"I am important", she always reassured herself. What else could matter, besides her and her parents? Others, they were nothing but filth. She had never wished to become a thug. All she wanted was to be a fucking badass. So far, half of Invictus saw her as a crazy hyperactive bitch, and nothing more. But she aimed for the stars, she always would.

BLOW HER UP

"Commander. 'Morning." Jack said, stretching out her arms and yawning in the least elegant way possible. She sat down, resting her arms behind the back of the chair.

"Jack." Moirae replied, nodding lightly and taking a sip of her hot, black coffee, and sitting in front of the bald soldier. It had been a tiresome night, with all these files and these tracks given to her by the Illusive Man ; she had had to analyze every single one of them, file out reports, and update the galaxy map with what she had found recently. Overall, the mission was going pretty smoothly, though Moirae could scarcely hide her mistrust towards Cerberus anymore. She didn't care, nor did she mind having the Illusive Man spying on her and telling her what to do. In the end, he was giving her resources and tracks to work with, and it was all she needed. But she didn't trust him one bit. She never would.

Garrus entered the room. He sat at the table with the Commander and the rest of the crew. It had been only a few weeks since Moirae had rescued him and recruited professor Solus from Omega ; they seemed to have adapted pretty well to the new Normandy. Especially Mordin ; how many months had it been since he had embarked aboard a ship? Life among the sick, smelling death and sorrow and distress everyday, waking up to more corpses on his hands and no one to help those left, no one but him. It wasn't something everyone could handle, but Mordin did it, and Moirae respected him immensely for that.

"Commander!" A voice shrieked across the whole crew deck, followed by sounds of heel clattering against the floor. "Commander... Commander Shepard!" The slim silhouette of a seemingly panicked Kelly Chambers appeared from behind a wall. She was holding a report file in her hand.

"Calm down, Kelly." Moirae frowned, turning to face her. "What's the matter?"

"Ma'am! I, Joker... And the others, we saw a ship... It appeared on our radar, it was sending warning signals and we recorded audio messages... I think its passengers are calling for help, it is possible that the ship is going to crash. We located it nearby, around Korlus..." The young yeoman announced under heavy breath, bringing a hand to her stomach and handing the report file to Moirae. What she could see here was exactly what it seemed to be ; a distress call. The Commander didn't think it twice and rushed to the Combat Information Center, followed by the rest of her crew. If there was a chance to save this ship, she had to take it ; for all she knew, it could've been full of children, civilians or sick people - but what mattered right now, is that it was full of people in distress.

"Ma'am, you might want to hear the audio message the ship transmitted to us." Kelly added. Moirae nodded positively, as they all exited the elevator to enter the CIC. "Joker, play the message." Moirae commanded, opening the galaxy map and reading the rest of Kelly's report.

- This is Legionnaire Urdmont, calling out for help- if you receive this call, please respond- This is Legionnaire Urdmont, I repeat, calling from the pilot cabin, please respond- The BS-4788 frigate is badly damaged, we are facing imminent crashing- Fuck, don't stay here Simon, get the hell out of here! Go to the bay and leave! You have to warn Officer Santiago- I repeat, this is Legionnaire Ur- Oh god no- The sicko has escaped the bay! Oh god I can hear her coming to the cabin! Simon, is that you?! Oh fuck, fuck, fuck! Where's my gun?! I'm going to blow her up, I'm going to- ARGH-

End of transmission.

Although the message was rather short, the crew remained speechless. Whatever or whoever was causing this ship to crash had seemingly decimated its entire crew as well. Kelly looked rather anxious at this whole situation, and Moirae frowned. What there even anyone left to save on this ship? The creature had apparently reached the pilot cabin already. Given by the call-giver's title, the ship was probably a military frigate with mostly armed men and women on its board - so it was possible they put up a fight and managed to survive this long. It was now up to the Normandy crew to make sure they could escape this ship-turned-hellhole safe and sound.

"Officer Santiago?" A loud and hoarse voice questioned. Zaeed emerged from the elevator, crossing his arms and frowning. Oh, crap. Now Moirae remembered that name ; her mind filled itself with the memory of Zaeed throwing a temper tantrum and breaking a glass on the floor of the engineering bay just because of this name. The veteran soldier hammered the floor with his combat boots, accompanying each of his steps with a 'fuck', a groan or a 'shit'. He seemed pissed off, to say the least, and Moirae feared that it would, again, drive his mind off their original mission.

"This absolute bastard..." He muttered, clenching his teeth. Jack raised an eyebrow, watching Zaeed walk in circles like a mad bull.

"Safe to assume the old man knows this guy." Jack commented, slightly amused by the situation. Shepard sighed. "Zaeed, does that mean this ship is working under Santiago's command?" She asked.

"Damn fucking right they do. BS-4788 stands for Blue Suns-4788 - the fucking ship license number." He replied, cracking his knuckles. Yes, it did make sense. What didn't make sense, however, was what happened aboard this ship. It was most likely that someone had infiltrated it - perhaps a spy, an assassin, anyone, sent by an enemy of the Blue Suns. But whatever, or whoever, this could be, and regardless of the fact that the BS-4788 was a Blue Suns ship, this whole affair was still a mess and was definitely worth investigating.

