Chapter 38

"You don't have to change much to change everything." —Mark Rosewater

July 2220

Thank you, Mister Warren. The Illusive Man typed out on the holographic keyboard floating in front of him. I urge you to remind the good doctor of the temporary nature of this solution. If he does not want it getting out that he does work for the organized crime rings, he would do well to continue providing us with the information he comes across during his work.

It was one thing after another, the graying fifth-column leader would receive and respond to a report from one operation, and immediately send out an order for a new one, before having to pause on that to respond to a deteriorating situation with regards to an ongoing assignment, to say nothing of what happened whenever another Vanguard operation wrapped up. The well dressed man leaned back and pulled another report from the thin air. Cleanup operations on Manheim were going well, and they had pulled a great deal of useful information from the Painter vault Force Recon had discovered. Somewhere around fifteen hundred functioning weapons were discovered, and there were no findings on what made the army of genetically identical rebels.

Miss Lawson did well… Thought The Illusive Man, with a small approving nod.

"Caesar, send a note to Miss Serenity in the AATF. Tell her that I will pull strings in Alliance Intelligence if she secures a number of Painter weapons for me to study. Then send a message to Richard Fenn in Alliance Intelligence…" He leaned forward and typed up a few keywords, finding the scandal he had covered up for the unfortunate Intelligence analyst. Staring at the picture of the naked child lying dead on a bed, he continued, "remind him of Thomas Veridy and instruct him that he must siphon another eighty thousand in unmarked bills and drop them off at a pre-designated drop point." He thought a moment before casting the image away, "then set up a contract with the Blue Suns through a dummy company to have a sniper posted wherever this drop point is. If anyone but Miss Serenity or someone she warns us about picks up that case, they get shot, and then the Veridy pictures are leaked."

"At once, sir." Said the AI.

The Illusive Man pulled up another document about a situation developing on the Citadel. Another attempted bombing foiled by C-Sec, with the primary suspects being humans, of course. Obviously that wouldn't do, and with a few thousand words typed into a few discreet messages, it would soon be revealed that genetic samples linked to Vorcha with ties to the Terminus and anti-imperialist movements were found on the bombs. However, he knew that this could compromise a few operations in the Terminus systems, so a brief word to his agents and a tip to Omega's 'Queen' kept their security tight and her eyes sharp. To gain trust, however, TIM knew that he couldn't simply keep dropping hints and playing on her good nature - he needed to do something drastic that she would tie together to all of these anonymous sources, providing her with the realization that she owed someone big.

The Illusive Man leaned back, he reached to his side but found that his cigarette had long since burned out. With a brief sigh, he pulled another one from the pack and lit up. It felt good, running through the motions. Light, puff, hold, release. Better yet were that these cigarettes were Martian - Martian soil had no insects or disease ridden soil whatsoever, so crops grown in controlled Martian environments had to fight nothing but time to grow, and it showed in their quality. The only cigarettes that were better than Martian cigarettes were Eden cigs, which had an all around better flavor and life - but they sacrificed in the texture and quality of the cigarette itself, which lost a lot of points in his book.

The Illusive Man leaned forward, pushing a few of the closer holograms to the side and holding out his hand. It took a brief second for the computer to register which distant, orbiting hologram he was grasping for, but it chose correctly when the pale blue projection froze in mid-air; The Illusive Man clenched his fist and pulled back, the hologram floated over to him and showed him a developing story on Omega. He read through it in minutes, burning through half of his cigarette as he did, but he nodded in a satisfied manner when he was finished. There was a small group of Gaian Rebel remnants hiding out on the station, at least eighty. They had boarded slowly, over the course of eight months, to fly under Aria's radar, and it seemed that they wanted to make Omega their next staging grounds, incorrectly assuming the Alliance wouldn't be so audacious as to send any strike teams there to burn them out. Fortunately for him, and for them, that wouldn't happen - but unfortunately for them, something worse would. Even SIGMAs and N7, the most likely choices for the job, had rules of engagement, but Aria's mercs had no such rules. He opened up a messenger and typed at lightning speeds, his pale blue keys making small pinging noises with each press.

After a quarter of an hour writing out an eloquently worded message, The Illusive Man sent it to one of his agents on Omega, along with a thousand credits so the junkie could get his next fix. Drug addicts were despicable, but they were also very easy to manipulate - deliver this message to this person and your payment will unlock, and you can go shoot yourself into a drunken stupor. If Aria was feeling generous, she may even let him drink himself silly and treat himself to a dancer, given that he was handing her information that would keep an Alliance strike team out of her station.

Then, all goes well, she makes the connection. Dozens of sources with no true connection other than an anonymous benefactor and their species. Too vague to be the Shadow Broker, but too coordinated to be a small operation. She'll put two and two together and will be waiting for a more formal contact. The Illusive Man smiled and put out his cigarette after another puff.

He pulled up another hologram, before he decided he wanted a change of lighting and silently raised his left hand, palm skyward. He waited just a moment and then lifted it steadily, the blinds on the windows surrounding his office lowering in intensity, allowing more unfiltered light from the dying star outside to enter the dark room and to reflect on the glass floor and ceiling. With a grin and a nod, he turned back to the hologram, which was a simple message - a report from the Intuitive Cell, promising results on the cloning technology recovered by Agent Lawson within the month.

Now that would be an interesting prospect… I would finally have something more than a handful of specialists, assassins and operatives. I could move forward from the political game and have a direct impact on the galaxy… A superpower in the shadows. He mused.

The pale blue holograms orbiting around him slowed to a crawl as a new one appeared on the outermost orbit, it in the shape of an envelope. The Illusive Man perked an eyebrow and called the hologram over. A small tap on the dusty, almost intangible surface revealed a simple message:

Prometheus has stolen fire.

The steel-blue eyed man stared at the four word message for what felt like an eternity, his entire world crawling to a halt as its meaning slowly settled in. He had gotten a report hours ago that McGraw had arrived to study Object Mars, as per their previous agreement. He had prayed he wouldn't have to employ his contingencies, but it appeared his prayers had went unheeded.

The Illusive Man, once Jack Harper, sighed deeply and clenched the bridge of his nose, slowly closing his eyes as he said the damning words. "Julius, make the call. Seal the station, quarantine the éschatos cell, and be ready to jettison the entire wing if it comes down to it. I want active updates, start with what McGraw is doing right now and work your way back." He heard the blast door the led to his office slamming shut and locking with multiple heavy metallic clanks and thuds. The blinds instantly dimmed completely, allowing no light from the nearby star to penetrate the room, enshrouding it entirely in darkness, only pierced by the pale blue glow of the orbiting holograms. The holograms slowly started vanishing, to be replaced by active security feeds, reports from his heads-of-stations, and security forces, with the emphasis being the largest hologram hovering right in front of him, which gave him a live feed from within the same room as Object Mars.

The originally brightly lit room was now dim, several of the lights broken and malfunctioning. There was a maelstrom of spinning dust and debris, not unlike the dust-tech that made his holograms, but in the center, with his cybernetic hand firmly locked onto the alien artifact, was Christopher McGraw. His eyes were as wide as they could be, behind his glasses, his hair was whipping around in the wind generated by the swirling nanomachine vortex, his jaw was clenched tight and there was a very light scowl on his face, almost as if he were fighting some intense mental battle. The Illusive Man leaned his head forward slightly, seeing that there were abnormalities all across McGraw's body - black veins stretching all under his skin, his skin rotting and turning black on various parts. The 'corruption' looked like it was slowly growing its way up to McGraw's head, but the moment it hit his neck, it looked as if it hit a wall, forming a ring around his neck and throat and being completely unable to move further.

