Who Saves the Hero (New-AU Version)

by Kudara

Rewrite of my work: Who Saves the Hero? Humanity is very much a minor newcomer to the Galactic scene, comprising only 15 B out of 3.5 T sentients. The Citadel Council has been in existence for 10,000 years, and the Asari Republics space faring for 18000 years prior to its founding. In such a Galaxy, the recently revived Shepard must determine who are her allies and who her foes.

18. Part 1: Chapter 18

Disclaimer: The Mass Effect universe is the property of Bioware/Electronic Arts. No infringement of these copyrights is intended as this is a not for profit fan fiction work.

Rewrite Notes: Still inspired by the Beyonce song "Save the Hero," from the album I am…Sasha Fierce.

Author's Notes: Spectre Alena M'Tara is based on LuckyFK's Confidence picture on DeviantArt.

Revision History: 2/13/2018

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Part 1: Chapter 18::12 Days Post-Awakening: Citadel Part 6

"Spectre Shepard," Valern began speaking almost immediately after the three Councilors' holograms formed, "concerning your proposed mission to discover a way through the Omega 4 Relay and provide any technology or information there to Citadel forces while denying them to Cerberus. We are intrigued with the possibilities presented by it, and certainly we don't want Cerberus to have access to advanced Collector technology. Before we can make a final decision however, we need more information from you." Shepard nodded, really she would have been astonished if they had not had more questions.

"Two years ago, you were convinced of the existence of the Reapers," Sparatus took up smoothly right after Valern fell silent, apparently they were back on script noticed Shepard, "what did Cerberus tell you about the Collectors in order to persuade you to go to Freedom's Progress instead of reporting directly to the Council or Alliance?"

"The Illusive Man did mention that he thought the Collectors and Reapers were somehow involved with one another," Shepard readily admitted, suspecting she knew what was coming next.

The turian Councilor leapt on the admission, "Then the real reason you want us to approve this mission is so that you can continue to pursue this Reaper obsession of yours!"

"So?" Shepard coolly replied, and then allowed herself a moment to enjoy his evident expression of surprise. She had thought for a bit that she wouldn't get to use this fine bit of reasoning that she had worked out in her pre-trip planning. "How does that impact the results of the mission? No matter what my motivations for stopping the Collectors, and whether or not it has anything to do with finding out if they are somehow involved with the Reapers or Metacons or whatever…that in no way changes the fact that I will have to find a way through the Omega 4 Relay to do it and would much rather the Council benefited from whatever I find on the other side than Cerberus."

"And if there is no evidence of the Reapers existence there?" Councilor Tevos inquired.

Shepard honestly didn't know if there would be, she hadn't yet seen any strong evidence one way or another, but something told her TIM wouldn't have mentioned it unless he thought there was something for her to find. How that fitted into his longer-term plans though she had no idea…yet. "Then perhaps Councilor Sparatus is correct and the beacon message was simply an older one relating to the Empire's war with the Metacons," Shepard allowed, "however, I do think we should take any hint of the Metacons continued or renewed existence as a serious threat."

"An entirely reasonable answer," observed Valern, "especially if they presented as much of a threat to the Prothean Empire as you state." The salarian fixed his large dark eyes on her, "Quite frankly for all our sakes I hope you find no evidence of Reapers or Metacons. As it is, dealing with the Collectors deep within the Terminus Systems, League claimed area or not will present enough of a challenge both militarily and politically."

Shepard nodded in understanding, then she hesitated, wondering whether or not it was wise to even bring this up or not…still though, better to have it out in the open than have it bite her in the ass later. "While I am pleased that the Council is considering my proposition, I am curious about the fact that you are willing to invade Collector territory given that you're publicly stating this is an Alliance matter and the attacks are actually the work of pirates and slavers?" That was something she had noticed before; the Council hadn't seemed at all surprised to find out that the attacks on the colonies were actually the work of the Collectors. She had mentioned Veetor's report that Tali had forwarded and it hadn't even seemed to be news to them at all, they hadn't even questioned her about it and that strongly implied that they were already aware of it - which begged the question of how exactly they were aware of it.

The three Councilors present by hologram glanced at one another then over at Anderson. Shepard followed their gaze, turning toward her former Captain, obviously it was his turn to speak. "Yes, we were already aware that the Collectors were behind the attacks," he paused for a moment then added, "we have been since the attack on Fehl Prime. There were witnesses to the attack who managed to escape the Collectors."

To say that Shepard was surprised by this was a bit of an understatement and she had to wonder how the survivors had managed to evade the seeker swarms used on Freedom's Progress. "And why is this not public knowledge?" She inquired, wondering why the secrecy surrounding it.

"Our colonists are panicking enough as it is over the attacks," Anderson stated his expression dour. "At least the colonists know how to plan for slavers and pirates, but Collectors with swarms of mechanical insects that leave them paralyzed…that would lead to a full-on panic and that's something we can't afford right now. We're in the process of placing GARDIAN emplacements at all of our colonies, even the ones in the Traverse that are independent of the Alliance, in the hope that they prove to be effective against the Collectors' ships."

