Book II - Chapter 6: Cuckoo
Liara was not one to boast, so Shepard had no idea how she even managed to find the Shadow Broker's lair on her own the last time around, nevermind then infiltrating the base without a stealth ship at her disposal. Shepard really wished she had more details. The only thing she remembered Liara mentioning last time was hiring an army of mercs to storm the base. Now they would have to strive for a better result with only a small squad of three. Lovely.
Perhaps she had grown too dependent on her foreknowledge, Shepard reflected. As much as she would have liked to keep her advantage, the Butterfly Effect had already set in. Deviations from the original timeline would only increase as time went by. Applying this principle to their current mission, it meant that what had worked for Liara the last time around might not work again under a different set of circumstances. She needed to get used to the idea that her foreknowledge was more of a list of helpful hints than a detailed walkthrough.
In other words, Shepard could hardly afford to be complacent. In an arena where the stake were people's lives, she absolutely needed to be more devious and more adaptive than the other players. If she slipped up… Look what happened when she got overconfident: Liara was nearly strangled to death and Shepard had to blow her cover to stop Vasir from killing her bondmate. Jack was missing, possibly captured by the Broker's agents (or Cerberus, if she was unlucky enough) - another reason to storm the Broker's lair and thrash the information out of the yahg.
Worst of all, Shepard was rudely awaken to the sad reality that she was losing it.
It wasn't because she had too many projects on the go; she can multi-task. She could handle her workload and she knew when to delegate. Shepard didn't think it was possible, but she was under more stress right now than during the height of the Reaper invasion when millions died every day.
Hope, as she found out first hand, was a heavier burden than despair.
Shepard was well aware she was making mistakes - especially around Liara. Although her bondmate had not questioned her further, mixing up her own timelines had to come across as forgetful at best, and psychologically unstable at worse. Liara was sharp. Any more careless mistakes like this one and she would wonder whether Shepard was losing grasp on reality. She might even suspect the beacon had truly scrambled her fragile human brain.
The sad part was, Shepard had a pretty good idea why she was slipping up. She was getting too comfortable, too happy. Before she realized what was going on, she had grown to be dependent of Liara as her pillar of support for her tattered mental health. Who would have thought that living through the end of the world would be so traumatic, she had to lean on another's mind to keep herself from falling to pieces? During the last few months when she had been away from Liara, she could feel herself slowly going insane from the stress alone. Sure, Kasumi was there with her, but the thief was not her bondmate. Jack's company was greatly appreciated, but then again, the woman herself was a few screws short of a hardware store.
After they were done with the yahg, Shepard promised herself, she was finally going to tell Liara about her PTSD.
Some hero I am. I can't even admit to my wife that I'm broken.
"Found it." Kasumi interrupted her depressing internal dialogue by drawing her attention to the Enigma's main display.
After two day's travel, they had finally reached Hagalaz, a second tier garden world that suffered from extreme heat and cold conditions due to its slow rotation. The Shadow Broker's base, which was a one-of-a-kind ship that chased around the planet's twilight band from low orbit to camouflage its presence within the planet's violent storms, would have been near impossible to find without Sekat's help.
"Would you look at that..." Kasumi trailed off into a whistle. The holo-screens for the various sensors were alight with colours. It was like Christmas in the cockpit.
Tali, who was currently sitting in as the helmsman for this mission, clicked her tongue at the readouts. "Amazing. It has to be custom built. I've never seen anything like it before. If I'm a betting woman, I would say that the ship is constantly harvesting the electrical energy within the naturally occurring storms as fuel. The excess electricity is then discharged back into the atmosphere, effectively using it as a powerful jamming device. Look at the sensors; the ship is visible, but since its surrounding is emitting all kinds of junk information, it might as well be invisible!"
"Like a needle in a haystack," Shepard agreed with a nod.
Liara studied the blurry image of the ship with a contemplative frown. Even with the most powerful sensors the salarian STG had installed on the Enigma, the ship was almost indiscernible from background noise. "The storm is going to be a problem. Landing will be tricky."
"Can we stay in stealth during landing?" Shepard asked Tali.
Tali shook her head. "Yes and no. While we can stay in stealth during landing, there is no safe spot to land. It would be better if we use the Kodiak instead. Because of the electrical surges, I doubt there would be any surveillance cameras installed on the exterior of the ship. They'll fry in no time. It would have been perfect if we had installed a stealth drive on the Kodiak. But alas, I haven't figured out how to miniaturize the heat sink enough to fit the frame yet. Something to think about."
Shepard nodded in agreement. "I see what you mean. If I were the Shadow Broker, I would rely on surveillance probes in orbit to watch for approaching enemy ships while keeping a contingent of guards on the base for security and maintenance."
"Our stealth ship already got us through the first hurdle, now we just need to sneak past guards and hack through locked doors - exactly the job for a master thief." Kasumi said with a happy sigh.
"The heist of the century," Shepard smiled. "Seeing how paranoid the Broker is, I expect this place to be crawling with bodyguards. We'll try your way first, but I have a feeling it won't be a leisurely stroll in the park. When stealth fails, we'll have to force our way in. There is one upside to this." Grinning affectionately at her squad, Shepard spoke with complete confidence, "the Broker is essentially trapped on their own ship. Their obsession with secrecy has pretty much ensured that there will be no reinforcements. As long as we strike fast, they won't know what hit them."
"And then we will make the Broker pay for everything they have done." Liara promised with a hint of cold fury that somehow managed to terrify her and turn her on at the same time.