"McGraw… What are you doing?"

Two Hours Earlier

Entry One:

While it isn't terribly difficult these days, getting to Mars, getting private property anywhere outside of the prefab cities and biodomes is somewhat impossible - no one in the Alliance or the MCP Agency trusts anyone to be intelligent enough to survive in the Martian wilderness on their own.

Regardless, it took me a while, mostly due to the bureaucracy of the Alliance handing out its research grants, but I finally was able to secure property and the proper equipment to facilitate long-term survival in the Martian wilderness. What better way to expedite the process than to buy a cave? Premade structure, I just have to seal it up and fill it with oxygen. The easiest part is honestly solving the gravity problem - just hit a button and I've got a stable, single G. Once I've made certain that my environment is conducive to long-term survival, it should be dusk. I shall perform an EVA and make certain my communications were not buried by the recent storm.

While Jack showed surprise that I was chosen over McGraw, both the boy and I understand why the Alliance approached me as opposed to him: Lineage. McGraw's father is the head of the AATF, and showing favoritism is unbecoming, and one must take all possible precautions when dealing with sensitive subjects such as this. We did, after all, find functioning technology in fifty thousand year old alien ruins, which were heretofore empty and decrepit.

Christopher McGraw had the journal of his best friend memorized, he knew every word and every detail, from the most black and white cry for help to the most subtle twitch of the man's hand as he wrote the journal physically - with a pen! Ed was always one for the classics, it was one thing McGraw appreciated about the man. Sometimes, when he was bored, McGraw perused the man's journal and reread it, looking for something, anything he may have missed - that one detail that might help him truly understand what happened to him, and why he was doing the things he did. The journal never changed, the words written were never altered, the implications never different.

Entry Twenty Seven

Seventeen hour day, yesterday, but I made a breakthrough. I managed to connect the device to power. I merely needed to expose it to unfiltered sunlight, and it activated. Of note, even in the low-pressure Martian atmosphere, its roar was deafening, almost like a trumpet blast mixed with a deep baritone bellow.

If I didn't know any better, however, I would say someone apart from the Alliance is watching me as I do this. The longer I examine this artifact, search it for clues as to its origin and attempt to find a way to connect it to a computer and data mine everything it has to offer, the more I feel as if I am being watched. Ironic, given that merely a century ago this planet was empty, and now despite there being seventy eight million people populating it, there isn't a soul except for mine for a great distance. I've heard plans to build an 'exclusion zone' around the ruins, more thorough than simple 'do not trespass' and unmanned guards, but I digress, I am sleep deprived.

I haven't felt so haggard since the final chess-team tournament, the day I first met Christopher McGraw. If anything, I miss him as a chess rival, and one could draw the conclusion that I miss Glade as well, though both it and I understood that the secrecy clauses specifically prohibited an AI in the ruins - lest they connect to the cloud and reveal to the entire Alliance that aliens existed at some point or another, and were watching us.

The shaggy-haired engineer was, to the eyes of the Cerberus assassin assigned to watch over him during his visit, dead asleep. He had made a beeline for his bench when he'd arrived on the ship, sat down, buckled up, and promptly passed out the second they hit Warp. He was so still it was hard to tell if he was even breathing, though where his body was still, his mind was not. Everything he had ever considered to be the cause, and every effect he had predicted to come to fruition, was blasting through his unconscious augmented mind faster than a ship could travel through the Warp. Even in his apparent state of unconsciousness, the engineer was an enigma: anyone else so deeply asleep would have assuredly been dreaming at this point, but the man's eyes didn't twitch at all, simply staring straight ahead behind his eyelids.

The six hundred meter warship hurtled through warp-space at incomprehensible speeds without even a tremble, the only motions, noises or disturbances of any kind were those made by the ship itself, or the people inside of it. Even though the rec room the engineer slept in was a low-traffic area, there still visited some of the crew, and they made noise as would anyone else, and despite the low volumes of noise that would have kept anyone else from a restful sleep, McGraw stayed silent, snoozing silently.

There was a light chime, similar to that of a doorbell, before the ship's AI spoke. "Exiting Warp in sixty seconds. All crew prepare for Warp-Deceleration."

As the engineer slept, the assassin assigned to guard him sat down and secured himself to a chair, as several other crewmen did the same. Those who were unused or inexperienced with Warp travel were advised to secure themselves during the transition back to real space, it helped with the motion sickness felt by those still new to the travel. One might expect that few would feel such things in the modern age, but a large majority of the modern human population, while certainly aware of the ease of space travel, haven't even stepped on a spaceship or travelled through the warp. Truly, it was the minority that had grown accustomed to Warp travel, those being businessmen who travelled constantly, soldiers, marines, and sailors, and politicians. The assassin was certainly used to the travel, but he had nothing to prove by staying upright and on his feet, so he sat down and secured himself.

The moment the ship exited the Warp, and the lightly armored assassin felt the feeling of acceleration vanish from the pit of his stomach, McGraw jumped. His entire body twitched as if stuck with a cattle prod, and with a grunt, he lifted his head and raised his arms in a loosely defensive stance, disoriented by his nap and sudden awakening.

"I didn't do it…" He grunted, preceding a deep yawn. "Ah… Shit." He gazed around and blinked, "what'd I miss?"

"We have arrived, mister McGraw." The assassin spoke, startling the man again.

"Whoa! Dude, where'd you come from?" The enigmatic engineer gave the assassin a brief look up and down, his deep blue eyes narrowed as he took in all of his physical features and outward characteristics, analysing everything about him that was on display, "and where did you get that armor? Looks new. I didn't make it. Is that synthetic muscle?" He asked, pointing at the black, fibrous cords that were tightly wound together around the assassin's body and underneath his gleaming gold armor plating. "Do assassin's usually wear gaudy golden armor plating? Or does it dull when exposed to direct light? Oh, wait, I see it -" He pointed at the man's chest, "that symbol, the Éschatos cell. That's not armor plating, it's hazmat gear. That's not gold, it's just colored like it." He squinted his eyes, "really dense, really thick… Damn, not a lot is passing through that, it'd have to be smaller than an atom, which is physically impossible, making you invulnerable to the diseases you may encounter in the cell."

The assassin blinked behind his helmet, unprepared for McGraw's instantaneous ascertainment of knowledge, or the fact that the man was just hitting his stride.

"You're also wearing a polarized visor, to hide your face and make doubly sure you can't give anything away… So let's make some conclusions based off of everything you've given away - the very reason the Éschatos cell exists, the object found and quarantined on Mars, you all turned it on and it started having adverse effects on the staff, thus the very very thick layers of protection. The effects have to be dastardly, perhaps even moreso than what was described by patient zero, Edward Spokane, in his journal, and you were ordered to enshroud yourselves entirely to protect yourselves from me, and to protect myself from you, in case the ancient machine is still obeying its long dead masters' orders, and trying to make everyone exposed, kill everyone else. The question now, however, is what all have you learned in the last twenty years, and what more can I learn in the next twenty hours?" He finished with a grin.

The assassin stayed silent, his face - hidden by the visor, though it may be - was blank, with a slight furrow in his brow as he stared at the man, who at this point was merely showing off just to get a rise out of him. Instead of rising to the occasion and trying to match wits with McGraw, the assassin spoke simply, "I only know what I've been told. I'm not a scientist. I'm an assassin."