She nodded, those were specifically designed as anti-ship emplacements and could take down a dreadnought with enough sustained fire. The only problem was that most ships could fire back and unless the GARDIAN's were protected with very strong barriers could easily destroy them. "That's something at least, especially since it seems the Collectors are able to slip in an out so quickly. Have you reinitiated the regular comms checks?" She referred to the practice started after the attack on Mindoir up until just after the attack on Torfan of the colonies checking in with the Alliance every four hours. It hadn't been perfect, but it had helped deter attacks when the slavers had known the Alliance would send a fast response unit after the four-hour window passed with no contact with a colony.

Anderson nodded, "We have," he confirmed, "and there's a few other things you should know as well." Something about his expression and stance told Shepard she wouldn't like whatever it was he was about to say. "The visual profile of the Collector ship that attacked Fehl Prime matches the visual profile of the ship that attacked the Normandy."

"The ship that attacked the Normandy was a Collector ship?" Shepard stated, startled, this was unexpected information.

"So, it seems," Anderson confirmed.

Was this why TIM thought the Collectors were associated with the Reapers she wondered, but didn't ask. Instead she asked a less controversial question, "Has there been any sign that they were allied with the Geth?"

Anderson looked startled, "No, no there hasn't been."

Councilor Tevos spoke up then, clarifying the matter, "Our intelligence sources indicate that the Collectors were specifically after you Spectre Shepard."

"Me?" she repeated numbly, thinking of how many of her crew had died in the attack. Yes, she had died as well, but she had just been the last one. "They attacked the Normandy because I was onboard?" she asked with growing anger. This then must be the connection TIM had referred to, she realized, the Reapers had decided to remove her as a threat to them. That was…she felt a chill, fairly concerning actually. 'Or an opportunity,' the tactically calculating part of her mind chose to let itself be known, 'if you want the Collectors to show up at a location of your choosing instead of theirs you can use yourself as bait.' Then Thalion's voice chimed in, 'Turning the hunter into the hunted.'

"That seems to be the case," Anderson confirmed, "for whatever reason they are interested in you."

"You have no comments on this," Sparatus asked her, his tone oddly neutral.

She scowled at him knowing what topic he expected her to comment upon. "Comments about the number of good men and women who died that day because they were targeting me?" she rebuked him, "no, I have no specific comments to make about that." She sighed, "Though it does seem like something to keep in mind in case we actually want the Collectors to show up at a particular location."

"Set a trap for them," Anderson commented, immediately seeing what she meant though he didn't look too happy about it.

"Should it be necessary," she reminded him, "and better that than trying to guess which colony they are going to hit next."

"You would put one of your own colonies at risk to draw the Collectors there?" Tevos inquired with a hint of disproval.

"Freedom's Progress comes to mind," Shepard hurried to correct the asari's impression, "as a site. A location with no colonists. We can install GARDIANS, but make it seem as if they're not operational. Instead of actual workers we would have Marines posing as workers."

"Hmm," Valern hummed with a thoughtful look, "that is an interesting idea. It needs a bit of refinement to maximize its chance of success, but it has promise."

Shepard nodded, "We would still need a countermeasure to those swarms they use to paralyze people. The Illusive Man forwarded a dossier to me on a Mordin Solus who he thinks can develop one."

"Brilliant scientist and doctor," the salarian Councilor immediately replied, "currently located on Omega. It's interesting that the Illusive Man should point you toward him for the project."

Personally, Shepard found it interesting that Valern immediately knew who she was talking about and where exactly he was currently located. "That brings up something I need to address for this mission to have a chance of success." Her gaze drifted toward the asari Councilor, "Though I consider the League's reaction to be reasonable considering what happened on Trident, the current bounties their offering for any Cerberus member will make it rather difficult for me to gather together a ground team to go after the Collectors and discover a way through the Omega 4 Relay."

"You are hoping we can intervene for you," Tevos responded, "to ensure your crew is not arrested and your vessel impounded."

"Yes, I'm hoping you can intervene for me," she directly met the asari Councilor's gaze, both of them knowing full well that she meant Tevos in particular with the Republics influence behind her.

"Shepard," Anderson said, drawing her attention away from the asari, "there's one more thing you need to know before we get into any detail about your proposal. Cerberus was working with the Collectors at Fehl Prime, they had an agent who assisted the Collectors by jamming the colonies communications just before the attack began. His goal seems to have been information gathering, in particular he was interested in the contents of a Prothean beacon present on the Collector ship."

The first thing Shepard felt was fury, fury at being lied to so thoroughly by the Illusive Man and Miranda, and fury at herself for not realizing to what extent they had been playing on her reactions, on her desire to help her fellow colonists. She had suspected that stopping the Collectors wasn't their actual goal, but hadn't suspected the true extent of how much they really didn't care about the fate of the colonists. 'He has a plan already,' oddly enough it was Lindariel's voice in her mind not Thalion that snapped her out of her anger. "He already knows or suspects then how to get through the Omega 4 relay," she said aloud, "what exactly was on the beacon? Do we know?" she asked Anderson.

