Shepard looked on in fearful anger as Jana brought up the holographic topography map in the ship's war room. Time was of the essence, and even though he was sitting perfectly still in his chair, Shepard wanted nothing more than to jump out, steal the ship's only shuttle, and go on a crusade against the Rogue Faction that had abducted his friends, who were more than likely in immediate danger.

Damn it.

He noticed that Jana was looking at him cautiously as she summoned the planet's surface of Horizon.

"What's the sitrep?" He asked, almost not wanting to hear it.

Jana looked down and gestured for the display of Horizon to zoom in, farther and farther until buildings that reached into the sky could be seen. She twisted it around until there was a clear view of the entire facility of Sanctuary, still scarred from battle damage from months ago when the Reapers fought Cerberus.

Jana sighed as hundreds of red dots signifying enemy ships hovered over the facility.

"Heavily fortified, impenetrable even without detection. The Rogue Faction has the whole area surrounded by atmosphere, and even more soldiers along the outside...I don't see a way for a rescue mission, Shepard. I think we might have to wait to see what their demands are."

"No, there is always a weak point," Shepard argued determinedly, thinking about the lives the Rogue Faction held. "We just have to find it and exploit it. It's what I've been doing for the past four years, after all."

"I guess so," Jana muttered. "But I'm scouring my brain for this one and I'm not seeing anything. I'm not a military strategist, Shepard, this is more of your momentum."

Shepard rolled himself over to Jana's side of the map, budging her a little off to the side to get a closer look. She was right, this is more of his momentum.

I relaxed too long, it's time to kick it into gear.

Shepard began to study the more familiar parts of the facility, like the courtyard he dropped into when he first landed, the area where refugees were sorted for slaughter, and the large tower that sat in the middle of the whole facility. The rest was a jumble of roofs that Shepard could only loosely pinpoint as a path that he took on his journey through the then Reaper infested hallways, back when he was rescuing Miranda and her sister.

He then inspected the red dots that symbolized the ships. There were too many to count, and Shepard had to admit to himself that he was slightly intimidated.

Thank God that these weren't still under The Illusive Man's control back then.

Upon further study, Shepard found that there was a large concentration of the red dots over a certain part of the facility, the base of the tower. No doubt that this was their area of focus, where they are most likely holding Tali and Garrus as well as planning to make more soldiers. How they were going to do that, Shepard didn't know. He would have to ask Jana later, right now he only cared about the rescue.

They must be here, where the ships are most.

It made sense. If the Rogue Faction's primary goal was to simply kill Shepard, they would want to keep the things closest to him under strict watch. Use them as leverage to get him to come out of hiding, then make a deal for their freedom if he would turn himself over. Except Shepard highly doubted that last part. He believed that the first moment he is even slightly exposed, that one of their soldiers would take a shot at his head, then execute Tali and Garrus right afterward.

So how am I supposed to get to them, unseen?

The perimeter of the entire facility was under lockdown. If a single soldier noticed Shepard's presence and reported it, then things would fall apart instantly.

"Are they still jamming signals?" Shepard asked.

"Yes."

"Then that's a good sign. Still haven't prepared their ransom broadcast yet, means we still have time."

"Yes, but who knows how long that'll be. They could send one out within the next minute."

"And that means we have to leave, hours ago."

Jana rolled her eyes.

Shepard continued his study of the perimeter. He really didn't have much time, so he had to find the best point of entry that was closest to the tower and he had to find it fast. All the while still managing some areas of cover to remain undetected.

Luckily for him, it seemed that it was just the perimeter that was heavily fortified. If he managed to get past that and keep his head low, then it shouldn't take much time to get to the tower.

Here? No, too close, would definitely be spotted before we even get to the ground...would have to punch a wall here, that wouldn't work...would have to punch a wall through here, too...Jesus, too many walls!

He looked back at the base of the tower, which had another large courtyard surrounded by long buildings that semi acted as walls. If Shepard could figure out how to get inside one of those buildings, then he would understand what he was dealing with inside the courtyard without being exposed. But the trouble still was how he was getting inside.

A single soldier can ruin this operation...

So make sure that there's no soldier that can see you.

...How?

Shepard took a closer look at the surrounding areas. There was a small portion of grassland just outside a section of the walls, with an abundance of trees and undergrowth. It seemed like a good area for an initial landing compared to the rest of the outside of the facility, which had empty lakes and marshland. But the grassland had the most cover, which made an obvious spot to watch closely.

So don't make them watch...perhaps we need a distraction?

If they could make a good distraction somewhere along the walls, then the guards on the perimeter would most likely constrict to that area to keep it protected, maybe enough so that Shepard could sneak in somewhere else.

But that would cause a tighter hold on the tower, and perhaps more troops would start patrolling the midpoints, making it tougher to get there. We need something better than that. Something a little less obvious.

