Sorry for the late update, University started and tyranny came out two weeks ago so any free time I had was being spent playing that. Great great game I really enjoy playing. I can only recommend it if you're interested in CRPG's of that nature.

CryNet Phantom Operative designation Wraith

Current Assignment: Raven Team, Combating hostile geth presence.

Current Location: The Citadel, Presidium

Current Time: February 28th, 02:19

"It's a real mess down in the presidium. We've got geth and krogan all over the damn place and C-Sec special response is not handling it all too well. They're used to dealing with criminals and the possible gang, not a full scale military invasion." I said, looking over my team that had arrived just before the geth did.

"At least the turians already have a military presence on the station." Viper commented.

"Very true. They're still redeploying but once they make it to the presidium they'll take the fight to the geth. The council is being evacuated at the moment so we don't need to worry about them. However reports indicate that the alliance embassies are under siege by the geth and are requesting assistance. So our job is going to be VIP extraction."

"VIP extraction? Hey no offense boss but don't you think we're a little overqualified for that?" Typhoon asked. "Besides why are we even wanting to extract Udina anyway. Isn't he the reason why you ended up facing a whole turian infantry regiment?"

"That 'whole turian infantry regiment' is soon going to be taking the fight to the geth Typhoon." I answered. "Besides we're also trying to extract his staff as well. Not to mention the leverage that will give us over him and by extension the alliance. I'm sure the directors will find valuable ways to use that leverage." I paused for a second "Also it would be a great opportunity to gather some intel don't you think? During the chaos no one will notice if someone takes a little peek through their databanks."

"I like it." Kestrel said grinning "It's devious, and gives us multiple edges against the alliance in the future."

"Alright then. Plan is as follows Ladies and Gentlemen. As previously stated our VIP's for extract are Ambassador Udina and his staff. Bringing up their dossiers now. In total there's five of them, memorize their faces because I'd rather not have any of us slot one of em on accident. Could end up being a little problematic in the future.

"Got those faces memorized? Good because here's the area that we're deploying to. The presidium embassies. I'm sure you've all been in the area at some point or other, but right now the place is a warzone. Vultures won't be able to land anywhere near the embassies until the geth presence is reduced somewhat so we're being dropped here, approximately two clicks away. We'll have to make our way to the embassies and take out any geth threatening the embassy itself. Once the area is clear the vultures can come on down and extract the VIP's for a nice mission accomplished."

"Hell we could go and get a drink after, I hear there's some real classy bars in that area." Bolt commented drawing some chuckles from the rest of the team.

"Well I hope the geth area ready for an asskicking because ol Typhoon is going to bring the pain." The phantom said hoisting a massive Tornado minigun and giving the barrels a quick spin.

"You got yours big boy but I think that mine pack a bit more punch." Nova motioning to the L-Tag strapped across her back alongside the JAW. "By the way I think you should all take one of these." She suggested passing Viper a JAW. "Never know what the geth have up their sleeves."

"An excellent point." Raven's second said taking the JAW from her and slinging it across his back. "We wouldn't want to run into an armature without one or two of those."

"I hope you boys and girls back there are ready to get out of my bird because if you're not I think the geth are going to insist." The vulture's pilot called glancing back through the crew hatch. "I'm not going to be putting her down, hell I'm not gonna be slowing down too much so I hope you guys are bringing your a-game when it comes to jumping. I wouldn't want to see you plastered on the side of a billboard. Might ruin the image."

"Yeah wouldn't want to ruin my good looks." Jackal shouted back.

"I was thinking more about the billboard. Time to drop twenty seconds!"

I walked over to the ramp that was slowly lowering down to provide me a view of the presidium flashing by beneath the Vulture. In the distance I could see the telltale red glow and smoke of fire accompanied by the staccato of distant gunfire. Turning back towards the rest of the team I gave them all a quick wave of my hand and Viper stepped forward to stand next to me.

"Ten seconds!" I gave Viper a clap on the shoulder as he stared out back the way we had come.