He looked a bit startled at her jump in logic, but answered, "It was a similar message to the one you received two years ago." That seemed like shorthand for the Council found every reason in the galaxy to ignore another warning about the Reapers to her. "Only this one included information that the Collectors were once actually Protheans."

"Mana?" (What?) she growled out in a deeper than normal voice, unconsciously employing her biotics to deepen it beyond her normal range and tone as her mind was assaulted with anger, indignation and pain which wasn't primarily her own. Memories hell, sometimes she felt as if she had ghosts with her, the thought ran through her mind as she struggled to get her emotions and biotics, for she could feel them rippling around her, back under her control. Collectors - Protheans. Now that she was looking for it she could see only too clearly how the Reapers had twisted the proud and, yes, arrogant race into slaves. Their heads, their eyes, similar and yet not similar at all her mind thought in anguish. Looking up she was aware of the Councilors looking at her in shock and no small degree of wariness, she lowered her gaze ducking her head as she struggled with the combined emotions of all of them. After several more seconds the prothean presences within her withdrew and her biotic flare calmed. Once she felt fully in control of herself again she lifted her head to ask, "You have confirmed this?"

"What was that?" Anderson asked her with widened eyes instead of answering her question.

At the same time, Tevos, who was staring at her with narrowed eyes, challenged her, "Bits and pieces of memory? This is something more than just a mild case of Zeukeso."

She chose to respond to the asari Councilor first, meeting her challenge head on, "Yet they are only memories, no matter how intense they are at times."

"The drell neurochemicals perhaps?" mused Valern, "Yet I've never met a drell that spoke from one of their memories from the past. They simply relive the memory." The salarian almost seemed to be speaking to himself at this point. "Still though," he abruptly refocused on her, "I find it interesting that you reacted more to the news that the Collectors might be Protheans than you reacted to the news that Cerberus had assisted the Collectors in attacking one of your colonies."

Shepard sighed, "I expect Cerberus to do things that harm Humanity more than they possibly help them. So, though it was surprising news, it wasn't that surprising to hear."

"And yet they brought you back to life," Sparatus observed dryly, his arms still crossed over his chest.

She snorted in grim amusement, well points to him for being the first one to fucking actually say it. "I'm still waiting for the other shoe to drop on that one."

Sparatus looked confused at that, but Anderson frowned, "You're expecting something to go wrong with what they did to bring you back?"

"It's Cerberus," she responded laconically, "based on what I saw of them while tracking Saren of course I'm expecting something to go wrong."

Anderson grimaced, "Well, let's hope for once that they got something right."

Shepard made a noise of wry amusement, then repeated her question that had gotten lost in their reaction to her reaction. "Have you verified that the Collectors were once Protheans?"

"No," Valern responded to her question before Anderson, "the report from Fehl Prime indicated that the bodies of the Collectors burned into ash within a short time period of their deaths."

"Like Saren did?" she frowned as she considered the problem.

"Yes, exactly like Saren," Anderson responded and the two of them shared a look.

"Hmm," she tapped her lip in thought as she considered the pods the Collectors had used in a new light, "I wonder…"

"You wonder what?" Sparatus sounded annoyed by the whole matter.

"Those pods," she responded ignoring his ill mood, "now that I've made the Protean connection I recognize that their derived from medical stasis pods."

"You recognize them," Valern sounded intrigued and she nodded, she did indeed recognize them, "they look a bit different, but they were designed to stabilize and put a severely wounded person into stasis for transport to a medical center. It makes sense they would use them to hold and transport the colonists."

Sparatus finally snarled, "Impossible this is pure make believe and fantasy!" Shepard had wondered when he would clue into the fact that if she did indeed understand and speak the Prothean language, understand Prothean technology, understand Prothean thoughts…that it then followed that she would understand Prothean beacon messages as well and be unlikely to mistranslate or misunderstand them.

Shepard noticed Tevos turn and contemplatively stare at him for a moment before turning back to her, "I believe we should move onto our next question for Spectre Shepard."

"Yes," Valern chimed in, "I believe we have already identified the two Cerberus individuals you mentioned before, Miranda Lawson and Jacob Taylor. They were actually of great assistance to the Council a few years ago, preventing an assassination attempt on us by the Batarian Ambassador of the time, Ambassador Jath'Amon." Shepard hadn't heard anything about this, and found it rather fascinating. She was starting to feel like she was getting some idea of what drove the Illusive Man's decisions, about his motivations and she didn't like what she was beginning to see one bit. His actions and by extent Cerberus's seemed contradictory at best if you took his motivation to actually be the betterment of Humanity. If however, you scrapped that and instead looked at what gave him more information, more technology, more influence…in short more power, then his decisions started making sense. "Intelligence had tentatively identified Miranda Lawson as a Cerberus agent and Jacob Taylor as a recruit or new member," Valern continued speaking, "but now you have confirmed that both are Cerberus members."