He needed to make the Rogue Faction think that he is still outside the walls if he managed to slip in.

Seems confrontation is inevitable.

Shepard finally had his plan. If it worked, he could make it to the tower easily. Sure, it was the first plan he could come up with, but he didn't have time to think of another. He had to go, now.

"Alright, Jana. I know how to get myself in, let's go," he said as he motioned to the door.

"W-wait, yourself?" She sputtered. "You need a team to do this, your mobility is limited!"

"I do need a team," he agreed at first. "But I am not waiting on the sidelines! As long as I can move my arms, then I can shoot," he argued.

"You do realize how, how...ineffective that is in combat, right?" She replied, still talking about the lack of use for his legs.

Shepard didn't want to waste time with talk, so he made his next words very clear.

"I don't care, I'm going," and motioned again towards the door.

Jana was more than frustrated, but otherwise still relented. She lead him out of the war room to wherever place on the ship he could prepare for the upcoming operation.

"I don't suppose I can change your mind," she started as they strolled past the ubiquitous amount of corners on the ship's command deck. "But please, Shepard. Please be safe. Humanity needs you."

"Your right...but a certain quarian and turian needs me more."

"Shepard, I'm serious!" She pleaded forcefully while giving him a hard, glaring stare. "For the good of the galaxy, be careful. No matter what happens, we need you alive."

Shepard hissed. "Everyone does."

"Except for the Rogue Faction."

Shepard rolled his eyes underneath his golden visor and he made no other reply. He only kept his thoughts to himself, and all of them were about Garrus, Tali, Tali's father. All of them were things he couldn't get off his mind for the past several weeks, but at least they made it easy to pass the time and ignore his aching arms as Jana lead him throughout the massive ship.

If Shepard had to guess, the ship was roughly almost the same size as the geth dreadnought he took down back when he was liberating Rannoch. This ship alone could've been a great asset in helping the war effort against the Reapers.

Kind of strange for a ship this size to only have one shuttle, though...the Rogue Faction must've been ruthless when they mutinied. Glad Chimera managed to escape with this ship...and I'm glad it wasn't under Cerberus's control in the battle for Earth back then. It makes me wonder how Chimera, an army on its own, managed to slip under The Illusive Man's nose...I guess I'm starting to wonder how Chimera managed a lot of things.

Shepard didn't keep track of how long it took for him to wheel down the uppermost decks of the ship. All he knew was that it was long enough for his arms to get exhausted by the time they reached a single elevator, which had sent them down the decks in the stern of the ship. After that, they strolled down a ramp by some hallways and passed by a security office filled with focused crew members, to yet another elevator. This time taking them up a floor.

"Our shuttle hangar and armory are right here," Jana said, referring to the floor they were about to stop on. "We have a troop deployment deck just below us. I trust in your strategic skills so you can command any of the troops at our disposal...Just make sure you bring them back."

Shepard nodded his understanding to her, silently promising that he would do the best he could. The elevator door opened, revealing a second door to the hangar. After the second door, Shepard was revealed to the biggest part of the ship he has seen yet.

The door had opened to the armory room, although definitely not unimpressive, it wasn't the largest part he was seeing. On the other side of the armory was a window to the hangar, and it sure was big. Enough to hold a private air force, which Shepard guessed had to make sense for a command ship.

The hangar was split into two parts. The first part was the collection of launching pads for immediate fighter deployment. The second part was the surrounding catwalks above the launching pads that lead to the shuttles, or in this case, shuttle. As impressive as the size of the hangar was, it looked pitiful due to the fact that it only had one shuttle to house, and Chimera knew it. There was a team surrounding their only other form of transport, guarding it in case anyone had a bright idea.

Always the underdog. Shepard snarled to himself in his mind. We only have a single shuttle to go up against a fleet!

With renewed fire, he twisted his wheels to get a grand look at all the experimental weapons that were on display in the armory.

He took note that most of the weapons were similar to the Cerberus weapons of old, but their frames were modeled to look nastier, and were colored red to match Chimera's colors. It reminded Shepard of the Blood Pack mercenary gang weapons, but as nasty as Chimera's weapons are, they still held a certain sense of elegance that the Blood Pack lacked.

Immediately he noticed a gun similar to a Harrier laying on a table and directly strolled to it. The weapon looked bigger than a normal Harrier, but there were vents around the frame, probably to diffuse heat quickly to allow a higher thermal clip capacity. He tried to pick it up only for it to drop heavily in his lap.

Shepard grunted then gasped under the weight. "Wow, what is in this thing?" He asked under the pressure of his labored breath.

Jana was quick to help lift it off him and back onto the table. "It's a DMR variant to the Harrier," she grunted. "It's still under development...basically the idea was if we could mix the rapid-fire capabilities of a regular rifle and the long-range accuracy of a sniper, while still being handheld."