"Five" I could feel the shuttle start to slow slightly "Four" the Vulture's decceleration was accompanied by a starboard turn "Three" I braced myself as the force of the turn tried to throw me out of the back prematurely "Two" Viper took half a step back "One" without a sound viper ran forward and fell out of the shuttle. An instant later Jackal and typhoon followed closely by Tigress, Kestrel and Bolt. I gave Nova a clap on the back as she ran out and followed closely behind her. A few seconds of weightlessness fell upon me as I left the confines of the vulture. I spread my arms out as my Nanosuit worked to stabilize my fall and the moment my feet touched the ground of the presidium commons I broke my fall with a roll, the forward momentum that I had inherited from the vulture's flight sending me sliding across the ground for a few meters before coming to a halt. I resting on one knee I brought my SCAR up scanning for geth. "Raven report in."

"Viper here, no sign of contact."

"Tigress, safe and sound."

"Bolt here, landed on some poor guy's fern, not sure if the fern survived."

"You adding plant killer to your resume bolt?" Kestrel asked.

"Nova here."

I waited for a few seconds then called out over the radio "Typhoon, Jackal do you copy?"

Jackal responded a moment later, sounding annoyed "Jackal here, I uh. I landed in the lake."

It took a second for Typhoon to respond but when he did I could hear the grin in his voice "You find any fish down there?"

"... No." Jackal answered sounding disappointed.

"You didn't actually aim for the lake to find out did you Jackal?" I asked with a grin.

Jackal merely sighed "Typhoon, mind giving me a hand here?"

A sudden burst of gunfire from a storefront a couple hundred meters away drew my attention and when I saw the figures of a couple C-Sec troopers scurry out and duck behind a fallen tree I cloaked calling out over the radio as I did so. "Alright we need to get moving. Fast and silent guys I want to get as far as possible without being spotted."

"Understood boss. We're right with you."

"Hold" I ordered falling down to one knee and listened to the gunfire in the distance. "We're coming up on the embassy and by the sound of things the geth are making things hard for the guards. Bolt, Kestrel you in position?"

"Nearly. Had to bypass a geth patrol on the way here." Kestrel answered.

"Make sure to set up mines on your entrance locations." I said glancing over across the lake to where the sniper team was setting up.

"One, we know, we're good at this kind of thing and two mines? We're in a civilian inhabited urban environment here boss. Not sure if mines would be the best choice. I'll set up some sensor pods down here to warn us if anyone- or anything trips em."

"That works. Viper how's it looking?"

"It's looking like it's a good idea we brought extra JAW's. There are two armatures along with what looks like a platoon of smaller geth infantry."

"I see em." I muttered bringing up the map on my HUD complete with red dots indicating the locations of all of the known geth that Viper had spotted. "We'll be going in real hot guys, once our two snipers get in position then we'll commence the attack. Jackal and Tigress, get your JAW's out and prepare to take out those armatures. If the Armatures don't go down to a single shot then Typhoon you and me will finish em off. The rest of you all I don't need to tell you what to do. You all ready?"

"Affirmative."

"Sniper team in position, waiting on your go Wraith."

I nodded and a quick glance at my HUD revealed that the entire team was ready and in position. "Alright, Execute."

The word had scarcely left my mouth when there were two roars followed instantly by explosions as Jackal and Tigress fired at the Armatures. The armatures staggered and one fell a gaping wound torn out of it's abdomen as there was a low thunk as Nova opened up with her grenade launcher. There was another whoosh as I fired my JAW at the armature that had not yet fallen and it fell to the ground as the armor piercing rocket struck it in the neck sending it's head spinning off and leaving its body to crumple to the ground. I gunned down a pair of geth that were turning to engage the new threat their shields sparking momentarily before failing as I sprinted closer armoring up as the rest of the geth began firing at us. One geth revealed itself to me, coming around a corner, it's rifle brought up to bear at me but before either it or I could react it's shields flickered and died as with a crack a sniper round flew over my shoulder and nailed it in the optics. Falling back I let myself slide behind a planter and fired at another group of geth, killing two of them as Viper uncloaked in mid air behind them, firing his shotgun as he fell towards the geth. One of the geth was destroyed with a loud electronic screech before Viper landed on top of the last geth jamming the barrel of his shotgun into it's neck and blasting it's head clean off before vanishing once more with a shimmer.

