrating when they died."

"Which makes things so much stranger."

Shepard nodded, "I noticed that. Don't Husks disintegrate upon death, making studying the process of making them almost impossible."

"Exactly, so why didn't they disintegrate, too?" The man said.

"Our current working theory is that Husks disintegrate at the demand of the Reapers. With no Reapers left to control them, they just flop over and die."

"So, why are they still intact and operational if there are no Reapers to do that?"

"Beats us, Commander. Acting on instinct perhaps?" The man replied uncertainly.

"Or maybe there's more going on than we're aware of?" The woman added, "If I may be honest, Commander, I feel like there's so much going on that we're not aware of."

"Like what?"

"For starters, Miss Dreamer certainly didn't tell us everything. Some things aren't adding up with her story. Secondly, why did these things choose to reappear now?"

"And what about this?" The woman added, motioning toward the burnt area, "Someone tried to burn this, but why… and how?"

"Incinerate?" Shepard supplied helpfully, to which both agents shook their heads.

"Miss Dreamer was the only one with access to this area prior to the investigation. She doesn't even have an omni-tool, which is strange in its own way."

"It does seem like there's more going on than it seems," Shepard admitted.

"Exactly. We're still trying to find any possible leads, but no luck yet."

"Alright, well I'll let you get back to it. As you were." Shepard said, to which they both saluted. She then turned around and walked elsewhere.

It'd been over an hour since they'd arrived at the scene, and the new Alliance officer had yet to make an appearance. Walking around the scene of the investigation revealed only a small amount of additional insight, but it was valuable nonetheless. Eventually, a shuttle entered the atmosphere about them, and glided to the top of the nearby overlook, forcing Shepard to reclimb the hill.

At the top, standing just outside of the shuttle was an official-looking man. The moment she arrived, he noticed her and approached with haste.

"Commander Shepard?" He asked, before pulling out an old-fashioned wallet and opening it, revealing a physical version of an Alliance Intelligence badge, "Agent Nightingale, Alliance Intelligence." He announced. The name seemed to set off alarms in her head, and seemed vaguely familiar, but she disregarded it as soon as she remembered where she'd heard the name from. There was a 'Robert Nightingale' from the story she'd just been reading, but how could it possibly mean anything? Nightingale wasn't a rare last name.

The man had sharp, dark brown eyes that peered deep into the Commander's soul, and aging brown hair that was slowly graying. He wore an older-fashioned suit with a dark jacket over it, emblazoned with an 'FBI' logo. Must've been a fan of the retired organization, or it might have been a favorite jacket. Once he showed the badge, he extended his hand toward her, which she shook.

"Agent." She replied, nodding.

"I apologize for my associate. He couldn't have picked a worse time to get sick." He said, "That being said, it's an honor to work with you, ma'am."

"The honor is mine, Agent Nightingale." She replied, to which he quickly formed a quick smirk, before it vanished back into a neutral expression, "So, what can you tell me about all this."

"Not much more than what you likely already know, Commander…" He said, before he turned to look at the shuttle for a moment, before turning back, "Actually, I was planning to do an aerial sweep with the shuttle, if you'd like to join me. Perhaps with your experience, you'll notice something I haven't, yet."

Shepard shrugged, "Sure, I'm willing to help."

"Excellent, follow me, but I'll have to ask for your associates to stay behind. Not too much room in the shuttle with all the equipment." He apologized.

Shepard could almost feel the objections from Ashley and James, and quickly cut them off, "Of course, it shouldn't be long, right?"

"Of course not. Half an hour, tops. I'll meet you there." He said, before turning around and leaving toward the shuttle.

As soon as he was gone, she turned around to see Ashley with her arms crossed, "I don't know about this, Shepard." She said, "Something about him rubs me the wrong way. I mean, did you see? He didn't use an omni-tool. And his ID? Who actually has a physical badge?"

Shepard shrugged, "I've known agents who use limited technology. Makes things harder for their opposition when there's nothing to hack."

Ashley nodded begrudgingly, "You have a point, Commander."

"Look, I know you don't know why you feel this way, but it shouldn't be long. I'd like you two to keep checking around. Maybe give these guys a few pointers. After all, we are the experts on Reaper tech and Husks…"

James chuckled, "Maybe experts on dismantling them, but I see your point, Lola."

