* * * Chapter 62 * * *

Presrop, Outpost

The airlock's outer door began to open; Kaidan slipped through as soon as he could.

Shepard started to follow, but stopped just outside. "Okay, we don't want to spook them. Wrex, Ash, Garrus, you three are probably the most intimidating, so I want you three to cycle into the airlock after we signal. Kaidan, Liara, Tali and I will go in first."

Tali stepped between Shepard and Wrex, arms akimbo. "Are you saying I'm not intimidating?"

Wrex snorted a laugh. "Sorry, little quarian. You are just too cute to be intimidating."

Tali pulled her Scimitar-IV out from behind her back, held it aloft. "I have a shotgun."

Wrex held his shotgun next to hers, which made Tali's look like a baby's toy. "My shotgun thinks your shotgun is cute, too." He shook it once, performing a one-handed ammoblock refresh. The move was doubly impressive for the weapon's mass.

Shepard nodded to himself. "All right, that's another good point; they know about the three of us, but not about you four. Tali, you get your wish: You wait and come in as part of the 'Intimidating' Group. That'll make it more likely you can crack your way in if they try to lock you out."

Tali turned to Wrex, nodded once. "Hah."

The krogan snorted a laugh, shook his head.

The airlock's outer door had finally finished opening; Shepard waved Liara in ahead of himself, and then turned to point a finger at Ash. "Cycle in behind us as soon as you can. Remember, we're trying to keep this peaceful."

The three of them filled the airlock comfortably; they looked at each other, checking each other's suits, wondering what would happen next. As atmosphere was dumped into it, Shepard's ARO displayed a technical illustration of the system's design; VIs had confirmed that the habitat was a stock installation of an off-the-shelf "first-in" colony module sold by Elkoss Combine.

When completed, the upper, visible part of the drill-in habitat rotated between two positions that were square to each other; one for supplies safe to store in vacuum that let the airlock stay open (for faster transfer,) and the other for users that granted access to the habitation spaces. There were two actual airlocks, both cubic in shape, but they were sequential, so if the seal on the outer airlock failed, the inner airlock could be used until repairs could be effected. They could even be used at the same time for oversized equipment.

The assembly rotated between the two positions, and because they were sequential, it could not be used to access both zones at the same time. This particular installation had been modified such that it could be locked from inside at a halfway point between the two positions.

Shepard considered his VI's intel, then subvocalized, Tali, the airlock design looks like they could manually lock you out. If it becomes a problem, how difficult will it be for you to torch your way in? Are you equipped?

The quarian studied a VRS of the airlock for a moment. Under 27 seconds, she answered confidently.

Once the airlock's outer door was sealed, a reservoir of atmosphere was dumped into it from below; the inner door cracked open, finalising the equalisation with a gentle "foof." The inner door opened into the secondary potential airlock (normally left open) that sloped down to the foyer proper.

Kaidan stepped through first, Liara behind him. As he exited, Shepard pulled down on the manual reset, closing the inner door and beginning to pump its atmosphere back into the reservoir as Kaidan and Liara moved into and through the inner airlock (a duplicate of the outer airlock,) which led to a pressure door that was cracked open.

It swung open, away from them; a bearded man was standing just inside the hatchway. Five other people stood a few steps behind him. Two of them – a man and a woman – were already glowing faintly with low-powered biotic barriers.

Of the two with barriers, the man was closest to them, his arms folded, his expression defiant. He turned his head, spoke quietly over his shoulder, "See? Told you there'd be more than two."

The bearded man took a step back from the inner hatch. "You…can't all come in yet." He put a hand in his pocket and looked anxious. "Things have…changed. Father Kyle wants to see you both, but…one at a time."

Victor Indigo, set DisplaiD to Normal.

The ARO tagged and identified the various people in the foyer; Shepard was most interested in getting a name for this bearded guy who seemed to have some authority. Mohammar Khan, tagged his ARO.

Kyle had not specified to whom he wish to speak first, so Mo – still excited at the prospect of another Alliance biotic – assumed he was supposed to bring Alenko. If he really intended to grenade this Shepard guy, he might also hope to get this Alenko on their side first.

*sigh* Shepard touched a key on his gauntlet, retracted his helmet. "I need to talk to the man in charge. It's important. If he doesn't see me, more people could get hurt."

"You'll have your time with him. But for now, you two stay in the airlock." He had spoken to Shepard and Liara, now he pointed at Kaidan. "You come with me. And no funny business."

Kaidan made a point of not looking at Shepard as he stepped out to follow the man.

"Kaidan…?" Liara said uncertainly.

