Log 23
Date: 10TH NOV 2186
Location: VANCOUVER, CANADA
We made it out of there without any more major issues. The Reapers and Cerberus were too busy fighting each other to notice our escape. As we passed through what they called 'Cold Storage Room 1' it was clear the fail-safe had been completely successful. The room had been turned into a strange sort of impromptu habitat for the Adjutants to live in. They had been allowed to roam free in this large cavern. Now it was littered with their corpses.
I felt a strange revolution as we marched through. If they had lived they would have been an unstoppable plague, turning everyone they met into more of themselves. But several of them were members of the resistance before being turned and all of them had been people once. I wondered briefly how Shepard had felt that day when he'd sacrificed 300,000 lives to buy the galaxy more time. Like the Adjutants they'd been dead already, none of them would have survived the Reaper's arrival. But to be the one that actually had to bring about so many deaths, I can't find the words to describe it. Maybe that's why I decided to stay here on Earth, to avoid facing decisions like that.
After we got through that room we were out of the base and into the subway tunnels. Our new Cerberus friend warned us that we would would need to reach the surface quickly, the Reapers often patrolled the tunnels. We were led down a tunnel we were told would take us away from the city where we might be safer. When I finally asked which city I was taken back by the answer.
"Vancouver?"
The others were just as astonished, I'm not sure there was any other city in North America that would have surprised us as much.
"How did you survive when the rest of the city fell?"
The technician shrugged.
"Our base is deep underground and the tunnels let us come and go discretely. We never knew much of what was going on above 'cept what we were told. Heard a rumor 'bout a bit of a battle in the east side of the city once but nothing came of it."
"All the time we spent running around fighting the Reapers, hunting Cerberus and you were right under our feet!"
"I guess so. But we really need to hurry, the sooner we're out of the tunnels the better."
We pushed on while in the privacy of my own head I tried to come to terms with it. We were right back where we started. My war with the Reapers had come round in a pointless circle. Oh it was true that I had saved people along the way and built up a resistance to try and slow the occupation. But I had lost a lot of people along the way. Not to mention I had no idea if most of the resistance was still standing at this point (we had only been out of contact for a few days but when you're up against Reapers that's the equivalent of months fighting).
We'd done a headcount as we escaped the base and a lot of people are missing. In the madness of the battle for Welcome and the isolation of capture it was hard to be sure who had been killed (or processed) and who had simply been left behind or escaped the fighting. Several units in the area hadn't even arrived before Cerberus captured us. They might still be out there but with no idea where we were or how to contact us. For that matter the other resistance cells across the world would wonder why we; the main center of the whole operation had stopped responding. No doubt they would assume we were all dead, afterall we were hardly the first resistance group to suddenly go silent in this war.
And silent we would remain I assumed. The QEC would have been confiscated upon our arrival and I hadn't even thought about it until now. The odds that anyone had remembered to grab it were slim but we certainly couldn't go back and look for it anytime soon. Without it we would be stuck with conventional comms systems which were barely functional after the Reapers destroyed the satellites.
As you can see despite the escape my thoughts were still pretty bleak as we made it topside. Even the weather reflected my grim mood. I'd been hoping to see some sunlight after days trapped underground but the sky was overcast and gloomy, a typical autumn day. We were in the suburbs on the northern edge of the city now so finding somewhere to stay the night wasn't too difficult. With no one else left in this part of the city we felt relatively safe staying here. Once we had settled on staying here I found the nearest bed and fell straight asleep.
When I woke up the next day I'd decided what my next course of action was going to be. The only question would be how to convince the rest of the resistance to join me. It was still early in the morning at that time, the few who were awake ambling about slightly aimlessly as folks sometimes do when they're waiting for everyone else to wake up. In a way it was like being on a big campsite the same sense of roughing it, the same loss of normality.
I headed into the building we'd sort of claimed as a temporary command center. It was a church hall originally I think, hard to tell now. One wall of the building had badly collapsed and there was rubble strewn across the floor. Not what I suspected most of the Resistance or Alliance would picture if they were asked to imagine my main base. I spotted Colonel Travis hunched over a flickering computer console.
"How's it going?"
She noticed my approach and turned round to face me.
"Not well, systems here are worse than useless and most our tech got left at Welcome, or a Cerberus lock up. I'll need Xi Chan to take a look at this system really."
"If it can be fixed he'll get it working. What's the situation with everything else?"
"Our food rations consist of everything we've been able to scavenge from the nearby buildings and I've still got people looking. We've been quite lucky in that so far, I guess Reapers don't bother to clear out food just people. Morale is shaky at best, it's been boosted by our escape obviously but people are starting to ask what's next. And a lot of them, a lot of us have lost people."
I winced as she said that.
"I know,"
"It's not a criticism sir, we wouldn't be free or even alive if not for you. We're all behind you but some folks are being burnt out by the endless war. People aren't meant to live like this, in constant fear for their lives and their loved ones. I think Cadet Smith is in shock, all she keeps saying is she wants to speak to you."