Ashley shook her head, "Don't worry Skipper, I'll watch the meathead."

"Hey, I take offense to that, Ceniza." James said. Ashley shook her head as the two of them walked off, back down the hill. Shepard smile at her two close friends before turning back toward the shuttle to meet up with Agent Nightingale. Along the way, she overheard a few conversations from some of the other agents.

"Did you see that guy? Never seen that man before in my life..."

"Agent Nightingale? First I've heard of him."

"Hopefully he'll be as good as Agent Burke was."

"Something about him rubs me the wrong way."

"You're paranoid, he's only just arrived. Seems nice enough."

Shepard ignored the side-talk and soon arrived at the shuttle, before climbing in. Once aboard, the doors began to slide shut as she made eye-contact with Agent Nightingale. He was already seated across from where she stood. "Let's get airborne." He called up as the shuttle began to lift-off.

As the shuttle glided through the night sky above the lake, Shepard sat across from Agent Nightingale silently as the equipment began scanning the lake below them. It was simply a waiting game now, until the first readings were gathered. After that, they'd finally have something to do aside from sit across from each other.

Shepard decided, after a few moments, to break the silence.

"So, Agent Nightingale…"

"Yes?"

"Tell me about yourself?"

He smiled lightly and nodded, "Sure. Been an agent for my entire career, seen and done things many of the faint-of-heart would never wish to see." He started, before he frowned, "Everything changed when my partner went missing. Never felt the same after Finn vanished…"

"Sorry for your loss."

"It's fine. It's been many years since then…" He was cut off by the equipment beeping, drawing his attention, "Pilot, take us in closer." He called out, which was immediately heeded as the shuttle began to descend.

He stood up from his seat and approached the closed shuttle door, his silhouette looked strange in the dark shuttle, as if it flickered like black flames for but a second. He pressed a button and the door immediately responded by opening, revealing the shuttle to now be only floating a few dozen feet over the pitch-black lake.

"Come here for a moment, Jennifer." He said, immediately raising several flags and questions. Silently double-checking that her sidearm was loaded, she stood up and stopped a foot behind the strange agent.

"Commander." She replied to him, but he didn't seem to acknowledge it.

"I must ask if you've heard the strange rumors and legends behind Cauldron Lake." He said, turning his head slightly to peer back at her.

"You mean the urban legends of the darkness and Alan Wake?" She asked. For just a moment, a sneer came across the man's face when she mentioned the writer's name. Something was very wrong.

"Ah… so you have heard. Have you read his work? I hear his use of metaphors can be quite distasteful."

"It's a good read so far." She replied evenly, her hand slowly drifting to her hand cannon.

"Of course,… If I may be so bold, Shepard, how have you been sleeping? Any odd dreams?" She immediately grabbed her pistol and unholstered it, almost as if on instinct. Something was very wrong here, but she didn't do anything hasty, like aim the weapon at the man.

"Pilot!" She shouted out, "Take us back to the mainland." Her unease only continued to grow as the man's presence became darker. Literally.

Immediately responding, the shuttle began to move back towards where they originated, but didn't speed up drastically since the door was still open. Nightingale didn't seem to mind though, as he turned back around slowly to fully face her.

"Let me ask you something, Commander… Are you afraid of the dark?" He said before smiling, "I used to be, but now… I embrace it!"

What happened next either was a new form of biotics, or broke the laws of nature and reality. The man threw his hand out towards the cockpit and where the pilot was, and a stream of darkness flowed from his hand at high speeds through the door. A quick burst of a scream sounded off, before it was silenced.

The shuttle rocked to invisible turbulence as the man in the black suit gave off a cruel smile, having obviously killed or injured the pilot. Her gun in hand, Shepard rose it quickly and fired once into the man's chest.

He brushed it off like a mosquito bite, barely stumbling half-a-step back as the bullet ricocheted off and hit the wall of the shuttle. Where she hit, a stream of blackness radiated off of him like steam. Much like the enemies in her dream did.

