SSV Everest, Arcturus System : Hackett
Crucible Event +0
For all he knew, Hackett could have been in the afterlife. Heaven, as his mother's faith would call it, or else whatever the great cosmic reward that awaited the worthy was called. An eternity like this wouldn't be bad for a man like him. Standing at the bridge of a ship alongside a crew he knew and trusted, sailing the endless expanse of space for all time was about as good an eternal reward as he could ask for. But with the unavoidable knowledge that he'd just sent tens of millions to their deaths along with the very real possibility that the fight was not yet over and the Reapers still hunted him, Hackett could also have been in hell.
But he knew he was alive. His forehead had been sliced open when his ship had trembled from the force of Reaper fire, and the barely dressed wound still throbbed and burned. His bridge crew chattered back and forth with news of casualties on his own ship, people trapped at their stations, decks aflame. It couldn't be heaven, because the universe wouldn't seem to let them just die yet.
"Diaz. Give me fleet casualties," Hackett said. His order came as a dry croak, and Hackett's brain was reminded that a drink of water should probably have a reasonably high priority at the moment.
Across from him at the command station, his XO swiped at the holographic readout. "Things were getting spotty towards the end, sir. Several thousand reports came in at once right before the Crucible fired, and we may not have logged them all."
"Best estimate, then," Hackett responded.
"Sword Fleet estimated casualties: seventy-eight percent. Shield Fleet estimated casualties: fifty-five percent. Hammer Ground Forces." She hesitated. Swiped through a few more reports before giving in.
"Unknown, sir. Estimated between ninety percent and total."
Hackett's response was a solemn nod. Total casualties. Statistically speaking, it was improbable that the Reapers could have destroyed the entirety of the galaxy's congregate assault force in the span of the battle. Possible for them, but not likely. It wasn't hard enough for Hackett to imagine that they'd come close enough. It had not been easy to keep current on the ground war from high up in the sky, but Hackett knew Hammer's camps and positions had been overrun one by one, and their desperate charge for the beam had been utterly shattered by Harbinger. Had Shepard and Anderson not made it, Hammer probably wouldn't have had another shot.
"Do we know if the Crucible succeeded? What's the status of the Reapers in the Sol system?" Energy had poured out of the Crucible in unimaginable quantities, but that wasn't a guarantee. As soon as it began, Hackett had sounded the retreat to Arcturus. Their gambit could have failed.
"Based on the scans ships got back just as we were jumping out-"
She was cut out by the blare of the general quarters alarm. Monitors displaying the orange of hazard reports were joined by the angry crimson of battle. The attitude of the CIC went from frantic to panicked.
"Sir, multiple contacts emerging from the Exodus Relay!"
"The Istanbul is reads at least fifty capital ships, several dozen support craft!"
"Confirmed, intercept course. They are on a confirmed intercept course for the fleet."
"Hull configuration is a match. It's Reapers, sir."
Hackett waved his hand to pull up his own tactical readout of the coming battle. It wasn't until he withdrew his hand that he noticed it was shaking. His head wound throbbed furiously as his face contorted. Veteran of a hundred battles. Humanities fearless leader. Now I start shaking.
It made sense, he supposed. At Earth, the Cerberus base, any of his skirmishes with the Reapers over the course of the last year, he'd led his forces into battle knowing that today could be the day he died. Today, he knew for sure.
It terrified him how comforting it was, just to be sure for once.
It had to be battle. Hackett had picked Arcturus for the fallback point since it meant two possible mass relays to escape through if they'd lost, and only a short trip back if they'd won. But the Reaper rearguard had beat the to the punch. They'd be in firing range before their ships could reach either relay at subluminal speeds, and charging up the FTL drives for a jump would be cutting it awfully close. So this was it.
Admiral Hackett gave his final orders. He didn't give a farewell speech, or even anything special to his own crew, many of whom he considered friends. He owed them the honor of dying in battle without having to hear a well-articulated dialogue on how they were about to die.
The fleets regrouped. The shields were raised, and what fighters that were left were deployed. All ships were free to engage, to take what shots they could. Hackett waited, bracing himself for when his ship would shudder as it fired its bullets that could shatter a continent. The Reapers, with their massive cannons, would get the privilege of firing first.
On his screen, the firing range of the Reapers was displayed as a ring of crimson around their advancing fleet. The allied fleet was represented in blue, and their pitifully narrow circle would have to wait far longer until the ships could fire and hope to hit anything.