"It'll be fine," the Marine answered, holding an open hand over his shoulder toward her. "I'll be right back."

The asari looked anxiously at the biotic humans standing there like a tiny, perturbed mob, and then at Shepard.

Liara T'Soni, Ph.D.: They are all standing together. I could collect them in a Singularity if you say to.

Shepard subvocalized, Not unless they present a threat. Don't even generate a barrier unless they become dangerous.

# # #

Kaidan followed the man past a wall full of environment suits, through the airlock foyer, turned left down a short accessway, and entered the main pressure vessel. It was divided into sections with walls and half-walls. Both "side" walls of the 12x25-meter area were lined with simple hinged privacy doors; each door had at least a placard at eye level with a name, but nearly all of them were covered with drawings, photo prints, notes, tiny dolls, novelties with glowing details, and other bits of miscellany. There was even a very old biotic amp. The place reminded Kaidan of a dormitory and common room.

The space between the walls was also sectioned; they had technical equipment, though Kaidan couldn't tell what it was for. There was a mess hall of sorts, though it didn't look like they could seat everyone at the same time. Kaidan assumed they ate, slept, and worked in shifts.

As he followed the man through the space, he noticed everyone was looking at him. He remembered having seen Shepard retract his helmet as a gesture of peaceful intent, and brushed at the toggle on his forearm to do the same. As the helmet folded itself into his suit collar, he put on his biggest smile, waved cheerfully at some of the people who were watching his every move. "Hi there," he said as he walked, "How's it goin'?"

"Don't try anything. We're watching you!"

Kaidan held up his omnitool, which was still showing the letter he'd received. "I'm here by invitation," he said cheerfully.

"Be nice." A human sitting in a PVR environment chair, visor up, chastised her colleague. "Biotics can feel safe here."

"Glad to hear it," Kaidan twinkled a biotic barrier partially into place and then relaxed it back to nothing.

"He may be a biotic," a voice from the other side stage-whispered, "But we can't trust the Alliance!"

Kaidan still had the invitation displayed, he turned it toward the person who had spoken from the other side, "Then trust me. I'm here to find out if this place is all your message says it is. It might be just what I've been looking for."

"Nobody cares about us biotics. We have to look out for each other."

"Father Kyle says we biotics have to stick together," said another, near the PVR user. "He's not even biotic. And he was with the Alliance."

The man had led the way to a door on the opposite side of the room and opened it. Kaidan followed him down another short accessway to yet another pressure door. As the door before them opened, the one behind them hissed closed.

Looking at that door, the bearded man sighed as he stopped and turned to face Kaidan, "And in case you hadn't guessed, some of our people have…issues. We haven't tried to get more help from mental health NGOs because of there being so may strings attached. You know…Conatix and all them."

"Yeah," Kaidan nodded his head. "Yet another potential side effect? Sloppy surgery installing neurotronics and you've got problems. Migraines are bad, but until I pulled a posting that got me time in an ICU, even I didn't know how bad it could be. I guess they only took the promising ones to Brain Camp."

"After you talk with the Major, you and I have a lot to talk about." He looked very pleased as he waved a hand around the corner, "But for now, let's go meet the boss."

# # #

Victor Indigo, display Kaidan's helmetcam stream in a window on my ARO.

A translucent window appeared in the top right corner of Shepard's visual field; close enough that he didn't have to move his eyes to see what Kaidan saw and heard, but out of the way enough that he could still focus on IRL things that required his attention.

The image corrected for the instability of Kaidan's walking, but then changed to another, slightly lower view. Kaidan must have opened his helmet, Shepard thought, Good.

A nearby voice distracted him, "If you try to take Father Kyle away from us, you'll end up like those other Alliance soldiers."

Liara folded her arms and turned away from the human biotics as though personally affronted. She looked anxiously around the inside of the sloping airlock floor before looking briefly toward Shepard.

Shepard motioned a hand, palm up, toward the asari. "Dr.T'Soni here…is a civilian. She came with Kaidan because she wanted to meet and encourage human biotics.

"The two Alliance officials who were sent here had been assigned to ask Major Kyle some questions about his activities following separation from the Alliance that may have been illegal. Since they have not reported back, we think they may be hurt, unlawfully detained, or…maybe even dead.

"I was asked to intercede with Major Kyle, make a preliminary determination as to what happened, and – if possible – prevent another incident." He raised his left hand in the general direction Kaidan had exited the foyer. "I've known Kaidan for almost ten years, and when he asked me about visiting this place at about the same time I was asked to speak with Major Kyle, it seemed a good opportunity to do both.