I glanced at a group of geth that was in the process of being mowed down by a withering hail of Tornado fire as Typhoon stood with his minigun braced up on a ledge, his suit sparking every now and then as the stray shot was deflected off of his armor while Jackal was crouched next to him, picking off any geth that sought to take out the dealer of destruction.

Sniper shots from across the lake fired in tandem taking out high priority geth units with surgical precision as I continued to fight my way forward accompanied by Nova and Tigress under the suppressive fire of Typhoon and Jackal while Viper continuously darted around the battlefield, striking cloaked from on high, behind or below, each shot of his shotgun eliminating another geth.

Three minutes after the first rocket was fired the last geth group fell having been blasted to pieces by a well placed grenade from Nova.

"Area Clear!" Viper said appearing halfway up a set of stairs with a shimmer of energy.

"Viper with me, the rest of you set up defensive positions. I'm signaling the Vultures." I turned Viper as he approached "Let's go tell the ambassador that his ride is coming."

"Out of curiousity, did you ask for us to extract the ambassador?" Viper murmured as we we approached the embassy, keeping his eyes on the alliance soldiers that were peeking out at us and the destroyed geth that littered the presidium.

I smiled "I may have volunteered when the various objectives were put on the table yes. Just wanted to make sure that the ambassador got out safely after all."

Viper chuckled, "You just want to rub it in his face that we're the ones rescuing him."

"There is that too." I admitted with a grin.

A shout from the alliance troopers slowed us to a stop. "Hold it right there! State your intentions!"

Drawing myself up to my full height I called out with my suit's exterior speakers "Operative Wraith of the CryNet Phantoms, we're here to extract you all."

"On whose authority and why haven't I heard anything about this?"

I looked up at the figure of ambassador Udina that appeared at the top of the stairs behind the two alliance soldiers. "I don't know if you've noticed ambassador, but there's a massive geth invasion and they've jammed most communications systems. The council has dispatched phantom teams to evacuate all ambassadors and their staff to the CryNet base."

The ambassador narrowed his eyes "Very convenient that you were dispatched when just hours ago you were in revolt against the Council. Why would you be sent and not C-Sec or the Turians?"

"Please Ambassador, C-Sec is not nearly well trained or equipped to perform tasks such as this and the turians are currently busy elsewhere, trying to kick the geth off of this station. If you would rather wait here for the turians to eventually arrive be my guest, but we have to extract the elcor and the volus ambassadors so consider us on a rather tight schedule. Now a Vulture shuttle is going to be arriving within five minutes, should I tell the pilot to not even bother to land or are you going to be sensible?"

Udina glared at me before finally relenting. "Very well. We will leave. But you will face consequences for your actions believe me Wraith."

"I'm counting on them ambassador, but I think that they are not going to be the kind of consequences that you want." I shot back. "Now tell your staff to prep for evacuation. You soldier, who's in charge of the embassy guards?" I asked the closest blue armored soldier who straightened.

"That would be me now Phantom." A woman stepped out from beside Udina. "Captain Gunson. Colonel Penn was killed by the geth about half an hour ago."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Captain, are your men ready for evac?"

"We don't have much luggage, we're pretty much good to go whenever the bird arrives."

"Good. Won't be too long, but make sure that the moment that vulture touches down that you get everyone moving and accounted for. The geth will be planning a counterattack and I want to be gone long before then."

"Understood." She gave me a curt nod and turned to another soldier standing nearby "Sergeant get the rest of the unit prepped and get the civies ready for evac."

"Ma'am!" The Soldier gave the captain a quick nod and entered the embassies as the Captain turned back towards me. "By the way I don't know if you already have this intel, but the geth came from that small mass relay. What we previously thought was just a statue."

I tilted my head to the side "Is it not?"

She shook her head "No I think it's actually a miniature mass relay. It started spinning and glowing and everything and then moments after that started, geth started flying out of it like popcorn. They immediately started gunning down everyone nearby. That's how the Colonel got killed. He was just outside when a geth flew all the way over here and shot him." She nodded town towards the courtyard in front of the embassies.

I whistled slightly "That's quite the distance to be thrown."