"Sure is heavy," Shepard gasped again.

"It's meant for our specialized heavy soldiers."

"So I see," Shepard replied as he continued his personal tour of the armory, picking out any lighter weapons that he found interesting. He was reminded of his and Silont's conversation way back after the attack on the Citadel when they were discussing how their attacker got his hands on an experimental sniper.

"How did you come across these weapons?"

"We made them," Jana answered. "The Illusive Man made sure we were always updating our gear. When I ordered a whole section of his army away from him, I made sure to include his top weapons experts."

When she finished her answer, Shepard found himself face to face with the same model sniper that was put to his mask back on the Citadel, the one that also put a round through Tali's side.

"Wait, those people didn't realize they were leaving Cerberus?" He asked as he inspected his new, most hated weapon.

Jana hung her head slightly. "Yes."

"No wonder why most of them mutinied," he criticized as he slowly picked up the sniper.

"I admit, it was...a mistake...I thought that...most of the people I was ordering away were those that felt the same way I did about The Illusive Man after he was indoctrinated...But I guess I should've realized the persistence of a group when they follow someone they revere to be a god."

"It wasn't a mistake, Jana," Shepard said to both himself and her. "If you hadn't ordered them away, then we might not even be alive right now. They could've been made tools for the Reapers. I guess what I'm trying to say is that you just got unlucky is all. There's no shame in that."

"Thank you, Captain."

Shepard put the sniper back in its place. It brought too many memories of that day back on the Citadel. It made him cringe internally. He promised Tali then that she wouldn't have to deal with any more fighting, and yet here he was, picking out weapons for his fight to get her back.

I swear, she deserves nothing less than the best after this!

"You haven't told me your plan to get inside the facility yet, Captain," Jana inquired.

"I'll tell you once we get there. Do you have any fully trained marksmen within your ranks?" He asked as he inspected a different rifle.

"Sure," Jana answered confusedly. "We have two squads of seven with a commander that leads them both."

"Perfect!" Shepard cried joyfully as he set down the rifle. "That's exactly what I need."

"Seems painfully small," she replied.

"Don't worry, I know how to make them effective," he assured as he picked up a different weapon, a pistol this time, looking similar to a Predator. "Do you also happen to have any cloaking tech? Like from Phantoms?"

"Of course? Shepard, I don't think leading fifteen invisible marksmen through close quarters enemy territory is going to work," Jana said, attempting to fully grasp Shepard's plan.

"I'm not. And I recall you said something about heavy soldiers?"

"W-we have a few."

"One is all I need. What's our ETA to Horizon?" Shepard checked over the pistol, it was simple enough and functioned the same way as a Predator, only it had an extended vented metal shaft attached to where the thermal clips went. Upon closer inspection, he realized the reason was that the pistol had a full auto mode.

"We won't r-reach the atmosphere for another, n-not for about another ten minutes...Shepard, slow down!"

Shepard thrusted the pistol underneath his seat and continued to look for more things that he might find helpful on this mission. Truthfully, he was going a rather average pace for himself at preparing for this mission. Then again, he was stuck in a chair. If he still had use of his legs, he would probably look even more frantic than he did now.

He was getting terribly anxious.

"Look, I'm sorry if I'm going a little fast," Shepard breathed. "But I need to get prepared as much as I can get within the next few minutes so I know exactly what I'm working with. My people's lives are at stake right now. So please...bear with me here."

Both of them paused. Shepard let her think on it, but he didn't allow himself to be caught up waiting for her answer as he inspected more weapons from his seat.

Jana took a deep breath after the brief moment. "Alright, what else do you need to know?"

Happy with her answer, Shepard wheeled himself over to the rest of the armaments. He thought he found some grenades resting by something that looked like a Mattock.

Haha, yes! Jackpot!

"I only need to know a couple more things. Who's the leader of these mutineers?"

"Oh! Well...that's not so easily explained...They don't actually, really have one...but they are looking for one. Who it is, I don't know...But for now, it's one of The Illusive Man's assassins. We were never given a name other than he was called, 'P4.'

"Hmm...even back before the mutiny I never got to know his real name."

"Anything I should know about him?" Shepard asked.

"Deadly, but I don't think he was trained quite as much as Kai Leng, he's not exactly a swordsman, but you'll know him once you see him..."

Shepard mentally growled to himself as he heard the name. Always assassins!

"...But he is still fairly unpredictable, and smart," Jana hissed. "I wouldn't take him lightly, Captain. Not anymore, anyways."

Shepard could guess that she was remembering how this one assassin had taken almost all of Chimera away from her. He understood her frustration. After all, this wouldn't be the first time he helped someone get their people back. But at least this time he didn't have to deal with the soft silver-tongued, bloodthirsty asari queen of Omega. Which he had to admit was a nice change of pace.

