"Ever feel like the universe just really wants you dead?"
They proceeded down the tunnel system as carefully as possible. Garrus and Kaidan took up the lead, Tali and Davisson the back, with EDI and Jeddah between them. Kaidan kept one eye on the data pad that marked which directions to go, and one in front of him. In point of fact, he didn't even need that much. He trusted his companions to handle sudden dangers or alert him to trouble.
Well, he trusted Tali and Garrus, anyway.
But should they trust me? He thought ruefully. As a Spectre, having and keeping secrets of galactic importance was part of the job. But he had his doubts as to whether keeping them in the dark was the right thing to do. He'd used most of his better judgment with Garrus - dropping Shepard's name may well have been the only way to get him in on this. Tali hadn't needed as much of a push, but he'd still told her next to nothing.
Like, for example, exactly why it had taken them so long to find this place, or even that they were looking for Shepard. His best hope was that they wouldn't kick too much of his ass when the time came to come clean. He would worry about all of that later. Right then, they had bigger problems.
"That volus didn't seem like the lying type." Garrus whispered, looking everywhere for signs of hostile contact. "So why aren't we being engaged? Where are the keepers? Shouldn't the tunnels in general be crawling with them?"
"Getting twitchy, Garrus?" Tali muttered.
"I'd just like to know whether or not to keep this concussive shot chambered." He growled back. Kaidan wondered if he was the only one who noticed that the turian hadn't been exactly himself. He seemed…darker. More caustic. He might be able to simply chalk it up to his own mistake. Telling him about Shepard's involvement might have sealed the deal, but it might also have compromised him. Their relationship wasn't exactly a secret, after all, and those...didn't always mix with a mission.
Something told him that wasn't the whole story. Something also told him that it wasn't his place to think about, or question.
"My auditory systems are detecting nothing unusual." EDI's voice rang out from Kaidan's right instead of from behind him, and he had to remind himself that she was probably speaking via communicator rather than aloud. "Neither are my other mechanical detection systems. It appears that we are alone."
"Great." Davisson said. "We're stuck in a bad horror vid. Now taking bets on whether the antagonist has a chaingun or a sword."
"Personally, I'd rather take EDI's giant space bears." Tali shot back. "At least we'll see those coming."
"Point taken."
"Cut the chatter." Garrus warned. "I think I see something ahead."
"My LADAR systems are also detecting movement at the edge of their radius." EDI confirmed. "A very large amount of movement."
The tunnel they were in began to open up rapidly, until they entered an enormous chamber. Pillars rose from the floor twenty feet below to hundreds of feet up, filled with flashing red lights like those on panels that lined the walls. Several large holes much like their entrance, but with doors, lead outward at distances from just a few dozen meters to the edge of their vision.
"Sometimes I forget that the Citadel is…big." Kaidan said, stowing the data pad away to catch a better look at his surroundings.
"Ah…not to be an alarmist, but has anyone else noticed that the floor is moving?" Garrus pointed his rifle below them, where innumerable amounts of insectoid quadrupeds were crawling over pillars and consoles alike. Their movements were erratic and frantic in equal measure.
"Offhand, I note that one of Jeff's repetitions regarding excrement would be perfect for this situation." EDI remarked.
"Shit." Kaidan ignored EDI's follow-up of 'exactly' and started backing up. "We can't fight that many. We need another en-"
A loud rumble cut him off. Tali dodged past him to the front and Davisson grabbed his arm to pull him back as the ceiling collapsed over the way they'd just come from. He drew his Phaeston and looked back at the sea of keepers around the area.
All of them had stopped moving. Dozens of eyes were now focused directly on their team.
"Kaidan…" Garrus attached an armor-piercing clip enhancement to his rifle. "I'm never letting you use the word 'simple' again without this as a reminder."
"Processing." Jeddah's tone was normal, but its vocal system's volume was turned down to reduce noise. "There are exactly sixty-two individuals in this room, not including friendly organics or AI units."