"We looked up Rupert Gardner," Anderson added, "He was an eezo miner out in the Traverse until he dropped out of sight following a series of Batarian attacks that killed his family." Anderson shook his head, "It's unfortunate that his reaction to that was to join Cerberus instead of the Alliance."

"You said the remainder of your crew appeared to have joined Cerberus very recently and were recruited specifically for this mission?" Tevos questioned next.

"Yes," Shepard replied to her, "several of them seemed to have joined specifically to work with me to stop the Collectors."

"If we find no evidence that they worked with Cerberus prior to this, how exactly would you prefer us to treat them?" Anderson asked her, a frown etching a crease in his brow.

"Time served?" Shepard offered after a moment's thought, "honestly my opinion is a bit split regarding them. On one hand their civilians willing to go on a very dangerous mission to protect their fellow colonists…but on the other hand they were willing to join Cerberus to do it." She hesitated and then decided this was probably the proper moment to mention it, "By the way you should be aware that three former Alliance members and one current Alliance member are also onboard the ship to support me." She considered that for a moment then amended, "Well Karen is there to support both Jeff and I." She had all four Council members attention now, and Anderson looked a bit pained at her admission.

He sighed, "That's unfortunate for her career, however on the other hand I'm reassured that she's your doctor onboard the ship. You need someone in that position you know you can completely trust. As for Mr. Moreau, I had wondered what happened to him after he resigned his commission. So, he's serving as your pilot?"

"He is," she confirmed, "as for the other two former Alliance members their serving as my engineers; Gabriella Daniels and Kenneth Donnelly, both formerly of the SSV Perugia."

Anderson crossed his arms and stated with an unhappy scowl, "We can't exactly just overlook the fact that their working for Cerberus." He sounded like he dearly wanted to, but knew that it would probably be a step too far for both the Alliance and the Council.

"And yet as you pointed out I need people on that ship that I can trust," she pointed out, keeping her tone eminently reasonable, "especially I need people on the ship that I can trust to side with me when the time comes to call in Council forces."

"That's true," he agreed, glancing over toward the holograms of the other Councilors to get their opinion on it.

"Yet that wasn't their original intent when they joined Cerberus," Sparatus all but snarled his opinion, pointed an accusing finger at her, "they are yet others who you have brought down with your insistence on this Reaper nonsense."

'He is concerned about the cost if you are right, yet he is equally concerned at the cost if you are wrong,' Thalion's voice observed in her mind. 'He had thought the matter decided until your return and the unlocking of the Cipher bringing renewed doubt. Now he cannot decide which of the two possibilities is right so he waits undecided in the middle and attacks you to see whether or not you will cede your ground and prove one right and one wrong.' Shepard narrowed her silver eyes on him, considering Thalion's assessment - and equally becoming more disturbed by how much like actual fragments of personalities they were beginning to seem…and yet they were proving to be so very valuable to her. "That quite depends doesn't it on whether or not it's just Reaper nonsense, that's three beacons so far that have indicated something disastrous happened to the Protheans and this latest one-pointed right to the evidence of it being on the other side of the Omega 4 relay didn't it?" She was guessing, but from Anderson's expression she had struck right on the money. She shifted her gaze back to Sparatus, "I would love to be proven wrong, but equally I'm concerned about being right. Let me cooperate with Cerberus for now. Let the Illusive Man lead me around so that I can discover the clues he either already knows are there or suspects are there about how to get through the relay. Then we can all see whether there is something to be concerned about on the other side of it or not."

"That is what you meant by he already knows how to get through the relay," Councilor Valern unexpectedly commented, pulling her attention away from the turian Councilor whose expression she couldn't quite decipher - anger, shock, unease, it was hard to tell which or maybe it was all three. "If you are correct, and we deny your request then Cerberus might have enough information to be able to activate the relay and proceed through it anyway."

"Yes, I believe so," Shepard turned toward him and confirmed, "I think the only way to ensure the Illusive Man doesn't get access to Collector technology is to play whatever game he has setup for me and then deny him his goal at the end."

"Such reasoning is very convenient for you Spectre Shepard," Councilor Tevos pointed out, her tone seemingly mild.

A bitter snort escaped before Shepard could hold it back as she thought about the dark showers and claustrophobic feelings of being constantly observed by a hostile watcher, of feeling like she was the only one with good intentions trying to hold back the ending of their civilization. The asari Councilor frowned at her nonverbal response, apparently it was not quite what the matriarch had expected from her. Anderson was frowning at her as well, but he seemed more concerned than anything else. "And yet I believe the reasoning is solid," Shepard responded, "especially with the information you just provided me about Cerberus working with the Collectors."

"Indeed," Valern commented, drawing everyone's attention back to him "such was my reasoning as well, now let us return to our discussion of your crew. You freed a human woman who goes by the alias of Jack from the prison ship Purgatory."