"Alright, P4, got it."

Another assassin to kill. He'll be my next target once I get Tali and Garrus out of there.

Shepard had been inspecting the Mattock looking rifle. Unlike the others, this gun was painted black with red markings. It reminded Shepard of the set of Terminus Armor he and Garrus had. He figured if the armor set had a specialized rifle, it would've looked like the Mattock rifle he was holding. He didn't quite understand what the function differences were yet, but if it was anything like the Mattock, he knew it was the rifle for him, so he slung it over the back of his wheelchair.

Alright, I got the location, the layout, the gear, the troops, and I got the name of the leader. The bare minimum.

"Can any of your soldiers carry an extra set of heavy arms?" Shepard asked as he looked for more assault rifles and snipers, as well as shotguns.

Tali and Garrus are going to need immediate access to weapons when I get to them.

"I mean, I guess so?"

"Take me to them."

Jana pursed her lips but said nothing as she led him back to the elevator.

"Pilot," she called out. "Please send our marksmen squads and our specialized heavy soldiers to the deployment deck, we have a special task for them in the upcoming mission."

"Sure thing."

"Jana, I really only need to ask one more thing, for now at least."

"Questions I can handle, Shepard," Jana grumbled. "But this is the last and only order I'm taking from you on my ship."

Shepard mentally scolded himself. He was too caught up trying to prepare that he didn't realize that he might've crossed a line. He was so used to being the one in charge in situations like this, so any other kind of leadership sort of slipped past him. Sure, Jana wasn't Alliance, but this was still her domain.

"Sorry, ma'am, won't happen again."

"Just ask me your question," she said as the elevator doors closed.

The elevator got colder for a moment and he tried to shudder off his embarrassment. He pulled his mind away to remember his inquiry, his most important one.

"What is this weapon they are testing on Garrus?"

This time it was Jana's turn to shudder.

"Remember how Cerberus managed to get so many troops?"

"They abducted civilians and augmented them with Reaper tech," Shepard answered in distaste as if the idea itself was poison.

"Yes, well...back before The Illusive Man went psychotic and had access to Reaper tech, we actually had to value our soldiers. Train them to be the best they could be...instead of chipping civilians like it was an assembly line in a factory."

Shepard nodded. The Illusive Man sacrificed too much. Shepard didn't know, he'll never know, perhaps, if The Illusive Man still had some good in him when he committed suicide back on the Crucible. It was an ugly thought. But at least he was able to recognize what the Reapers were doing to him in the end.

Shame. He could've been...better.

"We had an idea back then to quickly and efficiently train our soldiers," Jana continued as the elevator doors reopened to the deployment deck.

"Instead of putting in a lot of money in combat simulations for each soldier, we wanted to figure out if we could trick the mind into becoming fully trained. By hacking them, essentially."

"I don't think I quite understand," Shepard replied, confused.

He looked out on the deployment deck. The floor had been cleared except for the fifteen marksmen standing at attention off to one side, with one placed in front of the rest, and seven bulky armored soldiers standing off to the other side.

Shepard tried to ignore that their armor looked similar to that of the rogue attacker on the Citadel.

Well, they sure got here fast.

"It's hard to explain," Jana started to elaborate. "Back then we called the project a, 'Life Emulator.' It wasn't the best name but it got the idea. Really, what it does is stimulate the brain and simulate different scenarios...It's just like a combat simulator, but more advanced and...all in your head."

Shepard mulled over the idea while he and Jana placed themselves in front of the soldiers. Shepard took note that all of them were male and at the same height. But what caught his eye was how similar all their faces looked. There was very little variation in their facial features, almost too little.

These aren't...clones...are they? Shepard wanted to ask but kept his mouth shut for fear of lacking information. And even if they were clones, Shepard was in no place to complain. He desperately needed their help.

But how could they be clones? Cloned DNA should determine that they all look the same, even down to the same eye color. Plus, it didn't help the fact they some of them weren't even of the same race.

I feel like I'm looking at a big family of half-siblings...this is...really strange.

"We did our best to develop this tech," Jana continued. "But The Illusive Man scrapped it once he got his cheaper route through Reaper tech," Jana grimaced. "We only had to work through a couple of kinks and we would've entered the final stages of completion...and we would've been able to remain morally stable."

"What kinks were those?" Shepard asked. He was getting more unsettled by the fact that the men around him seemed blank, their eyes empty and staring off into space...like fogged glass.

Jana sighed. "The kinks were when scenarios required, 'on-the-fly variations.' Because the tech incorporated the part of the brain that was responsible for dreaming, those kinds of scenarios with on-the-fly variations would take a very long time to process. If the scenario wasn't programmed beforehand, a single moment in the Life Emulator could take a whole day in the real world."

Shepard nodded, somewhat understanding.