A second ticked by, and death crept closer.
Another second, as the ships hurtled thousands of kilometers closer through space and inches closer on the board. The red circle would overlap with them far sooner than the reverse being true.
Another second. Hackett locked eyes with Diaz, just as stoic and just as afraid as he was, and the two shared the closest thing to a goodbye either would commit to.
Another second down, far too few to go. Frantic reports coming in from his crew. Ships panicking and entering FTL. The turians where charging headfirst at the enemy to die well.
An alarm whooped, and an officer reported that they had entered effective enemy range. The Reapers could kill them all now.
A second ticked by, and they didn't.
"Nasimiyu, what's going on out there? Why haven't the Reapers engaged?" The Reapers were never ones to wait. When they could kill, they killed and were damn quick about it. Hackett didn't even want to think of what the alternative could mean out of fear of willing it to be untrue.
His crew began appraising him on the Everest's sensor readings. From the others in the fleet as well. They came in all in agreement. The Reapers were approaching at speeds consistent with their past attack velocities. Arrayed in an attack formation, albeit a loose one. The circles of range on Hackett's readout had well overlapped one another when the first of the new confirmations started coming in.
"Sir, new data in from the Cyone Dancer. Forwarding it to you now!" The young officer could hardly contain his elation, seeming like he'd leap up and hand deliver the data to Hackett. But as the old admiral beheld the information himself, joy welled up in him as well.
"Energy signatures confirmed from the Reapers, but its not being generated. It's dissipating, fast." The officer turned around in his seat, facing Hackett in the rest. "It's residual energy. Perfectly matching the Crucible buildup. They're dead!"
The CIC erupted. Cheers and clapping and laughter and crying filled the room that had been as silent as the grave a moment earlier. Some hugged, and Hackett glimpsed a couple locked in a kiss. He shook Diaz's hand, followed by the hand of his security chief as the infectious joy hit him as well.
Over the next few hours, Hackett and the other flag officers of the fleet tore themselves away from the impromptu victory celebrations to take better stock of their situation. The Everest's estimates of losses were in the right ballpark; the allied fleet could only account for a scant few thousand ships of the tens of thousands that had flown into battle over Earth. The Reapers that had appeared in Arcturus had been struck by the Crucible mid-transit, their inertia hurling them at the allied fleet at near deadly speeds. Had there been just a little more life in them, the survivors wouldn't have stood a chance.
Salarian elements of the fleet reported that STG "all clear" transponder codes had been received from Earth, and a few ships claimed to have heard echoes of transmissions sent from ships still in Sol. It appeared there would be an Earth to go back to.
Hackett had comms open up a general channel to all ships. Speeches were a topic Hackett was well versed in, probably as much as warfare and definitely more so than politics. He'd been there in the early days on the Alliance Navy when the flag officers of humanity's first interstellar fighting forces were clambering over one another to submit their own overwritten "one small step" analog to enter the annals of human memory. They were mostly garbage and evoked way too much grand interstellar imagery for a society that was only just putting on their first pair of space boots, but there had been a few winners Hackett could recall. Small speeches given to small crowds like the crews he had been on, about how out in the great dark expanse all they'd have were one another cramped into a fragile bubble of air, while every human soul awaited their success back home. Hackett remembered those speeches much more fondly than the ones that he'd heard in any auditorium. He liked his to be short and specific, their purpose to leave the audience knowing exactly what they needed to know.
"This is Fleet Admiral Steven Hackett aboard the SSV Everest. If you are hearing this message, then you have survived the worst the universe could throw at us. The Reapers are no more. We've won. There will be a time soon to celebrate, and to mourn our dead. But first we need to begin recovery. The healing will be slow, but nothing save for time stands in our way now. I advise anyone hearing this transmission to return to Earth as soon as possible. We will begin restoration and relief efforts there. Hackett out."
"Message has been sent, sir." Yazhu, his comms officer swiped a digital screen aside and set to work on another. "We're getting acknowledgement from all fleets. Plenty of affirmatives."
"Very good," said Hackett. His wound throbbed, and for the first time since he'd earned it, nearly a day ago in a battle for the future of the galaxy, he had the thought to take a walk down to the med bay and get it looked at. Plenty of time now.
"Diaz, you have the deck. I'm headed to Doctor Hillar," Hackett said as he turned for the lift.
"Yes, sir."
He stopped. "You sound hesitant, Commander. Thoughts?"