Tevos and Sparatus frowned slightly at him, but tellingly neither one argued with him. Shepard turned toward the salarian, evidently they were getting too far afield again from their agreed upon agenda and he was getting them back on track. "Jack, or Subject Zero, as Cerberus calls her is an interesting case."

"Subject Zero?" Valern questioned, looking intrigued with this new bit of information. Shepard gave them a condensed version of Jack's history, at least what she knew of it. That Jack had been a part of Cerberus experiment on biotic children, that she had been experimented upon from such a young age that she didn't recall if she even had a family. That she had broken out, picked up by a passing ship, raped by the crew, then unsurprisingly gone on to commit all nature of criminal actions.

Showing that he had found his voice again, Sparatus growled, "Are you claiming that her past exonerates her of all her crimes?"

"No," she responded calmly, "I'm saying it's not surprising that she's self-destructive and has little concept of things like self-control, civil behavior, or morals in general really. Given her past, the fact that her caregivers hurt her instead of protecting her, that she didn't receive any emotional nurturing and very little social contact, she should really be a textbook case of a sociopath with little to no capacity for empathy." In fact, Shepard thought, her mind drawn back to Noveria and the Rachni, she should have been planning how to either get Jack back into custody once the mission was done, or failing that kill her as she had the children of the Rachni Queen and for exactly the same reason - Jack should be dangerously insane and that she wasn't was a minor miracle. "I would expect that given her past…instead I'm finding that she's desperately seeking guidance and wanting approval underneath all of her protective gesturing. Instead of being unempathetic, she was actually captured in an attempt to free other biotics from a Cerberus base." Shepard shrugged, showing her bemusement with the situation, "I'm saying that despite the odds against it, she shows all the signs of being able to be a productive member of society. Her past doesn't exonerate her of her crimes, but it does make me want to show her there's more to life than the really terrible parts of it that she's experienced so far."

"I agree with Shepard," Anderson stated with a grim look, "this young woman is as much of a victim as she is a criminal. You're focused on justice for her crimes, but where is her justice for what Cerberus did to her as a child?"

Tevos unexpectedly intervened before Sparatus could respond to either of them, "Why don't we see how she progresses under Spectre Shepard's influence," Sparatus snorted derisively interrupting the matriarch, and causing her to pause to stare at him with a chill expression that had him focusing intently on his podium to escape it. It was all Shepard could do not to smirk at him, but she didn't want that glare redirected her way. After a moment the asari Councilor continued, "We can make a decision regarding her future later, for now let us move onto the purpose of your activities on Korlus."

"Korlus," Shepard repeated, realizing that Vasir and M'Tara must have passed on her mention of it in relation to her skin irritation. "We stopped by Korlus to speak to Warlord Okeer about his contacts with the Collectors." She went on to explain how the Blood Pack had decided to attack the Ragar Kalo, who were employing Okeer to produce krogan clones for them, mid-way during their mission. She then related how they had ended up fighting with Okeer and his clones against the Blood Pack forces under Warlord Garm, and how that cumulated in the deaths of both Warlords with Garm killing Okeer and then her killing Garm.

"Ahh," Valern made a noise of satisfaction, "that is how you ended up turning in the bodies of both Warlord Okeer and Warlord Garm for their bounties. What of this clone that you mentioned, how exactly was he supposed to ignore the genophage?"

"From what we could piece together from Okeer's notes Grunt possesses the necessary genetics to survive the genophage as well as being within the physical and mental ranges typically found in pre-genophage krogan of a few centuries of age." She shrugged, "Okeer seemed obsessed with the idea that the Krogan as a race were growing weak because they in his words were coddling every krogan who simply managed to survive the genophage itself."

"He is not immune to the genophage then?" Valern pressed for an unequivocal answer.

"No, he has the genophage," Shepard confirmed to set his mind at ease, "it's just that unlike the other clones Okeer was producing he could have been born naturally."

"So he's essentially just like every other krogan born since the genophage?" Anderson asked with a puzzled frown.

Shepard shrugged, "Along with a hint of eugenics, yes."

"Strange," Valern commented, a sentiment which Shepard could only agree with, "his research? Could it be used to produce more clones such as this Grunt?"

She shook her head, "No, the technology Okeer traded the Collectors for was genetic material and it was used up during the development of the clone. The only way Grunt can produce more like him is to produce little Grunts the natural way just like every other krogan male." She was being purposefully blasé with this, the last thing she wanted was the Salarian Union getting unhealthily interested in the young krogan.

"Hmmph," Sparatus snorted dismissively as he rejoined the conversation, "he is of no concern to us then. Let us move onto this Menvra Fund we discovered and its relationship to the Normandy Fund."

Shepard frowned puzzled at this line of questioning, "Alright? What did you want to know?" She wasn't entirely happy they knew already knew the name of the ship, but there was nothing to be done about it now.