"Another kink was regarding the simulation itself. If the simulation itself wasn't as realistic as possible, then soldiers would most likely enter Uncanny Valley. An uncomfortable state of mind where they would be too distracted, and it would disrupt training. The soldiers would, in a sense, 'wake up,' and all that time in the Life Emulator would have been for nothing."

"Those are some pretty big kinks, how did you figure them out if you never tested it?" Shepard said in a whisper. He didn't like the idea of these seemingly mindless men overhearing their conversation. He was starting to get feelings back from the Leviathan mission, back on the Mahavid asteroid with those entranced colonists. "And, besides that, the soldiers wouldn't know that they were entering a simulation?" Shepard also asked, still whispering.

"Oh no! They would know, of course!" Jana defended at average volume. "But it's like falling asleep. You never really know when you are dreaming, unless you were a lucid dreamer. We had a whole reorientation process and everything ready for when soldiers would wake up...Of course, we never actually got to test it. Leading into your previous question, we figured out the kinks without tests because, well, basic real-world knowledge.

"To us, dreams are quick. While dreaming may seem a long time while we're experiencing it, when we wake up it feels as if it only existed for a moment. A simple preprogrammed training course would allow a soldier to absorb all the information within a single sleep cycle. But on-the-fly variance is much more complicated because a soldier doesn't simply pause a dream. We have to prolong their said sleep cycle to extend the moments, giving us time to set up for a more properly suited training session.

"This is where Uncanny Valley teeters. When you see something unnatural, then something is obviously wrong. What's difficult is that you have to think of the project as both a dream and a real training session. If something in the simulation is unsettling, the soldier can realize that they are not in the physical world, and get, 'shocked,' into waking up...trust me, it wasn't hard to figure out that these things would've occurred during testing."

Shepard pulled his eyes away from the eerie men that have been quiet throughout the whole explanation and returned to his normal voice. "So how does this relate to the weapon the Rogues have Garrus under?" He asked. "I mean, even if they perfected this tech, it wouldn't grant them more soldiers, it would just make them smarter. And if this is the weapon they have Garrus under, what would they gain by giving him more training?"

"That's the thing, they're not."

Shepard raised a questioning eyebrow underneath his mask.

"We believe that they had indeed perfected this tech. But I think they might have taken it a step further. By being able to mess with the memories of the person...I believe they made it so they can brainwash people into believing things that never really happened."

"You mean, giving them false memories?" Shepard reiterated.

"Exactly."

"So that means..."

That means they could take their prisoners and turn them into highly trained soldiers, loyal to the Rogue Faction because of something they believed to have really happened...and Garrus.

"Oh shit." Shepard could feel his eyes expand wide.

"They're not using a weapon on Garrus, they're turning Garrus into a weapon!"

The Rogue Faction are like damned Reapers in human form!

"Ma'am," came the voice of the pilot over the intercom. "We're approaching Horizon."

Shepard felt more scared than ever for his turian brother. Garrus was Garrus, a smooth-talking war hero. Not some puppet stripped of his identity. His sense of urgency was surging out to space now.

He closed his eyes, he didn't even want to think about what might happen if he failed. If Garrus popped out of one of those tubes in Sanctuary a different man, eager to serve the enemy and willing to kill him. He could almost see it in his mind's chilling eye. Him and Garrus, having a standoff, their guns pointed towards each other...

No! Not happening!

"Alright, Jana," Shepard started quickly. "Part of my plan is for me and a couple others to take the shuttle and land as close to the facility as we can. Can we do that?"

Jana took a slight step back from his urgency but instantly recovered. "Sure thing, I'll go prep the shuttle. You can direct the troops here. Meet me when you're finished." With that, she swiftly took a sweeping turn and was immediately back in the elevator, the doors closing and going up a floor to the hangar. Shepard didn't expect her to leave so soon and he had to admit it surprised him, but that didn't matter now. At least she understood.

Alright, now it's really time to kick it into gear.

Shepard turned to the empty-eyed men. It was creepy, but he had to get used to it. So he strolled himself up to the one marksman placed in center of the rest. He looked up at his face. His facial structure was still similar to the others, but his hair was trimmed short and his nose was slightly crooked.

"What's your name soldier?" Shepard asked.

The man didn't respond for a moment. But Shepard noticed his eyes were getting less glossy and came more into focus. After the pause, he looked more alive and immediately saluted. In a loud voice, he responded. "Lieutenant Tracks, sir!"

"At ease, Lieutenant Tracks. That goes for everyone else here, too," Shepard responded.

Lieutenant Tracks immediately loosened his stance, but like him, it took a moment for the rest of the soldiers to have life put back in their eyes before they too went loose. Stranger still, their stances were almost in sync, like they were some kind of hive mind.

This is, perhaps, the weirdest thing I've seen, and I've seen plenty.