"Sir, if the scans we took when we reached the system are right, the relays are damaged. Badly. The trip from here to Earth at FTL is only a few days, but outside the cluster? We're talking months or years."
Hackett frowned, and his wound was again numbed by thought. There it was, the next big problem. The Reapers couldn't be dead for more than a few minutes before that came along.
"We'll figure that out when we get there, Commander. For now, take us to Earth. Take us home."
London, Earth : Miranda
Crucible Event + 3
She awoke in darkness. Her head was wracked by a sharp pain on one hand and slow to wake up on the other, so she couldn't even tell what she heard or smelled yet. With nothing to draw on for context, her brain began to tiptoe over the line between rest and panic. Primitive urges that reckoned if she didn't know where she was, it might be somewhere dangerous. Miranda breathed deeply, and leaned back to her side of the line.
Smell returned to her as she inhaled through her nostrils. Nylon, and sweat. Human sweat, and definitely her own. Still in her tent, she reasoned, and from the way that the sound of her breathing returned to her, most likely alone.
She could hear outside, but it was difficult to discern what was near and what was far. Shuttles landed and took off, soldiers shouted and grunted, and very rarely laughed. Heavy treads over the gravel and debris. Crying, laughing, shouting, screaming. The sounds of a war that was done but not yet over.
Propping herself on her elbow, Miranda reached to where her water bottle had been last night when she'd taken her final sip before falling dead asleep. Her fingertips brushed its surface when another migraine wracked her skull. She didn't bother trying not to scream.
In the thick of the pain, it was easy for a mind to let itself stop keeping track of time to avoid recognizing just how long the body was under strain. Miranda forced herself to count heartbeats as she writhed on the cot. Nineteen past by the time the flaps of her tent were thrust open and heavy boots pounded in.
"Miranda!" She needed no clues to discern Jacob Taylor's voice, but the ozone smell of biotics had proceeded him, and she knew the rhythm of his movements when he ran.
"Took you twice as long," she said in a near whisper, attempting to prop herself up.
Gravel crunched as he rushed to her side, helping her up the rest of the way. "Can only stand around for so long before they expect you to get to work like everyone else."
"Don't they know who Jacob Taylor is? Or who is friend is, more importantly."
"Everyone here's a war hero. Can't pull that routine," Jacob said. Miranda felt her water bottle placed in her grip. Before the war, she'd have been ashamed at requiring someone's help to do something as mundane as sitting up in bed or quenching her thirst. For her own sake and for his, she could suspend her pride for the time being.
She drank greedily, and was disappointed by the gulp and a half the bottle produced before it was emptied. By now, the wave of pain was wearing off, and the energizing endorphins with it.
"I'm sorry you've been glued to my side. I'd be out there with you if I could."
"I know," said Jacob, a hand clapping down on her shoulder. "And before you ask, the answer's still no."
Miranda managed a grin. "You aren't my doctor, Taylor."
"I could find a dozen medics to explain to you why leaving your bed would be a horrendously bad idea," Jacob retorted.
"And I could present nuanced counterarguments to their medical opinions."
"Yeah. Yeah, you probably could," said Jacob in mock resignation. But they did share an understanding, and she didn't press the issue.
Time had lost a lot of its meaning since the Reapers died. When the Crucible had been activated, Miranda had been in the center of it all. She'd heard the titanic corpses of the machines tumble to the ground as all across the city, the howls of their undead army fell silent. Shouts and weeping and celebratory gunfire filled the air. Before they even really knew for sure what was happening, the allied forces were declaring in all possible ways that they had won.
Miranda had heard it all. But blinded, she'd seen none of it.
She had her theories, as ever. Hours of use of her biotics bordering on overuse, and not enough water or electrolytes to replenish them. Bursts of adrenaline between this firefight and that one as she fought throughout the city, dodging bullets and explosion. The latter certainly wouldn't have done her any favors, whether they'd been nearby grenade drops, airstrikes, or ships in orbit briefly giving off a comparable amount of lumens as a star as the Reapers decimated them. Any one of those things, or more likely a combination, had at some point turned Miranda's sight into a flare of light that never left the center of her vision, and then nothing at all. Miranda could remember much, but not all, for trying to think about the moment where it all came to a head only rewarded her with another splitting headache. It seemed the blindness had seared itself into her memory as well.
Miranda's usual response would be action. It was the cure to any ailment. Take in all the data points, develop working hypotheses, and then putting them into action. But the blindness and splitting headaches made that near impossible to do by herself, and with most of the medical attention being directed towards the dying, Miranda could only sit and recover in whatever ways her body could manage on its own for now.