"That we will." The pleasant smile on Shepard's face morphed to a bloodthirsty snarl. "The Shadow Broker is partly responsible for blowing up the Normandy. Not to mention they want to kill me and sell my corpse to the Reapers. Pissed off does not begin to describe how I feel. I swear, when I find them, I'm gonna pulverize them with my bare hands."
Kasumi added helpfully, "and then we're going to rob them blind." There was no mistaking the out and out glee in her voice. "Hey, if you ask me, it's totally justified!"
Shepard gave the thief a grin. "Exactly."
Liara brought their attention back to the task at hand by pointing at the holo-screen. "According to the readings, the electrical disturbance is more concentrated at the back of the ship, specifically around those towering structures. I suspect their main function is to divert lightning away from the massive communications array located right below them at the stern."
Shepard immediately picked up on what Liara was trying to say. "That's the centre of the spider's web. That must be where the Broker is. And I suppose we wouldn't be so lucky that the Broker has left the shuttle bay unlocked. We'll need to land on the ship and hunt for a hatch."
"There is one problem - I wouldn't recommend landing at the back if we want to try sneaking in first." Kasumi offered her opinion as the professional entry man. "That communications array is the beating heart of the Broker's operations. If there's one place the Broker wants to keep an eye on at all time, it would be that. At the least I would expect a horde of guards, maintenance drones, and automatic turrets. I would prefer to park our ride at the front of the ship. That way, it'll be easier to infiltrate the ship before they smarten up and dead-seal all the hatches - if they know how to do that. There shouldn't be too many guards patrolling the exterior of the ship. I mean, it's got to be a shitty job that nobody likes to do."
Shepard was impressed. "So we land at the bow, bypass most of the guards by walking outside, and then find a hatch closer to the stern. I like it. Suit up, ladies. It's show time."
x-x-x
And what a spectacular set it was.
Shepard was never more glad she had mentally ruled out airdropping in as the squad's landing method early in the planning stage. It would have been suicide. Hagalaz's perpetual electrical storms churned and boiled in a violent symphony. Lightning lit up the rolling clouds, casting writhing shadows all around them like dancing spectres. Even though she knew they were perfectly safe within the protection of the Kodiak, the fact that they were hit by lightning more than a couple times was strangely disconcerting.
They approached from below and landed on the bow of the ship, in between two lightning towers and out of sight. The first thing they did after jumping off the Kodiak was to activate meg-lock attached to their boots. Their hardsuits would save them from stray lightning strikes, but it would be a hell of a long drop if they were to fall off the ship. The constant howling wind and the creaky hull only served to make the trek more perilous than it had to be. Shepard could only hope the Broker had promised hazard pay for their private army, because a lot of them were about to be flung off the ship. By her.
"Keep your shields up at all times. One stray lightning strike won't kill you, but it'll kill your shield. Don't rush. If your shield is low, stay behind cover and wait for recharge. One more advice - those capacitor towers look dangerous. I would give them a wide berth." Shepard warned. She had wisely left her monomolecular blade on the Enigma for this trip because she had no desire to play human lightning rod.
"I'll scout ahead." Kasumi said before she activated her cloak and vanished from sight. Fortunately she had graciously kept Shepard's tracking program running in her Omni-tool, so even though she was invisible, her location still showed up on the helmet's display as a green dot.
The first stretch of the hike was uneventful. Kasumi was right about guards not enjoying patrolling this section of the ship because of how dangerous it was. For one thing, there were no guardrails along the walkway. Shepard idly wondered how much credits the Broker had to spend on HR every year. With these kinds of absurd working conditions and the high attrition rate, keeping a steady stream of loyal recruitment must be a logistical nightmare.
"Drones." Kasumi said quietly. Shepard and Liara stayed back and let the thief deal with them herself.
In the background, Widget dutifully recorded the ship's dimensions and began scanning. It seemed there were numerous access hatches built into the hull for storing maintenance drones. Shepard had expected as much. What was surprising though, was the subtle scuff marks made by Omni-tools all over the hull.
This ship, regardless of how unique and sophisticated its design was, was old. Maintenance drones were only good for minor repairs. Any non-routine upgrades or more serious repairs would require technicians to do the job by hand - hence the tool marks. Perhaps, this was probably the real reason why the Broker had people patrolling the exterior of the ship. They were not just the security guards - they were the mechanics who kept this hunk of metal from crashing down onto the planet below.
What would happen to the ship if they were to kill them all while trying to break in?
"Patrols coming our way." Kasumi reported in.
Shepard made a split second decision. "Stay low." She said to the thief and signaled Liara to go hide behind a section of the ship's uneven hull. They waited until the group of guards walked past them and out of sight before they continued. "We need to hurry. It looks like they're disciplined enough to keep a regular patrol."
Knowing their time was short, they pressed on with more urgency. Eventually their luck ran out when an unremarkable section of the hall unexpectedly slid open and out came a group of guards and security mechs that literally ran into Shepard.
To their credit, the guards were only momentarily stunned from the shock, though the security mechs didn't pause at all - they were exceedingly polite and apologetic about it when they fired at the squad, however. Liara's warp and her own biotic pull hit the group almost at the same time. Shepard rolled away, unclicked the new M-5 Phalanx from her belt, and quickly fired off three head shots from cover. All three of her targets stayed down after that.
"Impressive." Liara complemented, sounding rather pleased with herself that her gift to Shepard had worked as well as intended.