"Now I may not be Chimera," Shepard called out, ignoring his last thought. "And you all aren't Alliance. But I'm still here to oversee the mission. Jana put me in charge, so that means you listen to me."

"Understood, sir!" The soldiers chorused.

"Alright," Shepard confirmed, happy to see that they were all relatively human. He then turned his wheels to look up at the heavy soldiers behind him.

"Now who's squad leader over here?"

The soldier in the middle raised his hand, his mouth was smaller and his hair was a little longer. "Me, sir. Squad Leader Lortelle."

"Alright," Shepard said again. "Tracks and Lortelle, you two will be coming with me. Lortelle, split your squad and have them be support for Track's squads."

Lortelle nodded and urged each arm of men besides him to go stand over with the marksmen.

"Let me be clear, this is not going to be a regular military operation. You all will be doing something you're likely not familiar with. But if you all focus, everything should work out."

"Yes, sir!"

"Alright," Shepard said once more. "Tracks and Lortelle, are you both comfortable with a high-risk stealth mission?"

"Yes, sir!" They both replied surprisingly quick.

"Good, you two will need stealth tech. Lortelle, can you carry an extra sniper and shotgun?"

"Yes, sir!"

"Great...I'm trusting you guys with this."

Shepard then turned to the rest of the soldiers to address them. "We're going to have to make this quick! When we get close enough to the facility, Tracks, Lortelle and I are going to launch out on the shuttle. We'll land, scope out the area, and wait for the rest of you guys to meet us. You all will get more directions from there."

"Yes, sir!" All the men said in unison.

"Perfect. Marksmen, pick out your long-range snipers. Heavies, pick out your weapons with the highest rate of fire. I'm not familiar with all your gear but we don't have time for that now. Just be prepared for landing, and when you do, hustle out to our position! Now go!"

"Yes, sir!"

The men immediately dispersed, again in sync, to get their gear. While they did that, Shepard turned to his Chimeran fireteam. "You two also get your gear, remember Lortelle, I need to see another shotgun and sniper. Tracks, see if you can manage to carry another assault rifle, anything will work. Don't forget your stealth tech. Meet me when you two are done."

"Yes, sir!"

Think I found myself a new drinking game.

Shepard rolled himself over to the center of the deployment deck where a large table with a holographic map of Sanctuary sat. He had noticed it just out of his peripheral vision when he first entered, but he didn't think he would need it until now.

He waited patiently for the two leaders but kept himself occupied by going over his own plan in his head, making it fresh so there's no chance he could forget. But at the same time, thoughts of the Rogue Faction's weapon poked at him like the tip of a sword.

Garrus...then Tali...oh god. I...her...

The Rogue's did want to kill him, and they were ruthless. He just couldn't prepare himself enough to suspect that they might be this...cunning.

I swear I'm going to put a bullet in between the eyes of this, "P4," when I'm done. He silently snarled.

He sighed to himself and resumed studying the facility. He had picked his point of entry, which was the wall just in front of the grassland. The wall also had the secret backdoor that he took on his previous venture there just behind it. If his plan worked, and it had to, then he could slip in through most of Sanctuary undetected from the ships overhead. He just had to hope that the Rogue's didn't find the backdoor already and had soldiers patrolling its halls.

This is going to be one tough roadblock to get over.

It didn't take long for Tracks and Lortelle to return to him. As leaders, their arms lockers were the closest on deck, and no doubt they have been trained for immediate responses like this.

"Sir, we're here," Tracks said to grab his attention.

"Good," Shepard replied and pointed at the grasslands on the map. "Look here, this is where we're landing, and this is where we're entering." He then pointed at the wall. "Here, we have the element of surprise.

"We'll be taking the shuttle. The ship is going to land a little ways away with the rest of your guys, the shuttle will then take round trips to bring them to us. We'll be using stealth tech to get up close, and on my orders, your guys are going to fire on the guards. We wait for a window, get over the wall, and enter through a secret backdoor. Once we're in, it's going to be a lot of improvisation. We just have to make sure we get to the courtyard at the base of the tower. It's heavily guarded, so it's most likely where my team is held as well as the Rogue's soldier-making weapon. Primary goal, save my team. If we get lucky, we can destroy their weapon."

And if we're really lucky, I get to kill the person responsible for all this.

"Yes, sir," both of them answered.

God, these guys are robots.

"You two have any questions? No?" He asked. He did speed through the plan rather quickly, but neither of them seemed too worried or confused about the mission. They didn't even seem to care at all really with their blank faces and unsettling neutral behavior. He was sure any normal soldier would've had a question about what would happen if the mission failed, or what about their people in prison cells on the ships, or what will happen if they don't find his team at the objective.

Huh, they better be there. If not...then I guess I have no choice but to keep fighting until I find them...no matter the cost!

