Log 35
Date: 23RD DEC 2186
Location: EARTH RESISTANCE HEADQUARTERS, LONDON, UK
Not a great place to cut off the log I realize (though it would make a great cliffhanger). Honestly I just got called away to speak to-. Well that's skipping ahead a bit. Anyway we reached the resistance base and found Coberg standing over a body.
It took both groups a little while to recover from the shock of what they were seeing but soon enough weapons were being raised on all sides. With no cover available to either faction we quickly found ourselves in a standoff. Much as I wanted to put Coberg down, at this range any firefight I started would get very bloody, very fast (and might well not favor our side even with the Justicar helping us).
"Stand down Admiral. The base is in lockdown following a major incident but rest assured the matter is in hand."
"In hand?"
"We've discovered that some individuals within the resistance were indoctrinated. Fortunately I have just executed their leader, I think the danger is over."
So he was going to try and claim that he'd caught the indoctrinated agent and that everything was OK now? I wasn't fooled, perhaps there was some way the man at Coberg's feet could have found out our plans for Harbinger but we'd been hounded by betrayal long before we linked up with the other Resistance cells. Possibly it was the realization of my own subtle indoctrination but I felt I could see more clearly now than I had in months. In that moment of clarity I dismissed any notion that the betrayals that had plagued us for so long could ever have been a string of coincidences. And there was only one man that could've been responsible for them all.
"Do the words 'red handed' mean anything to you General? There's no way that man could have been responsible for the attack in Vancouver or the murdered guard. It was you."
Coberg frowned.
"Murdered guard, Admiral? I'm afraid I've no idea what on earth you are talking about."
I was rendered speechless for a moment. It wasn't his lie that left me dumbstruck but the pathological certainty with which he delivered it.
"So now that you're in London you want to bury your past so no one sees this 'lockdown' for what it really is? Not a chance General, too many people know about everything that's happened for the rumors not to spread. Hell Lara here was present for most of it."
"The word of an alien, not to mention one who hates me hardly makes the story more convincing. But I'm surprised you would invent something like this Admiral, maybe you should be taken down to the med bay. We can try to get to the bottom of all those headaches you've been getting," he was grinning widely now, like a man who knew he held all the cards.
"How many witness do you think you can dismiss Coberg? I'm not exactly in danger of running out: Major Coats, Daniels-"
"Oh the Major backs your story? Convenient thing to claim after we lost contact with him on his scouting mission."
"What? What did you-"
"As for Daniels? Well now Private, come over here and tell the Admiral that he's mistaken about this whole 'murder' thing."
Daniels? I looked round just in time to realize that he was one of the military officers in the room. Up until now he'd kept his head down, hiding his face from sight (and I'd been focused on Coberg to take in the rest of the room anyway). He looked at me briefly, his face pale and empty of any emotion but said nothing. Then he began to walk forwards slowly, dragging himself forward with every step. Once he reached the center of the room he repeated what he'd been asked to, word for word. He didn't seem to have the slightest clue where he was at all.
"Apparently no one else reliable seems to know anything about the murder of some guard on a sub. I really think we need to take you down to the med bay."
In my shock I barely took in the General's words, clearly traitors had wormed their way into the heart of the Resistance right under my nose. Coberg and Daniels certainly but how many more? Was everyone here part of this? Fortunately the next words spoken showed that wasn't the case.
"Hang on," one of the other officers said. "Anderson never mentioned anything about a sub. And I overheard Major Coats talking about something similar a few nights ago."
"Did you? That's annoying," remarked Coberg. "Kill him."
"What? No," the officer turned his rifle to aim at the General but it was already too late. A shot caught him from behind and flung him across the room. A second shot finished him off. Both shots came from the man now moving to replace the man he had just killed, Private Daniels.
"That's a shame actually, he was an extremely competent officer," said Coberg casually.
"But at least this way we can dispense with the charade."
"So it was you all along? You're the indoctrinated agent we've been looking for all this time."
"No," Coberg snapped. "Your incessant boasting of how much stronger the Reapers are than us was always your weakness. You were so caught up in looking for someone that was indoctrinated you never stopped to think that those machines might not even be involved. That I did this of my own free will!"
"What the hell for? What was worth throwing away so many innocent lives? Power?"
"Strategy Admiral, Strategy! Throughout this campaign you've always been too weak, too soft, too afraid to take the fight to the enemy. I had to take control, to give the Resistance real leadership."
"No matter how many had to die to get you there."
"Dammit Anderson! There are millions dying every day that this war drags on. Do you really think I'm going to regret having a little extra blood on my hands in the face of all that?"
I looked at Daniels, he hadn't looked at me once since I'd arrived.
"I can understand the General turning out to be a power hungry S.O.B. by why did you join him? What are you getting out of all this?"