"I don't think stealth is gonna work at this point. So much for that idea." Kasumi grumbled.
"Agreed." Shepard gave her a sharp nod and picked up the pace. Someone had to have noticed that shots had been fired.
They ran into another group of guards soon after. Now that stealth was out the window, Shepard opted for the next best thing - chaos. Taking advantage of the enemy's proximity to the ship's towering capacitors, Shepard fired off a shot at the glowing structure and watched the electrical surges fry the guards with a perverse satisfaction. Liara followed up with a singularity to fling two shield-less guards off the ship while Shepard snapped out a reave that rapidly ate through an asari agent's barrier like nobody's business. A laser-guided headshot finished her off neatly.
"You didn't charge." Liara said in a puzzled tone.
Shepard shrugged. The small furrow between Liara's brows at her reply made her smile. "It's, em, a bit of a signature move of Commander Shepard's. Vasir would've told the Shadow Broker all about it. I don't want to give myself away." Not yet. And hopefully whoever had installed the surveillance camera at Liara's apartment had not realized the significance of it, either.
"Oh." The almost bashful expression on Liara's face at the obvious answer made Shepard chuckle out loud.
The squad ran into several more patrols. Though each group was quickly dispatched, it became apparent that the resistance was escalating steadily as well. The Broker must know by now that their uber secret base was being invaded.
"Clearly, looking down was a mistake." Liara complained breathlessly as they skidded down a particular steep slope to access a walkway with no guardrail.
"We've been spotted. Again. I really don't like fighting mechs." Shepard crouched behind a row of metal pipes and fired at the three Loki mechs clanking towards the squad from cover. The ever-so-polite mechs kept advancing steadily while apologizing for shooting at them.
"I got this." Kasumi said gleefully while rapidly hacking into the mechs to cause a surge to overload their system. This stunned the enemies long enough that the squad was able to finish them off with their pistols.
Shepard missed her Spectre grade Master shotgun. The M-23 Katana that she had to settle with for her undercover work really could not measure up. This model would improve in the next few years, but as it was now, the Phalanx was the superior weapon.
"Hey, look. A door. Finally. And it's not locked." If she had to guess, they had probably killed the mechanics who had unlocked the door to conduct maintenance. Shepard cautiously walked into the room. Now that they were not being battered constantly by the strong winds, the place seemed disturbingly quiet. There were a row of panels, sliding up and down along one side of the room, hissing quietly as visible bolts of electricity zig-zagged between the panels. Shepard wasn't sure what this complicated equipment was for, but she knew enough to stay clear of it.
Liara watched the contraption in awe. She was clearly impressed. "This is incredible. It must have taken them decades to build in secret."
"I wonder what happened to the contractors." Shepard pondered out loud, already knowing the answer.
"I think we can guess." Liara said in a dry voice.
As they walked across the room to find a way through, Liara had an epiphany. "Navigating this storm is brutal. If the ship's engine stops even for a moment…"
Shepard caught on immediately. No one in their right mind would dare to sabotage the ship's critical systems unless they were willing to go down with the ship as well. "At least the Shadow Broker would go down with us."
Liara shot her a disapproving glare.
"Just saying." Shepard said, wilting a little at Liara's frown.
"That's comforting." Kasumi quipped.
They moved across the engine room and paused in front of another set of doors at the end of the walkway. Shepard had to remind herself to brace for the howling winds when the door hissed open. From where they were, the towering antenna at the stern of the ship seemed ridiculously massive. She briefly wondered if its main function was to diffuse the electrical surges in the storms or to transmit encrypted data throughout the galaxy.
The second leg of the trek was slightly more exciting than the first half. For one thing, there were more capacitors closer to the back of the ship, and there were more guards swarming at them. It was a lethal combination for the unfortunate Broker agents. Repeating her earlier tactics, Shepard ordered her squad to stay well back, out of range and behind cover, while setting off deadly electrical surges by shooting at the glowing capacitors.
It was almost too easy. The last time around, Liara had lost two dozen mercs storming this place. Now, Shepard knew she was good, but she had expected more from the paranoid Shadow Broker. No way their HQ would be this lightly guarded.
They stopped in front of the locked main hatch that led directly to the base of the main deck.
"Kasumi?" Shepard asked, scanning the surrounding with narrowed eyes. This location was a perfect ambush site. Even without the short range map overlay Widget had plotted out on the HUD, she could tell that they were completely exposed.
The thief examined the panel with her graybox goggles in place. She must have saved a copy of thousands of schematics in there. "Interesting. Top of the line blast door. More suited for a fallout shelter or a bank vault than a simple airlock. I've seen this before. Yes, I can get us through. This lock has been recently updated to patch the glaring security hole all locks had suffered from a scant two months ago. The Omni-gel trick is outdated, just so you know." She laced her fingers together and stretched, cracking her knuckles a few times before whipping out her Omni-tool with a flourish. "But that's why you need the best."
"About that," Shepard gestured Liara to crouch behind cover at one side of the door while she took up position on the other side. "You should stay cloaked while you do it. We've got incoming. At least twenty." The raised segment of the hull that served as their cover was pathetically small. With Kasumi immobilized by her task, they needed to draw fire away from the thief's location, regardless if she was visible or not. Kasumi did not have the thickest armor. A stray bullet would take her out. "Do you see any cameras here?"
"There was one in the engine room, but none here. No camera can survive this ship's outer hull for long." Kasumi confirmed.