Captain Gunson nodded "Well geth are synthetic, don't break as easily as we do. I also saw a group of geth immediately get in the elevators that lead to the council chambers."

"Thanks for the intel Captain. We'll definitely make use of that. Make sure you spread that information around when you reach the base. Lookup Commander Alexander."

"Commander Alexander got it."

I glanced up at the sky as I heard the roaring sounds of Vulture engines approaching. "Looks like your ride is here, get everyone onboard now."

"You heard the man, let's get moving!"

As I strode away from the embassy Viper alongside me I glanced over at the mass relay monument in the distance. "We have to evac those other ambassadors Wraith." Viper reminded me, correctly guessing my thoughts.

I nodded slowly "I know. That's why I'm going to go on my own. If she was right then it's extremely likely that Saren is with those geth as well and Saren must be taken out."

Viper stopped in his tracks. "So that's it? You're just gonna go off and leave us to do the dirty work that you don't want to do?"

I stopped and turned to face my second in command "Excuse me?"

Viper could respond Nova spoke up. "Viper leave it be."

"No. No I will not. Damn it Wraith you do this way too often! You charge off to leave us, you can't just take command when it suits you and then halfway through a mission leave me in charge to go off doing your own thing! We're supposed to be a team! But right now I'm more feeling like we're just here to do the dirty work that you don't want to! You did it with the Normandy, you did it on Virmire hell you did it on X57!"

I stared at Viper, pondering his words before looking over at the other Phantoms. All of them were spread out in defensive positions but I knew that they had heard that through our internal comms. "Is that what you all think? That I just use you when it suits me?"

"He has a point boss." Jackal said quietly. "You're supposed to be part of the team, but at the moment it's not feeling like it."

I nodded slowly "I see. Well we'll have a good long conversation about this when the battle here is won… But until then who wants to go hunt Saren?"

Viper's words continued to stick in my mind as the team seemed to leap at the idea of us going after Saren together. I felt like it was less the fact that it was us going after Saren and more that it was me asking them to come with me on an "Unauthorized" mission, abandoning our previous one. I think that it gave them the feeling of actually being a team, there was certainly a bit more banter going on as we fought our way across the presidium toward the council tower. What Viper had said was true, I had been just leaving my team to go lone wolf quite a bit recently. Obviously my assignment to the Normandy had been the right decision but they were right Ever since when we'd ended up working together it had ended up where I was going with Shepard while Raven was doing their own objectives. My confidence in my team's capability was extremely high which meant that I was comfortable letting them do their own missions and objectives while I was running with Shepard, but it appeared that they believed it to be otherwise.

"What the hell? How did a Mako get here?" I glanced over doing a double take as I saw the Mako that Jackal had just spotted. It was turned upside down leaned up against a wall. "I somehow doubt that the embassy would be allowed to have one on the presidium."

A grin spread on my lips as I released a chuckle "I don't think that belonged to the embassy. No I recognize that Mako, that's the Mako of the Normandy."

"Huh. I guess Shepard made it through. I guess if the geth can go through that mini-relay then a Mako could as well." Viper mused.

"And if Shepard made it through, then it's likely that Saren is here as well." I turned to glance at the team "What would you all say about giving the spectre a hand? Keep the geth off of her while she takes down Saren?"

Tigress looked over at me "I think that I speak for the rest of us when I say that that sounds like a great idea."

"Well then." I turned towards the elevator leading up to the council chambers. "We'd best get going, Shepard has a head start on us and who knows how far Saren is ahead of her."

"Slight problem boss." Typhoon called out "Elevators are shut down. We're going to have to go up the slow way or get transport."

"I think that I can get some transport arranged for us."

"You sure?" Viper turned to glance at me. "Remember we are supposed to be extracting other HVT's."

I shook my head "It's been cleared. Serpent is taking over the extraction, We've been granted our request to go after Saren. A Vulture is already en-route, ETA two minutes. I suggest you gear yourselves out for mobility, the Vulture may not be able to take us all the way. The Citadel arms have closed and Sovereign managed to get inside. Depending on geth presence we may not be able to make it all that far, but we should be dropped off on the outside of the tower itself. From there we'll make our way up on foot. So make sure that your suits are configured accordingly, I'd suggest a boost to speed and strength. Schematics indicate that there are a series of maintenance hatches near the top that will lead us into the main council chambers. It's likely that Shepard and her team are heading for one of those but without knowing exactly which one we can only hope to run into them on the outside or rendezvous inside the chambers themselves."

