Well, here it is, the next chapter. As always I own neither Mass Effect or Crysis.

CryNet Phantom Operative designation Wraith.

Current assignment: SSV Normandy SR1. Aide to Lt. Com. Shepard, Spectre

Current Location: SSV Normandy SR1, Medical Bay

Current Time: January 17th 20:03

I awoke slowly, my head pounding. I groaned, raising my hand to my head in a vain attempt to block the pain. Noticing that I didn't have my helmet on I opened my eyes to see the sterile white ceiling of a med bay.

Hearing someone move I groaned once more "All right Tigress. What is it this time?"

A small chuckle responded to my question "Tigress isn't here Wraith."

I turned my head to see a familiar redhead sitting on a bed next to mine. "Vanyali." I mumbled.

"How are you feeling Martin?"

"Like shit." I muttered.

"I'm not that surprised, considering what we think happened to you."

"EMP, Plant."

She nodded "It looks like the Thorian really did a number on you."

"It sure did." A new voice cut in and I turned my head to see Dr. Chakwas approaching me. "But that EMP did quite a bit damage as well."

"Doctor. What's the damage?"

"You're lucky that Tigress told me how I can treat you when you're in critical status."

I let loose a weak chuckle "I should have guessed that she would have."

"The team has been rather worried you know, especially Shepard here." She said. "She hardly left your side."

"Doctor!" Vanyali hissed at the Normandy's medical officer, a red tinge appearing on her cheeks.

The doctor merely gave a sly smile before continuing "Now then, the EMP caused all your nanites and nanocells to fail, this included every injury you ever had while wearing the nanosuit so you were walking around with all sorts of injuries." Here she gave me a stern look "Including the injury on your chest from when Shepard hit you with her warp. You should have had me examine the injury when you got it."

"I was fine!"I protested "How was I supposed to know that I was going to get hit by an overpowered EMP?"

"I'll be the judge of that from now on. Tigress has graciously forwarded the necessary scanning protocols and has read me into Crynet's medical corps." Chakwas admonished before turning her attention to her datapad once more. "Your shoulder is healing, if slowly. The EMP interrupted the healing process when it hit you. And healing was, understandably, rather low on its list of priority while you were in the clutches of the Thorian. However, possibly the most damage done, may have been to your mind. Having your suit neural link cut so abruptly, followed by the thorians mental assault, could have inflicted irreparable damage. You are lucky that the nanosuit was able to come back online and was able to shield your neural centers from the majority of the Thorian's spores. I also believe that it may have repaired whatever damage the Thorian did do, while you were unconscious."

I gave a dry chuckle. "Well at least it didn't do any permanent damage. I'll be fine."

Chakwas pursed her lips. "While normally I wouldn't be so quick to agree with you, the nanosuit seems to have everything under control. Remarkable really. It almost takes my job out of the equation. I did however give you a nanite and nanocell infusion that Tigress left with me, and it looks like the nanosuit used them to great effect, replacing all of the destroyed nanites and nanocells with the new ones."

"Well that's good." Shepard smiled. "It looks like our tin-man just needs some oil and he's all good to go."

"Not quite." Chakwas grimaced. "If what my scans picked up are correct, and if I understand them properly, which granted I might not, seeing as I don't know that much about the nanosuit." Chakwas paused for a moment "But well. It seems that you are showing signs of Symbiosis."

The brief silence following her statement was interrupted by Vanyali "Which type?"

"Both." Chakwas said simply.

"Both? But how could you be experiencing both types of symbiosis? I can understand the physcial type, after all it had to heal all of your injuries, so I suppose it would make sense for the suit to begin fusing to the wounds. But that doesn't explain why it would be messing with your body's workings." Shepard said confused.

I hesitated for a moment, remembering something that SECOND had said while I was held by the Thorian. "The suit disabled the symbiosis inhibition systems in order to come up with a countermeasure to the Thorian's spore. I suppose that it needed to get rid of both types to come up with one."

"But I don't think that is the complete cause." Chakwas said shrewdly. "I did a hormone and chemical test, the results of which are in a complete mess. I noticed unbelievably high levels of dopamine, Serotonin, Orexin and a whole cocktail of other chemicals including some kind of synthetic adrenaline, while your Melatonin levels are non-existent."

"In English please." Shepard said obviously not completely understanding the biochemical jargon.

"Pretty much all of his hormones that govern sleep are completely out of wack, along with increased levels of chemicals and hormones that maintain the cognitive functions without the need for sleep all indicate, that Wraith has been awake far longer than the human body was meant to be.