Jacob must have been able to read the frustration on her face. This served only to frustrate Miranda further, unable to read others or to tell if she was be read.
"I know this isn't your style, Miranda. But that big brain of yours must be telling you that the more time you spend here, the sooner you'll be able to join us out there," Jacob said, emboldened by Miranda having agreed with him. Back in their SR2 days, they'd butted heads so regularly as to make her agreement seem like a foreign delicacy to him. He always took it like a shot.
"My 'big brain' is mostly throbbing excruciatingly, but I unfortunately concede your point," said Miranda. Not much point in fighting when even Jacob could tell how it was. No offense to him, she thought.
The ex-marine chuckled dryly. "First we beat the Reapers, now Miranda Lawson is saying I'm right. What next?"
"Galactic peace. Cats and dogs in perfect harmony."
The two shared another chuckle, ending with Miranda wincing as pain lanced through her skull again. Jacob was silent, but Miranda heard the slightest shuffle of gravel. She figured he'd had a quick internal debate on whether or not to help her back into a laying position, but decided against adding insult to injury to Miranda. Good choice on his part, but even the thought of it now made her feel frailer.
"I'll be in and out if you need anything," Jacob assured her. "I know I've probably hit my limit for how much advice you'd take from me, but I'd probably give yourself a couple more days on the mend before you tried anything bold."
She let out a heavy sigh. "A couple more. Meaning it's already been at least one?"
"Yeah," Jacob said, not realizing the impression she'd been under fully until now. Miranda had thought she'd just went to sleep for the night, maybe even a short series of naps interspersed with murky semi-lucid consciousness.
"How many?"
"Three. Had medics check you out, they said you sleeping deep was a good thing."
Her headache returned again, and just as she was dredging up another sickening thought. Jacob not telling her yet was as grievous as a lie of omission at this point, either that or the news was so grim even he was struggling with coming out with it.
"Shepard," Miranda said through gritted teeth as another headache struck her like a hammer. "Any more news."
"Not yet," Jacob said. He said it like a boy fishing for an answer for his mother that he'd rather not bring up. "Went up to the Crucible. Didn't come back down. I've heard some scuttlebutt teams on the wreck of the station are combing for survivors, but no Shepard yet."
Miranda tried to get up, and this time Jacob did rush over to physically stop her. She pushed against him for a moment, but one of his hands came into hers, clasping it. But it was comforting, not forceful. She felt his shoulders slacken as he surrendered.
"Miranda, you can't be out there right now."
"There needs to be direction here, or this all falls apart. Shepard brought them all here. I brought Shepard back from the dead. They need my help."
"I don't disagree with you, Miranda, but-"
With their short scuffle and the following debate, the sound of jogging footsteps approaching the time had been hidden from Miranda's ears. She heard the tent flaps swatted aside and the light panting of another person. Jacob gracefully pivoted from facing her on the cot towards the entrance, and she felt his right hand go from clasped to hers to where his waist would be, clasping his gun.
"Is Miranda Lawson here?" asked a tired human male. Military for sure by the way his voice carried evenly from beginning to end, no dips or trailing off. Precious few non-military personnel in the allied camp nonetheless.
"Might be," said Jacob. Both of their relationships with the Systems Alliance had been awkward at best and legally tenuous often, so the possibility of arrest during or after the war had been a subject they'd discussed at length. They could have sat in the tent and debated about anything all day, but she knew they were still on the same page for what they'd do if it came down to this scenario.
"It is," Miranda answered, swinging her legs onto the ground and herself up into a sitting position. Weirdly enough, the sudden vertigo cancelled the new wave of headaches a somewhat. Small blessings, she thought.
"I'm going to need you to come with me, ma'am. You too, Mister Taylor."
"Appreciate the invite," Jacob responded curtly. "But I have plans tonight. Mind if I ask where we're going and who is asking?"
"We're going to the central command pavilion. Major Coats asked for Miss Lawson specifically. He said her expert advice was needed."
Miranda felt a whole new headache coming on. The number of subjects she could be considered an expert in was substantial, not to toot her own horn. But practically when it came to people asking for her expertise, she felt like an artist with a lifetime's work in her repertoire that was only ever asked to play two songs. Most people only asked for Miranda's expertise when it came to two specific subjects.
The first thing was John Shepard. The second was Cerberus.