There was no other way to do it. This operation hinged on Kasumi getting them in. Shepard had anticipated for a more direct approach anyway. "Liara, stay here and guard Kasumi's back while she does her thing. And since no one is watching, I'm cutting loose." She clicked the laser-guided heavy pistol back onto her belt and reached back and pulled out her shotgun. What she was about to do required a lot of brute force and zero subtleties. Hopefully, the bigger the fuss she could kick up, the less danger the master thief would be in.
No Nova. Shepard reminded herself in her head. She needed to present herself as an attractive target, so she would have to keep moving to draw attention away from Kasumi's direction. Depending on how many enemies showed up, she might even take a few hits deliberately in favour of staying behind cover. Between stray lightning strikes and hostile fire, she had to keep her shield up at all times to stay alive. Shepard was aware that her barrier was nowhere near as strong as it could have been (which, Vasir was in her right to make fun of her lackluster technique). In her opinion, mobility trumped defense. A properly powered biotic barrier, as well as all other defensive techniques she knew of, would have slowed her down too much.
Basically, she was going to reave, charge, and hope for the best. Plus, shotgun to the face should be obnoxious enough to draw most people's attention. Shepard was confident that if the quality of the opposition was similar to the security mechs and common Broker agents she had encountered so far, they would fall over quickly even if she had to take whole teams of them out by herself. The only potential problem she could think of would be turret flyers.
And before she was ready, there was no time to strategize anymore. Over a dozen guards descended from three sides all at once, boxing them in. Roaring out a muted warcry, Shepard stretched out her left arm and caught three guards coming at her from the middle path in a powerful reave. A split second later, her armored outline blurred into a streak of silver and cyan as she charged into the fray. Unstable biotic fields exploded outward, flinging all three off the ship's hull. While two were killed instantly from the attack, the last unfortunate salarian guard was still screaming as he sailed off the edge. It would be a long time before he hit the ground.
Shepard didn't pause. She mentally mapped out her squad's location versus the coming waves of Broker guards before storming towards the group of commandos at her left. Rolling behind cover just in time to dodge a warp aimed at her head, Shepard spun around while crouching and fired at the glowing lightning capacitor across the hull, right next to the group of security mechs creeping up behind her. It was impossible not to grin at the satisfying visual of Loki mechs melting down to slag.
"Oomph!" Grunting at the unexpected attack, Shepard had good enough reflexes to braced for the tackle coming from her flank. It seemed one of the commandos was also a vanguard, albeit not a very good one. After the momentary stun, Shepard returned the favour by executing a short distance charge at the asari vanguard. Unlike the love tap she received earlier, her own attack crushed through her opponent's barrier like it was made of cardboard. She then followed up with a biotic enhanced heavy punch at the commando's unprotected jaw. The familiar yet unholy crack at the moment of impact could only be the sound of bones breaking. Shepard didn't waste time to check if the commando was completely out or not, a point blank shotgun to the head was enough to ensure her opponent would not get up again.
A fresh wave of reinforcements rushed in and attempted to swarm her position before the previous group was completely pacified. Shepard snarled, firing her shotgun to keep the guards back as she surveyed the scene. Not so far from Kasumi's location, Liara had ensnared a couple guards in a singularity while fending off a rocket drone by firing at it from cover. Shepard finished off the dangling guards with an area reave, and then took off at a different direction where the enemies were the thickest.
The next little while flew by in a haze of fire and steel. It became apparent quickly that there was a good reason why Liara's hired guns didn't make it the last time around. The sheer number of guards the Broker had thrown at them would have been difficult for ordinary mercs to handle. If Shepard had not had the experience of fighting an overwhelming number of enemies at the same time, she might have been overrun two minutes in.
"I got it! We're in!" Kasumi let out a triumphant cry, just as Shepard dispatched the last Broker guard standing with her shotgun.
Breathing heavily to steady her thundering heartbeats, Shepard scanned the corpse littered battlefield with a brief stab of regret. She had lost count how many guards she had to put down during the skirmish. It always bothered her to kill the Broker's private guards, knowing that every dead agent would be one less gun at their side to be used against the Reapers later on.
Liara calmly straightened up from behind cover, brushing off a patch of soot on her shoulder from her otherwise pristine white coat. "I thought it would take longer. Kasumi, what program did you use to crack the hatch open?"
"Oh, it's just a simple bypass shunt program of my own design. You won't find it on the open market. I don't think it's legal anywhere. Why? Are you planning to break into another secret base?" Kasumi teased.
The faint smile on Liara's face could only be called impish. For once, Shepard had no idea what her bondmate was thinking about. "Perhaps," Liara said with her head slightly tilted to the side, glancing at Shepard's direction with a curious glint in her eyes. "We'll see."
"There's got to be more guards inside, and they must know we're coming. Standard formation, ladies." Shepard said as she took point.
The hallway was quite narrow for a ship this size. Worse still, it appeared that there were plenty of nooks and crannies located on either sides of the passage - perfect for guards to ambush intruders unfamiliar with the ship's layout. Liara and Kasumi stayed a few steps behind her, each protecting Shepard's flanks while she concentrated on the enemies down the middle of the hallway. Opposite to her previous tactics, the claustrophobic interior space restricted Shepard's ability to use her mobility to its fullest extend. Instead of charging forward recklessly like a human wrecking ball, she had to switch gear and rely on her pistol and her long range biotic techniques. This actually reminded her a lot of the mission back on Noveria, where enemies could jump out from any corners. Minus the giant, acid-spitting death lobsters on steroid, of course.