"We are not here to hurt or threaten anyone. But you're all here because you feel you've been wronged simply because you're biotics…and that's unjust. You want justice for the wrongs that have been committed against you, don't you?"

Three of the five looked uncomfortably at each other. One of them shrugged, "Yeah…"

"And the families of those Alliance officials want justice if something has happened to them. We hope they're not dead, but if they are, someone will have to answer for that…because two wrongs do not make a right…do they?"

The one who had spoken scratched at the side of his head. "Uh…I'm…maybe you should talk to Jim or Mo first."

Shepard nodded and shrugged faintly. "I can wait. Let's see what Kaidan and the Major can hash out." He leaned casually against the wall to his left.

Liara watched him for a moment. "Why are you so confident Kaidan will be all right with them?"

"I've known Kyle for longer." He shrugged. "Well…that's misleading. In the Alliance, we trust our superiors, and when I met him, Major Kyle outranked me by several grades. Though I met him about the same time I met Kaidan, Major Kyle and I had a…significant mission together. He and I were the only ones who came back…and I was the only one walking. Even though we haven't interacted regularly, we have a…I suppose you could call it a special bond. We're warbuddies.

"Anyway, because of that, and because he's…or, he was…an Alliance officer, I trust him."

Liara looked anxious, "How long will you wait for Lieutenant Alenko to return?"

"I'm trusting Kyle to be honest with us," he said, as if that was all anyone needed to know.

He knew the biotics were listening.

He subvocalised, Liara, I'm monitoring what Kaidan's suit cameras show is happening to him. Don't worry.

# # #

When Mo returned, Kyle had expected to see Commander Shepard with him.

The Alliance CEVA suit was fairly standardised, so it took a moment for him to realise that the head atop it was not that of Stephen Shepard. He opened his mouth to ask Mo why he'd brought this other person instead.

But before Kyle had a chance to speak, Kaidan, both playing his part to the hilt, and genuinely interested in giving these folks a chance to be all he hoped, strode forward to greet Kyle, hand extended. "Hi, I'm Kaidan Alenko. Thanks for the invitation, thanks an awful lot. I'm really interested in finding out what you're about here, it sounds like you could really do something amazing, make a lot of progress for biotics."

Kyle, finding his hand firmly and vigorously shaken, blinked in surprise. He glanced toward Mo, but couldn't recall why.

Kaidan stepped back and explained, "My current commitment ends in a few weeks, and if you've really got something amazing here, I'll muster out, and join up with you instead. I sure hope it's as great as your message made it sound."

"Uh…thank you…Lieutenant." What happened to Shepard?

"Though I do have a few questions," Kaidan continued, "I heard them call you 'Father Kyle,' and it made me wonder if this is also a religious retreat?"

"I act as a father to these children, abandoned by the Alliance, and by humanity itself," Kyle said. "Not all of them view me this way, but it…makes many of them feel more secure. Most of these people have been rejected by their religions as well, as monkeys, or demons or worse. They need a sense of place…and of family."

"Hm." Kaidan had the distinct impression this was a tiny speech that Kyle had used so many times that he could repeat it when needed. He nodded, hoping the man would have more to say.

Kyle sniffed unsteadily, shivered. "I am…the only one who knows or cares about them. In many cases. Sometimes I…stand in for the mothers and fathers who rejected them as well."

Kaidan thought the man sounded like he was getting a little unstable. Maybe there's more emotional significance here than I know. Best to just let him go on, he thought. It takes more than one nut to make a sundae.

"I heard something about biotic research without the damage that Conatix had caused, about using biotics to heal other biotics? Long-term? Or short-term? Or to at least reduce the side-effects for first-gen users? I have personal experience with that, so it kind of hits home for me. What sort of research are you doing?"

Kyle blinked rapidly, squinted, took a breath. "Mo." As his hand moved across his thigh, and the lump formed by the grenade, he remembered his original plan. "Mohammar is…doing medical research that…respects the children; you should ask him. But–"

"That sounds great," Kaidan smiled broadly, "Can I meet him, talk with him? And maybe some other people? I'd like to know more about what you're doing here."

Kyle forced himself to breathe. "Shepard," he frowned, "I need to see Shepard. Mohammar will talk to you…"

Mo had begun to realise he had brought the wrong guy, but found Kyle's reaction disconcerting. "Wait, I can fix this." He held a hand toward them, "Wait." He'd been standing near the door, so Mo was halfway down the hall before Kyle even finished his sentence.