"I'll have to leave the tempest aboard the dropship, no way am I going to be able to keep up with you lugging it around." Typhoon glanced over at me from his position of watch with the minigun braced on the ground.

"Unfortunate but true."

I paused as a new voice crackled on over my radio accompanied by the distant sound of Vulture engines "Angel one to Raven Lead."

"Good to hear from you Angel, you here to pick us up?"

"That's me alright, transmit LZ coordinates."

A quick motion marked a nearby open plaza on my HUD. "Coordinates sent Angel."

"And received. You all good if I remain cloaked or have you cleared the AO."

"Cleared it as much as possible but you're good to remain cloaked. If possible link us in to your sensor systems, would rather not get fried because I accidentally ran into your exhaust."

"Linking you in Raven."

"Uplink successful, good to see you." I said as a quick progress bar shot across my hud followed by seeing a wireframe image of a Vulture coming in towards the LZ that I had marked. A quick gesture towards the clearing sent a command to the HUD's of the rest of my team. "Prepare to board."

The battle had gotten worse the further up the spire we managed to get. Halfway up the citadel arms had opened and alliance, turian, asari and CryNet ships alike had flooded in attack the reaper which immediately retaliated having taken out five dreadnoughts already. The resulting clouds of debris were pelting the spire making survival on the surface much more difficult than it would be with just geth trying to kill us. I hoped that the opening of the spires indicated that Saren was dead, but the only thing I had heard about Shepard was that she had unlocked the mass relays allowing Alliance reinforcements in to save the destiny ascension. She had gone dark afterwards which could mean that Saren was still alive.

"Just another few hundred meters! Jackal and Typhoon flank right."

I shot a glance off to one side as Tigress shouted a warning "Another piece, incoming!"

I sprinted around a corner as a large piece of metal slammed into the ground a hundred meters away, sending deadly fragments scattering all around.

"We need to get inside the citadel or we're going to end up being hit by one of those!" Viper called out. "There's another cloud coming in!"

"Going dark! Cover me!" I shouted vanishing with a shimmer and running towards the geth that were engaging us. An increase in gunfire forced the geth to remain within cover as I dashed over to them, my SCARAB gripped tightly in my hands. Vaulting over a wall I landed on the other side of the geth, continuing on until I managed to duck behind a corner and recharge my energy reserves. When my suit had regained energy I ducked out from around the corner and opened up with my SCARAB.

"Maximum Armor."

My SCARAB hardly moved in my hands as my suit completely nullified the recoil allowing me to fire in extremely fast bursts, every shot landing true to it's mark, every burst taking out another geth trooper.

"Danger. Impact. Danger."

I threw a quick glance upwards at the warning from SECOND and saw that another cloud of ship debris had fallen upon us and in the middle of this cloud was a large piece of hull plating slowly rotating but heading directly towards the geth line.

I bolted running away from the geth and further up the spire as fast as my suit could carry me. I managed to put a hundred meters between me and the geth within the second it took for the piece of debris to impact with the spire with a thud that nearly threw me off of my feet. As the rumble subsided I slowed and turned to look back to see that the large piece of plating had smashed edge first into the spire and had sank partway through. A significant piece was sticking out of the spire like a bent blade. I call out to the rest of the team as I surveyed the damage caused "Is everyone still up?"

Viper responded after a brief moment of silence "We're all good. I think our path forward is blocked though."

"Can you go around?"

"We may need to backtrack a bit and circle around to the other side of the spire. Go on without us. We'll find our own way up."

"I don't suppose you could blast through it?"

"That's Military grade dreadnought armor. I'm good, but I'm not that good, now with what we have with us." Nova answered.

"Understood. Make your way up here asap. I have no idea what I'm going to find up there."

"Don't worry, we won't take too long. I'd say don't get any trouble but I know you." Viper called out.