"I see." Shepard turned to glare at me. "I wonder why that is."

I quailed under her stare, not saying anything as Chakwas gave me a glance. "Even CEO's who run around as covert operatives need restful sleep you know. Nothing can compare to real sleep." She berated me turning and walking away "I'll leave you with the commander now."

I watched Chakwas walk away in confusion until I remembered that I wasn't wearing my helmet, something that I had forgotten moments after having noticed it earlier. Panic swept through me as I realized that I might have gotten exposed. "Oh fuck. Who knows?" I asked worriedly.

Shepard grinned apologetically at me "Just the ground team, Chakwas and Joker. I've made it perfectly clear to all of them that they are never to tell anyone else unless you give them the go ahead.

I sighed "Oh that's a relief. I guess tt couldn't have been helped. I guess it really was just a matter of time until it got out. But are you sure that Joker will be able to keep his mouth shut?"

"Don't worry. Joker is smart enough to stay quiet about that. I don't think that anyone will let it slip." Vanyali assured me.

"I can only hope so. So, what were you doing when I was being mind-fucked by a giant plant?" I asked taking a sip of water from a glass standing on a table next to me.

Shepard gave a tight smile at my casual mention of my capture by the Thorian "Oh you know, this and that. We fought a cloned asari in a mutant nanosuit to get to you."

I promptly spat out the water in my mouth before bolting upright "You WHAT?" I immediately regretted the action when my head immediately protested, feeling like every phantom operative was using it as a punching bag all at once. I groaned in pain and slumped back down limply.

"Are you alright?" Vanyali asked, concerned.

I merely waved my hand limply "Did I hear you right? The Thorian created a nanosuit?"

"Well, not quite. It was similar to the nanosuit but quite a bit different. More like a knockoff. I don't think that it could cloak, but it was able to soak up a lot of damage and was a lot faster and stronger than normal. The asari that was wearing it mentioned that the Thorian was going to make an army of them. It called you an 'organic machine.'"

"Semi-organic." I muttered "Wait, did you say an asari was wearing it?" I asked astounded.

"Yeah." Vanyali nodded. "It used biotics very well, they were rather powerful." She mused while I gaped at her speechless. "We brought it onboard. I figured you would be interested in studying it for yourself."

"Where is it?"

"In the cargo bay."

The moment I heard those words I immediately sat up. This time the sudden motion didn't hurt my head only a bit lightheaded, but that soon passed. The moment it did, I swung my legs off the bed and stood up. The lightheaded feeling returned for a moment stronger than ever, forcing me to stay still for a minute.

"What the hell are you doing?" Shepard asked me surprised by my sudden movement. "You aren't fully healed yet!"

I didn't respond because I was still feeling woozy and shocked from the bombshell that Shepard had just dropped on me. Within a minute I began feeling better and I reached out and grabbed my helmet from the table next to me. "This is too important. I need to check this out now." I said as I placed my helmet over my head.

Shepard sighed in exasperation. "It will still be there later. Now you need to get fixed up."

I shook my head. "No this is too important to wait." I told her striding out of the med bay, ignoring Shepard's protests that were soon joined by those of Doctor Chakwas. Heading straight for the elevator I punched the call button waiting impatiently for it to arrive.

"What exactly is so important that you need to rush to do?" I turned to see Shepard leaning up against the wall next to me, leveling a sharp gaze at me.

"Three reasons." I told her. "Firstly, I can't just leave something like that lying around. No offense to you of course, but this is top secret stuff here. I'm sure that the Shadow Broker, or Cerberus, or anyone for that matter would pay quite the price for even some basic scans of that thing." I paused for a moment when the elevator doors slid open and I walked in, followed by Shepard. "Second, if it can use biotics, then I need to get that thing scanned immediately. That data would greatly benefit CryTech's work on finally implementing biotics and aliens in the nanosuit program. Hell, it might even be helpful in finding a countermeasure against biotics."

"And the last reason?" Shepard asked.

I gave her a slightly worried glance. "The last reason-" I was cut off by the elevator doors sliding open accompanied by panicked shouting. "-is that it may not be dead." I finished charging out of the elevator. There I saw that my fears had been realized, the Thorian's nanosuited asari was currently engaged in a brutal fight with Wrex.

