A/N: So, a lot of you will probably become very confused over the course of the next three or four chapters. Don't worry, an explanation is swiftly approaching that will hopefully make
The ice-encrusted globe of Noveria hung in space, cold and forbidding even from orbit. The Normandy had rushed there almost immediately, only taking a slight detour to drop off the Cerberus prisoners on a Raachok cruiser headed to Arcturus. Now they were above the planet, waiting on permission to dock. The planet's enormous defensive missile batteries were searching in vain for the stealth ship, trying to find some way of locking on and enforcing the empty threats being spewed by the air traffic controller. Eventually Saren grew tired of the constant stalling.
"This is Spectre Saren Arterius. I wish to enter the planet and make an inspection of my company, unless you would prefer I move my business elsewhere."
The cocky ATC replied with a hint of a derisive sneer in his voice.
"What company would that be, sir?"
"Binary Helix."
That shut him up.
Surprised, Anderson glanced up at the Spectre.
"You own Binary Helix?"
Saren nodded.
"Yes. I hardly have anything to do with the running of the company but I need my cut of the profits. This gear isn't cheap, and it's that or mercenary work."
Yet again Anderson found himself shaking his head at the way in which the Council didn't pay their most powerful agents. More than a few Spectres had been caught on the wrong side of the law just trying to scrape up enough money to complete the latest assignment the Council had given them.
The obnoxious ATC brought down hard from his power trip, the Normandy was swiftly directed to its berth and the ground team prepared to disembark. The Grassa were grounded, for want of a better word, and so it was just nine of them heading out - four Humans, two Turians, an Asari/Prothean hybrid and two Atavira. They were greeted at the entrance to the port proper by a five man security team. The formula was common to almost any mercenary group - a soldier, a sniper, a medic, an engineer and a biotic - but was slightly more intimidating than the factory standard thanks to the fact that the soldier was a Seu'Seun loaded with enough firepower to put a dent in a frigate.
The team leader, a Japanese woman, stepped forward.
"Welcome to Noveria, Arterius-san. May I help you with anything?"
"Yes. Could you tell me if an Asari matriarch has passed through recently?"
The woman nodded.
"Yes, now you mention it Lady Benezia T'Soni passed through a couple of days ago. If you wish to arrange a meeting you should speak to Hekubah-san. He can put you in contact."
Throughout the exchange Lizzie had been watching Ocean. At the mention of Benezia she had tensed up, fists clenched. Lizzie still had no idea why the Blue Suns captain had insisted on accompanying them but she wasn't about to question it when Ocean was clearly quite distraught. It seemed as if she had some connection to the errant Matriarch.
Nodding at the security team, Saren led the unit through and up into the port proper. The concrete concourse was bleak, uniformly dull and without personality, matching the people standing upon it perfectly. The odd pot plant here and there only made it look sadder. Saren led the team down and towards the office of Administrator Hekubah, the current chief of the port. It was common knowledge that the Salarian was past his prime. All estimates were that Anoleis would replace him as early as 2179, putting merely two years left on his tenure.
"Mr. Arterius. A pleasure to see you again."
"Likewise, Mr. Hekubah. I would like to know the current location of Matriarch Benezia."
The genial old Salarian bobbed his head, looking up the data on the port's computer system.
"Ah, here we are. Yes, Lady Benezia is currently at her private residence in the Skadi Mountains. Would you like me to arrange a shuttle?"
"Yes, thank you."
Garrus leaned into Lizzie and muttered something in her ear.
"That was much easier than I was expecting."
###
The shuttle was packed with the Normandy's strike team. Saren was sitting up front with Anderson, Auhelu standing behind their seats as the other six were in the passenger compartment. The low flying aircraft crested a peak and started to come round for a final approach on the T'Soni Estate. As the large building came into view, so did the very large anti-aircraft gun turning to target them.
"Shit! Deck it!"
Swearing profusely, Saren slammed the controls down, instantly dropping the shuttle to the deck, sending it skidding across the ice until it came to a halt.
The wreck was almost instantly surrounded by Benezia's commandoes. The shaken strike team couldn't do anything about it. Before they could react each of them was introduced to ten thousand volts of electricity. The battle was over before it had begun.
