15 BCE

"Harbinger." The voice called across the vastness of dark space using power and technology on a scale unimaginable to all the lesser beings that now thought they were the galaxy's power. They rose to their apex, and when they did Harbinger and its kind reminded the puny organics far they truly had to go. But they would never reach that level, for that was Harbinger's purpose. They were as dust and wind against the likes of Harbinger, they could not even grasp how far beneath they truly were.

"Nazara, why do you contact us?" Harbinger replied over the same method, subtle confusion in his manner unknowable except to those most ancient of its kin.
"We have a dangerous report. The minor organics have risen once again, and we have sent the signal to the Great Relay to begin the Cycle anew, but we must report failure."
"Explain." The single word was heavy with all sort of data-emotions, that even galaxy-distances away, Nazara quailed.

"We have sent the signal that will activate the custodian-slaves, but they have not activated the Great Relay."
"Send it again, our grand work is too perfect for a flaw." Even Nazara could hear the notes of pride in Harbinger's response.
"With respect Harbinger, we have made 1337 attempts. We believe we have discovered the reason for this malfunction. Sometime after the last Cycle was completed, a modification was made to the Great Relay, and the signal to the custodian-slaves was altered."

There was silence for a time as Harbinger considered. This was unprecedented, no species had ever managed to affect changes to the Great Relay, and the Cycle could not be continued without the Great Relay's activation. While Nazara was a shining example of the sheer power their kind exemplified, it hardly made them invincible. After eternal seconds of thought, an idea presented itself, and Harbinger felt rare tinglings in its deep processors of pride in its ability to think creatively when presented with a problem not encountered in thousands of Cycles.

"Nazara, we have a solution."
"We await instruction Harbinger."
"Use your ability to influence to create chaos among the organics. Use this confusion to enter the Great Relay and take control manually. Then we shall flood the galaxy and the Harvest will commence."
"I hear and obey, Harbinger."

2183 CE

Even Harbinger, far beyond the edge of the Milky Way galaxy in the dark space between them, heard the death scream of Nazara, data flood into it along with programs desperately seeking a new platform to host them. Harbinger absorbed the data and purged the programs, too prideful to admit that one of his kind needed help. If it was stupid enough to fail more than once over two thousand years to find a way to access the Great Relay only to fail in the end, then it was not worthy to continue existing.

This did present a problem though. The organics, pitiful though they were, had now reached a point where they could present a threat, however insignificant. Nazara's execution was flawed, there was no other possible way Harbinger's scheme could not have succeeded. Now the organics were aware of the oncoming end of their existence. They would prepare, and cause more losses and damage to their betters, and the Harvest, than would be acceptable. A new solution would have to be found.

After thinking long and hard, a new solution again presented itself to Harbinger. He had not informed Nazara, for it was a project Harbinger had done on its own. During the last Harvest, it had been impressed by the performance of the organics. It had taken them two centuries longer than originally anticipated to finally purge their chaos from the galaxy, and for pitiful organics they had created some interesting and ingenious ideas. He decided to reward them by keeping them as pets, taking the best of them and warping them to its own desires. He had used them to study this Cycle's species in a piecemeal fashion since several centuries after Nazara's first report. Now it had a higher use for them, and activated the processes that would allow it to assume direct control once again.

This newest species, these 'humans' had been instrumental in Nazara's defeat. Examining the data from Nazara's scream, as well as data his drones now began to collect, it found there was one human in particular who seemed to embody and embolden these organics.

Shepard.

The name meant nothing, and the being it was attached to even less. It would strike a blow against the pitiful organics who dared to stand against their own salvation by reminding them how fragile and pathetic they were.

Shepard would die, and then be remade into a tool to herald their doom and ascension.

2186 CE

Harbinger could not understand how it had failed.

It had prided itself on its reasoning and planning, far outside what he had been called upon to do in long eons and countless cycles since it had been created. When Nazara had reported the failure to activate the Great Relay, it had been proud to suggest an alternative. When Nazara was destroyed, it was proud that it had thought to preserve something from the previous Cycle to continue, and succeed where Nazara had failed. It had killed the champion of the organics, this Shepard.

It had obviously underestimated Shepard, for the persistent organic had returned two short years later, barely a blip as Harbinger measured time, and destroyed his drones and the newest of his kind he had been directing them to create. There was only one option then, to bring the fleet to full awareness and have them start the long journey to the galaxy of light and chaos that sprawled around them and filled their optical processors.

The journey was long, and had been further delayed when the Alpha of the Lesser Relays was destroyed, once again by the meddling Shepard, further delaying the full invasion to begin the Harvest. Though the organics were easily attacked, they formed stubborn resistance bred from knowing their end was come and preparing for it, Shepard's doing no doubt. The pitiful organic had even found the Leviathan, the unworthy ancestral organics that gave rise to Harbinger itself from their own hubris. Though they paled in the light of their forms perfected in Harbinger and its kin, they were still formidable opponents in their own right. Allied with the rest of the organics, and building a device they had dubbed the Crucible, it was beyond the pale.

So when the pitiful and thoroughly indoctrinated organic dubbing himself 'Illusive Man' had contacted them and alerted them to the weakness the Great Relay presented to Harbingers, it was relocated to a more secure area. Even then, the assembled organic fleets, aided by synthetics of their own called the geth, attacked them in great numbers. Though they could not hope to defeat Harbinger, they would still cause unacceptable losses to their betters. Yet it turned out the grand action was little more than a stalling tactic while Shepard attempted used Harbinger's own device to try and ascend to the Great Relay and open it, allowing this 'Crucible' to interface with it.

Harbinger had been incensed that this pitiful organic had been the catalyst of all that had gone wrong it its attempt to once again establish order to the chaos created by these organics. It had left the battle above and went below to ensure that no organic reached the ascension device. It even spotted Shepard, and caught it in its beam. Once it observed that the pitiful human's life signs were weakening, it left to once again observe and conduct the battle above once again, proud of its work.

And then the arms of the Great Relay opened, and the Crucible was put into place. Once it was there none dared to fire upon it, for fear of damaging the Great Relay and releasing the energy stored within, potentially destroying them all. Then the arms opened wide and the Great Relay activated, a wave of energy spreading through the system, and eventually through the Lesser Relays to envelop the galaxy. The wave approached Harbinger; it watched and felt the death of its kin ahead of it.

As the wave washed over Harbinger and it felt itself dying, it wondered idly if its pride had been a weakness.