I looked around the cargo bay for a weapon, my suit instantly highlighted a table off to the side of the cargo bay. Sprinting towards it I grabbed a majestic pistol lying on it and spun around to take aim at the cloned nanosuit. Pulling the trigger, I sent a shard of metal straight into its back causing it to stumble forward, straight into a vicious punch from Wrex that sent it flying. However it was able to quickly right itself and immediately turned to glare at me before flaring up blue and sending a bolt of dark energy at me. The bolt slammed into me with the force of a cannon, sending me flying back at the wall causing me to loose my grip on the Majestic. Quickly changing my angle mid-flight I hit the wall with my feet, kicking off the moment I did to go flying straight back at the mutant which wasn't able to react in time.

I landed on top of it, crushing it down beneath me before I raised my fist above my head, glaring down at the clone mercilessly.

"Maximum power."

It's eyes flickered up to my fist a moment before I brought it slamming down onto its head with crushing force. The skull cracked loudly as my fully powered punch smashed into it, causing some green blood to trickle out of a few cracks that had appeared. Raising my fist I sent it cracking down once more. This time the head exploded sending green blood and gore splattering up against my visor. Slowly standing up I shook my hand to rid myself of some of the gore which was already slowly being absorbed by my suit.

"Spirits! I thought we killed that thing already." Garrus exclaimed as I stood over its now headless corpse.

"I thought this might have happened. The Thorian did one hell of a job." I knelt down next to the corpse and studied it.

Ashley walked up to glare at the corpse in disgust. "I'm honestly not interested in how well of a job the Thorian did. I just want to get rid of it." She turned towards Shepard. "We should space it."

I shook my head. "Not gonna happen. We need to learn everything we can about it. This is going to a CryNet base."

"With all due respect, that's not your decision. This is Shepard's ship." Ashley argued turning back to face me.

"And yet this is something that is based off of the nanosuit 2.0 and as such Ceph technology. Because of that, Shepard has no more authority over this corpse than the Alliance does."

"The Commander is a Spectre! Spectres are above the law!"

I rolled my eyes in annoyance "Williams, keep your nose out of business you don't understand. In accordance with the CryNet Accords, Section A: Any and all technology and/or data based on or derived from the nanosuit or Ceph technology is to be handed over to CryNet immediately and without exception by all Citadel associated races. This includes the Spectres, Salarian STG even the council itself." Standing I grabbed the nanosuit by the collar and pulled it up, before turning and dragging it toward the elevator, leaving a slight trail of green blood behind behind it.

"Bullshit! CryNet can't override Council Spectres!"

"Williams!" Shepard admonished sharply "Let it be."

"But Commander-!"

"Chief, He's right. This stuff is way over our heads." Shepard told her gently.

Unceremoniously tossing the corpse into the elevator I did a half turn, looking over my shoulder at Ashley who was looking very disgruntled. "It's for the safety of the galaxy, you know." I said softly as the elevator doors slid closed behind me.

CryNet Phantom Operative designation Wraith.

Current assignment: SSV Normandy SR1. Aide to Lt. Com. Shepard, Spectre

Current Location: SSV Normandy, Wraith's office

Current Time: January 17th 20:49

Immediately upon arriving in my office I began hooking the Thorian's nanosuit up to some sophisticated sensors that I had brought with me.

"CARLA."

"Yes Director?"

"I'm sending some scan results to you. I want you and CRYSTAL to get to work analyzing it immediately." I motioned towards the clone. "And please open up a channel to the other Directors. What time is it over there by the way?"

"It is 10:49 on the Prism." CARLA told me as the scanners began moving around the Thorian's creature and various data began compiling on one of my screens. "Opening communication channels to CryNet board now."

"Thank you CARLA." I smiled, taking off my helmet as three holograms appeared on my desk.

"Ah! Martin. You had us worried there for a bit." Niel greeted me as soon as he saw me. "Your suit signals went down for quite some time before coming back online with warning lights all over the board."

"Yeah," I rubbed my neck for a moment "We ran into some. . . unexpected problems on Feros."

"Unexpected is one way to put it." Derek told me. "I'd say the only thing that could make your signals go down like that are nanosuit jammers and EMP's. I better hope that it wasn't a jammer or we might have some big problems."

I shook my head. "No, no jammer. But you're right about the EMP."

Axel raised an eyebrow. "Why would the geth be using an EMP? It seems rather. . . Counter intuitive. For the geth at least."

I shrugged "It would be strange. If it were the geth that EMPed me."