"You both realize that you might not make it back from this, right?" Shepard asked. He didn't want to intimidate them, but he had to make sure of what kind of people he was working with in order to accomplish this mission.

"Yes, sir," both of them answered, but said nothing more.

Shepard didn't know if this was a good or bad thing. But he didn't have time to wonder.

"Alright, we take off soon. Follow me." He then led them back to the elevator to the hangar bay.

Jana had been standing there patiently by the shuttle waiting for his arrival. She had a datapad in one hand and some kind of tube in the other. She smiled simply as the fireteam approached her.

"Good team, Captain. The shuttle is ready on your go, and we've come up at an angle on Horizon's atmosphere so we're not detected. What exactly is the plan?"

Shepard quickly went over only the part of the plan where his fireteam would scout out the area, and how the rest of the men were going to reach them. He chose not to disclose how he was going to get into the facility just yet, mostly because the door to the shuttle was already opened and he was making his way to roll his chair onto it, which was difficult for the height difference between the dock and the floor of the shuttle. He had cursed underneath his breath before Lortelle finally helped him in.

Damn this chair!

Jana came forward with the tube in hand after noticing the difficulty and handed it off to him.

"What's this?" Shepard asked.

"Painkillers," she responded. "Hook them up to your medi-gel dispensers. If you ever find yourself in need to run, that would be your best bet. Of course, I would advise it as a last resort. You'd risk reopening your stomach wounds, and I'm sure it'll be a lot more difficult to heal again with that condition of yours."

Shepard looked at her quizzically and the shuttle began prepping its engine for take-off. "How did you..?"

Jana gave a small wink. "I'm a doctor, Captain!" She called over the rising noise of the shuttle. "It's not hard to figure out!"

The hangar bay slowly opened and a gust of Horizon air came whooshing into the ship, making it even more difficult to hear. "I'll get as many troops to your scouting position as possible in case things go wrong!" Jana called louder.

"We may not have time for that!"

Jana shrugged. "We'll do our best! Good luck!"

The hangar bay has fully opened now and Shepard lost sight of Jana behind the shuttle's sealed doors. It was generally quiet again, and he wheeled himself against a side of the shuttle and anxiously waited for it to leave the ship and head to the scouting point.

Tracks and Lortelle kept themselves standing. A cold, organized stance. Shepard didn't care for it now. He just hoped these guys were just as tough as they let on.

He held his speaker light in his fingers. It was going to take a little longer than he would like, but he had to remain patient.

AN HOUR LATER

This is taking way too damn long! Shepard grunted in thought.

"This the last of them?" Shepard asked quickly without looking away. He has been furiously studying the wall of the facility through Track's sniper, and the low hum of the rushing shuttle coming up behind told him that more of Tracks and Lortelle's men had arrived at the scouting site.

"That's the last of them, sir," Tracks confirmed.

"Good. Send them down the line with the others," he directed.

Shepard was more than eager to get the rescue mission going, and the longer he waited the more agitated he became. But he still somehow managed to keep himself under control...no matter how much he wanted to lose it.

I'm on my way guys, I'm going to get you out!

The grasslands had made the perfect vantage point for the Chimeran team. The trees provided excellent cover as well as the hills they were position on, and the tallgrass and boulders were large enough to even conceal a human-quarian hybrid with a sniper sitting in a wheelchair.

Bet the Rogues won't be expecting me this way, and definitely not so soon. He thought. His trigger finger was getting itchy each time the crosshairs hovered over a guard on the wall.

He also surveyed the grounds in front of the wall that he had to cross. Pits of ash still black from months ago littered around in the grass. They would make perfect hiding spots if something happened during Shepard and his fireteam's journey across the field.

The shuttle went silent now, and a few hushed footsteps brushing past the grass made their way down the hill. Shepard had set up the two squads of marksmen in different positions, one on the hill with him, and another a little ways down to his left. The heavies were with them as well, three for each squad. Although they would be ineffective at this range from the wall, they could use their weapons as distractions. But that was only if things got hairy.

After the rest of the team were put into position, Tracks sent the shuttle away and returned to Shepard's side.

"We're now picking up regular footsoldiers. Some have begun marching to our position."

That's a long walk.

"No time," Shepard said. "We're going to have to enter now. Are your squads ready?"

Shepard expected Tracks to oppose, but he was surprised yet again when the Lieutenant only responded with a, "Yes, sir!"

Jana's gonna be upset.

"Good, we have thirteen guards on the wall. Make sure the two of our snipers on each end of our line focus on the one guard on each end of the Rogue's line. We need to make sure they fall so there's less of a chance of a warning getting out. After that, move on to the guards in the center...This has to work. We need to make sure the Rogue's don't realize a whole section of their perimeter just went dark."

"Yes, sir, I'll relay the orders now."

"Make sure they understand to repeat the process for any other guards that come by. Get Lortelle as well and prep for our run across."