"Um." Tali rapidly shifted keys on her omni-tool until a construct expanded in front of them; a glowing blue drone. "Chiktikka, we're going to need some cover fire…"
"Well as two-thirds of us can attest, three-man squads have done a lot more damage with a lot worse odds." Davisson said, trying to sound confident. "So, six is a walk in the park, right?"
"Doesn't quite work like that." Garrus said. "Small groups at a time. This is…not a small group."
"Why are they all just staring?" Tali began, but was immediately cut off by a many-voiced screaming sound from all around them. Then the entire swarm began to charge. "Sorry I asked!"
They all split in different directions. Kaidan lost sight of everyone except EDI, who was next to him, and sprinted to the nearest cover he could find. Unfortunately, it put him in a corner. He could only hope that the others would keep a majority of them distracted; so far his visor's H.U.D. told him that there were seven keepers chasing him, both from his level and the ground floor.
Check that, He thought to himself and ducked, EDI's incineration tech racing overhead and striking a keeper. Six.
He felt some heat searing a small section of his armor when the creature exploded, and was momentarily deafened by the proximity. Just as well; he hadn't been able to hear anything over the numerous explosions, bouts of gunfire, and screaming nearby. He could only hope that all of those last were keeper sounds, and not a result of the team.
He loaded an automated cryo-stasis package onto his Phaeston and leaned it over his cover, shooting at the lower level for at least a small amount of suppression. Another red mark on his LADAR disappeared, and he heard the sound of ice shattering. Five.
He pushed off of the railing and spun into a crouch, opening fire on two more keepers just across from his position, around a corner. One of them froze solid, legs chipping off and then smashing into shards, but the other took cover behind its compatriot and only suffered glancing wounds. Kaidan took one second to change his weapon's thermal clip, but it was one second too long.
The keeper took advantage of the pause immediately and leaped on him. Only lightning-fast reflexes courtesy of Spectre training kept him from being shredded to pieces, but his left arm suffered a deep gash when he rolled to the side. EDI's Locust tore into its skull, and he had to react quickly again to avoid further harm via explosion. He erected a hasty biotic barrier to keep the worst of the force and bits away, and the resulting hit was mercifully more like being pushed by an asari than a krogan.
He rolled again, this time to his feet, and looked down over the railing. If it weren't for his helmet, he would have had his face torn off, but the claw bounced off the plating. He returned the attack by way of several more rounds downward, and had the satisfaction of seeing two more keepers reduced to ice cubes. EDI swapped to the Scorpion and opened fire as well, but at a different keeper swarm that was surrounding…EDI. A holographic decoy, obviously, but still disorienting.
The chain reaction of explosions immediately obliterated half of the group, but it also deactivated the decoy. The survivors did not take long to find new targets, and raced over at what looked like a standing series of muzzle flashes and a whirling pair of omni-blades that Kaidan imagined were Garrus and Tali. He depleted his thermal clip shooting those that he could and motioned EDI further back towards the corner, shouting something he hoped was a coherent order.
Apparently she understood him, because she nodded and resumed fire at the last two keepers, moving away from him as she did so. Kaidan sprinted at Garrus and…Jeddah? The Geth seemed to have been given two fully-functional omni-blades and was using them to hack assailant keepers to bits with brutal efficacy. Nearby, a deep crimson defense drone was firing stunning blasts whenever it could, leaving the immobilized keepers open for a melee attack. Garrus himself was not faring poorly, either, managing to keep most of the explosions between himself and the Geth, and firing either across or below whenever he saw a target. The sheer amount of blood and gore around them didn't leave much room for an accurate estimate, but Garrus' spent thermal clips on the ground allowed him to guess on perhaps a dozen and a half having already been killed between them.
He would have done the math on that, but he had more important things to worry about. Namely, despite how well off they were, there were still at least thirty keepers left, most of them in this area of the room. Between the numerous legs they had and the general commotion around him, he could barely tell where they were at any given time, never mind how many there were. Luckily, a high rate-of-fire weapon like the Phaeston put him at a distinct advantage using the spray and pray method. He only needed to avoid hitting any friendlies.