"So who did?" Axel asked "I don't know who else would be on Feros that could be a threat to you."

"The colonists did." I said seriously. "Or rather, colonists under control of the Thorian."

"What do you mean, 'Under control of the Thorian?' What's the Thorian? And how was it controlling colonists?" Niel asked me.

"The Thorian. A large sentient plant, able to infect unprotected people with an airborne spore. This spore targets the brain and with sufficient time can control its victim. The Thorian creates some kind of neural link to the victim through which its able to directly control the one that it infected."

"Well. That's... unexpected." Axel muttered.

"So you're saying that this, Thorian, brainwashedthe colonists on Feros. Made them build an EMP, with which they knocked your suit out?" Derek asked. "Why?"

"To create a mutant, fully organic version of the nanosuit." I stated bluntly.

Silence greeted my statement before. "Care to repeat that?" Niel asked incredulously. "Because I swear I just heard you say that it tried to create a fully organic version of the nanosuit, which you know as well as I do, is not possible."

"It didn't try." I said. "It did. And what's more, this organic nanosuit was worn by a cloned asari, and it was able to use biotics extensively."

Even more disbelieving stares greeted that statement. "CARLA, send what you found to the other directors please."

"Transmitting data." CARLA's voice said, and a moment later one of my screens popped up with various information on it. "Directors, as you can see, here are the basic scans for the organic nanosuit. We are still analyzing the data from director Duncan as it comes in."

The extremely perky female voice of CRYSTAL continued "It is such a wonderful find! This data is a massive treasure trove of information and could lead to some fascinating new developments for the nanosuit program!"

Derek smiled slightly as he rubbed his eyebrow "Yes, yes CRYSTAL. But about this suit now."

"Oh yes. I'm sorry, I got sidetracked by all the wonderful data here. Oh look here! The possibilities for biotic nanosuits! How wonderful-"

"CRYSTAL!"

"Oh, so sorry. Anyway, this is a new unique lifeform. It is unique in that it contains elements from plants, animals, fungi and bacteria to create a new kind of life form. This lifeform does similar things as the nanosuit, only is not nearly as fast or powerful, and is entirely organic. As such it cannot be hacked, or disrupted by technology such as an EMP."

"What do you mean by 'not as fast or powerful' CRYSTAL?" Derek asked.

"The 'muscle' strands that take the place of the nanofibers responsible for the increased strength and speed of the nanosuit, are no where near as strong or fast as the synthetic muscle fibers in the nanosuit. I believe that it also does not have the same abilities regarding the more advanced features of the nanosuit, the ones contained within the Deep Layers. Unfortunately I cannot be certain until we get the complete scan data."

"Right right." Derek muttered.

"Interesting." I muttered. "But what about its biotic applications?"

"So unbelievable! It appears that this 'suit' was able to incorporate element zero nodes within its nerves, just like what happens to normal biotics. I believe that we could implement these within the nanosuit in order to make it compatible with biotics!"

I raised my hand "Wait wait wait. Hold on. How would that work? We tried to introduce Eezo nodes to the nanosuit. It failed! The nanosuit notices its danger to the wearer and immediately rejects it! What's changed?"

"Yes the nanosuit rejects the Eezo because its dangerous to the wearer. Just like it does to many other things that are potentially harmful to the user. However, the Thorian's nanosuit is different! The Thorian obviously created a new 'nanosuit' by itself. It created it with the Eezo in mind. That nanosuit doesn't reject the Eezo because the Eezo wasn't introduced to it. It was created with the Eezo already in place. I believe, that if we are able to get this in our hands on the Prism, we will be able to create a way to create a nanocatalyst so that we can introduce it into the nanosuit."

I frowned "Why don't I just do that now? I could just let my suit inject its own nanites into it and harvest the nanocatalyst that it gets in return."

CRYSTAL tutted at me "Tsk, tsk, tsk. You really should know that the suit's nanites are not that efficient. It would most likely require more than one of those lifeforms for you to get enough nanocatalyst to procure the necessary change."

I rolled my eyes "I know how the nanosuit works CRYSTAL. I know that one batch of nanocatalyst wouldn't instantly complete the adaptation. But I also know that the suit is capable of starting the evolution with just a tiny amount of nanocatalyst, albeit it would take more time. Further catalyst merely increases the speed at which the reaction takes place."

"And do you know how long that reaction could take? It could take anywhere between a day and a hundred years. We would be able to fully create enough nanocatalyst to facilitate changes in all nanosuits within a year, more likely only after a few months."