Instead of Sparatus continuing, Tevos picked up the discussion, "At our request, Councilor Anderson forwarded the documentation Ambassador Udina sent to the Alliance as well as some relevant requisitions records, they were exceptionally informative." The asari Councilor's voice held an unusual undertone of displeasure that made Shepard rather wary. She was also completely caught off guard, why were they returning to the topic of Ambassador Udina? "To verify our information," Tevos said next, "the Alliance refused to pay for any expenses related to non-Alliance members including even essentials such as food and medical supplies?"

"That is correct," Shepard promptly responded, "I paid their salaries, food, medical supplies and any necessary medical bills out of the Normandy Fund."

"I see," Tevos responded after a moment, then she asked, "you were also never reimbursed for your initial weapons and armor purchase from Citadel Security's Supplies and Requisitions after you were made a Spectre?"

"No, I was not Councilor," she replied with a slight frown. Did that mean she should have been?

She had barely finished her reply to the asari Councilor before Councilor Valern asked the next question, "From these records, it appears you financed this Normandy Fund by surveying mineral deposits for the Alliance and turning over several significant archaeological finds to their respective governments for reward fees?"

Shepard nodded, "The crew would begin scanning the entire system as soon as the mission team left. After the mission was completed we would follow up on anything interesting they detected. We also refurbished and sold any weapons we seized to either the Alliance or Citadel Security."

"Yes," the salarian Councilor responded, not sounding particularly pleased, "It does seem to have been quite the profitable system you had set up to finance your primary mission...and also time consuming."

Ah, so that was his problem with it, and probably the fact that they had continued long after the point when it was strictly necessary. By then the crew had divided into three survey teams, one for each of the sensor stations available, and were informally competing against one another to see which team could locate the most resources the fastest. She hadn't wanted to call a stop to something which had turned into a game for them and was keeping morale up. "We tried to be as efficient as possible Councilor, but yes, it did take a small amount of time away from our efforts to find Saren." Shepard decided to just cut short any accusation he might be trying to make that funding things took up so much time that it substantially impacted the total time it took to track Saren down. "I would like to point out though that the scanning and scavenging took up much less time than we spent docked at the Citadel trying to gather enough intelligence to figure out where Saren would turn up next and what exactly he was attempting to accomplish. Also, those funds were used to purchase supplies not available through the Alliance as well as non-standard armor and weapons for my ground team; without them we would have not prevailed against Saren's forces given the fact that we were generally heavily outnumbered by the Geth." Out of the corner of her eye she saw Anderson cross his arms and scowl at the rest of the Council members, probably at the reminder of the sheer number of hours the two of them had spent searching for information.

Given his prolonged silence following her statement, Councilor Valern obviously hadn't expected her to make a peremptory rebuttal of his assertion. "While I do not dispute that," the salarian finally commented, "my issue lies with the fact that you continued to accumulate credits after that point. Records show the Normandy Fund's total at disbursement was close to nine million credits."

"Morale," Shepard answered simply, drawing puzzled expressions from all four Councilors, even Anderson. "We started out of necessity and then the crew turned it into an informal competition between the three survey teams. Each team even worked out their own sensor algorithms trying to develop the most sensitive and accurate ones possible. Once we had the equipment we needed and the credits to buy enough supplies for four months, I let them continue with the caveat that we would only spend a maximum of three extra hours in any system since the entire crew was still intensely interested in the project." She smiled wryly, "That only encouraged them to develop plans to maximize the credits we could make in that amount of time by going to only the most promising finds and making multiple Mako drops and retrievals. Joker got very good at dropping the Mako close to the target location." She met the salarian Councilor's gaze and with all seriousness said, "That practice was one of the reasons he was able to successfully drop the Mako in a twenty-meter landing zone on Ilos and one of the reasons I trusted him to make it." The other reason had been that Joker hadn't been bragging when he said he was one of the best pilots in the Alliance Fleet, he was that good.

The salarian considered her answer for a few seconds before nodding, "Very well, Captain Kirrahe commented upon the lack of living space aboard the Normandy given the size of the crew. I can understand why crew morale would have been of significant concern to you."

Shepard had to contain her amused smirk at his response. She would bet Kirrahe had commented extensively upon both. Though grateful for their survival, the salarian STG Captain and his surviving team members had been quite happy to leave their makeshift accommodations on the Normandy's Storage deck for the more familiar and relatively spacious surroundings of an STG vessel.

"I assume you are also unaware that Spectres receive a salary from the Citadel government as well as the standard governmental employee benefits such as medical and disability insurance once they cease any other prior employment?" Councilor Valern stated his question, making it clear he expected only one response to it.

"I wasn't certain whether they did or not," Shepard admitted, "I couldn't find any information about a salary figure at any rate." As for the other, she hadn't thought about medical insurance as most companies only covered accidental injuries not combat related ones and the ones that did charged ruinously high rates.