"Yes, sir."

That phrase is starting to no longer sound like real words anymore.

Shepard backed away from the sniper and wheeled over to the small box of gear stashed under a tree that they brought with them. There was the extra shotgun and sniper as well as the important stealth tech. Shepard picked up one of the cloaking devices that sat in there and hooked it up to his suit. He made sure to calibrate it so it included his wheels, otherwise any, hopefully not, surviving guards would be very confused as to why there was a wheelchair out in the field moving about on its own.

Calibrate...Oh, God...I need to get going.

Shepard gave the cloaking device a few shaky test tries to make sure it was working properly. After a couple of bouts going invisible, Shepard was satisfied with the tech. But it didn't stop the sweat that was starting to pool on his forehead. He made it halfway to his face before he realized that he couldn't wipe it away.

He stopped himself from cursing the mask. He was getting sidetracked and he needed to remain focused on saving his friends. But It wasn't easy with the constant reminders of those friends around him...especially with his fiancée's handiwork wrapped around his body.

But there was something else he had been fighting off for the last day when he was putting this plan together. This fear.

This overarching fear he had been suppressing to the side of his mind by only looking at parts of it. Never wanting to take a step back and look at the whole. The, "What if?"

The problems built up, and the, "What if?" was getting strong. But Shepard, the man who had defeated a race of organic slaughtering machines, was ignoring it. Not because he was confident, not because he overcame any odds that had came his way so far, but because of fear.

This fear of, What if I lose?

Back when he was early in his military career. Shepard did fear losing fights, but it was different then. Because then it was uniform. Someone put a gun in his hands and he would perform his duty. That's what any good soldier does. He served his species and found fulfillment and purpose in the good work he did. When an ally falls, he mourned and moved on. He got back in the fight and kept going. What else do you do?

Then the Reapers came, and everything for Shepard had changed. He met so many fascinating individuals and found a new purpose in his life through his love of a certain quarian. He was even more terrified then. But then if he had lost, he would be dead and the next cycle would move on until it would be broken. But he didn't lose. He succeeded, and if he had succeeded at the cost of everyone he loved around him dying...Sure, he would be hopelessly lost, but at least their sacrifices would've meant something. He would move on. Not in the same way, but he would move on.

But now, his crew, his family, were alive. And had successfully brought about a new era of peace. They had overcome the largest obstacle in all of organic history. They could head home and live for each other for the rest of their lives...But the Rogue Faction had to exist.

They had to exist and had to successfully take the two cornerstones of Shepard's life. The two people he lived for most. The two people he would suffer through hell for.

And Tali...the woman who made him feel more emotions than he ever thought he could in his life. The color to his frame. The strength to his will. The best happiness he could ask for.

He was experiencing a different kind of fear now. A different kind of fear the question of, What if I lose?

Because now, it would be utterly unfair to lose Tali now. More so than if he lost her during the fight with Saren, more so than if he lost her during the fight with the Collectors, more so that if he lost her during the fight with the Reapers. Because after all that they had been through together, to lose her one way or another to nothing more than a band of mercs...

Shepard didn't think he could possibly move on from that...he might just have to let the mercs take a shot at him.

And this fear made him even more pissed.

"We're here and ready on your go, sir," Tracks said after returning to the top to the hill with Lortelle. The two leaders grabbed their gear, again almost in sync. Tracks retrieved his sniper and waited for Shepard's word.

"Get ready then, guys," Shepard responded, huddling up behind the boulder that acted as his perch and the two leaders followed suit. "If things go sideways, dive into the nearest pit and wait for more orders. Got it?"

His Chimeran fireteam nodded.

"Alright, get ready."

Tracks nodded again and lifted his arm in a swift, confident move to raise his signal. A marksman on both sides of the line held up theirs in response.

"On my mark."

Shepard's breath caught up in his throat as he prepared to commit to this. There was no going back, and the longer he waited, the bigger the chance he might lose Tali and Garrus.

He shoved the breath back down his throat with a gasp. Then took another, deeper breath to keep it clear. And after a lingering moment...

"Send it."

Tracks threw his arm down and two couplets of suppressed gunshots sounded in rapid succession.

Another moment.

The marksmen threw their own arms down, confirming the kills of the guards on either side.

"Follow through!" Shepard hissed excitedly.

Tracks lifted his arm once more and signified for both squads to take out the rest of the guards.

A single volley of hissed sniper shots shot forwards, and immediately all the marksmen threw their hands up, signifying their own kills. Shepard didn't have time to be impressed at the group cohesiveness, though.

"Alright. Let's go," Shepard said to his fireteam, but mostly to himself.

He engaged his cloaking tech and got a strong grip on his wheels. Lortelle grabbed his seat from behind and all three of them slowly and agonizingly picked their way around the boulder and down the hill.

The rescue had begun.