Kaidan turned to Kyle and continued to engage him, "Well, while we wait, maybe you can tell me what inspired you to start all this. You've got quite an operation going here. What we saw from orbit made it look like you had automining in place, so you have a potential revenue stream. But from what I heard on the way in, you're not actually a biotic, right?" Kaidan ignited his barrier momentarily as a way of indicating he was himself a biotic.

"Uh…no, I am not a biotic, but…it's become very important to me to protect those who are. Uh…" Though it was still in his pocket, Kyle grasped the 72mm disc-shaped grenade more tightly; he found himself becoming uncertain. How could he hurt a biotic like this one?

# # #

The sound of hurried footsteps announced Mo's entry through the doorway to the foyer; he stopped just inside the hatchway. Liara and Shepard both turned to look.

"Father Kyle wants to see you," he spoke to Shepard.

Shepard looked at Liara, then back to Mo. "Can I bring her with me? I'd rather not leave her alone."

Mo shook his head. "He doesn't want to talk to her. He wants to talk to you."

"And I want to talk to him, and we can talk with Dr. T'Soni in the room, too. She's not even Alliance; she's an archaeologist."

Mo folded his arms, seemed to be considering the idea...or resisting it.

"Look, I'm not here to pick a fight." Shepard didn't challenge him directly, taking a couple of steps toward him as if in concession. "I want this to–"

"Then why are you all carrying weapons?" One of the other biotics was pointing at Shepard's thigh hardpoint. She seemed nervous, almost hiding behind one of the others, pleading for him to go away.

"Because there were two other Alliance representatives who came here before us – unarmed – have not reported back. We don't know why they haven't, but if we have to fight our way out…well…we're ready."

He held his arms away from his body in a surrender-like gesture. "But notice we don't have weapons in hand. I'm not here to bully anyone, I just need to talk to the guy in charge, and see if I can get this settled peacefully."

The same woman pointed at Liara, "Then why is she here?"

He turned to look at Liara, then turned back to the young woman. "We had picked up Doctor T'Soni on a planet called Therum. We were taking her to the Citadel when we got asked to look into this, because it wasn't too far out of our way. Biotics are spread kind of thinly across the Alliance, so once she was aboard, she and Kaidan – that other guy who went to talk with Major Kyle – have spent a lot of time together, talking about biotic stuff." He shrugged and gave a wistful smile. "And I get that…it's nice to have something unusual in common.

"Anyway, when Kaidan asked to visit your 'biotic sanctuary' because of that email he'd received, Doctor T'Soni asked if she could come along."

"I am sorry that your people are afraid of the biotically-capable," Liara said. "On Thessia, all biotic abilities are considered gifts."

"All right, whatever." Mo made eye contact with Shepard, waved toward himself, "Bring her along, then. Father Kyle still asked to speak to you." He addressed the four human biotics, "No need for you all to stay here, so the rest of you can go back to whatever it was you were doing. Cammi, I forgot there's a new list of stuff that need–"

Behind him, a mechanical ka-klunk and a brief but noisy notification tone interrupted. The inner airlock status light (directly above the door) switched to green.

Shepard turned to it in surprise, having forgotten the rest of the team was still on their way in. He put a hand aside his mouth (as though shouting, which would send his subvocalized message to the whole team,) I want all weapons holstered or slung right now. I want nothing in your hands when they first see you. We've got a room full of nervous civvies.

"And apparently a nervous Spectre," Ash replied over LOSI, which Shepard heard in his head. "No worries, CO, we're all friendly here. It's too crowded to have weapons out anyway." She paused, likely adding the rest of the team to the comm group, "You heard the man, be sure to wave and smile as you step out of the airlock," Ash advised over LOSI, "And doff your helmets; like he says, we're all friendly here."

Liara stepped through the inner airlock's hatch and into the foyer to get out of the way; Tali was right behind her. The smallest of the group, she looked left and right, put her hands forward, palms up, and bowed slightly in a traditional greeting.

"Ah...introductions might be in order." Shepard pointed at Tali, "This is Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, visiting from the quarian fleet. Ashley Williams, an Alliance marine," Tali had stepped aside and Ash had come through next, with her hair still in its helmet netting. As she stepped aside, Shepard continued, "Garrus Vakarian, from Citadel Security, to, uh…make sure no one's rights get violated…"

Garrus bowed his head toward the human biotics as he hesitated in the hatchway, gesturing for and holding his holographic C-Sec badge close to his torso; behind him, Wrex filled the hatch, and ducked as he started to enter.

"And that's Urdnot Wrex, who pretty much invited himself along. Stay in the airlock there, will ya, buddy? Let's not make our new friends too nervous."