"We do not publish it," Councilor Valern responded, "but we do not expect our Spectres to fund themselves," he continued, his tone rather dry. "They are supposed to be performing their duties, not trying to figure out how they will get to their mission site, the equipment necessary to complete the mission, or basic essentials such as food, shelter, clothing and medical care."

"Such a lack of funding would also make it difficult for us to compete against employment offers from private companies and retain the services of our Spectres," Councilor Tevos added, her tone just shy of condescending. Beside the asari, the salarian Councilor nodded his agreement with her statement. Shepard fought the impulse to scowl at them. Yes, she should have asked them about such things, but she still stood behind her reasons at the time for not doing so. Besides, it wasn't as if they had mentioned anything to her either as her six-month window got shorter and she made no comment about leaving the Alliance.

She was half expecting Councilor Tevos to ask the next question, but Councilor Sparatus spoke instead, "Alliance records show that you went on no less than six missions for the Alliance at the direct request of Admiral Hackett." The turian pointed at her and lectured, "This is why Spectres are required to resign any prior military or governmental positions, they cannot be answerable to any other authority but the Council's."

"I did," Shepard agreed readily, "and I do understand your point about clear lines of authority." She sighed as she restrained the impulse to reach up and run her hand through her hair, especially since it would only dislodge her hood. "And after dealing with said conflict of interest, I can definitely say that I agree with it as well. However," she emphasized the word as she looked him back in the eye, "I would also like to point out that accepting those missions worked out well for you, Councilors," she stated firmly.

"Why do you say that?" inquired Councilor Tevos, before anyone else spoke.

"When the Normandy showed up at Acturus station and asked for the Alliance's help Admiral Hackett agreed to do so. When I gave my tactical assessment that the Geth would micro-jump to flank him unless he dealt with them first and recommended that he do so with the assistance of the remaining Citadel Fleet, he followed my recommendation without any further questioning. I'm not sure either would have happened without the goodwill I cultivated with him by agreeing to investigate those situations and resolving them successfully," she answered frankly.

The three original Councilors didn't look as if they liked her answer, but they did seem to accept it, which indicated they had been surprised when the Alliance intervened to help them. They should be, Shepard hadn't been certain Admiral Hackett would follow her suggestion as the Alliance military generally did not hold the Council in high regard. Humanity had agreed to the Treaty of Farixen, which limited their production of dreadnought class ships, on the assurance that the Citadel Fleet would assist in protecting human colonies if they were ever attacked. However, the Council had yet to ever act to protect any human settlement during any attack in all the time they had been associate members. The widely accepted sentiment in the Alliance military was that it was unlikely they ever would and in reality humanity was effectively on its own unless maybe Earth or Bekenstein, as it was so close to the Citadel, was ever directly attacked. Their refusal to help after Saren and the Geth attacked Eden Prime had only strengthened that viewpoint, thus asking the Fifth Fleet to help the Citadel Fleet's flagship had been a fairly significant request for her to make.

On the other hand, Shepard's thoughts wandered to the viewpoint she had learned was prevalent outside of Alliance space; the Alliance had claimed more planets than the Volus, who had four times the population, and then placed tiny colonies on each of them. They hadn't bothered to make sure each colony was large enough to defend itself against pirates and slavers, which for the rest of the galaxy meant a population nearing a million or so colonists, before seeding the next one. From the viewpoint of the Hierarchy, which provided the great majority of the Patrol Fleet, the Systems Alliance was trying to abuse the letter of the Treaty to colonize more far more planets than they would be able to otherwise and had brought their problems with slavers and pirates upon themselves due to their irresponsible expansionism. Then, when their poorly defended undersized colonies were unsurprisingly attacked, they expected the turians of the Citadel Patrol Fleet to risk their lives defending them, something they were loath to do.

Shepard thought both sides were a bit right and a bit wrong. The Alliance had colonized so many planets in order to claim as many as they thought they would need in the next few centuries to prevent the Hegemony from boxing the Alliance into a small area of space. That naturally resulted in the Alliance having far too many planets to defend with their numbers, which in turn forced them to rely more on the Patrol Fleet than any other member of Citadel Space. By contrast, if they had colonized more like the Asari or Turians, the Alliance would probably have about four colony worlds with decent sized populations by now and would have easily been able to defend them from slaver and pirate attacks verses what actually happened, which was they became a favored target. However, the only reason they were in that situation in the first place was because of the nature of the area of space that the Citadel had given them to colonize. The Council had intentionally put them in direct competition for planets with the Hegemony, apparently thinking that would slow down the Alliance's expansionism. Instead, contrary to the advice given them by the Council, who advocated a cautious approach to colonization, the Alliance had continued their rapid expansion, ignoring all warnings about the risks to their colonists inherent in it.

Quite frankly, she thought the Alliance would have been better off in the long run if they had followed the Council's advice. They had far overestimated the ability of the Hegemony to colonize anything quickly for one thing, and now colonist and dangerous were almost synonymous in most human's minds which greatly depressed colonization rates. That in turn meant their colonies weren't growing quickly, which meant they remained vulnerable and temping targets. And the turians of the Patrol Fleet were still not minded to risk their lives because of the Alliance's exceptionally poor colonization policies.