"That's just not fair." Shepard grumbled to herself, her shoulder pressing against the durasteel bulkhead while she waited for the fire and smoke to clear. "What made them think firing a missile launcher inside a ship is a good idea? I want one too."
The Shadow Broker's garbled voice blared through ship's internal broadcast just as the squad mowed down the group of guards stationed at the first checkpoint. "Hold your position at all cost!"
The yahg is sweating. Shepard thought, gleefully. She picked up the missile launcher clutched in a dead guard's hands and clipped the heavy weapon on the back of her armor. The added weight was uncomfortable, but she had a feeling that she'd need it later.
While she was busy checking the ground for supplies and extra thermal clips, Kasumi had her Omni-tool out in front of the terminal at the checkpoint. "I've got the ship's blueprint. Forwarding it to you now. We're close... Eww, is that a torture chamber? That is sick."
An angry growl slipped through Shepard's clenched teeth. They had better not be holding Jack in a fucking torture chamber. If that's what they've done...
As if sensing her distress, Liara put her hand on Shepard's arm to calm her mounting temper before she could work herself up into a frenzy. "We're almost there."
Shepard gave her a jerky nod. Keep cool now, get angry later.
When they finally cleared out the guards in the prison block, Shepard wasn't sure whether she should feel relieved or dejected that the torture chamber was empty. Where the hell would Jack be then, if the Broker hadn't captured her? She couldn't think of one good reason why Jack would ditch her Omni-tool and go incognito in the middle of an important mission. The whole thing simply didn't make sense.
Forcibly pushing aside her concern for her missing friend, Shepard signaled her squad to press on. According to the blueprint, the Shadow Broker's inner sanctum was only a few airlocks down the main corridor.
Intellectually, Shepard had known that the Shadow Broker was a yahg. Hell, she had seen one on Sur'kesh during the mission to retrieve Eve for the jerk, Urdnot Wreav. What she didn't realize was that the yahg she saw back then was a runt.
Unlike the escapee, the Shadow Broker was a gigantic beast of a yahg. While wearing an expensive looking tailored suit and sitting calmly behind a large desk, this civilized trappings did nothing to disguise the aggressive nature their species was known for.
"Vasir has failed, I see. This is unexpected." The yahg's deep, gravelly voice grated on her nerves. He folded his hands together in front of his face in a casual gesture, looking unconcerned that his lair was being invaded and his private army reduced to a pile of bodies. "Reckless. I had thought your sense of self-preservation would be strong enough to override your misguided thirst for vengeance, Dr. T'Soni."
Shepard kept her pistol trained at the yahg's face. In the dim light, she could still clearly see rows of needle-like teeth in his triangular maw… And she just figured out what the Shadow Broker's red arrow icon stood for.
"My vengeance is justified. You've allied with monsters, Broker. Are you so naive to believe that the Reapers will spare you for your cooperation?" Liara hissed.
All eight of the yahg's eyes narrowed dangerously at her bondmate's accusation. "You understand nothing. You showed poor judgement when you handed Commander Shepard's body to Cerberus. I had thought better from Benezia's daughter." The Shadow Broker kept staring at Liara as he continued to address her. "Regardless, your arrival is merely an inconvenience. All you have accomplished is to waste my time."
Liara's lips curled in a faint sneer. "You are quite confident for someone with nowhere left to hide."
The Broker shrugged off her taunt and retorted with his own barbs. "You travel with fascinating companions, doctor." He fixed his eyes on Kasumi, his voice dripping with malice. "I'm obliged you brought along Ms. Goto. That graybox she's hiding is priceless. As for you, Ms. Gunn," the yahg turned to address Shepard, "you are invited to stay on my ship as an example to all. The prison block has been left empty for too long."
Shepard grinned widely underneath her full-faced helmet. It took everything she had to stop from bursting out in hilarity.
Liara, on the other hand, did not see the humour in the situation. Her beautiful face contorted in a vicious snarl at the blatant threat. "You're not putting a hand on anyone!"
"It's pointless to challenge me, asari." The yahg seemed almost amused by Liara's reaction. "I know your every secret, while you fumble in the dark."
"Is that right?" Liara's furious expression morphed into a contemptuous narrow eyed frown while her voice acquired a silky, honeyed quality that gave Shepard the chills. "You're a yahg, a pre-spaceflight species quarantined to their homeworld for massacring the Council's first contact teams."
The fleshy frills on the Shadow Broker's head flickered in agitation.
But Liara was not done yet. Her eyes glinted in the dimly lit room like two torches of dancing blue flames; at this moment, she was all Benezia. "This base is older than your planet's discovery, which probably means you killed the original Shadow Broker sixty years ago, then took over. I'm guessing you were taken from your world by a trophy hunter who wanted a slave… or a pet." Her lips curved into a cruel smirk while flagrant superiority oozed off her aura in seductive ripples.
Shepard watched, swelling with pride as her sweet and innocent bondmate verbally savaged the Shadow Broker like he was a particularly dimwitted child.
"How am I doing?" Liara closed with one last jab at the yahg's smarting ego.
He rose from his seat. Shepard had to look up to maintain eye contact as the yahg's towering height made itself known. And then the flimsy disguise of civility the Shadow Broker had donned was violently ripped off in one loud smack when he finally snapped and broke the massive desk in two with one slam of his fist. He then picked up half of the broken desk and tossed the hunk of twisted metal at the squad. Already prepared for an attack, Shepard was fast enough to tackle Liara out of the way.