"Clever answer, ol' buddy ol' pal." McGraw snapped, as the ship burned off its excess velocity and slowed to a halt in front of a docking station. "But, riddle me this - what happens when a criminal confesses on the condition that his actions were not his own? Would not then other criminals, perhaps worse than the first, attempt the same? What are the rules when it comes to stuff like this? Is a machine deactivated if we can't see its parts moving, and does it cease working just because it's old? The saying, after all, is that we don't make 'em like we used to." He smiled, "and that, ladies and gentlemen…" He groaned, placing his hands on his lap as the ship snapped into place with a metallic clank, "is why I'm here."

Entry Thirty Five

I have finally confirmed that the source of the voices and paranoia I have been experiencing is the object itself. It took eight hours to do so, but I also made contact with Glade back in Massachusetts, and he, along with his 'sister', cracked into Alliance Intelligence and sent me the data to confirm my theory - whether or not they were aware, this machine has been active for at least as long as we have been exploring the ruins. People began experiencing paranoia after prolonged time spent examining the ruins, hearing voices that weren't there, feeling like they were being watched - that is why the complex is known as the Ruins, because it suggests that it was ruined and therefor haunted.

They even came up with a name for it, within their social circles. They called it 'Prothean Paranoia'.

They had no idea that it was a machine, and it was influencing them.

I can feel it dragging at my mind, even right now, so far away from it. The voices it generates, they compel me to do things, it takes everything I have to disobey them and keep control of myself. It is strange, this compulsion almost feels as if it isn't - as if it is instead something I have a vested interest in doing.

The longer I spend in the ruins, the louder the machine gets and the more difficult it becomes to resist its temptations. Ironically, the only way to learn how to 'silence' these 'voices' is to study it, further exposing me to its effects. Notably, it is amazing that technology that predates the ruins is still working in such an apparently perfect manner, it makes one wonder what happened to these Protheans anyways, and if the beings who designed this machine were at all peaceful.

I cannot help but wonder if I myself am a test subject of the Alliance, as I am willingly exposing myself to this machine simply because it is alien and it is old. Perhaps they know, perhaps they always knew, and as I study and learn about the machine, they study me and learn what it does.

If that is the case, then my prospects are not good. I may need to contact Glade again and plan an escape, as they will not let me leave amicably. But before that, I must find a way to reverse the effects of this device. I would say I know there is a way, but every time I think such things, the voices seem to agree, going from livid, horrendous hissing voices to calm, warm, dulcet tones at the drop of a hat, the shift of a thought, only lending further credence that they don't want to hurt me, but much the opposite - they want me working perfectly, they want to control me, but to do so, they must first break me.

If it is my will that keeps me from being enslaved to the wills of an ancient, extinct race, to fight a war that has most certainly ended long before Man could even walk, then I will not give in. If I can soldier through this, I may yet be able to return home to my friends and family, perhaps even celebrate. After all, it is a momentous occasion: First Contact. I owe Christopher six dollars, they fired first. It was a brief engagement, and did nothing to start a war, but regardless. They call themselves 'Quarians'.

As he entered the station through the long, narrow connecting bridge, McGraw noticed that the Éschatos cell was less of a part of Cronos station, but more a completely isolated addition. It looked as if it was added on after the main station had been finished, and like it could be jettisoned at any moment, should the need arise. To McGraw, it made sense: potential biological, or, heaven forbid, extraterrestrial hazards and dangers to the main station could be avoided entirely in the event of a security breach. If anything went wrong, blow the support struts, send the isolated wing tumbling through space.

Beyond the bridge connecting the ship to the station, and through the airlock, McGraw was presented with a small, sterile white clean room, within which stood two doctors, who had in between them a box resting upon a small table. With an eyebrow arced, McGraw walked forward and leaned towards the box, coming to a stop a few steps behind it. "And what have we here?" He asked, looking at the two hazmat-suited scientists, who respectfully backed up a step to give McGraw space.

One of the golden suited scientists cleared his throat, "your cleansuit, sir. It will protect you from Object Mars."

"So that's what you're calling it?" McGraw asked, slipping off his gray jacket and his shoes, before opening the box, within which was a suit similar to that which the assassin and scientists wore. "It reminds me of Quarian enviro-suits." McGraw remarked, as he picked up the synthetic mesh, "do I have to strip naked, or does it go on over clothes?"

"Just put the suit on, and then the plates, it will do the rest." Said one scientist.

"It was indeed designed after the Quarian life suits, few else in the galaxy know how to protect themselves so well from any and all potential pathogens." The other added, as McGraw slipped the mesh on over his torso, he shivered slightly as he felt the suit grow outwards to encompass his limbs. When it was done, he grabbed the golden, gleaming chestplate and weighed it in his hands, before he slipped it on and felt it compress against his chest, fitting itself to his body. Next he grabbed the helmet, which booted up its HUD immediately upon sealing itself against his neck. A wire slowly extended from the base of his spine, which connected to the spinal mount on the mesh suit, which gave him a fresh supply of isolated oxygen. Finally, McGraw a pair of of small golden plates to the backs of his hands, put back on his shoes, and threw his old gray jacket over his suit.

Now the epitome of isolated against the world, McGraw turned his head to one of the scientists, which the bio-suit's HUD identified simply as 'Bergins'. "Alright Bergins, lead the way."

Entry Forty Eight

My hand has been forced - I have been isolated in the Prothean Ruins, stuck here with a legion of automated defenses programmed to kill anything without the proper IFF tag, and a machine that is now actively trying to coerce me into doing things I have no true desire of doing.

I am sorry… This machine, it is frustrating to be around, and even moreso to be stuck with. I have tried to explain to the Alliance, time and time again, that we need to bomb this area and destroy everything in it, but I black out every time I sit at my computer. I digress.

First Contact went about as well as expected, and the Quarians brought some friends with them. The Sol System is a battleground, the Summer Fleet versus non-Quarian extraterrestrials. I was in the ruins, working on Contingency Alpha when I got the call. They told me to stay put, to not leave the ruins for any reason until further specified. I tried to protest, but for the life of me I could not lift my hand to respond to the message.

These creatures, I learn more about them with every passing second, and yet I know nothing. They are not dead, far, far from it. Their war is not finished, very much the opposite - omnicide is their goal, that much I know. They try, with every passing second, to force me to quit, to force me to leave, they try to break me and make me serve them willingly, they want me to use my position, use my mind, use my friends, to work my way up the ladder, to get further connected, but for what reason I know not.

Initially, there was but the one - the creature from which this machine fell. When I was first exposed, it alone was the first that tried to ensnare me, to corrupt me, to indoctrinate me. As I described earlier, I merely attributed it to a lack of face-to-face interaction with other people, at least until I started feeling compelled to do things. I would want to leave my Martian home, to fly back to Earth and pursue lives I never even considered earlier, and then the logical parts of my mind would kick in and I would realize that these things I was being compelled to desire, I did not want them, not in the slightest.

Somehow, I wanted, and did not want, the same thing, at the same time. When the first creature realized that its passive attempts was insufficient, it instead placed its full focus upon me, trying everything it could to break me. For the first week, I did not sleep. For the second, I rarely ate. The things it whispered to me, the horrors it showed me, the promises it made if I merely obeyed. It was after the first month of its full-focused attempts to indoctrinate me that it realized it needed help, and a second creature, a second voice, joined the first. Soon came a third, and a fourth, and now, as Earth burns under alien assault and my friends and family are in impossible danger, I hear thousands of them.

Worse, is that a small part of me - the true, uncorrupted me, that is held together by will and by spite - I want to believe what they say is true. I want to believe that they will rescue me, my friends, my family, my race, if I give in and obey, if I become their puppet. But I know that they will do the exact opposite if I give in. The Quarians, their enemies, they all pale in comparison to the precursors that made this machine. The danger everyone on earth - the danger faced by Christopher, by Jack, by Danielle and Rose - it all pales in comparison to this. I cannot help them if I am enslaved to a race I do not understand, I cannot comprehend.