There was silence from Daniels, not even an attempt to reply.
"Oh I think those questions might be just a tad beyond the Private's current mental capacity," chuckled Coberg. "Like asking a Krogan to write poetry really."
I could see he was right, he wasn't just trying to avoid my gaze out of shame at this betrayal, he just didn't seem to notice me I was there. In fact he didn't even seem to be aware of what was going on around him at all.
"What have you done to him?"
"What have I done? I'm afraid you have your Reaper friends to thank for his current condition, not that he's the only one."
"Indoctrination?"
The General nodded. "Not of everyone of course, or even many people really but I noticed that a few of our soldiers were being affected."
"How did you find out?"
"I honestly didn't know anything about it. Not until I saw Daniels transmit a warning to the Reapers back in my old base in Vancouver. He's the one that alerted the Reapers to my plan to attack them with the Mako's, prompting their swift invasion of our position."
"No! He wouldn't!"
"Oh but he did Admiral, I saw it with my own eyes."
"And said nothing. To any of us."
"I wasn't really in a position to do so now, was I? What with being captured and then Daniels going MIA for weeks I obviously wasn't able to confront him on it until after we escaped the Cerberus base."
"And?"
"He denied it furiously at first, I had to really work to get the truth out of him. In fairness I don't think he was even aware what he'd done himself, not consciously at any rate. To be honest at first I considered killing him myself for ruining my plans."
"What stopped you? Not morality I assume?"
"Morality has its uses in peace time Admiral but we are at war. No what held me back is that I learned that the indoctrination made him very compliant. They seem to obey any order given to them, particularly from me but then I did always have a knack to keeping troops in line."
"They?"
"I'm hardly likely to give you their names am I Admiral? But don't worry, it really isn't too many. Most of them are like Daniels, little people the likes of us would normally step over, which of course has been useful in keeping them hidden from you. To be honest they're far from your biggest problem, it's the other indoctrination cases you should be worrying about."
"What other cases?"
"Apparently indoctrination doesn't seem to affect everyone the same way, there are some affected that I haven't been able to control," Coberg explained, the frustration at this fact clearly evident on his face.
"Daniels, why don't you talk them through the other cases involved?"
Daniels turned his gaze towards the General but for the first time he seemed hesitant.
"That's an order Private Daniels, tell them."
Still he hesitated, drawing out the moment.
"Yes sir," he replied turning to face Lara as he did so.
"Your indoctrination took a different form. I saw it in your devotion to your new crew, your new family. You've certainly not been acting as a Justicar should. The Reapers have compelled you to act selfishly."
"She would never do that, you're mistaken."
"Wasn't Karlakh meant to be keeping an eye on me? If he had been this coup would have been much harder to arrange but unfortunately she never asked him to watch me."
"What?"
"Instead she had him transferred to another Resistance base. Apparently protecting her own has become more important than following your orders Admiral."
Daniels turned to face me.
"Don't bother. I know the Reapers are trying to influence me, to wear down my resolve and convince me to surrender. Frankly I wish them luck, they're gonna need it."
Daniels turned round to face Coberg.
"Finally your-"
"That's enough Daniels, keep your weapon trained on the enemy."
Daniels nodded slowly and returned to his previous position.
"So you forced Daniels to kill the guard for you on the sub? Or did you do it yourself and force him to cover for you?"
"It was necessary."
Behind the General, Daniels empty hand started twitching uncontrollably. Hoping desperately that it was a sign that he was still fighting the conditioning I decided to play for time.
"For what? So you could get us all killed?"
"No, the Reapers only wanted you. They don't attack me, they think I'm one of them, indoctrinated."
"They think you're one of them? Wow they really did a number on you, didn't they?"
"But what about the sabotaged shuttles? That must've happened before you even found out about Daniels."
The General looked annoyed at the endless questions but I wanted to clear everything up before I made my move.
"While we were in Vancouver I learned about your plan to evacuate the base. Don't ask me how I'm getting tired of answering to you. The plan, which only failed because of the Reaper attack I might add, was to-"
"To blow us out of the sky when we tried to leave," I finished for him.
"I assume you intended just to order a 'warning shot' so that you could look as surprised as anyone when my shuttle's kinetic barriers failed and I was killed. Along with all the perfectly innocent civilians I'd have been evacuating but hey, they're just casualties of war right?"
"I don't have to stand here justifying myself to you of all people, shoot them."
"Wait!" I called out.
"There just one more thing I want to know before the shooting starts."
"The shooting starts? Don't imagine you have a chance here Anderson, your shields were destroyed in the battle and your Asari can barely lift a gun right now."
"Still, final request?"
"What is it?"
"How did you know about our plans today? We specifically kept the details secret from you and we didn't involve Daniels either."