"We've been waiting a long time for an opportunity like this, Jennifer." He said with a cruel smile, especially after seeing her reaction to him surviving a shot to the chest like that. "Ol' Stephen King finally grew the balls to try again." He said, "This time, Lovecraft isn't going to be writing a sequel…" With that, he put his hand back towards the cockpit and pulled an invisible item back toward him, sending the shuttle into a nosedive.

Shepard threw biotics at the man while attempting to reach the cockpit, but it was all in vain.

The last thing she heard was dark laughter from all directions, and a large splash as she and the shuttle hit the lake at top speeds.

The cold darkness soon consumed everything.

Director Drescher stared distastefully at the retreating figures of his agents, watching them as the doors to his office closed behind them. He let out a sigh once they were gone, allowing himself to relax upon their exit.

Being FBC (Federal Bureau of Control) Director was no small task, especially with the loss of agents during the Reaper War. He remembered the FBC Operations quite clearly during that fateful event. Many of his staff wanted to aid the rest of humanity on Earth during the invasion, but he had prevented many of them from leaving. An action he credits as the sole reason they weren't wiped out during the attack.

Of course, the FBC didn't just go into hiding at that time. In fact, the Reaper invasion triggered a very dangerous AWE in Manhattan. Without needing to go into detail, the entire event was catastrophic, but they couldn't allow humans, aliens, nor the Reapers to get their hands on the produced Altered Item.

It was an antique 3-D printer… What a shitshow that was…

Regardless, the agents had angered him when they told him they had not made any headway with research into the 3-D Printer. The only thing they'd figured out so far was that the printer contained several 'pre-set schematics' which could be used if one knew one of the many passwords locking them. No other schematics could be uploaded to it. And failed password attempts... well, those never ended well for those who attempted them.

A knock came from the door before it opened, revealing a Janitor listening to music through old headphones. He peaked in and made eye-contact with the Director.

"Ahhh… sorry, did not see you were still here. I'll be back… Lots of work, I'm sure you will have…" Ahti said, quickly leaving, muttering nonsensical words as he did.

Director Drescher decided against attempting to reason or think about what he was doing or what he may or may not have meant. The janitor was as mysterious as any other part of the Oldest House.

His eyes darted over to the Service Weapon sitting on his desk in front of him, before noise caught his attention and pulled his sight toward an old radio by the bookshelf to his left. It quickly played a small portion of an old song.

"…It has begun!

Into the dark below,

Evading shadows.

Blind in a rabbit's hole

We fall beneath the Earth.

And watch the shell come unraveled

As the seed begins to rise.

Awaking its starlit fate as we wait in the night…"

Before he even had a chance to jump up and make a call, the old phone at his desk began to ring. He picked it up immediately.

"Sir, we have an A.W.E. occurring in Bright Falls."

"Wake…" He breathed out, his gaze hardening, "Assemble Alpha Team. We leave immediately."

"Yes sir!"

"And I want everyone equipped with a flashlight and a personal HRA. We're not taking any chances."

CLASSIFIED CODEX ENTRY:

A.W.E. (Altered World Event)

Altered World Events are paranatural events that occur, which follow certain guidelines. To be considered an A.W.E., an event must occur that breaks the known laws of reality and nature, being caused by forces beyond our dimension. AWEs normally result in the creation of an Altered Item or Object of Power (OoP), the emergence of a Threshold, or other unexplained phenomena related to alternate dimensions or the human collective unconscious.

Thresholds, which normally create AWEs or are caused by them instead, are locations that connect our plane of existence with other dimensions. Thresholds very rarely occur outside of the Oldest House, but have been known to occur in seemingly remote locations such places as Bright Falls or Riverport, such as the case was with Monarch Solutions.

The most infamous occurrence of an AWE for the FBC occurred in 2019 within the Oldest House, known as the Hiss Incident, only slightly ahead of the AWE of Ordinary and Bright Falls…

*Access to these records is restricted to FBC officials only.

A/N: Just played the AWE dlc from Control, which inspired me to finally finish and upload this. For the purposes of this story, Control and its dlc do occur in this timeline, however, as for the next appearance of Alan Wake in a game, I'm running under the assumption that Alan and Jesse meet but he becomes trapped within the lake once more by the end of it.

I'm still working on this and TPOE, so I'll hopefully have an update on that. More info about what's going on and the delays will be featured in an Author's Note in that story. Hope you enjoyed this chapter!