They see everything I do, and with every word I force myself to write, the pain in my head grows harsher, the voices grow louder and angrier, the compulsion to leave and sow the seeds of chaos stronger. It is all I can do to resist, and even then, as I have learned, sometimes it is simply not enough. The darkness, the shroud, that is their control is entrenched within my mind, and my only chance is Contingency Alpha. I cannot write it down, I must keep it hidden in that single, solitary safe haven of my mind, lest they learn what it is and the number and volume of the voices grows exponentially.

I will not let go, even though it will kill me.

I can only fight as long as they believe it impossible for me to win. Atlas held the celestial spheres for eternity, I can hold these creatures for one more week.

The room that held the object was deceptively small, it had wide floors and long walls, but a very low ceiling, barely stretching three meters high. There was a multitude of tools spread about the countertops, tables, and shelves lining the walls, and McGraw found himself nodding lightly as he inspected the room. It, like the others, was sterile white and lit brightly, and in the center, seated upon a pedestal and within a see-through case was the artifact that was the artifact of McGraw's desires.

The dark blue orb in the center of the room was seated atop a gunmetal gray plate, and was contained within two metal spires that spiralled around it in opposite directions. As McGraw walked closer to it, he felt a chill running, unbidden, down his spine. He saw in the depths of the orb what looked like smoke, shifting and oscillating, almost like a crystal ball.

McGraw observed the glass case that contained the object, watching as a set of scanners lowered around it and rotated, first horizontally, then vertically, leaving none of the metaphorical stones unturned. He knew that they were scanning every possible facet of the object, trying to discern everything they could, he had been kept up to date with this thing for as long as they had been studying it, his only condition that he be kept away from it.

But then they slowed down, didn't they? McGraw thought, narrowing his eyes behind his bio-suit's helmet. You thought you were clever… He thought, leaning down and getting close to the machine, as he heard the door to the room shut and lock behind him, signalling with a final-sounding 'thunk' that he had six hours of unsupervised study. You thought that you could hide behind the safety nets… Attribute everything to stagnation, a lack of direct supervision and study. You slowly tried to broach the subject, to try and convince Jack to convince me to let them open you up, expose themselves directly to you, remove those precious last safeguards before their suits. He straightened up, turning to one of the countertops lining the walls and walking towards it. You thought that, if you took your sweet, sweet time, that you'd slip under the radar. But even though pawns may go first, they are important unto themselves. It takes just one to bring back a queen.

McGraw set to work, searching for a hardlight field generator. You thought that, as long as you took your time, you would be fine. That I wouldn't notice. He thought, raising a small orb and inspecting it closely. But that was your biggest mistake. When Jack sent me that report, that simple request for advice, I knew you had spread your oily tendrils too far. Jack knows that I know what I'm talking about, more than most everyone in the known universe… He would not up and ask me if I had changed my mind yet. He would wait for me to broach the subject. He took the orb and clicked it once, generating a small disc of physical light. So when he sent me that report, I will admit, I was stunned. It all fell into place - what you did to Ed, what you're doing to Jack, how it managed to take them both by the horns, and it gave me an idea as to how Ed cured himself. I knew that I had to move, and fast, else the damage done would be irreparable. He shut off the device and grabbed two more.

McGraw turned back to the entrance and walked back towards it, his footsteps making light taps on the floor as he walked, the dull throbbing hum of the ancient machine slowly gaining in volume, almost as if it knew what he was doing. With no warning, McGraw placed the three hardlight machines next to the door and turned them all on, and in less than a second, a barrier was created between him and the door, sealing him inside and away from the others in the station. Barely a second passed before he heard banging on the door, the assassin demanding to be let in, someone yelling to open the 'red folder'.

You and I both know how this has to end. The only way to understand something like you is to kill you, but to kill you, I must understand you… So what third option is available to me? He asked, turning back to the machine and strolling over towards it. Well, it's simple, really: I must become you. You played your hand early on, and you failed to consider that you were playing against a master. As you continue to expose yourself to your indoctrinated agents, they learn who you are, they learn what you are, you allowed him to say as much. You are arrogant. He arrived next to the machine, and lifted his hands to his head, removing the golden glass helmet and exposing himself to the open air, the system's computers flaring out in alarm, beeping annoyingly until a wave of McGraw's hand muted them.. Your biggest mistake, however, was that you thought you could just try and ruin one of my closest friends and get away with it. He wrote everything down, and in your arrogance, you let him. It took me damn near eighteen years, but I finally found it, that one detail. He slipped off the mesh suit and lifted his right hand, spreading his fingers wide, before he smashed the glass case open, and barely a second later, the machine came to life.

Entry Forty Nine

Contingency Alpha is complete, I retrieved the artifact, and transported to my home. They know I am trying something, I can feel them clawing at my mind, trying everything they can to get me to stop. It is everything I can do to keep this hand writing.

If everything works, if I wake up again from the deep dark abyss, if I can bribe the ferryman, if I can cheat the universe of its one absolute, I will write again. If not, I know this journal shall find the right hands.

I find it fitting that both I and my species are fighting wars, and that they began and ended with a discovery on Mars.

The dark blue orb flashed with a deep blue, fiery pulse, reminiscent of a biotic flare. The environment began to roar with the sounds of deep trumpets, and McGraw watched as the air itself came to live, the winds roaring as scores of infinitesimal machines joined together and began flying around the enigmatic engineer. He watched calmly as the raging rapids oily black machines crashed into him and tried to corrupt him forcibly, as they had done many others in the past. They found, however, that they were impeded, that they could make very little progress, as if the man were immune to their effects.

"That's one theory proven." Said the engineer, as he raised a hand and let it pass through the flying machines, which stuck to his limb like salt on wet skin, yet fell to the ground like sand barely a second later. "Interesting." He brought his limb to his face, "your hypno-bots don't like inorganic materials." He rubbed the machines into his skin, watching with a fascinated gleam in his eyes as they seemed to vanish inside of it, almost as if his skin had drank in the machines and absorbed them. "Enough foreplay." He said after a few more passes through the flying nanomachines, he felt them trying to bore their way through his body, slowly making their way upwards to his head.

McGraw grinned deeply and grabbed the pulsating, roaring object with his right hand, his eyes growing wide as he made contact.

Entry Fifty One

They're dead. The war took them.

Damn them all.

McGraw saw everything, and nothing. His eyes opened wide, taking in the endless black expanse before them. He felt as if he were floating in the void, with nothing tethering him to any surface, just aimlessly floating, forever. He heard nothing, felt nothing, and smelt nothing, this lack of feeling went on for an eternity, before a deep baritone horn blast filled his ears and shook his very soul. From the blackness, a light was shown, and soon, hundreds more filled it, all serving to illuminate one single, solitary body and its lonely, blood red eye.

The massive cuttlefish-shaped machine roared out one last time, its sheer size dwarfing that of the small human many million times. It was the size of a planet, and he, an ant. The machine's moon-sized, deep red eye rotated around and McGraw got the very distinct impression that it was focusing directly upon him, but barely a second later he realized that this planet-sized monster wasn't the only one giving him its undivided attention. There were millions more, all multitudes smaller than the first one, but they all awoke in sequence, bright white lights illuminating their aquatic bodies, and deep red orbs turning to focus upon the floating human, menacingly.

There was another baritone roar, the rumbling of a thousand horns, blasting as deeply as they could. McGraw's eyes widened as the titanic, planet-sized cuttlefish machine finally spoke, not with a voice that pierced the void of space, but one that resonated within McGraw's very mind.