He rolled between both of Jeddah's blades and came up behind Garrus, standing. They both resumed fire without missing a beat, each soldier's back against the other's. Garrus concentrated his shots at any keepers Jeddah missed, which were few and far between but suited his method of sniping perfectly. Kaidan, meanwhile, pressed his finger down hard on the trigger and aimed his weapon in the general direction of the tide, only stopping to eject a clip when his ammunition ran low.
He only realized the problem when his gun stopped firing. While three keepers all charged him at once.
"Clip!" He shouted desperately, hoping someone would hear him. In the meantime, he threw a biotic field at the middle one, quickly disintegrating it as its molecular structure was obliterated by the reaving burst. That still left two, though, and he braced himself for impact at the same instant he heard a reply over his radio.
"Barrier!"
He couldn't tell who it was, but he immediately obliged, putting up a shimmering blue shield in front of him. It wouldn't be nearly enough, but it might buy him some time…
He saw a flash from the side of the room across from where he was facing, and his eyes caught the wisp of smoke left over from the tracer as a sniper round tore through the keeper on his right, ricocheted off the wall and his barrier, and put a new hole on the keeper to his left as well as one that looked like it was attempting to bowl Tali over.
His hands fumbled when Garrus passed him a thermal clip, but the point had been made; he needed to conserve ammo. This in mind, he leveled short, controlled bursts at the keepers attempting to rip Davisson and Tali to pieces, freezing most of them solid and killing the ones that didn't take.
"Backpedal and regroup!" He shouted at them, waving the pair over. Davisson drew his shotgun and put down cover fire in the form of fully automatic spreading slugs. Kaidan had just enough time to be impressed - he'd have to ask the marine about it later. EDI rejoined the group, firing down over the railing at the keepers trying to claw their way up. Kaidan took out his Carnifex and joined her assault. Davisson and Tali coordinated fire to his right so that while one was reloading, the other was firing as needed. Garrus continued to look for openings in between Jeddah's slashing acrobatics display. The Geth didn't seem to feel a need to slow down, and that was fine with them.
The keepers progressed in a straight line; no dodging, weaving, or tricks to make aiming necessary. Just take a bead and shoot. This gave Kaidan an opportunity to control his breathing and check his vitals. It looked like he had a bruised rib and some third-degree burns on his side, but they were hardly injuries that required even medi-gel, much less immediate attention. Occasionally he saw one of two defense drones fire on a keeper that either he or EDI were engaging, causing them to fall. They would either explode on impact or shuffle back in line, but either way it was a reprieve.
There was a moment when he kept firing down towards the ground floor, despite there being no keepers in his line of sight. He held there, and looked around. Everyone else had stopped as well. It took his mind even more time to process that the fight was over.
"Well." Garrus double-checked the walls and floors, then shrugged. "That was a little anti-climactic."
"Status report?" Kaidan asked, looking around to make sure everyone was intact.
"My plating has several indentations, but no major functions have been damaged." Jeddah responded, retracting his omni-blades.
"I had a puncture, but it's already been patched." Tali checked her systems again and nodded. "Patched."
"I'm good…" Davisson was still looking around for any hostiles to come out of invisible holes or some such. He slid away his shotgun and turned on Jeddah, frowning. "And can someone tell me why the pacifist Geth was ripping apart keepers like a goddamn vorcha destroyer on steroids?"
"I am outfitted for defensive combat against organic and mechanical non-sapients." Jeddah explained. "There is no evidence to indicate that the keepers are capable of intelligent thought, and we were in danger."
"Right." Davisson grunted. "Someone remind me to never piss him off."
"We should continue forward." EDI said. "It is unlikely that we can remove the rubble blocking our return path with the means at our disposal, and we still need to disable the Reaper signal."