Kasumi was not as lucky. One section of the broken furniture had bounced off the floor and smacked her in the head, knocking her out cold. Shepard and Liara both scrambled to their feet while the yahg let out a terrifying roar of pure rage. He then whipped out an assault rifle from his back and held it with one hand like it weighed nothing.
Liara didn't need further directions from Shepard. She bolted for the closest cover and dove behind it just as a spray of bullets rained down at her direction. Taking advantage of the Broker's undivided attention on Liara, Shepard pulled out her shotgun and fired off a lightning fast potshot loaded with incendiary rounds and slapped on a reave for good measure before rolling behind cover as well. Grunting from the pain, the Broker changed his target and fired at Shepard instead. But the moment he was distracted, Liara lashed out with a powerful warp and detonated the unstable biotic field surrounding him. The resulting explosion stunned him long enough for Shepard to unload her entire clip into his fizzing shields.
They did not give the yahg any room to breath. As soon as his shields came down, Shepard switched to the Phalanx and began methodically tearing down his armor.
Of course, the Shadow Broker was not about to go down without a fight. With a thundering howl, he activated an unknown device that formed a translucent layer of tech barrier that encased his entire body.
"The shield's kinetically sensitive! Energy and projectiles are bouncing off!" Liara shouted.
Shepard cracked her knuckles. "Then we do this the vanguard way." And she was off. She charged into the immovable mountain of armored flesh and drilled into his gut with her fist. The Shadow Broker doubled over from the pain, and Shepard used the opportunity to quickly landed two punches on his massive jaw. Her third punch, however, was met with a solid flash-forged Omni-shield. Bellowing out his challenge, the yahg brandished the large shield like a weapon and used it to bash her away.
With the Omni-shield in place to deflect fire, it was now significantly more difficulty to hit the Broker. Worse still, the brief delay was enough for his spare shield generator to kick into effect - they were back to square one.
Shepard decided that the best way to deal with the yahg was to employ liberal amounts of brute force. Instead of staying behind cover to chip at his defense from a safe distance away, the vanguard reaved through the Omni-shield and charged once more. The sheer momentum smashed the Broker's shield arm away from his body. While he was stunned again by the biotic explosion, Shepard pulled out her shotgun and fired rapidly into his gut.
Liara didn't stay idle during the exchange either. She timed her singularity to keep the Omni-shield away from the Broker's body while Shepard unleashed another devastating flurry of punches that had the hulking beast growling in agony. This physical pain somehow triggered a state of berserker rage in him. Ignoring the force from Liara's singularity through sheer physical strength, the yahg ripped his shield arm back in front of his body, and charged at Shepard like a runaway train.
For a second, Shepard had a flashback of being tackled by a Brute on Tuchanka.
But luckily for her, her reflexes picked up where her higher mental faculties had left off. She whipped out the missile launcher she had picked up earlier and took aim. The heavy weapon was proven to be too much for the Broker to handle. After two hits, his Omni-shield was broken. Shepard didn't wait for him to regain his balance and charged yet again, and this time, she held nothing back. The charge was followed up with two consecutive Nova blasts at the expense of all her shields. As the Broker staggered backwards from the blows, Shepard pulled back her glowing fist and punched as hard as she could.
Her punch had the Broker bent over with his hands bracing the floor. He could barely stay on his feet.
"Shepard, move!" Liara shouted urgently.
Not wasting a moment to pause, Shepard abandoned her weakened opponent and rolled away. A warp shot out from Liara's outstretched arm and hit the tempered glass above the Shadow Broker's head.
Crying out in exertion, Liara then proceeded to bring the entire ceiling down. The blinding torrent of electrical surges crashed through the startled yahg and lit him up until his entire body exploded in a shower of ashes.
Only vaguely did Shepard realized she had been knocked flat on her back until Liara offered her a hand to pull her up. The room's automatic failsafe had been activated to contain the excess electrical energy. Still, the smell of charred flesh and ozone was thick enough to make her gag a little.
Off to the side of the room, Kasumi stirred with a groan. "Did you get the number plate of the train that hit me?"
"Shadow Broker, this is Operative Murat. We have a momentary connection failure. Can you confirm status?"
Liara flinched at the comm station where numerous screens were flashing urgently as communications from the Broker's contacts poured out in streams of overlapping voices.
Shepard stayed silent. She wanted her bondmate to make up her own mind. In the original timeline, Liara had taken up the mantle and assumed the role of the Shadow Broker of her own accord. But that Liara had not lived the same life as this Liara. And the last thing Shepard wished was to force her bondmate into a mold she wasn't ready for.
A myriad of emotions flashed across Liara's young face. Anxiety, uncertainty, fear, even a sense of slight panic. But then, Liara closed her eyes and took a calming breath. When she opened her eyes again, there was only resolve. "This is the Shadow Broker. The situation is under control." Liara began.
Shepard didn't know it was possible to fall more deeply in love with Liara, but she did.
"We experienced a power fluctuation while upgrading hardware. It disrupted communication momentarily. However, we are back online. Resume standard procedures. I want a status report on all operations within the next solar day." Liara's expression was composed, and her posture radiated strength. "Shadow Broker out."
Shepard waited until Liara shut off the console before she spoke. "You don't have to, you know."
"But I want to." Liara clarified. "We need his contacts, his trading sources. We cannot afford to waste the entire Shadow Broker network if we want to win the war. With this, I can finally help you. Shepard, I need to do this. I can't just let you..."
"Hey." Shepard pulled her bondmate into a hug. "It's ok. I understand."