Unexpectedly the General grinned widely at this.
"Oh thank you for reminding me about that, I'd almost forgotten to tell you my best source of information. The one that kept me five steps ahead of you the whole time. Anderson, I read your book."
"The journal? How?"
"Daniels managed to get hold of the datapad and install a virus onto the system. It transferred a copy of each log you wrote directly to me. While you were agonizing over the best moment to confront me I was finessing my statement so to speak."
It's painful to write those words even now. I wasn't the traitor, I didn't warn Harbinger that we were coming but I might as well have done. Through sheer carelessness I handed Coberg everything he needed to plan a coup. And yeah I can try to claim that I couldn't have known. I can tell myself that I took every possible precaution, except for the obvious precaution. Not writing it down in the first place.
But here I am again, writing out yet another passage. I can't deny it any longer, it has become an obsession. Whatever the original purpose of this journal was, whether to record this piece of history or as a warning to the next cycle is now irrelevant. Its purpose now is to help keep me sane. Reading through the entries reminds me of who I am, who I was before the Reapers tried to meddle with my mind. It helps me to remember my victories in this war and doesn't allow me to forget the defeats. I wonder if when I look back on this chapter I'll see it as a victory or a defeat.
"So you read about our plan and then warned Harbinger. That explains why our fallback position wasn't targeted, I didn't write about it so the Reapers never knew of its existence. Guess that's also why our weapon wasn't effective either, you gave the Reapers a chance to prepare a defense. You really are a traitor."
"They would have found a defense without my help, the Reapers are smarter than even your best scientists. Luckily you can't out think brute force or firepower."
"But why not just have Daniels shoot me from the beginning? He must have had dozens of opportunities."
"Unfortunately it's taken time for the indoctrination to overcome some of his more... Deeply ingrained ideals."
"They're called morals General," I replied and dropped my gun.
"Let's see if they've really stopped functioning, shall we?"
The General sighed.
"Did you really think I would fall for that one so easily? Fortunately Carlson here never really had those kinds of morals to begin with."
He smiled and turned to the other guard he had left in the room.
"Execute them, Anderson first."
The guard turned to face me and raised his rifle to head height. There was no where for me to go, my pistol was still on the floor where I'd dropped it. The sound of single shot echoed throughout the chamber.
And then another and another shot as Daniels kept firing every few seconds. His face was pale as death as he swung from side to side, shooting at everything. In his right hand his pistol continued to fire seemingly regardless of where the gun was pointed (half the shots he fired went nowhere). His left hand wrestled with his right attempting to drag the weapon in the direction of a target. Over and over I heard him repeat the last order Coberg had given him 'keep your weapon trained on the enemy.'
The other guard went down with the first shot. He tried to get up again but a quick boot to the head put him out of the fight. Coberg ducked low and tried to get out of there, shouting for more guards. He would have done better to stay quiet. The noise seemed to alert Daniels to his presence. The General was hit twice in the torso and went down.
Now Daniels turned towards us, still having difficulty controlling his right arm.
"Daniels it's alright, you've done it," I called out.
He looked directly at me for the first time and I saw on his face all the sneering hatred and disgust the Reapers felt for humanity.
"Why do you hate us so much?" I muttered almost to myself.
"Your people have a story about a man named Icarus, who flew too close to the sun," replied Daniels though the voice was not his own.
"We stop races like yours from flying too high, a service done to protect organic life from itself. If you were given such a task for millennia, you too would come to hate the creatures that you were forced to kill."
For a moment the gun started to be lowered as he pointed it at me. Then a look of absolute, abject hopelessness replaced the sneer on Daniels' face. For a moment I saw the boy I had found in the ruins of Vancouver, full of fear and thinking that the world was about to end.
"Let me help you."
He shook his head sadly.
"Not this time Admiral, I'm sorry."
He raised his gun again, straight up until it was pointing under his chin. But his right arm still wouldn't stop firing.
I ran to his side and caught him as he fell but he was already gone. Yet another life taken from me by the war. Another face that would haunt my dreams. Already I know that I'll see that image every day I have left and remember every detail. The way he closed his eyes just before the end, the peace on his face as, in that final moment, he accepted his fate.
Everything he could have been, could have done with his life destroyed in a single moment. But I could not, would not allow myself to regret his decision. To do so would be an insult to his memory, a sneer to everything that he had been in his life, both good and bad. Instead I did what I always do when a fellow soldier falls. Offer a silent prayer of gratitude for his bravery, an acknowledgment of the sacrifice he made. And then as always, I moved on to deal with the man responsible.
By the time I reached Coberg he was lying on the ground, badly injured but still alive. A Resistance member was kneeling over him about to apply a batch of Medi gel that would save his life. I'm ashamed to admit it but I gripped her arm and held her back.