The krogan stopped midstep and looked at Shepard. With a shake of his massive head, he sighed and took a step back into the secondary airlock.

Shepard was momentarily relieved; Wrex's begrudging concession would give him credibility with the biotics.

"We're not nervous." One of the station occupants stepped forward, fists clenched, but down at his sides. "We're not afraid of you!"

Shepard nodded toward the younger man, spoke calmly, "I'm glad to hear that; you shouldn't be. You don't happen to know what happened to the other Alliance officers who were here before us, do you?" He waved a thumb over his shoulder as if into the past. "If we can get that cleared up, we'll get out of your hair."

"We're not afraid of you!" the biotic repeated; he shook himself once, summoning a biotic barrier. "Any of you!"

Another biotic turned, tried to calm him, "Sath…!"

Sath continued to get angrier, "And we have nothing to hide!"

"All right, everybody calm down. Sath, knock it off." Mo was cynical enough to not be surprised to learn there were more soldiers with Shepard; he waved a hand toward the Alliance officer and his minions, "We're taking all of them to Father Kyle, but the bunch of you bring up the rear so you can keep an eye on them." He eyed the motley crew of aliens again, pointed an accusing finger at Shepard, "Remember, we have cameras in here, and we have followers watching the streams."

* * * Glossary * * *

27 seconds: Because of their three-digit hands, quarians math is base-3; 27 seconds (3x3x3) has a single-syllable word in keelish, which contributes to its common usage by quarians. Tali simply read the translation rather than convert it to its nearest human (base-10) analogue of "30"

AFEWS: Anti-Fire Electrical Wave System; popsci dot com/science/article/2011-03/future-firefighters-could-fight-fire-blasts-flame-bending-electricity

ARO: Augmented Reality Overlay

doff: to remove; from "do off," or "doffen;" opposite of "don" (do on,) some readers may be familiar with the lyrics to the Christmas carol "Deck the Halls," "Don we now our gay apparel, Fa la la la la…etc."

HUD: Heads-Up Display

ICU: Intensive Care Unit; at a hospital, where the most dire or tenuous cases are treated

IRL: In Real Life

MDP: Mission Data Packet

NGO: Non-Governmental Organisation

PVR: Polyphase Virtual Reality; a total-immersion VR technology with between two and five channels of data that stimulates multiple regions of the brain, allowing for a nearly complete reproduction of environments or experiences. Because it is a demanding, high-bandwidth technology, it became a measure of network capability, particularly among users who depend upon it. PVR games can be very addictive, particularly to the young.

VRS: Virtual Reality Simulation; simulation of a process or device in VR for analytical purposes as a way of examining equipment without disassembling it.

A/N - With all the media attention on GPTs, it's starting to feel like a soft-takeoff Singularity around here, isn't it? Eliezer Yudkowsky has been making the rounds, trying to convince people this does not work out well by default. Alignment is nowhere near as developed as it needs to be. But at least that is getting some attention now.

KSC work continues apace, my data analyst wife had her first gallery show (sold several thousand dollars of her acrylic impasto art...she's selling it almost as fast as she can paint it, I'm so proud of her,) I've installed and run 7B and 13B models of local GPT, still working on how to turn it into an Expert System with PDFs and DOCs, and I'd like to make it so you can just talk to it. Can we collectively train the bugs out? I suppose only as long as it stays open source, AND the sysadmins who are driving GPT4 and later actually opt to keep alignment goals for the entire species, not their corporate or government overlords like the CCP or the autocracy that is modern Russia. It keeps me up at night.

But I'm really excited at the prospect of using AI to code mods or UE3-to-UE5 porting. (Just saw Premiere Pro does speech-to-text mapping of video footage, and then lets you edit by text.) Since I started publishing this, it's been a goal to turn this story into a playable game (ultimately, an immersive one,) using as many of the original assets as possible. Partly for fun, partly for escape, partly because it could serve as a model for an optimal world.

In other ME:AitD news, I've been messaged by a Russian who wants to translate this into his native language. To me, this is a Very Big Deal. I hold Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality as the Gold Standard of fanfiction, and one of the metrics I consider indicative of it being so was the fact that it had been translated into other languages. I'm profoundly honoured at this development; I hope that any Russian readers will be able to get more out of it, and other people who can read Russian better than English will now have access to it.

I'd apologise for taking so long on this chapter, but since it seems to be my M.O., maybe I should just own it. Also, the next chapter is already written, and 64 is happening quickly. Lots of good character- and world-building dialogue coming up here (most of which was written months ago, and just had to be ordered so it all makes sense.)

Thanks for riding along!