Sara hadn't seen a Geth since the attack on the Citadel by Saren years ago. "Is it…?" She ran her hand along the metal contours of its head. The machine didn't move, or spring to life. She had feared them once. and all the horror stories of the things they had done on Noveria, Eden Prime, Virmire, and Feros.
"This unit was deactivated." Zenari calmed Sara's fears as the doctor gave her a reassuring smile. "We found this unit in one of the air ducts after the Nexus encountered the scourge. We haven't brought the unit online."
"That would be a really, really bad idea." Sara interrupted. "I was on the Citadel when…"
"So was I." Kandros sighed. "We have been working with some of the data we have on the Geth that was provided by the Quarian, Tali'Zorah nar Rayya."
"She was with Commander Shepard." Sara lit up at the mention of one of her heroes. "I was thinking your SAM unit might be able to help us gain more information?" Zenari interrupted.
"SAM?" Sara inquired. "Can you scan the Geth?"
Of course, Pathfinder. SAM replied as the orange light emanated from her omni-tool. This unit is non-functional. It was not destroyed in the scourge. This Geth unit went offline roughly 600 years ago.
"While we were en route to Andromeda." Sara added looking up at her companions. "Anything we can use? Any information on why its here?"
Negative pathfinder. SAM replied. Perhaps some of the archival data may hold more results. I can attempt to decrypt its memories but I would need the unit to be online first.
"That is not happening." Kandros cut in."Geth were not part of the manifest. They weren't even invited to be part of the project. Before we came to Andromeda I found a few broken units. We figured it was some crack pot messing around with them."
"Now they might be with us. SAM?" Sara called on her AI.
There is an unfamiliar code in their system. I have downloaded their file diagnostics. SAM replied.
"I wouldn't go further with them until we know what we are dealing with." Zenari covered the unit with the white cloth.
"Do you think they belong to the Benefactor?" Sara asked.
"Pathfinder," Kandros warned as Zenari looked up confused. "There are some things not showing up on the manifest." He reasoned. "Ryder has been looking into it."
Zenari nodded but let it pass.
I agree with Doctor Zenari. We should not bring the unit back online until we figure out where the anomaly in the code originated. I am accessing the history of the Quarians and the Geth. There is a docket from Admiral Daro'Xen vas Moreh in regards to their activation.
"SAM, let me know how I can assist you. I have 500 years of robotics experience might do well to finally put those degrees to use." Zenari smiled at Sara.
Be careful, Doctor, we have yet to understand how an errant Geth would react to being 600 years away from the veil. SAM reminded them all.
"I will be careful, Zenari patted the white cloth.
"And don't let anyone else see it." Kandros placed his hand on Zenari's shoulder. "The last thing we want to do is cause wide spread panic."
"Thank you." Sara piped up, "I promise not to betray your trust."
"I hope this helps you both." Zenari turned back to the datapad in her hand. "I'm sending you the notes I have and vids of the area we found the Geth. I'm still monitoring the station to see if any other units in the area."
"What about the Arks?" Sara perked up.
"We've been running a background search for anomalies," Zenari explained. "We can't do a much in depth search without raising suspicions."
"I can do it." Sara volunteered and she almost could hear Lexi in the back of her mind complaining. "I'm still technically on medical leave and have a penchant for sticking my nose into things."
Kandros chuckled. "Her reputation does proceed her."
"I will send you the extension application that I've been using on my omni-tool." Zenari smiled and sent the app to her. "would SAM would be able to enhance its functioning capabilities?"
I will try, Doctor Zenari. SAM replied.
Their two shadows moved along the walls towards Hydroponics. Silently Kandros and Sara stood near the door to the Vortex. "Do you think they have to deal with.. you know." Sara whispered as she looked around. The sound of the bass in Vortex pounded in her ear and drowned out any likelihood that they were being listened to.
"Possibly," Kandros sighed. "Jien thought there was something about them before we left the Milky Way. We thought we left that investigation behind… but…"
"Here we are." Sara leaned against the wall. There were so many more people awake on the Nexus, getting ready to be sent to new settlements. Any one of the colonists could have brought or hidden the Geth units before getting into cyro. This was far more complicated than stopping the Archon. She hated looking at the members of the Initiative with such distrust.
"Director Tann is right about one thing," Kandos interrupted her train of thought, "what you just saw could cause wide spread panic. With the distress call from the Keelah Si'yah we can't be sure if the Geth were the cause."
"Wide spread panic, another uprising and Director Tann being an insufferable know it all." Sara grumbled. "Why can't anything in Andromeda be as easy as the brochure promised?"
"I'll pretend I didn't hear that." Kandros chuckled.
"Welcome to Andromeda! There are no rules and everything is broken!" Sara gestured dramatically.
"Be careful, pathfinder." Kandros' voice dropped on octave."Tann might hear you."