"I'll check in on her as soon as I can and the others," I promised.
"Is there any chance of getting word to the people we left behind when we were captured? I know there were several units not caught up in the fighting."
"Well... I've done my best on that. Can't use the radio's particularly with those Capital ships still over the south part of the city."
"They're still there?" I asked surprised.
She nodded clearly exhausted from her night's work.
"From what we've seen Cerberus is still putting up a fight somehow. There was a massive explosion that wounded one of the Destroyers about an hour ago, not much activity since."
"Wounded?"
"You know what I mean sir, the Reapers act more like living creatures than machines. They seem to feel pain just like an organic creature would or at least that's what it seems like. "
"I guess it helps them react quickly in combat, they aren't just controlling the ship, the ship is their body. But you were telling me about contacting our troops?"
"Oh right, sorry sir I got distracted. I was saying we don't have any means to signal the troops but we did find some bikes on our scavenger hunt."
"Bikes?"
"Well I think they actually used to be called motorbikes sir, I guess someone here had a hobby involving ancient modes of transport. I sent out a couple of scouts with them to go and find our men, thought they might attract less attention than a skycar. I probably should have waited for your authorization but I didn't want to wake you and-"
"I put you in charge of all this for the night shift Colonel, you were well within your authority to give that order."
"But-"
I sensed her hesitation didn't actually come from not having gotten my permission, at least not exactly.
"You're worried about the men you sent out."
"Yes sir,"
"Colonel you could have asked my advise but sending anyone out on a mission like that is still going to involve a lot of unknowns. Your plan seems sensible, I couldn't have suggested anything better myself. Ultimately you gave what you thought was the right order at the time, that's fifty percent of being the other commanding officer."
"What's the other fifty percent?"
"Trying to make it look like you know what you're doing. Now I'm going to see to this Cadet and anyone else I can help out. Go get some rest, we'll have someone drag Coberg out of bed to take over from you."
She smiled for the first time I can remember.
"You might need to get a foghorn to wake him up, goodnight Admiral."
I headed over to the house where General Coberg was staying and managed to get him up (with only a dozen or so curses and threats from him). Once he'd been apprised of the situation we agreed that he would take command of organizing patrols and perimeter defenses and I would work on raising moral (Obviously I could have organized the defense just as well as the General could but that would've have left the job of comforting traumatized civilians to Coberg which would have been a disaster).
So my first proper job of the day was to go and see Cadet Smith. I found her sitting on a bench alone in our command center. She was looking down, her face hidden under a mess of brown hair avoiding eye contact with everyone. She looked so young but then again I recalled that she actually was. I think it was Xi Chan who told me at some meeting or other. She was one of the youngest Cadets the Alliance had ever taken on, given special treatment for her technical skill. The idea had been to keep her in the lab. No one had ever anticipated a war starting that would land this teenager on the front lines.
I took a seat next to her on the bench, last time I'd seen her she'd been trying to help a man with life threatening injuries. Traumatizing enough for anyone that young but while she'd seemed nervous at the time I thought she had been coping incredibly well, what had brought about this change?
"Karlakh is going to make a full recovery soon, you did an amazing job helping him." I told her. I got a small nod in response, aside from that she barely moved. I waited for awhile patiently and then eventually tried.
"I heard you wanted to speak to me about something?"
Nothing. At least not at first but then I heard a sound coming from her, a sob. Never having been the best at dealing with this sort of thing I felt awkward at first as I tried to comfort her. In the end I decided the best I could do was to stay with her so I waited patiently for the tears to end. Eventually she reached down and opened up her bag holding it up for me. I decided to humor her and take a look at what see wanted to show me which to my shock I recognized as the QEC device.
"How did you get this?" I asked in absolute astonishment.
"He, he asked me to get it to you."
The story as I later understood it from what the cadet told me filtered through my own experience was this. Her friend on Xi Chan's team Cadet Monroe (I'm ashamed to say I had to look the name up in my own book) met up with her after they were both released from their cells. Then Monroe suggested that they should try to grab the QEC before everyone escaped the base. There was a certain amount of commitment to duty shown here, the QEC was their main project in the team and a critical asset to the resistance. That said I think Monroe was trying to play the hero, living out some kind of Commander Shepard fantasy in his head.
From what I could tell Cadet Smith was set against the idea but eventually went after Monroe when he slipped away from the main group in the confusion. They managed to hack a computer terminal to get low level access that included a map of the facility. Even through they'd heard that the Reapers already controlled the area where the device was being kept Monroe refused to turn back. It sounds as if they got incredibly lucky in avoiding enemy contact until they reached the device. There they encountered some Husks as well as some 'pointy headed' Reaper soldiers (I tried to ask what these were but all I learned is that they weren't Marauders) who were examining the device. There were so many Husks that Monroe used a grenade to clear them.