Slowly turning back I took a step forward and vanished from sight with a mere distortion of light. Now on my own I bypassed the few geth and tank bred krogan that I encountered between me and the maintenance hatch. I opened the hatch with a sharp yank and dropped inside without hesitation, landing at the end of the hallway below. I drew myself up as the hatch closed above me and started jogging towards a door at the end of the corridor. With a quick command the door unlocked and hissed open revealing the council chamber's foyer. The sound of shouts and gunfire caused me to break into a sprint running towards the audience chambers when I heard six loud shots that rang in the silence that followed. Bursting out into the auditorium I witnessed a scene of carnage. Shepard stood with her Majestic pistol steaming with heat aimed down towards the ground near Wrex who had what looked like a turian skeleton pinned under his boot.

As I got into view Shepard snapped her pistol over towards me before lowering it when she recognized me.

"Is it dead?" Tali asked picking herself up from where she was lying on the ground. As she stood I noticed that her visor had a single jagged crack running down through it.

"I think so." Garrus said his rifle still aimed towards the skeleton.

"Wraith, you're late to the party." Vanyali said stepping cautiously towards Wrex.

I approached her slowly "Looks like it. I'd ask how the hell you got here so fast but I think I know. I'm more curious about that." I nodded towards skeleton still trapped beneath Wrex.

"That used to be Saren." Wrex explained. "After he killed himself Sovereign turned him into that. Took control of all of his implants. I think it's dead now though."

"We thought that twice before though." Liara said cautiously a deep rend in her armor running down her right arm.

A sudden curse from Wrex caused all of us to raise our weapons defensively as we looked at him to see him jumping back, as the metal skeleton disintegrated before our eyes.

"I guess that's the answer to that." Garrus muttered finally lowering his rifle.

"Look!" At Tali's shout we all turned to look out the windows where she was pointing. The massive black form of the reaper was slowly falling from it's perch on the spire, countless shells from distant dreadnoughts striking it's armor.

"They're doing it!" Liara exclaimed "It's weakened!"

I smirked as I stared out at the falling reaper "If that isn't one hell of a glorious sight."

A sudden streak of black followed by a massive flash from the reaper drew cheers from the six of us as we recognized the Normandy as having just made the killing blow against the ship. As the massive silhouette of the reaper fell apart amidst a large fireball a new danger arose as an entire segment of one of Sovereign's legs, propelled by the explosion of the reaper's drive core, was sent heading directly towards us.

"Go!" without hesitation we scattered at Shepard's shout bolting from the window as fast as our feet could take us.

A single glance back towards the window revealed that as the time until impact ticked down extremely quickly on my HUD that we wouldn't make it. "Not enough time!" I grunted. A moment later Shepard released a breath of exertion and a wave of biotics slammed into me, washing over my suit. Yet as Garrus, Liara and Tali were thrown off their feet just as Wrex flared blue himself and threw himself forward, propelled by his own biotics I was left behind alongside Shepard with a mere stumble.

As the timer on my HUD reached zero I changed course, flinging myself shoulder first into Vanyali as with a deafening crash sovereigns leg segment smashed into the council spire with the force of a train wreck. I felt a sudden sharp impact followed by the feeling of my entire body being on fire as I blinked owlishly seeing a long piece of railing, having broken off in the crash sticking out of my throat. My vision darkened as I saw blood pouring out of the wound in my throat in ever weakening spurts as my heart started giving out, painting Shepard's armor in red. The last thing I heard before I felt no more pain was the dispassionate voice of SECOND and the muffled shouts of horror from Vanyali.

Accessing file CryNet Database/Phantom Operatives/Master List of Subjects

Entry Modified:

Wraith/Martin DuncanP:YStatus:KIA[Battle of the Citadel(suit recovered)]

Save file [Y][N]?

A/N: If you're wondering no I am not finishing off the series here. I have at the very least two more installments planned, for ME2 and 3 and there may be another addition onto that for after ME3. Next chapter is already in the works.

Also I'm going to try and make a real effort to begin using my twitter more to update anyone who follows me on my fics. You can find me LEGION001 if you're interested.

If you have questions or feedback leave a review and I'll get back to you.