Kasumi cleared her throat. "Don't mind me. I'll just look around… over there. Oh, and I'll open the shuttle bay and let Tali know she is cleared to dock."
"Thank you." Shepard tried not to look too embarrassed. She had forgotten they weren't alone.
Kasumi waved them off and limped away to explore the rest of the ship.
One big bad down, more to go. Beaming proudly at Liara, Shepard leaned in to kiss her soundly, putting aside all her worries for a hard-earned moment of peace.
x-x-x
"Get up."
Flight Lieutenant Jeff Moreau groaned in pain. The dull throbbing inside his head made him think he was suffering from an epic hangover, but after a moment's pause to orient himself, his eyes shot wide open in alarm. He hadn't gone out drinking last night - he had turned in early and stayed in his room in the barracks onboard the Arcturus station, in between assignments. Blinking rapidly, he looked around his surroundings with a sinking heart. As he had feared, he was no longer in his room. The subtle hum of engine clued him in that he was currently onboard a small transport vessel.
"I'm in my shorts." Joker felt the burning need to point this out to his abductor, who was grinning evilly at him. The pair of shorts he was in was exactly what he had worn to bed last night. He had also taken off his Omni-tool before taking a shower prior to going to bed. And now he was completely unarmed, and almost naked.
"I've noticed." The woman in an unmarked black hardsuit said nonchalantly. "Good thing you're so scrawny. You should see the other guy I had to haul. He's almost twice your weight."
Joker wasn't sure what to say to that.
The woman nudged a small suitcase towards him with a foot. "Here, your kit. Get dressed and we can get the briefing started."
Joker was then left alone in the room to change. He still had no idea what the hell was going on. Deciding that there was nothing else for him to do, Joker opened the suitcase to inspect whatever was available for him to use as a weapon.
The answer was: not much.
Inside the suitcase was various clothings and a pair of boots. Whoever prepared his kit didn't even bother to give him a fork to stab people with. Just clothes. Which, he supposed, was better than nothing. Fighting his way out in his shorts wasn't an option. Hell, fighting wasn't an option. The brunette who just admitted of kidnapping him from his bed looked as tough as Chief Williams. If he made her mad by attempting to inflict injuries with a kitchen utensil, she might just snap him in two like a twig.
Sulkily, Joker put on a set of blue and white BDU and laced up the black combat boots.
He missed his hat. What kind of monster would deprive a man of his hat? The inconsiderate kind, that's for sure.
Joker scratched the top of his head absentmindedly and hobbled out of the room.
The door opened to a small hallway. From the look of it, this ship was most likely a Kowloon class merchant freighter. Pretty much your run-of-the-mill civilian transport that everyone and their grandma could fly. If he could somehow hijack the control…
"Hey, over here." The kidnapper waved him over to a larger room that served as the ship's mess hall.
Joker slowly limped over, taking care to exaggerate his physical disability to appear harmless, and gingerly sat down on a chair he was pointed to, right next to two people he didn't recognize. He highly suspected that those two were also fellow kidnapping victims, judging by the wide-eyed look on their faces. The guy sitting next to him was built like a bear, but his demeanor made it painfully obvious that he was not a fighter. A short-haired woman of slight built sat rigidly in the third chair with her arms folded across her chest, frowning in barely contained contempt.
Standing at the far end of the room with her back leaning casually against the wall was a woman with short black hair wearing a form-fitting black catsuit. Joker didn't fail to notice that she had a heavy pistol holstered at her hip. Another kidnapper.
"Now that we're all here, allow me to start by offering a sincere apology. The manner of our invitation wasn't ideal, but it was necessary." The brunette in the hardsuit started.
Joker had to wonder what kind of sick game this woman was playing at.
The brunette addressed them each by name while making eye contact. "Flight Lieutenant Moreau, Engineer Donnelly, Engineer Daniels. You three have been drafted to be a part of a highly classified mission. Refusal is not an option. I am LC Hadfield, and my partner here is LC Rizzi. I know you must have a lot of questions, but please hold them 'till the end."
"Whoa-ho what?! Are you kidding me? You people draft me to run black ops? Have you seen me? In case you forgot to read my medical files - hello, I have glass bones!"
The big guy, Donnelly, also put his hands up in protest. "This has nothing to with me. I'm done with the Alliance. You can't send me packing with a pink slip one day, and then turn around to ask me to do your dirty work the next. I mean, I literally just got dishonorably discharged yesterday. You can't do this." His voice was gruff with indignation. The thick Scottish accent was verging on unintelligible. Joker had to really concentrate to understand him.
The female engineer, Daniels, tilted her head up in a petulant manner while glaring daggers at their kidnappers. "And I have already handed in my notice. Kenny and I have a pact. I go where he goes. You can't force me."
The woman in the catsuit let out a growl of frustration. She marched up to the brunette and said stiffly, "Mel, this is a mistake. They're complete amateurs. Just look at them. No way they can handle it."
"Tell me about it." The brunette who introduced herself as LC Hadfield agreed with a snort. "But orders are orders. Why else would they ask two N7s to babysit these three clowns unless it's for a very good reason?"
Joker straightened up in his chair.
"So you claim." Daniels huffed in disdain. "Far as we know, you guys kidnapped us. And you're just feeding us bull about some bogus Alliance mission. I don't buy it."
Donnelly looked torn.
Joker spoke up. "Hold it right there. You said N7? Like Commander Shepard, N7?"
Hadfield put her hands on her hips. "Yeah. So?"