"Human." It said, its voice deep and booming; it spoke with a very blank tone, almost as if it were a menacing machine. "McGraw.

"Oh… Shit." McGraw suddenly felt much smaller than he had ever felt in his life. Ed fought Cthulhu in a battle of wills, and won. The human thought. But the question is, is this thing truly so massive, or is he just trying to intimidate me? "What are you?"

"We are your salvation, through destruction." The titanic terror responded, succinctly.

McGraw narrowed his eyes, "Uh, whoa, what? What are you saving us from that would require our destruction? You sound almost experienced in the matter... Would I be correct in concluding you've done this before…" He traced his eyes up and down the enormous frame of the machine in front of him, "to the Protheans? Perhaps even those who came before them?" An artificial extinction cycle, brought about by an army of building, or, in this one's case, planet-sized machines.

"We have seen the rise and fall of countless civilizations, we have preserved them all."

So they've been around a long time… These things weren't just what killed the Protheans, they could have been what took out whoever came before them, and so on and so forth… But that's not what I'm here for. "What did you do to Edward Spokane?"

"The human, Spokane, was an anomaly, as are you. He was the only being to escape our enthrallment, as you were the only being to touch us as we touch you." The creature boomed, McGraw felt the power of its celestial voice in the depths of his chest, making him wonder if he were truly floating in space, or if this was all one vivid, shared hallucination.

If they're machines, it would stand to reason that they would have a cloud to share data and experiences, and potentially a hive mind… Perhaps I've tapped into this cloud, and what I'm seeing isn't a hallucination, but the entire horde from the point of view of the master of Object Mars. Thought McGraw. So they could potentially affect me, if that were the case… But, better yet, they just admitted that Ed survived and cured himself of their 'enthrallment'. Given how the room came to life when I touched the machine, they're using the machine as a means to grab attention, but it's only one part of the equation. He cleared his throat, "you said you enthralled him, and that he escaped it. What is the purpose of enthralling someone, if your age-old experience and vast numbers could just steamrole the galaxy?" He asked, "you need us, but for what purpose?" He looked around, feeling a slight buzzing in the back of his skull as he saw that more and more of these cuttlefish were still coming to life and revealing themselves. How could there be so many of them, if they turned systematic galactic genocide into a dayjob? There was a piece of this puzzle that McGraw was missing, he knew it, just as he knew that the titanic eldritch abomination would refuse to answer him directly. "To assist in our destruction?" They were big, people were small, perhaps they simply needed thralls to perform the smaller-scale, precision actions.

"We do not destroy, we preserve."

This gave McGraw pause, "a controlled burn… You aren't machines, you're synthetic, organic hybrids. Sentient starships… The collective knowledge, experience, and genetic information of billions of species… But merely 'preserving' us wouldn't be enough, not for action of this scale… You have to exist for a higher purpose, one that would require the preservation of information on such a scale. You're saving us from a worse fate, and it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to believe you would bring us back when this fate has passed. But that begs the question of what specifically you're saving us from?" It suddenly dawned on McGraw that his sense of time could be being skewed by this experience, and a lot more time could pass back in the Éschatos Cell than he felt passed here, he had to end things soon, he had already gotten what he needed, everything else was just extra.

"Entropy." Said the machine, "there is a realm of existence so far beyond your own that you cannot even imagine it. You exist because we command it, and you will end because we demand it. Our vanguard is already among you, its agent making preparations for your fall." As it spoke, its moon-sized eye began glowing, energy gathering around it in massive wisps of a smoke-like substance.

"An interesting choice of words… You are not our destroyers, yet you are preparing our 'fall', implying destruction. So do you save us, destroy us, or both?" McGraw demanded of the machine, "this statement is false."

"We are not so lesser as to fall to a logic error. To understand us and our goals would be to understand the universe itself. We have existed since before your kind crawled out of the primordial soup." It thundered.

That pissed him off. Thought McGraw, with a grin. "Implying billions of years of work and advancement. What problem cannot be solved with that much time?" And, he didn't ask, could he solve such a problem just to spite them and their methods? The machine was silent, prompting McGraw to continue. "Your sheer size, and your implied age means that you were made by a race that has entire eras to further your design and advance beyond anything we can dream… Perhaps your 'entropy' was more direct than I thought. You don't fight any singular enemy, but rather you fight the fight itself, you combat the end of everything, by jump-starting that end yourself… But while matter and energy can neither be created nor destroyed, so too can they not exist as we know it forever. Eventually something would happen that would beckon, or even demand change… And here you are, creating your own weakness. Machines have clear limits, barriers they cannot surpass and things they cannot do. Even the most advanced AI cannot write a symphony like a living being can… They cannot change as easily as a person can. So back to my original theory, an enemy you must fight."

The machine rumbled deeply, "you know not -"

"Entropy… Entropy, entropy… Perhaps light is the answer. Information can only naturally travel as fast as light can, perhaps the universe has already died and you are the vanguards of existence as we know it… But if that were true, you wouldn't seek to be our 'salvation through destruction'... I'm liking my bigger threat theory the more I think about it… But what could possibly make a species that could literally create robot Cthulhu piss its pants? What frightens a race that can create machines, which can then self-create more, that can literally control the minds of its organic enemies? What validates the cyclical slaughter and preservation of countless species? Do you yourselves even know?"

"Enough." The machine boomed, "these questions are pointless. You cannot understand why we are. Only by becoming us could you even begin to comprehend."

McGraw sighed deeply, feeling like he had learned enough, "let me tell you something about us humans, you know, give you an edge. Make it more fun. It doesn't matter if it's God himself, we'll fight anything that comes our way, and we will win." He warned.

"Prepare yourself, human, for the arrival." As its voice crashed into McGraw and rebounded around his soul, its enormous eye began glowing bright.

"Prepare yourself, machine. I can promise you we will speak again one day, but when we do, you'll find that your biggest mistake was letting Edward Spokane free himself… Until then, ask yourself this. Titans war by making giants, and giants, by making men… So how do men war?"

The eye flashed, and McGraw's world went from dark to pure white.

In a space station, the ground shaking underneath one's feet was, truly, the very last sensation one would want to feel. Typically following the quakes of the floor meant that something was very wrong, any number of things, all of them meaning sudden and painful death, such as explosions, decompression, or the failure of critical machinery, could shake the floor, and when Jack Harper felt the floor tremble beneath his feet, he slowly sighed and hung his head. Hovering in front of him was a pale blue hologram, depicting the blank screen that followed Object Mars' detonation. The moment the Éschatos Cell's soldiers had breached the room, the ancient alien machine had detonated, shredding and burning everyone within in an enormous, scalding fireball and raging shrapnel.

"Mister Harper…"

"Not now, Julius." It had all transpired so fast, Harper didn't even know what had happened. First he got a report that McGraw was here to study the object, then McGraw had sealed the room, and not ten minutes later the room had detonated. "Detonate the support struts, back up all of the data… Let the Éschatos Cell fall into Anadius." He sighed, slowly lowering his face to his hand and running his fingers through his hair, trying to wrap his mind around the suddenness of it all. His mind was reeling, his breaths shallow, his steely eyes wide, he was in shock.