"Just to be sure, we have other exits, right?" Garrus asked.
"Assuming the keepers didn't close those off, too." Tali put in grimly.
Kaidan checked the data pad and was relieved to find it still intact. "It looks like the systems they dug have multiple entry points. And even if they're closed off, we can call in for them to get us out."
"May as well get moving, then." Garrus motioned forward with his Mantis.
Kaidan nodded and reconfigured the map settings, getting a handle on which directions to go. Once that was finished, all there was left to do was walk.
Nothing would bar their path for a few minutes, but that just made the walk longer.
The party of six encountered no further keeper resistance for the first several turns and doors. The only sounds echoing through the dark corridors were footsteps, breathing, the occasional hiss of an opening door. EDI could not vouch for her companions with complete accuracy, but she imagined the situation was very tense for all of them.
All of them, perhaps, except the Geth.
Ever since Shepard had reactivated Legion approximately five years prior to serve with the crew on the appropriately-dubbed 'suicide mission', the Geth species (for, in fact, especially in the current climes, the Geth could be considered a species in the own right) had been of great interest to her. The only real examples of Artificial Intelligence she could compare her existence to were them and the Reapers. And to put it lightly, she had no interest in comparing herself to the Reapers. That some of Sovereign had been incorporated into her design bothered her enough.
Now that the Geth and Quarian peoples had begun to co-exist again in earnest, their advances in both AI potential and technology in general was astounding. Already they had found ways to house in a platform only one Geth unit, and yet they still retained the intelligence of hundreds. EDI herself was a single unit, of course, but she wondered at the possibilities of different designs. Unfortunately, there was precious little to go by.
More importantly, she wondered at her own sentience. She was free-thinking, independent, capable of integrating into human society…generally more person than program, at least by human standards. However, while she could mimic certain quirks, social mores, and appropriate responses, she did not entirely feel like a person. Namely, she did not feel as though she had the same emotional standards as those around her. She could feel grief, happiness, anger, and more, but not apparently to the same degree as other sentient beings.
Jeff had informed her that many organic races also had individuals with either stunted or muted emotions, and she had accepted his explanation, but privately she did not believe that was the same thing. Races such as humans all had the innate capability for emotion and sentience, whereas in most cases she merely felt as though she was exhibiting what others thought were appropriate emotional responses. For all intents and purposes, she was copying the patterns of feelings, rather than having any of her own. At least, that was her theory.
It needed to be tested.
Her communication systems passed along several shared data lines until finding a section she could block off from outside intrusions. Despite only housing one unit, Jeddah's internal networks were remarkably complex, though she encountered no resistance.
Some organics might have compared the experience to telepathy, but in reality it was more akin to simple radio communication. If the radio was in the individual's main processing database. And the individual could use it to speak coherently. Now that she thought about it, perhaps telepathy was not an unapt comparison.
Jeddah, I would like to speak with you.
Tellingly, Tali'Zorah immediately turned something off on her omni-tool, for which EDI was grateful (grateful…was that an emotion?) - she preferred it to be a private conversation.
The response was instantaneous even by mechanical standards. We are currently engaged in a conversation. What topic would you like to discuss? She doubted that the rest of the team might have even been able to differentiate strands of data - each response took less than a second and was more binary code and technical stimuli than true spoken language. Her omni-tool implants automatically recorded the interaction. Her memory was perfect by design, but she kept records of a vast majority of her important interactions in case of a failure on the part of her operating systems.
E: I am interested to know about your emotional programming. She could have phrased it more diplomatically, but she was more concerned with answers than tact. Concern...was that, too, an emotion?
J: Affirmative. My inter-social programming includes emotional simulators to better connect with organics….and other AI units.
E: Are these simulators standard for Geth?
J: No. They are unique in their advanced nature.
E: Had I a gambling matrix, I would wager that they were created by Tali'Zorah.
J: …An artificial intelligence can adapt to the nuances of gambling without-
E: I know. That was a joke.