"This new Menvra Fund you've setup as a salvage company on Illium, what is its purpose?" Anderson's question pulled her out of her wandering thoughts, she was starting to feel the fatigue of a very long day and a full stomach dragging her down.

"Paying out salaries for the ground team," she replied after a second's worth of gathering her thoughts, "any necessary medical expenses for the crew, general expenses for the mission, and upgrades to the ship. At the end of the mission the remainder of the funds will be paid out to all the surviving members of the crew or their designated beneficiaries on a 40 60 split with sixty percent going to the ground team members and forty percent to the ship's crew."

Anderson frowned at her answer, but it was Tevos who first asked for clarification, "To what extent is Cerberus supporting your mission?"

She glanced back over at the asari's hologram, "They provided the ship and its crew as well as paying their salaries, and an operating fund of 50,000 credits a month. They're also providing dossiers on suggested members for my ground team."

"So," Anderson spoke up again, his expression showing his disbelief, "Cerberus expects you to stop the Collectors with a civilian run ship and a hastily put together ground team - and on top of that expects you to fund the majority of the mission expenses yourself?"

Shepard let out a quiet laugh and then gave him an evil smirk, "I did say I thought we were ultimately expendable…but honestly I think TIM got miffed when I painted over his shiny white, orange, and black Cerberus color scheme with matte black and grey anti-reflective LADAR absorbing paint, removed the multiple Cerberus logos from the publicly visible sections of the ship, and changed the name from SSV Normandy SR-2 to MSV Menvra." She paused for a second and then dryly added, "I'm pretty sure I was supposed to be an advertisement for Cerberus on the side."

Valern blinked a few times at that, "He intended you to complete the mission in an obviously identifiable Cerberus ship?"

Shepard could only shrug a bit helplessly, she couldn't figure out the reasoning behind it either. "I know, I don't know how he expected that to work out with the bounty. However, this does seem like a good moment to bring up the subject of upgrades for the Menvra," she said getting their attention. "The Collector ship's attack on the Normandy went right through the barriers and standard Alliance ships armoring. Given that the Menvra is made with essentially the same technology and materials, it seems critical that I get those upgraded as soon as possible before facing them again."

"I agree given how quickly the Normandy was critically damaged," Anderson responded. "I don't know of anything other than a larger drive core that would provide you with stronger barriers, but Silaris armor should give you a better chance of survival." He shrugged, "If it doesn't, then I don't know what would, that's the best ships armoring available. As for weapons, the Hierarchy has been working on a frigate sized main cannon based on Sovereign's technology called the Thanix cannon…"

"Certainly not!" Sparatus angrily interrupted him, "not on a Cerberus ship where they can study the technology!"

"I would suspect they already have access to it," Valern commented, which prompted Sparatus to turn and stare at him in dismayed surprise, "the Shadow Broker offered the relevant engineering data to any buyer with the appropriate funds approximately two months ago." Sparatus reacted to that news with an angry growl which the salarian Councilor seemed to ignore as he turned to Shepard and continued, "You also might want to check with your quarian friend, Tali'Zorah vas Neema," Councilor Valern advised her, "the Quarians have been doing some interesting research on modifying shipboard shield emitters to produce an oscillating barrier system instead of a static one. Our information reports indicate that the results of their research efforts are very promising and should be most suitable for frigate sized ships."

"Alright, thank you for the information," Shepard said as she wondered whether or not he had gotten that information from the Shadow Broker as well or from the STG.

"Well," Shepard turned toward Anderson as he began speaking, "between the armoring and oscillating barriers that should offer some survivability against the Collectors. Now the question is how to get them on your ship?"

"Ah," Shepard grinned in response, "the fortunate thing about paying for it myself is that I can chose where to have it done. Considering I paid a rather outrageous three million for the LADAR absorbing paint job from Cerberus, I was planning on looking for someone else to do the rest of the work." She glanced over at the other three Council members' holograms, "I don't suppose any of you might have some recommendations on where I might want to get the ship refitted with Silaris armoring? A place where while the refit is going on perhaps the shipwrights might take the opportunity to search for any odd monitoring and transmitting devices that might have been installed on the ship."

Councilor Valern's thin lips curved into a smile, "Illium has some excellent shipyard facilities," he looked over toward Councilor Tevos, "I believe we could recommend a contractor to meet your needs."

"Really," Shepard drawled after the asari Councilor nodded in agreement, "If you could forward me your recommendations I'd appreciate it." STG and RIS agents together? That should be rather interesting, at least what one didn't catch the other probably would…provided they informed one another. Hopefully they would still disable or remove anything they found even if they didn't mention it outside their own group.

"Now as to the shackled AI onboard your ship…" Valern moved onto the next subject.

Shepard silently groaned upon hearing that, this was definitely not going to be as short of a meeting as she had hoped.