###
Tali was bored. While the ground team were chilling on Noveria (no pun intended) there was very little to do on the Normandy. Sam and Kelly were doing 'girl stuff' that interested her in the same way a psychologist might be interested in the thoughts of a clinical psychopath and Jack was in the cargo hold practising biotics, leaving her at a loose end. She was passing the time by fiddling with her Omnitool, trying to create a program that could selectively intercept Collector transmissions. She had a lot of signal samples to work with from the various times the Normandy's ground team had engaged the Collectors, the challenge was to calibrate her detector to pick up the subtle traces. She wished Garrus were here - the Turian was legendary in his ability to calibrate almost anything - but she could use the practice anyway.
Tweaking the last couple of settings, she finally got it. The short range Collector signal she had been generating registered on her Omnitool as a pattern of jagged waves and a low clicking noise. Pumping her fist into the air in victory, she shut off the signal generator, watching as the signal trace faded.
Except it didn't.
She slammed the intercom.
"Joker, we need to get out of here now!"
To his credit Joker didn't question her. He ripped the Normandy out of its moorings and punched for the horizon. Less than five seconds later Port Hanshan was consumed in a flash of nuclear fire and a mushroom cloud.
Angling the Normandy upwards, Joker gunned the engines to the max, then flipped the Normandy bows on to the explosion and reinforced the forward barriers. The shockwave of the explosion hit them, propelling them away and upwards. Using the blast as the final nudge, and with his cockpit swiftly becoming colonised with red status lights, he gave the Normandy the last nudge she needed to achieve orbit, engaged the miraculously still functional stealth systems and flopped back in his seat.
"Well, shit."
###
Lizzie regained consciousness very abruptly as a bucket of cold water splashed over her body. It took her all of two seconds to register the situation. Which was very, very bad. Her wrists were pulled above her head, held by thick titanium manacles with her toes suspended inches above the floor, ankles also held by the heavy cuffs. She couldn't see, presumably as a result of the blindfold wrapped around her head, or speak thanks to the thick leather gag between her teeth, but the clanking of chains suggested to her the rest of the crew were in a similar predicament to her.
Her attention was drawn by the clicking of heels as somebody entered the room.
"You people have been causing a lot of trouble for me. Especially you, Spectre Arterius."
There was a clink, as if something had been unchained, and moments later Saren's voice rang out.
"Benezia. You have betrayed everything you once stood for! Why?"
A dark, sinister chuckle.
"Why don't I let Nazara explain himself?"
The room suddenly got ten degrees colder.
"Saren Arterius."
"I take it you are Nazara?"
"Rudimentary creatures of flesh and blood. And yet ..."
###
Fifty thousand light years away, Nazara's logic pathways were experiencing something it could never have predicted. It was experiencing doubt. These organic creatures had created AIs that lived with them in peace. Surely the grand purpose couldn't be flawed? Based on a false premise, even?
The harder it tried to claw its way out of the logic loop, the tighter the skeins of code constricted. For the first time since it could remember the Catalyst wasn't instructing it precisely what to do. Contingency programming activated, the entirety of the Reaper's higher processes converging on the irascible trap it had fallen into.
It was so preoccupied it didn't even notice another segment of alien code slip into the part of its computer core that controlled its communications.
###
Lizzie heard the voice yet again, and this time it was different. The low throbbing that had been building in her head abruptly cut out, with a noise that sounded somewhat like a soap bubble popping, and the room was filled with screeches and the discharge of guns. Then all fell silent.
She yelped as the chain dangling her from the ceiling was abruptly severed, making her crumple to the ground. Something tugged the blindfold off her eyes and she blinked as the world came into focus. She was greeted with a nightmare insectoid visage.
Reflexively jerking back, she let out a shriek as the back of her head bumped into another one of the enormous horse sized insects surrounding her. A tentacle stabbed down, gripping the manacles around her wrists and secreting something onto them before ripping them off. Before she could react, the same treatment was applied to her ankles and then the ... whatever they were ... scuttled away. She scrambled to her feet, biotics flaring, as a bug just like the others apart from being three storeys tall forced its way into the surprisingly cavernous room.
"Peace, little one. My soldiers will not harm you. I am Rachni."
From the other side of the room, Garrus executed what appeared to be a triple take.
"You're what now?"