She gave him a small flirty smile. If she didn't know better she would think he was rather fond of her antics. "Well, if he is listening… Tann is an asshole."
"And Sara?" Kandros cleared his voice. "Those emails you told me about… I would recommend deleting those audio files."
"I was thinking the same thing. It is a good thing Scott is bed ridden," Sara replied.
"From what I understand he also doesn't have the habit of sticking their nose into everything." Kandros offered.
"It is not MY fault everyone keeps needing me to hold their ha-" Sara stopped mid sentence. There was something itching at the back of her mind as a man walked towards the balcony above them. She swore he looked familiar and that she had seen him somewhere before.
"Pathfinder?" Kandros asked watching her face.
The moment of realization rolled through her like fire. Kandros' eyes followed hers. "Duck!" Sara thought she screamed as Kandros moved in front of her. There was a loud bang and the sound of a bullet hitting bone. "Kandros!" His body crumbled in front of her.
Shifting to his side she tried to pry off the front of his suit trying to reach the wound. She had forgotten her medi-gel back in the Tempest. Crowds ran and dispersed as security moved towards the man above them. She could hear the screaming as she removed the front plate of his gear. She ripped her scarf off and used it to cover the bullet hole. It was anti-armor build, and it didn't go clean through. She applied pressure hoping to stem the bleeding until help arrived.
Another loud shot rang out and she felt like she got pushed to the ground by a mako. Everything seemed to change into white light. She felt dizzy as she slammed against the ground. She felt like she was dancing in Tartarus again, a life time ago. She was a child chasing after her brother, or held by her father in the orchard they visited in Vancouver.
Pathfinder, You have been shot. SAM spoke on their internal channel. I am assisting as best I can.
"Thanks SAM," she slammed her fist on the ground willing her body to move. The agent jumped away from the Nexus Security as she finally managed to stand. She focused and remembered her breathing techniques.
Assisting with your biotic charge, SAM informed her.
Sara saw her target and willed her body. Her biotics rose in tune with her anger and she lurched her body forward. The biotic charge flinging her past the security agents. She charged straight into the sniper and her fist connected with the man's face. The agent fell on his back as Sara straddled his body pining him on the ground. She raised her fist and slammed it in his face. She could feel the blood trickling down her body from her bullet wound.
Pathfinder, you need medical assistance SAM reasoned with her.
"Who sent you?" She punched the man again feeling woozy. Sara recognized him now, and she cursed herself for not realizing it sooner. "Was it the Charlatan?" Her rage consumed her as she remembered the agent's face in the back of a cave in what felt almost a lifetime ago.
Sara didn't realize when her brother's hands came around her and pulled her off the man. "Spirits," she heard Vetra somewhere out of sight as she collapsed into Scott's arms.
"I got you." He whispered into her ear. "I got you. You are gonna be okay."
"Is he dead?" She heard Gil whisper.
"Am I dancing?" Sara asked as the world began to spin.
The familiar hum of the Tempest med bay woke Sara from her slumber. She was lying on the bed closest to Lexi's station. Scott was fast asleep to her side on a small rolling chair. She reached out to muss his hair and everything hurt. She groaned at the strain as Dr. T'Perro looked up from her computer.
"Welcome back, Pathfinder, you seem to have a knack for making me worry." Lexi walked over.
"You should see the other guy." She tried to sit up. "Oh, ow."
Lexi smiled at her as Scott woke up groggily. "What do you last remember, Sara?"
"I was happily punching a guy in the face." She looked over at the Doctor as the realization sank in. "Is Kandros okay?"
A firm line was formed on Lexi's face and she knew what the answer was. She didn't believe it. "He…" Scott tried. "He didn't make it. The bullet was manufactured to puncture armor… and…"
"He was at peace by the time medical arrived." Lexi offered as she ran a scan over Sara.
Tears threatened to well up, but she pushed the thought down into that tiny hole inside her which she labeled "later." Sara Elizabeth Ryder was the Pathfinder. There were colonists that were depending on her to help them find homes. She didn't have time to mourn her losses. One day when she would be allowed to stop andfeel them. She'll have her good cry, but right now all she wanted to do was fight. "And I got shot in the arm." Sara grumbled. "He walked in front of me."
Scott looked uncomfortable as he opened his mouth to speak. "You weren't the target. If Kandros hadn't moved it might have been a headshot. Sniper had to adjust." Leave it to her infiltrator brother to make things worse.
"Great, so he was in more pain because of me." She tried to sit up again.
"Rest," Lexi implored.
"I have had enough of resting. No more lesions in brain. Only a shot up arm, Lexi, throw a sling on it and I want to talk to the sniper." Sara growled.
"No." Lexi crossed her arms. "You are exhausted, Sara Ryder."
"I still want to punch the guys face some more." Sara looked away from them. "How is-?"