"No, leave him be," I said, hating myself for the words.
"Sir?"
"We lost a lot of good people today. We're certainly not wasting our miracle cure on him. Do your best to patch him up without it."
Even after everything he'd done I could still feel the shock of my two comrades.
"Anderson," Lara didn't know where to begin. "His wounds are severe, I don't know if he'll survive without this."
"I know. This stuff is like a miracle, we've all seen it save the lives of those we care about," I said indicating the Medi gel dispenser.
"Do you really want to risk the chance that one day you could be standing over one of your injured crew knowing you chose this traitor over them?"
Lara scowled.
"Are you trying to manipulate me using the Reaper indoc- Using what Daniels talked about? It won't work Anderson, I'm a Justicar, we have a duty to do what's right."
"I'm glad to hear you're still fighting it Lara. But I'm serious, I've shown mercy in the past and it's backfired badly. I even let Kai Leng escape once, I could have stopped him if I'd wanted to but I wasn't ready to consider that option. And just a few days ago Leng almost killed Shepard, almost ended any hope that any of us might survive."
"Anderson, I-" Lara paused. "We'll do what we can for him for now."
"Make sure you find someone to help Xi Chan as well."
They left me alone with my guilt. In truth I hadn't really explained the main reason I'd stopped them from helping the General. It was out of fear of what was coming next or at least what I suspected was coming. When I saw the Citadel floating above London, like an instinct I knew that the end was fast approaching. One call from Shepard quickly confirmed my suspicions.
He'd just come from a mission, an all-out assault on Cerberus' main headquarters in fact. He'd gone in to recover the data Kai Leng stole during the Thessia mission. The information was about the Catalyst, the final piece of the puzzle needed to complete the long prayed for superweapon that might end the war. And apparently that missing piece is the Citadel.
It seemed almost unbelievable at first but in a strange way it did make an odd sort of sense. The Citadel was built by the Reapers, it was the single greatest feat of technology they (or to my knowledge anyone) had ever built. Supposedly one of the cycles that had revised the superweapon's design had decided to incorporate this advanced technology into the plans.
Unfortunately Cerberus had left us a parting gift while their organization was in its death throes. They had transmitted this information they had on the superweapon to the Reapers. Most likely it was due to being indoctrinated, though from what I'd heard of the Illusive Man, perhaps it was just a final act of revenge. I don't think he's the sort of man who accepts losing easily.
Regardless of the reason the result was the same, the Reapers seized the Citadel and brought it here to protect it. Earth was certainly one of their most well secured planets and London itself had been turned into a fortress (though it still disturbs me that the defenses had been built before Cerberus warned the Reapers about the Crucible).
Now that it was here, there would be no other choice and no reason to delay any longer. The fleets would have to come to Earth and a last, desperate attempt to assemble the weapon would be made. And so while the rest of the Galaxy fretted about the slim odds of success we celebrated our imminent rescue and prepared for battle. I'm not sure how much help we can be from here but I know I can count on everyone in the Resistance to do whatever it took to liberate Earth (okay technically I couldn't count on the indoctrinated Resistance members but thankfully they'd given themselves away following Coberg's fall. All we can hope is that we got them all).
But how does any of this relate back to what I did to the General? Well the biggest battle any of us are ever likely to see is about to come to pass. Dr Serov predicted that I would die before the end of the war and I fear he's right. And what then? What if I die tomorrow, along with countless others?
Or to put it another way: Udina is dead, Arcturus station destroyed and the Alliance Parliament along with it and almost every politician on Earth has been killed. How many would have to fall in this next battle to leave Humanity without a leader. Myself, Admiral Hackett and Shepard too I would think, a small handful of other Admirals that will be traveling with the fleet as well. Not really very many of us left now, I fear a future where we die in battle and the General reasserts himself.
Being imprisoned and accused of being indoctrinated would be a setback for him but not necessarily a permanent one. With his influence and without any other real leadership he could still achieve his dream of taking control. The thought of him leading Humanity in its final days make me shiver. But does that justify condemning him? Is it something I can live with?
If I've learned one thing from all this, it is that their can be no turning back from this. The soldier I once was, is dead. That man would have despised the action I took today and from his point of view he would have been right. It was an immoral act, letting a prisoner die for fear of what might one day come to pass. A soldier would have accepted the risk and been ready to deal with it if possible, willing to face the consequences if he failed (though of course he never really believed he'd ever fail).
I took on this task of defending Earth to get away from the politics but it followed me here. After everything I have learned as a leader, I cannot close my eyes or return to the naivety of my youth. The knowledge I have gained brings me no joy, I still despise the actions I am forced to take but after all that's happened I can be no other way.