"So prove it." Joker crossed his arms and leaned back into the seat, which both Daniels and Donnelly copied his gesture. All three of them were now staring at the self-proclaimed N7s expectantly. "I was the helmsman of the Normandy. I served with Commander Shepard for six months. Show me your dog tags."
Hadfield and Rizzi exchanged a look, shrugged, and pulled out their IDs from underneath their armor. "Happy now?" Rizzi asked with a long suffering sigh.
Joker squinted as he inspected their dog tags carefully; there was no doubt. Those tags were the real deal. He had seen the Commander walking around the crew deck with her dog tags hanging around her neck enough times to know what the genuine article looked like. Not that he was actively trying to commit the N7 logo on her dog tag to memory for any special reason, just that he was never going to admit he was guilty of checking out his CO's assets whenever she was in her tank top. "Yeah. I'm good." Joker cleared his suddenly dry throat and fixed his eyes on the floor. The sight of the familiar N7 logo had invoked all the memories of his time on the Normandy and was now making his eyes burn.
"Wow. I didn't know you flew the Normandy. That's… I don't know what to say. Gabby and I were both on the Perugia under Admiral Kahoku. We rode in as part of the Fifth Fleet reinforcement. That was damn fine flying you did. Saved all of our bacon. I saw the whole thing on a vid afterward. I wish I had the chance to watch Sovereign blow up first hand, but I was busy trying to prevent our Eezo core from an untimely implosion. You know what, the next time we're in a bar, I'm buying you a drink." Donnelly laughed good-naturedly while patting him on the back with his meaty hand.
Daniels was proven to be less easily distracted than her buddy. She frowned at the two N7s and moved the topic back on track. "Alright, so you are who you claimed to be. That's one thing out of the way. You haven't explained what you want from us. I understand this is all very secretive, but did you have to drag us from our beds in the middle of the night? Why didn't just show me the paperwork? You have to admit, this is looking very suspicious."
Rizzi rolled her eyes. "Exactly how many black ops have you been on? What about espionage training, no? It's easier to disappear you in the middle of the night than watching you guys flounder about and blow your cover. Besides, it's called black ops because we don't exactly keep paperwork. Just think for a moment. How important do you think you are that would require this elaborate deception involving two N7 elites? I'm not asking you to trust us. I expect you to use your eyes and ears and come to your own conclusion."
"Well, so what is it that you want from us? What's the mission?" Daniels asked.
"We were getting to that, but someone kept interrupting us." Rizzi narrowed her eyes.
Daniels toss up her hands and gestured for her to continue.
Hadfield cleared her throat to get everyone's attention. "As I was saying, you three have been hand-picked to be part of this mission. Why? I cannot presume I understand what the Brass was thinking when they put your names down, but they always have their reasons. Donnelly, you said you got the pink slip. What's the charge?"
Donnelly scowled. "Insubordination."
"Why?" Hadfield pushed.
"Because nobody listened. They think they can just sweep the whole thing under the rug and pretend it never happened. Commander Shepard was right. Sovereign is a Reaper, and there're more coming. I don't understand how anyone can be so blind. I was at the Battle of the Citadel, and I helped with the clean up afterward. Our team helped compile damage assessment reports to recreate the battle for post-battle analysis. I can't stand how the Council, how the Alliance could throw the Commander under the bus. She is a hero. She is not paranoid or delusional. I just got so angry."
Hadfield nodded, and turned her eyes on Daniels. "And you?"
Daniels pursed her lips. "I'm with Kenny. That's why I handed in my notice when they fired him. It's not right."
"And you, Lieutenant Moreau, flew the Normandy." Hadfield said to Joker while rubbing her chin in thought. "I think I get it now. Interesting. I see what's going on."
Joker stared at her. "What's going on?"
"Politics." Hadfield explained in one word. "In any case," she continued, "the first part of the mission is quite straightforward. For now, we are to cut off any and all contact with the outside world except with the cell leader - who will brief us on the mission parameter later."
"What cell?" Joker asked, thoroughly confused.
Rizzi waved her hand impatiently. "Black ops don't keep paperwork, and each operation is run independently of each other. The only thing we do keep is the code name of the operation, but never the details. The Brass may dictate the mission objectives, but it's up to the cell leader's sole discretion how it should be carried out. This mission is named Operation Neptune. We are the Neptune cell."
"Since you're not the cell leader, does that mean you actually have no idea what this mission is about?" Daniels asked, sounding a tad smug.
"Which is the norm when it comes to black ops." Rizzi explained calmly. "This is why we had to grab you in your sleep and confiscate your Omni-tools. We must ensure complete communication blackout until we rendezvous with the cell leader."
"Any chance you'll tell us where we're going, at least?" Joker asked.
Rizzi gave him a blank stare. "No."
"Aww."
x-x-x
A/N: Sorry for the wait. I got distracted. This chapter is a little longer because I couldn't find a good spot to break.
Mel and Susan are not OCs. Mel is, well, Mel. Incidentally, her twitter handle is De_MEL_Isher with an avatar of a fiery explosion in the shape of a "rock on" hand sign. She is one of my favourite character in ME3. I gave her the last name "Hadfield" in honor of the Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield. Susan is the nameless N7 Fury arguing with an Alliance Procurement Officer in the Silversun Strip. According to Wiki, her full name was Susan Rizzi. I believe someone on ffnet wrote an entire story about her.
EDIT: Fixed some typos. Thank you FatherJack82! I'll definitely give the fic a read.