"Pretty badly beaten," Scott interrupted Lexi, "like a Vanguard punched him repeatedly in the face. Broken nose, multiple fractures, but he'll live."
"Good," Sara said coldly, "I have questions."
There was a loud commotion outside of the medbay and they could hear the sound of Drack loudly protesting. The door swooshed open and Director Tann pushed past the Krogan. Drack scowled with Vetra alongside him as the Salarian ignored them pointedly. "I need to speak to the Pathfinder," he said with no sound of humor in his voice, "alone." He gave her companions a glare.
"Nice to see you too, Tann." Scott spat as he assisted his sister with sitting up. "To what do we owe this pleasure?"
"Confidential business with the human Pathfinder," Tann crossed his arms.
Drack looked at Sara for approval whether to remove the Director or break his arms she wasn't sure. She shook her head and motioned for Scott and Lexi to leave. "I'll be okay."
"Director," Lexi interrupted, "the Pathfinder is on painkillers so she may not be able-"
"I'll decide what she is capable of," Tann was not backing down. Sara lifted her good arm and gingerly touched the Doctor. She loved Lexi who cared for her like she was her own.
"If you need anything there is a button near your good arm." Lexi pointed. "Scott." Lexi beckoned as the two of them left the Director and Sara alone. Neither of them moved or said anything for a few brief moments.
Tann sighed and pulled up the chair that Scott had been sitting in. He folded his hands and laid them on his lap. She could see his mind carefully going through the words he wanted to use. "Tann," Sara broke him of his train of thought.
"Kandros is dead." He said with no hint of emotion.
"Dr. T'Perro told me. I thought I got to him in time. I thought I helped-"Sara looked down at the white blanket on her barely able to meet him in the eyes.
"Pathfinder, did Tivan Kandros give you any indication that the Collective Agents were after him?"
Sara stopped. "What?"
"The agent we have in custody is a member of the Collective. Recently Kandros had deployed several APEX teams to Elaaden to disrupt their smuggling routes." Tann explained.
"I didn't know," the rage boiled under her skin as she thought of the Collective of the lies she had been told.
"Why were you with Kandros outside of the Votex?"
Sara bit her lip evaluating her choices. I do not advice disclosing information about your investigation to Director spoke on their private channel. Not like she was going to do that anyway. Then again she remembered her father told her that the best lies were the ones that were half truths. "I had some questions about Jien Garson."
"Pathfinder, I told you to drop that investigation." Tann replied sternly.
"Not like that," Sara insisted as earnestly as she could. "I never got to meet her myself and the Asari in the cultural center told me they had been friends. Do you think the Charlatan did this?"
The Salarian looked like he didn't believe her for one second, but even so he let it go. "Kandros and I may have not seen eye to eye on everything, but he was a friend. The last time you were on Kadara did you hear anything about agents from the Collective?"
Swallowing she thought of the Collective and the man behind them. The one hidden in shadows in Tartarus and the one who made her smile on the docks during a sunset. She thought she had known him and his intentions. Reyes Vidal wasn't a man to shoot someone in the middle of the Nexus, or maybe that was the man she had driven him to become? His choices were not her fault, but all she could think of were stolen kisses. "Last I heard they wanted to take over the port, and they failed when I assisted Sloane. I never met the Charlatan directly, but they wanted the Outcasts out of the way."
"The Charlatan apparently is some third rate smuggler named Reyes Vidal." Tann sounded bored. "He has been becoming quite a pain on Elaaden."
"Reyes Vidal is the Charlatan?" Sara tried her best to sound surprised.
"The Collective followed him to Elaaden. Set up shop there and started trading. They are taking away trading from the settlement and causing problems with Morda in New Tuchanka. Kandros had been trying to reinforce security and put a stop to the smuggling but we can see where that got him." Tann replied.
"Reyes Vidal was the contact Evfra from the Resistance had me meet." Sara replied.
"Oh," Tann sounded unamused. "I'll have to speak with him and see if they still have a connection. I do not want that man getting any information about our alliances with the Angara."
"Forgive me," Sara approached the next subject carefully, "but this doesn't sound like the Collective. They are more the lure you to a dark corner and put a bullet in you types."
"Looks like they are just turning over a new leaf." Tann grumbled.
"Why would the Collective want to get involved with the Nexus?" Sara asked.
"A good question that we will find the answer to," Tann finished, "I thought we would be done with this madness by now."
"Can I handle the investigation into this?" Sara asked immediately. She still had a bone to pick with Reyes.
"No, we are going to be assigning Avitus Rix to the Collective investigation. He and his team have been deployed to Elaaden to repair relations with Morda and investigate this." Tann firmly put his foot down, "As for you… you are a witness for this investigation. I would like you to turn into a statement regarding the events that transpired. Once you are mission ready and cleared by your doctor we have found another com buoy from the Keelah Si'yah. Our communications specialists think they found the location."