"Right away, sir, but you've got a call -"

"Julius… Clear my schedule, and prepare a vessel to take me to the MSS. My friend just succumbed to the same madness that claimed Edward… Christopher is dead, and we are no closer to understanding what happened to Edward, as we are to understanding -"

"Jesus CHRIST, is this what I can expect at my funeral?!" Demanded a new, lighter voice, halting Harper's words. "Fuck, man, it's almost like you expected me to die. What, you think a ninety billion year old mind-bomb will take me out? It'd take a stick of antimatter to do that. Now accept my god damn - oh, wait, I did that for you." There was a pause, as the gray-haired fifth-column leader slowly turned his wide-eyed head to a pale blue hologram with a caricature of a speaker floating several feet from his head. "Hey Jack!" The voice of McGraw said.

Staring at the call-in-progress hologram, Harper didn't know whether or not to believe his ears, or his eyes. "Is this a recording?" He asked the air.

"No, that's too cliche."

"And a fake-out death isn't?"

"Well, the latter is less cliche than the former, but at least I didn't build it this time. I mean, last time I did vanish for, what was it? Six months? While I was with the twos? Ah, doesn't matter. While that explosion was big, I want my death to go out in a BIGGER bang! I'm talking, nuke, big. And besides - I'm never dead unless you've got a body. But that's not what I'm… Well, not there, for. Suffice to say that what happened to Ed did not happen to me. I was operating primarily on guesswork and a half-dozen theories with little base, but it looks like I was right, for the most part: You can't mind control a remote-controlled robot. Check, but not mate. I think I've been left more disturbed than usual, but it doesn't matter, we're all mad down here." Said the engineer, "I'll be back soon, Miranda just came back with the Nomad, and boooooy is she confused that I'm still here - YES! I'm talking about you." He interrupted himself, the sounds of a very faint, but definitely confused woman pervaded the background. "I'll be there in…" There was a loud noise, similar to that of a guitar chord being struck, and wind howling. "Two seconds, give or take. First time self-testing the Traveller."

"McGraw, what is going-"

"Jack. Not, the fuck, now. Trust me, this is something that needs to be-" A pale green sphere expanded in the center of Harper's office, eliciting a sound similar to that which he had heard mere seconds earlier, and without even breaking sentence, McGraw strode through it, pushing a cart which had upon it a large, life-support like machine. "- Dealt with before it needs to be explained." He said, as the humming sphere shrank down and vanished like a deflating balloon. McGraw gave his glasses a tap on the temples, and then glanced around Harper's office, his head snapping back and forth as he saw what he was looking for. "Shit." He grumbled, "can't even see it…" He shook his head and slid his hand across his temples again, switching the glasses off. He made the motion to reach into the outer pockets of his jacket, but realized after he'd tried that he wasn't wearing the jacket, and his hand simply slid across his abdomen, giving him pause. "Oh… Right. Oops." He shrugged, and instead reached into his back pocket, now finding the object he was looking for: a lead pill box the size of his hand. "Alright, I need you to take this." Said McGraw, as he clicked open the pill box and retrieved one of two pills inside.

Harper stared at McGraw, his jaw slack and his lips barely parted in an expression of shock and befuddlement. First McGraw dies, then he comes back, somehow crossing several thousand lightyears in the span of seconds, now he wants him to pop a pill he retrieved from a lead case. The Illusive Man could barely comprehend it all, but a small part of him, the part that always questioned McGraw's 'method to the madness', finally became vocal enough to make Harper put his foot down. McGraw had kept secrets from him, refused to explain his ridiculous means, given him roundabout answers, and had been all-around frustrating to boot, and now here - on the one subject they both agreed that was dangerous beyond measure - he was refusing to answer questions and was acting worse than usual.

He had Spokane's notes, he knows what the broadcaster does… How can he expect me to just trust him on this? Harper asked himself. He was exposed to the machine, how can I believe anything he does? The machine's creators, they could be trying to use him to get to me. His eyes slowly gravitated towards the pill, his head beginning to hurt from the events of the day, from all of the double-think, and worse, the day still wasn't over. There was an urgent report from the Teltin facility he had been putting off reading.

Understanding Harper's silence, McGraw spoke up, "I need you to trust me, Jackie. Now, more than ever."

Harper sighed, looking his friend in his deep, blue eyes. I can't take this pill. He has to know this… He's been exposed to the machine, I can't. I can't trust McGraw… He's just... His eyes narrowed, as McGraw slowly inched the pill back to him, as if silently questioning whether or not Harper was going to take it. Wait… Did I… Did call him McGraw? Did I call Edward, Spokane? I don't… Do that. Others do, but they're my friends, I give them that respect. I trust them. The steely-eyed man slowly widened his eyes as the pain in his mind backed away, almost like a predator making a tactical retreat, so its prey would begin doubting the whole encounter. I trust him… So why did I not, just then? It can't be the machine, it's in another wing that had its own self-contained environment, nothing it contained, nothing it could do, it couldn't have made its way in here. Even if it made its way into Cronos station, it can't have gotten in here, the air supply is cycled hourly, it's soundproofed inside and out, scanned for bugs daily… This station is impenetrable, this office a fortress, the single most well-protected room modern technology, and even McGraw himself, can design. It can't have been breached… Except… By something more advanced. Suddenly the pain was back, almost as if the predator knew that its prey was onto it, and was pressing every advantage it had, trying to hurry up and kill its prey before it escaped. I've been compromised. He slowly looked down at one of his hands, barely even able to trust it to reach across and accept McGraw's answer.

"What does it do?" He asked McGraw, biting through the pain in his mind.

"It'll help."

Harper nodded, and slowly reached forward, having to force himself to do even that. He took the pill, feeling something in the back of his mind telling him that this was a horrible idea, everything about this decision going against his better judgement. He took a look at the pill, it looked to be filled with some kind of sand-like substance that shifted around with every movement. Harper recognized it pretty quick - nanomachines, very typical McGraw. McGraw was telling him through this simple, subtle detail, that he was still in control, that he was still himself. With a great feeling of trepidation, he took the pill and swallowed.

McGraw nodded, "good… You aren't too far gone. Now, I'm going to be honest with you… You aren't going to like my solution." Said McGraw, as he popped his own pill, and walked over to the life support machine. "I think the only reason you are recoverable is because of the considerable precautions we both took in designing this room. Had they been any lesser and we wouldn't be having this conversation." He said, as he pushed the machine closer to Harper, and retrieved a fold-out chair from underneath the cart. "But that's a conversation that's going to have to wait. Simply put, in order to save you and me, I'm going to have to kill us." He held up a hand, prompting Harper to hold his questions. "I know, I know, not a good idea. But, it's what Ed did. He hid it pretty damn cleverly… How do you hide something from the smartest men in the universe? You shove it right under their nose and wait. He wrote it in his journal, that he would have to die in order to save himself. That his solution would kill him. There was no 'maybe', no room for debate, only absolutes. He was literally telling us what to do… Soundwaves don't require death to remove, you only need to mute it. So the question…" Said McGraw, as he began setting up the machine. "... Is what would require such harsh measures. So I started thinking, and my little robot's encounter with Object Mars confirmed it. Those creatures use nanomachines - very… Very… Very small nanomachines. Smaller than atoms. They use them to control their indoctrinated thralls. It sounds like something out of a mid twenty first century sci-fi cliche, but think about it. Nanites influence the chemical flows in the brain, making their goals seem more pleasurable and positive. Add on the soundwaves to trigger various responses in the brain, and also as a means to actually speak to their thralls.