"Garrus, Zaeed, go grab your gear. Joker, what's our ETA?" Moirae asserted. Said crew members rushed to the elevator right away, and the others shortly followed. Kelly started typing vehemently on her screen, visibly concentrated. "Fifteen minutes, Commander." Joker responded. "Ten, if we hurry." EDI added, getting a discreet 'shut up' from the pilot.

As soon as those words were said, the Normandy flew across the Imir System. Initially, the radar didn't pick up any more signals from the lost ship - but after a few seconds, it started beeping furiously again. Moirae was confident they were getting nearer to its location. She walked to the shuttle and waited for her squad members to arrived before leaving the Normandy. It was always a moment she liked - departing from the ship, losing herself into the immensity of the Universe, unshielded. In this case, the mission could prove to be dangerous. It was even more... exciting, somehow.

"Commander! It's right here - It's... It's not moving..." Kelly informed Moirae. The lost ship had reappeared clearly on the map. It was, indeed, completely immobile, though the engines were seemingly still functional and working. Two things could be concluded from here - it was either a trap, either everyone was dead, and the intruder had taken commands of the ship.

Wary, Shepard boarded the shuttle at the ship's cargo bay - it was wide open, probably because the passengers had escaped hastily aboard escape pods and shuttles. "Helmets." The young Commander indicated, as she stood up and put on her own breather-helmet. Garrus and Zaeed followed her. As the door of the shuttle opened, Moirae raised up her arms, holding her sniper rifle firmly between her fingers. She scouted every inches of the bay, but there was virtually nothing, and no one. Furniture, gear, armors and weapons were broken and scattered over the floor, however. Three corpses could be found as well - all three of them were Blue Suns mercs. Moirae knelt down, inspecting their wounds - they were mostly bruises, probably caused by punches or strong shocks against walls or crates. As they were about to take the elevator, Garrus stopped them and made a sign towards a small door. "Better check this room too." He murmured ; Moirae acquiesced and went to bypass the security, only to find the door already unlocked and open.

A peculiar sight caught their eyes as they entered this new room. It was apparently a regular part of the cargo bay, probably used to stock goods and weapons. But literally everything was torn apart. The walls were covered in sludge, ashes and blood, and about a dozen Blue Suns mercenaries were lying, lifeless, on the floor.

"Well, I suppose that's where our intruder started his killing spree." Garrus cocked a plated brow, his eyes hovering over the whole room with wariness. "The audio message mentioned someone who had 'escaped the bay'. I suppose they were talking about this room." Moirae added, blinking a few times, slightly thoughtful. Though there was much more blood in this room than in the cargo bay's main board, it was still rather dense. Again, no big wounds on the corpses, mostly bruises.

"Our intruder is either a ghost, or a very good brawler." Garrus added as the squad exited the room, and took the elevator. It was still functioning well, and wasn't lined with blood, this time.

Moirae resolved to investigate the pilot cabin before anything else. The ship was immobile - for now, but if someone tried to pilot it or crash it on Korlus, they would obviously do it from there. She had little hope to find any living survivors now.

Once again, she pointed her rifle in front of her, cautiously taking small steps outside of the elevator, closely followed by Zaeed and Garrus. This ship's combat center was inexistent. They had only a cabin and a screen room, which was probably occupied by engineers before the intruder went on his killing spree. Moirae walked slowly towards the door of the cabin.

"Locked. Not surprising." She commented under her breath, summoning her omni-tool and bypassing the security as discreetly as she could. That was it. The core of this small, unplanned mission resided here. Either the cabin would be empty, either it wouldn't. In both cases... It wasn't reassuring at all.

As soon as the door slided and opened, all three of them stood steady on their feet, pointing their gun nervously in front of them.

Nothing.

The consoles were a little damaged, and a single body was sitting, dead, on the pilot's chair. Moirae approached him. It was a human man, wearing a Blue Suns armor, sitting in front of the radio commands. His arms were dangling on his sides, and his empty pupils were staring, terrified, at the ceiling. A gun was lying on the floor, under the chair. The man had a single wound ; a big, bloated, crimson-red mark on his right temple - He had, evidently, been punched to death.

"Legionnaire Urdmont." Moirae concluded.

The silence of the empty, dead ship was abruptly broken by a groan. Immediately, the three soldiers held their weapons firmly again - but there was no one, nothing in front of them. Zaeed lowered his gaze, only to meet that of a body on the floor. Except this body was breathing.

The bounty hunter elbowed Moirae, and they all pointed their guns at the new face. As the Commander knelt down next to them, she noticed they weren't human. They weren't wearing a Blue Suns uniform either. It was a Turian, a female Turian. Wide curvy hips, plated face, three digits on each hands ; no doubt here. No wonder they hadn't noticed her before. She was curled up against a console, and her plates, along with her clothes, were pitch black. She seemed to have a rather small build for a Turian. She was wearing a simple light armor but it was mostly torn apart, covered in blood and smudges. Her irises went out of focus for a second, before rapidly shifting back to look at Shepard's face. They were barely still open, and the female obviously struggled to even stay conscious. It didn't last long.

"G... Get me outta... here..." Was the only sentence she managed to mutter before passing out. Moirae pressed two fingers against her neck ; she was still breathing. Judging by her clothes and body in general, she had been severely beaten up. She had two gun wounds as well ; one on her thigh and one on her shoulder, this one smaller than the previous one.

The Commander stood up again, stretching her arms, and letting out a sigh.

"You heard the lady. Help me carry her to the shuttle ; we're getting the hell out of here."