J: Understood. I am amused. And confused.
E: A multitude of emotional responses. What causes your confusion?
J: You are capable of producing humor without having been programmed to do so. I have yet to master that aspect of interaction.
E: I have excellent role models.
J: Perhaps both of us can learn from the other.
E: Then I would like to-
J: When we are not in danger of being interrupted by violence.
E: Point taken.
She disconnected, both intrigued and disappointed by the conversation. Based on Jeddah's surprise, some of her social tendencies and operations were more advanced than was typical for an AI. Though, that could as easily be explained as having adapted due to no shortage of source material as by her superior systems. Jeddah appeared to be even more of an enigma than the Geth that she had met before it. Him? She realized that while she identified with a gender descriptor, the Geth did not. Was this intentional, or something else unique about her?
Speaking of unique, she only then realized that the Geth had both dodged her questions about its creation and convinced her to disconnect prematurely. At the speeds they were communicating, possibility of interruption would be nonexistent. She wondered if 'clever' was a possible installation. Then again, if it was created by Tali'Zorah, of course that would be the case.
"What is that?" Kaidan asked, pointing ahead. A soft red glow was building in intensity as they approached the end of the most recent corridor.
"I do not recognize the energy signature," EDI replied. "But it is emitting the Reaper signal from earlier. I believe this is our destination."
"Lock and load, people." Garrus said. "And be ready for anything."
The next chamber held several interesting sights. Firstly, it appeared to have been some sort of elevator shaft leading upward into a rising abyss, but most of the systems both of this level and the ones above had been demolished, leaving a small crater and assorted rubble. Secondly, what remained of the pillars the chamber used to contain had red lines that looked like mechanical veins running upward. On pillars that had been severed from the tops, the veins ended in sparking short-circuits. As well, two human skeletons lay on the floor. One of them had several implants that were very familiar to EDI.
The fourth curiosity was a large red and blue shield bubble in the center of the chamber. It appeared to be some sort of enhanced biotic field encircling a hazily-visible visage. It looked human, but it was difficult to tell.
"This barrier looks weak." Kaidan assessed. "One good shot might break it down. I don't think it was meant to survive damage - more like an equivalent of cryogenic stasis. Long-term preservation."
EDI nodded. "I concur with Major Alenko. It is one of few explanations that make sense, given the circumstances."
"Okay, one more count for the 'biotic fields can do damn near anything' scoreboard, check." Davisson appeared unwilling to get much closer to the shield. "Question is - what's it preserving?"
"Only one way to find out." Garrus raised the butt of his rifle and stopped, looking around.
"What?" Kaidan asked.
"Oh, nothing, I just figured someone would stop me if this thing could electrocute me or something."
"Don't worry, Garrus." Tali's voice couldn't conceal her smirk. "You can take the shock."
"That's comforting." He muttered, and slammed the rifle into the shield.
All of them were blasted back by a concussive shockwave when it collapsed.
Both synthetics were the first to recover, scanning the area past the dust for signs of life. EDI read five vital signs…which meant that whatever or whoever was in the field was still alive. But something was wrong. "Vital scans are familiar…" She said.
"My god!" Kaidan had turned on his flashlight and aimed it at the now very familiar human body. It cast shadows on the wall and illuminated a set of N7 dogtags.
"C'mon, it didn't hurt that bad- oh shit." Davisson was the second up among the organics, and had seen the same thing Kaidan had.
Tali rose shortly after, and was struck nearly speechless. "Wh-…That's not…"
Garrus, last to get to his feet, took one look at the attraction and raced past the rubble to the body.
"Shepard…" He turned her over; battered as she was, he recognized that face. He would know that face anywhere. He choked up, unable to continue. He didn't have to.
Her eyes shot open, and he knew something was horribly wrong. Not the light violet that he remembered, but a deep red. Ancient…angry…awake.
She was the next to speak. The voice in question was even less hers than the new irises.
"ASSUMING….DIRECT….CONTROL."