"But the problem is the power source… But my robot's exposure answered that too. They feed off of the bio-electricity of the host to power themselves. That is why Ed had to kill himself. No power, they stop functioning. And with how damn small they are, they'd just… Fall. No power to keep them afloat and in the body. In order to clean yourself of their influence, you have to die. After that, it's just the simple matter of restarting the body." He turned, and nodded to the pillbox. "That helps keep your body in stasis. It doesn't keep you alive, but makes it much easier for this -" He tapped on the life support machine, "-to hit the… Reboot button, so to speak." The machine beeped in the affirmative, "and I've got Gladys riding shotgun on this one, so she'll make sure nothing goes wrong." He set up a few IV's, and pulled out two vests connected to the machine by wires. "Now put this on." He tossed Harper one of the vests, "and let me set this up…" He said, jamming one of the IV's into Harper's arm.

"What will happen to everyone else on the station?" Harper asked.

"In order to purge the air of all of the nanites, we have to vent the station. In order to deactivate any of the nanites still present, we have to hit the place with an EMP. In order to make sure there are absolutely none left, we have to decontaminate the place." Said McGraw, as he put on his own vest and hooked up his own IV. He gave Harper an oxygen mask, and strapped his own to his face.

"I see." Said Harper, "it will take time to replace them all."

"I think your exact words were, 'mine will be stocked by those who are good in all things, and excel in none.'..." Said McGraw, "it's not too hard to replace people like them." He said, as he sat down in his own chair, and leaned his head back. "Besides, I'm pretty sure there are a lot of people out there who would love to pay back their favors to the Illusive Man. Twelve hundred people out of a species of billions…" He inhaled deeply, "they aren't the only jacks of all trades."

Harper nodded, "that is true." He said, sitting down. "I was referring to how long it will take to clean their bodies, let alone how long it will take to replace everything."

"Gladys and Julius don't sleep, and we've got a lot of bipedal drones here." Mcgraw exhaled, "you ready? Everything changes after this. They'll know we're onto them. Worse, they'll know we're beyond their ability to control. They'll be preparing for war."

"Then so will we." Said the Illusive Man, as he settled into his chair and felt a great, brief weight fall over his eyes, before he lost consciousness.

There were few moments in Tech Sergeant Grant's day-to-day that made him smile, mostly due to the asinine work he had to deal with every moment of every day. "My computer is too slow. My connection vanished. The AI stopped talking to me in the middle of a conversation, I may have spilled some water on the projector." Easy solutions to nearly every problem, but not a single person learned from these problems and figured out how to replicate the solutions on their own. It was grating, frustrating, and, most of all, annoying, but seven o'clock, on the dot, every day, was a moment the dark-eyed man could look forward to.

"Hey hon." He said, adjusting the camera on his monitor. "Can you see me?" He asked, leaning his head down and reaching over to change the position of his lamp, so the light wouldn't shine so brightly against his dark skin.

"Uh… Yeah, there we go." He heard his wife say, after a few moments. With how far away she was, time lag generated fifteen seconds of silence between responses, but those fifteen seconds were worth it. "Hey Grant, how're things out in deep space?" She asked, with a wide smile playing across her pale face as Grant's own came into focus.

"'I spilled water on my computer and now it doesn't work. I tried plugging it back in but then it started smoking, help.'..." Groaned Grant, hanging his head for a moment. "We're supposed to be some kind of think-tank, but everyone here can't even work the auto-lacers on their shoes." He shook his head, "now, where's my baby girl at? You know how long I've been waiting to see your faces?"

His wife smiled many thousand light years away, and reached out of view of the camera. "Hey… Daddy wants to say hi!" She said lightly to a sleeping baby. With a light groan, she picked her up.

Grant picked up on it, "she that heavy? What've you been feeding her, Mel?"

"Steak, chocolate, things that are bad for you." Said the woman, as she brought the baby into frame, cradling her close to her chest but also away enough so the father could see its resting form. "She's growing like crazy, I tell you."

"Got that from my side." Grant said, adopting a tough expression and lifting his lanky arms up in a body-builder pose. He and his wife chuckled, "spoke with my supervisor today, got my leave for next month, should be there in time for her birthday."

His wife smiled another beautiful smile, lightly rocking the baby as she did. "That's great, she'll be so happy. Oh - Jacob stopped by a few days ago, he's being deployed with the corsairs. They found Manheim! They think the war will be over by the end of the year."

"Oh, good, I've been getting tired of that crap. Rebel propaganda, anti-rebel statements, bla bla bla. Almost as annoying as people - oh, yeah, listen to this. I've gotten eight complaints the last week alone, people think their's a computer virus going around. They think that it's making their speakers play trumpet blasts. I've checked and cleared eight computers, absolutely nothing. Brought it up with security, they've gotten complaints about the same thing. I'm thinking one of the new recruits brought in a trumpet or something, and he's been fucking with everyone." Grant said, with a grimace.

"What a…" The woman peered down at the baby, "... Rude word."

"I think you wanted to say dick."

"One of these days, she's going to repeat you."

"She's eight months old. That'll be a while, I've got time." Grant waved it off. "Anything interesting happen today?"

She shrugged her shoulders, "not… Much." She said, leaning over and depositing the baby back off screen. "Today was my day off, I just spent it keeping up here. I think I spent an hour trying to find my watch, though. Guess where it was?"

"Here."

"In my pants. The ones I was wearing. I literally turned on watch to use the flashlight, and sat there and stared at it for a few minutes."

Grant clapped, "nice. Nice job." He said, before the lights went out and the emergency red lighting. "Ah shit." He groaned, "I knew it was coming."

"Oh? What's going on?"

"Evac-drill. I'll call back in an hour… Love you." He said with a nod and a smile, before he cut the call and stood up. He cleared his throat and called out to everyone in his section of the tech wing, "alright, folks. Just another drill, I need everyone to -" He didn't finish his sentence, the the entire station went dead silent as its air was vented to the void in less than thirty seconds.

Grant and several others, after recovering from having all of the air in their lungs vanish, scrambled for the emergency O2 tanks as the others were too stunned and in too much pain to even get to their feet. Grant's lungs were burning and his vision was darkening, but when he made it to the tanks, the lights in the station vanished and he felt his feet leave the ground. He hit the wall with a silent, jarring thud as his momentum in the vacuumed, gravity-less room carried him forward. Before he could even recover,the temperature the room began climbing exponentially as the heat shields were partially lowered and the inside of the station began cooking under the intensity of Anadius. Lasers soon began to sweep over the individual rooms and corridors, frying anything that wasn't already cooking under the partial exposure to Anadius' heat.

Grant, barely ten seconds after the heat shields were lowered, blacked out. When the decon lasers began sweeping his room, his bloated, burned body was flash-fried and turned to ash.

In less than an hour, Cronos Station was empty and lifeless.

In the deep void of space, a man sat in his spartan room aboard a massive spaceship. He was dressed in an expensive suit, though unlike most occasions, it was not done up tight and his tie was hung up on the wall. He sat in front of his computer, its light counter-balancing the bright lights fixed upon the ceiling.

Director Serios, I advise you remember who buried your medical report. What I want is simple, I know you know this, but for thoroughness' sake, I shall repeat myself: I want one of the weapons you recovered from Manheim. Just one. You can lose one. One can fall out of a ship. I can find it.

You do not want me to take one, but I will if I must.

-Edward Spokane.

"Glade, report on the pods."

"Project Genesis is running on schedule, Mister Spokane. An update on Project Hippo: John Shepard S2-15's augmentation ceased activity. McGraw was nowhere to be found. Likely assumption is that an AI discovered it and deactivated it on his order. I believe the tension between the Ones and Twos will skyrocket because of this, but given the way they were created, they won't pursue war yet."

"Compounded with Manheim, it is likely the Twos' trust has been shaken… Were Shepard to meet his mother, it would likely shatter entirely. Make a note, this can be used." Said Spokane, as he opened up another email, this one from one of the Councilors in Citadel space, Spokane smiled.

