ILOS
REFUGE SYSTEM
PANGAEA EXPANSE
JUNE 2188
"When the last days were upon me,
and the ugly trifles of existence began to drive me to madness like the small drops of water torturers
let fall ceaselessly upon one spot of their victim's body,
I loved the irradiate refuge of sleep.
In my dreams I found a little of the beauty I had vainly sought in life,
and wandered through old gardens and enchanted woods."
NAHJR KOLST'LLUM L'M'SKRET nhor JAVIK, Avatarii Imperator and Commander of the Last Shock Legion of the Prothean Grand Empire gazed at the rust-flecked landscape of Ilos and pondered his current situation.
It had not been a good day. Interminable delays at Relays, as refugees and warships and heavy supply traffic made even the most simple requests gargantuan labours, he having to constantly use false identities supplied by the Shadow Broker to even move from world to world lest he be molested by media and 'fans' - whatever they were. Both his temper and mood had been stressed to volcanic levels.
Yet, despite it all, he had hopes for this world, despite how it appeared.
This planet was clearly dead, long stripped of anything his people had brought here, only their empty structures mute witnesses to former greatness. Yet, he had to see it for himself. Despite what he'd been told, despite the records of the Normandy and its crew, he took nothing at anyone's word. Once, as on Eden Prime (in his day called Ianniannos), thousands of his kind had fled here to sleep and hide - and although they like his comrades had died - hope, he discovered, was the one thing he had left, the one thing he had regained from this cycle and its warriors. It was not inconceivable that, in the vastness of this Galaxy, waiting to be discovered, more of his people had survived, only waiting to be reawakened.
He refused to believe he was all that was left, the single last living representative of a once-great species. Extinction did not sit well with him. If the creators of the Reapers could survive the eons, his people certainly could.
To his mind, his reasoning was sound, although many doubted him. They were not Protheans. Though learned, they did not know the ways of the Prothean mind, could not know the technology as he would know it, not know how his people thought, or what they might do, how they would accomplish and hide their sanctuaries.
If any other Protheans remained alive in this Galaxy, he would find them.
Following the path blazed by the crew of the Normandy, Javik found the elevator into the Archives, descended into the catacombs, the tombs of the last of the great minds of the Imperium.
How far they had fallen.
How much the Reapers had destroyed, yet, how great a tribute to the skills and genius of his race that what remained yet remained as it did, that their legacy was not lost, that even dead, his race had confounded the Reapers through Vigil, through the Conduit, through their understanding of the Relays, which even the races of this cycle did not possess. Despite all the great efforts of Shepard and the rest, his people were, in a very significant way, responsible for the destruction of the Reapers.
It was, as he'd been told, likely a foolish mission, a waste of time. Yet, it was his time to waste, his life to expend in the search. Fifty thousand years out of time, he had no place to call his own, his homeworld long ago blasted and recolonized beyond all recognition. He had nothing to lose, having lost everything there was to lose already, long since. If he discovered nothing, so be it – but it would not be because he didn't try.
Lit only by the dim power of ancient organic batteries, the Archives had a gloomy cast, broken only by shafts of orange light let in through gaps made from ancient fallen structure. The archeological teams that had been interrupted by the Reaper War would not return for some time. The equipment they'd left behind was inoperative, but he needed none of it.
High on either side, the empty now-coffins of five thousand scientists and support staff, silent in the gloom. Eventually, he found the dead console of Vigil, deftly disassembled it, stowed its memory nodules in a pack on his back. This era's scientists called the VI inoperative, but Javik knew better.
Moving on, Javik came to a section that had been blocked off by the collapse of ancient structure, and only a cursory excavation had begun on it. At the base of the rubble, he found the shells of inactive geth, several crushed by debris, and left where they'd fallen. It took him a moment to realize that the excavation of this area had been done by the geth themselves, and not by any organic teams that had come after.
Most curious.
If he remembered correctly, these particular geth had been led by the Indoctrinated Spectre turian Saren Arterius, and directed by the Reapers to find and use the Conduit to open the Citadel – yet, this area of the site was in the opposite direction of the Prothean-built miniature Relay.
Why send geth to dig here?
Most curious indeed.
Javik surveyed the site for himself, taking care to avoid any further debris falls. Through some gaps, he could feel faint currents of moving air, which told him that there existed a large space beyond the rubble. Stretching high above his head, he could see the tops of the walls before him, through holes in the roof he could see that the structure behind the debris was a separate annex. Climbing carefully, he found himself on a slanting rooftop, nearly buried in soil and covered over with the detritus of a destroyed ecosystem. To his left, an oblong structure that looked for all the world like… yes. If that is what he thought it was… his excitement grew as he approached it, dug at the overgrowth. Underneath, in the dead script of his people the wall bore the simple legend of "Caution: fuel cleansing and recycle hub" – and he exulted.
That meant that he was standing on the roof of an underground hanger.
A hanger meant Prothean starships. Javik had no doubt that, if there were ships under his feet, they would be intact and they would function. They would also have functional Prothean computing systems and databases. If fate cast him an opportune eye, they would also contain locations of other caches of desperate knowledge and survival – and possibly more of his kind.
Tracing a pipe from the structure, he found an access hatch and smiled to himself, began to dig out access to it.
For the first time in a very long time, Javik's heart felt light, he found himself humming an old battlesong from his homeworld.
It could very well turn out to be a good day after all.
So enthused by his discovery, Javik failed to notice that he was being watched.