The explosion alerted the Reapers nearby and the pair of them fled with the device. Eventually they ended up in a corridor near the lift, holding the door closed against an Adjutant. The lift eventually arrived but if they tried to make a run for it the creature would kill them before they made it out. Monroe told Sarah to take the device and run. As the lift doors closed she saw the door come off its hinges and Monroe was crushed, two seconds later the Adjutants head exploded.
It seems like a cruel joke to be shown that if you had just waited slightly longer your friend could have lived. There is no blame whatsoever for Sarah Smith, I wouldn't expect anyone to have acted differently in the circumstances. As for James Monroe? A hero's death with full honors, what he did wasn't wise or even sensible but it may still save many lives in the rest of this war.
In the end I had to leave the cadet with another officer who'd been apprised of the situation. I did what I could to reassure people but what good could I do this time? These people had gone though days of fear, many of them had lost loved ones. Platitudes were all but a waste of time, empty words that did little to dull the pain. I eventually settled on an idea, not exactly a traditional morale booster but it might help them come to terms with it all.
"A funeral?" Asked Major Coats.
"These people need closure, a chance to say goodbye to those they've lost," I explained.
"Yeah, that's true but who for? There's no lack of candidates," he said with some bitterness in his voice.
"Everyone. A joint ceremony for everyone lost in the war, everyone we can remember at least. Can you make the arrangements."
The Major smiled.
"Yeah I think I'd like that, or well... You know what I mean."
I nodded and then headed off to do what I'd been putting off. It had been on my mind ever since I'd found out we'd gotten the QEC back. I thought about my time in that cell when I thought I was going to die and all the other times I'd been in danger in this war. My thoughts had been of my son Jason and the woman I love, Kahlee Sanders. The woman I love. How rarely had I actually said those words to her? I'd told myself before that if I ever got out of that prison I'd tell Kahlee how I felt about her, try to say the things that really matter. I'd had Xi Chan set up a comm building for us but as I walked over to it I realized I was nervous. Funny that, you'd think as we get older we'd start to outgrow that sort of thing but my heart was in my mouth as I switched on the comm platform.
I dialed up the code for the Seventh Fleet which is stationed near the crucible. Once they saw who I was they let my loved ones know I wanted to talk. They arrived a few minutes later Jason, Kahlee and Cynthia too. I asked if they didn't mind me speaking to them separately and soon Jason was on the screen.
"Hey dad what's up?"
As bright and cheerful as ever, that's what I remember about him most.
"Oh just your old man checking in. How are you son?"
"I'm good, though I'm not used to living on military rations. Not sure how you put up with it to be honest."
"Oh we manage, haven't poisoned anyone in over a week." I say falling into the usual bad dad jokes.
"What're you working on over there by the way? Crucible project got you busy?"
"Yeah but if I told you about it I'd have to kill you, or get mum to do it."
"Well she's always wanted an excuse," I laughed.
We talked like that for quite a while just about any topic that came to mind. You never want to break off conversations like that but eventually he had to go.
"Listen dad, I really have to get going there's a schematic they want me to take a look though before lunch."
"Okay then but before you do, I just want you to know how proud of you me and your mum are. And if I don't make it out there-"
"Dad you'll be fine-"
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.
"I just want you to know how much I love you that's all and I'm so sorry for all the times I couldn't be there for you."
"I love you too dad."
And that was it. I'm very glad I spoke to him but somehow I'm always expecting him to be angry over the times I wasn't there. But that's not really Jason, he's always been upbeat and cheerful. It's just my own guilty conscience that makes me expect it I guess.
I spoke to Cynthia next, just briefly. I informed her I was going to ask Kahlee to marry me. I wasn't sure quite how she was going to react but she beamed widely and said it was about time. I thanked her, she just told me to hang on to this one a little more tightly this time.
Then came Kahlee just as I was trying to work out what to say to her.
"Hey there, we were getting worried you stopped messaging for days!" Kahlee's face was full of concern and worry.
"Cerberus captured me," I replied honestly.
"Cerberus? On Earth? How?"
"Looks like one of their cells got stranded here before the Sol system was declared off limits. I managed to deal with them but they're not what I wanted to talk to you about."
"David you need to be more careful, if anything happened to you I-"
"I know. And I heard you were headed off to the front soon yourself. One of the officers said you were going just before you arrived."
"I have to take care of my students David and that means the biotics out in the field as much as it does the techs working here."
"I know. We both have dangerous lives, especially now. I've been thinking about that a lot recently. About the things that are most important in my life."
I looked up at her, directly into those crystal clear blue eyes of hers.
"I'm afraid I don't exactly have a ring to offer you. But I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you."
"Are you saying you want to...?" Her eyes widened with surprise and shock.
"If you'll have me."
She gave me one of her most radiant smiles, the kind that can light up an entire street in my opinion.
"Of course, of course I will marry you David Anderson. Once the war is over."
'Once the war is over?' I thought to myself. So the only thing left standing in the way was several thousand Reapers.
Piece of cake.