I don't know who you are, or how you got this address, but I can assure you my daughter is dead. She has been for three centuries. I will send this along to a Specter, you can expect to be found very soon.

Tevos Voria, Councilor for the Asari Republic.

"I also have news from Cronos Station, when you are ready."

"Jack's little fifth column…" Said Spokane, as he began typing up a response.

Saira Voria, born 1801 CE, vanished 1922 CE during a brief trip through the attican traverse. The remains of her ship and those of several of its crew were discovered, but hers remained undiscovered, and were declared unrecoverable due to it being likely she was blasted from the ship and her corpse sent careening through space forever. An investigation was launched and it was determined that her ship was raided by pirates, notably with no direct connection to any major slave-trading organizations. As the year went on, millions more, a majority of them Asari, would vanish, from the traverse, the Terminus, and even Citadel space. Due to the very low number when compared to the overall Asari population, it was simply attributed to pirate actions.

Congruently, the Asari slave trade in outer Hegemony space experienced a marked increase due to the introduction of multiple million Asari slaves. The Batarian Hegemony's economy experienced a notable uptake for several decades as the slaves were bought, traded, sold, and bought again, the massive funds used to purchase various goods and generate more jobs. The end of the last Batarian Recession spread outwards, their increased spending flowing towards other Citadel races and territories, generating jobs and creating more money on your side as well, as the galaxy itself forgot about the missing Asari under the continued gleaming of the golden age, which itself only ended when first contact was experienced with the Human Systems Alliance.

Now, Councilor Tevos, the question is why do I reiterate history you yourself experienced?

Simple: Your daughter was not killed by pirates, she began her journey down the modern Stream of Slaves. Where before the slave trade was direct - raid, sell to buyers, spend money, repeat - as time went on, it got more complex so as to combat discovery. In modern times, it begins with a general desire - in this case, one for Asari. This desire drives sellers to send out contracts to slaver rings, who then send out smaller portions of those payments to lower-scale raider and mercenary groups, with bonuses handed out to those who brought in high-quality products.

Over time, it became even more complex. Holding worlds, dummy corporations, bulk orders, the days of simple kidnapping and selling have long since gone. My personal favorite is one particular company that, itself, cannot legally be tied to the slave trade, but their multiple subsidiaries all hold property on various backwater and uncharted planets, and on this property are slaves. Hundreds, thousands, and, with some of the more popular species, millions of them, all simply kept and stored there, so they can drastically reduce the time it takes to gather product and sell them. This company even hires contractors out to kidnap and enslave during dry spells - simply because they know that the time will come that the demand for various species will come up again. These days, what with how entrenched in the trade they are, they are powerful enough to influence the demand itself. The company is worth multiple billion credits, and is ironically run by Turians.

This all plays into you. Your daughter, for fifty years, 'rode' this 'river', so to speak, until she landed on her new permanent home. She was handed down from generation to generation, like a living heirloom, ever faithful and ever broken. She was property for three hundred years, and has experienced such a life for longer than she lived under you. When she was rescued by the Alliance, she was brushed through the system by a well-connected OD3 and his daughter, but suffered a nervous breakdown in the center of New York City. Two people died, one was crippled in his left leg. The OD3 was court martialed, his daughter is trying to get a job on Mandal so she can see Saira once again.

A quote from one of Deborah Vanice's reports:

"Her earliest memory is from a decade before she was enslaved and sent to the Tureg holding center. She recalled her mother wearing a deep red dress with no back, and herself wearing a conservative, dark green one. Her mother was running for Citadel Council, and had brought Saira to a fundraiser ball. During this ball, her mother introduced her to a Hanar by the Face Name of 'Assists the Downtrodden', though many adopted the name 'Doas' for short. As it turned out, Doas was there as repayment for a favor from her mother, who was the deciding vote on a standardized healthcare vote for the homeless on multiple outlier planets. She remembered little more beyond that, but shared a story in which Doas explained to her, gently, what it was to be homeless. He said, and I quote her here, 'to be homeless is not to lack a home, but rather a roof over one's head and a bed beneath one's back. However, home is where one belongs, and no living creature belongs on street corners.' This must have had a profound effect on her, to have survived three hundred years of slavery. Anecdotally, researching this Hanar revealed a long and influential political career, that started with a healthcare vote on Balias-Premal, an Asari colony upon which current Asari councilor Tevos began her career, perhaps lending credence to her story."

I believe I need not explain anything more to you, but I shall attach her medical file to this message as well. Unfortunately, I know the skill which many Spectre hackers possess, and I fear I may be found through these messages. While this does not concern me, I would think it would concern you, because should I be confronted by a Spectre about these messages, your daughter will be moved, and convinced to change her name as a part of the recovery process, and her files lost. The OD3 who brought her to Earth will be killed, his daughter sent to the wrong rehabilitation center, with much more violent patients, where her naive self's death will be a foregone conclusion, and even the unfortunate Batarian family that lost their generational Asari slave will find itself doing time for treason and sent to mining camps on various accident-prone asteroids.

You will never have the chance to find her again.

Good day, Councillor.

-Edward Spokane.

The dark-haired man leaned back and read over his message again, before sending it. "So, Cronos."

"His facility went silent minutes ago. The atmosphere was purged from all sections, including his secure office, and the entire station was bombed with an electromagnetic pulse and decontaminated. My sister is currently helping Julius with the station's continued operation."

Spokane turned to gaze at the hologram projector, which had hovering above it a grass-green AI in an expensive-looking three piece suit. "Oh really?" Said the man, as he leaned back in his chair and looked to the ceiling. "It appears as if Christopher has caught up… Knowing him, he came to the same conclusion I did, perhaps because of my missing journal." He grinned, "I guess now we can play our game with no distractions. I would say It should take a week for him and Jack to revive themselves… A week without Christopher McGraw… I wonder what would happen." He thought aloud, with a light smile on his handsome features.

A/N:

So, this chapter.

It was originally was going to be one hell of a lot longer, in that I was going to cut from McGraw and TIM sleeping to them waking up, but two things stopped me from doing that, the first being that I felt this chapter was feeling too rushed, so I decided I'd chop it in half and move from there.

The second was that I realized that if I effectively doubled the chapter's length and started packing on the exposition, it'd defeat a lot of the impact from the chapter. I mean, McGraw talked to Harbinger, I can't just let that be glossed over.

Though, I hope I kept with Harbinger's character. Thing always struck me as an arrogant, 'holier than thou' kind of guy, and those kind of folks rarely give straight forward answers.

Anyways, allow me to explain why this chapter took a week longer than others.

Simply put: I forgot about it. It was never written. I was looking through the drafts of later chapters, and suddenly realized that the whole 'McGraw is supposed to go to Cronos' arc hadn't been touched on again. I had to write a mega-whopper of a revelatory and expository at the same time, whilst also not answering everything so as to keep the interest going, and I had a week to do it.

Writer's block didn't help - this was a chapter that had to be executed pretty damn well, especially coming off of the last one, which I'm very glad to see was well received.

So, I've got two more chapters in the woodwork before I take my next break [you know, to stockpile more chapters and do some work on other stories], the first being the last of the Interlude chapters, and the second being the one that sets up the next arc.

With the last Interlude chapter, I run into the same problem as this one - it completely escaped me and is, as of yet, unwritten. So we may be looking at another week or two until the next one, but if you've been following them as closely as I hope, you'll know I've been building up one whopper of a battle scene, so I'm hoping that will make up for it.

If you're ever looking for news, I'm always updating my FFN Profile and tweeting my thoughts -at-ProfFartBurger.

'Till next time, folks!

-PFB