I sighed surrendering to her logic "Fine. Fine. I will get this to the prism as soon as possible."

Derek rubbed his hands together excitedly "Excellent. I can't wait to get my hands on that suit."

"This makes me wish that I were still a scientist and not an operative." I muttered in envy, wishing to have to chance to continue working on what has been my life project for years now.

"I hear ya." Derek acknowledged. "But don't worry, we'll get it skinned as soon as possible."

Before I could respond I was distracted by a flashing red light and the sound of an alarm. Furrowing my eyebrows I opened the alert. My eyes widened in surprise as I read it.

Niel immediately noticed my surprise. "What is it Martin?"

Axel answered for me, obviously also having gotten the alert "Asteroid X57 is showing strange behavior."

"What kind of behavior?" Derek asked.

I looked up at him "All comms go down and then the fusion torches that propel the Asteroid are activated. It's way past the point that the fusion torches should be on. Now its just propelling the asteroid toward Terra Nova."

Niel immediately understood the situation "A terrorist attack using the asteroid to pulverize the colony there?"

I nodded gravely "Sure looks like it. I'm deploying Raven Team to the asteroid now. They will no doubt figure out what's going on there."

"Understood. I will continue monitoring the situation. If any new information crops up I will immediately send it to both Raven and you." The director of CryTell told me.

"Excellent. Whoever these terrorists are are in for a world of hurt." I muttered, more to my self than the other directors.

"Indeed."

"Well, if there isn't anything else then I suppose I should be going." I said looking at the three directors.

Niel was the only one who didn't give me the ok to go, but rather was reading something on his end. "Actually, it looks like there is."

I raised an eyebrow "Well? Don't keep us waiting."

"The Council wants to discuss something with the entire board."

"The Council?" I was rather surprised with this request, there usually wasn't much reason for the council to want to discuss something with the entire board. They usually just dealt with one of us at a time. "Very well, put them through."

I leaned back in my chair and steepled my hands infront of me as the three holographic figures of the council appeared on my desk. I inclined my head slightly "Greetings. How can CryNet be of assistance to the Council."

"I assume you are aware of Commander Shepard's mission to hunt down the traitor Saren?" Speratus asked needlessly.

Axel nodded "We are aware yes. We do, after all have an agent on the Normandy."

Valern continued "We believe that we may have found Saren's base of operations. If we are correct we believe that it is on Virmire." Here Valern paused for a moment with a slightly sour look on his face. "We wanted to, inquire, whether or not you had any more information on Virmire that could maybe help us determine whether or not we are correct."

Axel shook his head after a moment of perusing his computer. "Unfortunately we have no further information on Virmire, other than what is public knowledge."

Tevos sighed. "We were afraid of that. As such we are planning on sending an STG team to Virmire to investigate."

"And you want us to send a Phantom team in with them? Am I correct?" I asked shrewdly.

Speratus nodded "To put it bluntly, yes."

"If we are correct in thinking that Virmire is Saren's base of operations then we will need more than a single STG team to deal with it." Tevos said.

"And while we could assign another STG team, we believe that it would be a misallocation of resources." Valern finished.

In other words, another STG team would not be as effective as a Phantom team. I however didn't give any sign of my thoughts as I gave them my offer. "I can have one phantom team join your STG team and another on standby should they be necessary. Get us in contact with the STG commander and we will sort out everything else on our end."

Tevos seemed slightly surprised by my offer "That is. . . more than sufficient. We will be informing you of whom to contact within the next day. Good day Directors." She finished as the Council faded away.

"Two teams Martin?" Niel asked me surprised.

I nodded "Yeah, if this really is Saren's base then we should and can expect heavy resistance."

"So who are you sending?"

"I'll send Serpent and Raptor. Serpent will go in initially with the STG team while Raptor deploys covertly on the planet surface to await confirmation of Saren's base."

Derek raised an eyebrow, "Yet you said that the second team would be on standby."

"And they are. Standby until confirmation of the base. Don't worry I'll deal with it. Anything else?"

This time all the directors shook their heads. "Well then. I'd better get on this."

So there it is. The aftermath of Feros and the groundwork for Virmire. We won't be going to Virmire for a while, as first the STG and Phantom teams have to go to Virmire, find out what is going on, and then send that info back to the council.

Up next will be an interlude chapter which will have a flashback type scene.

As always, if you have any questions or feedback, don't hesitate to ask.

~LEGION