Omega stinks of piss and sulfur. X3 wears a modified Phantom suit, stripped of the usual Cerberus insignia and colors. There doesn't seem to be a quiet (or clean) spot anywhere on the space station. Blaring music echoes from some dive bar not far away. Groups of people congregate in the halls, talking, yelling, laughing, preaching. Idiots and drunkards babble and slump against the walls, sometimes collapsing on the floor until someone kicks them or rousts them awake. One wretch lying in a pool of vomit hasn't moved since X3 arrived. She isn't sure if he's alive or dead. Beneath it all, the deep, rhythmic clang of mining machinery thrums through the metal hallways.
Leng says this is where the scum of the galaxy reside, where the worst of the worst find refuge. Ruling over them all is a territorial bitch of an asari named Aria T'Loak. It's important that they stay off her radar. Aria wouldn't be pleased to discover Cerberus agents are running black ops on her station. The Illusive Man needs her cooperation. There's a hint of disdain in Leng's voice when he discloses the last.
A human female standing in the shadows motions to them as they approach. "Leng!" she hisses a whisper. Their contact. They join her in the darkness. Her hair is dyed pink and she's wearing a glittering gold outfit. Not every dancer in the galaxy is an asari. She's smoking a cigarette, and offers one to Leng. He refuses. "Who's your girlfriend?" she asks, nodding to X3.
"She's nobody. Tell me what you have." X3 wonders if she could stick her sword through the back of Leng's head before he could react. He made her hurt Annalise.
The pink-haired girl blows a puff of smoke in X3's direction and turns to Leng. "That geezer you're looking for. Randall Eezo?"
"Ezno."
"Yeah, him. He's been here a couple days. He hangs out in a little joint called Afterburn. It's a couple levels down. Some of the miners go there after their shifts, you know?" She takes another drag on her cigarette. "I've heard he's a pretty good tipper. I like that in a guy." She holds out her hand.
Leng activates his omni-tool and wordlessly transfers some credits to her. "Anything else?
"Yeah. I've got something, if you'll double that."
Scowling, Leng grabs her forearm and squeezes. "Don't waste my time," he hisses. "What is it?"
"Ow! Okay okay, just let go, all right?" He releases her arm. She rubs at it with her opposite hand. "Shit, I think that's gonna bruise."
"Talk!" Leng barks.
She looks at him with a hurt expression. "We've been keeping an eye on Aria's daughter, like you asked. She's been seeing some guy on the hush-hush. A human. One of Aria's men. He keeps his face hidden most of the time, but we got a shot." She activates a simple omni-tool interface and punches up an image.
Leng stares at it for a moment. X3 has never seen him look surprised. "Grayson," he mutters. A moment later, he turns to X3. "You. Find Ezno. Shadow him, but don't engage him. He's… competent." Competent? High praise from Leng. He turns and strides away.
"What an asshole," the dancer mutters once he's out of view. Still rubbing her arm, she turns to X3. "So, you got rest of my tip?"
Randall Ezno walks into a bar. It sounds like the opening to a joke, but it feels more like the punchline. The Afterburn is a shitty knockoff dive that caters to a lower class of clientele. There's a few not-pretty-enough-for-Afterlife dancers who gyrate on mini-stages in the corners and throughout the room. The waitresses are surly and rarely get the orders right. The place stinks of sweat with undertones of yeast and vomit. Yeah. This place is definitely growing on him.
The joint is filling up. Some shift or another must be just ending. He's not sure which one. How does anybody keep track of time in this godforsaken place? Some miner, a batarian covered in soot and grime, bumps into him. "Watch where you're…" four-eyes starts to say, until he glances at Ezno's face. "Uh, excuse me, human." He backs away and moves around him.
He's used to the reaction. Cerberus did him up good. Gave him fancy new eyes and plugged all kinds of experimental cybernetics shit into him. He took to it like a salarian takes to school. They tell him he's one of the best subjects they've ever had. After they rigged him up, they started sending him out to bring back exotic animals and aliens for their research. It wasn't pleasant work. It wasn't personal. He wasn't proud of it, but he thought he was doing it for the good of humanity. That's what they told him. Then he saw the things they were doing in the name of humanity. The things they did to Inali...
He orders a beer at the bar and mutters a gruff thanks when the bartender slides it to him. He walks around, looking for a place to sit. He finds a booth that only has one person sitting at it: a turian with blue face markings, nursing a green drink and staring at the only quarian dancer in the room. One side of his face is messed up, covered in a web of scars.
It'll do. He slides in across from the turian. "Suuure," the bird-man drawls. "Have a seat. "
Ezno glances at the quarian dancer. "Blocking your view?"
The turian stares at him. "Nah." He points at Ezno's face. "What happened there?"
He's direct. And maybe a little drunk. "I was too pretty." He takes a swig of beer, swallows. "And not very useful. What about you? Someone decide you were too pretty?"
A chuckle. "Nah. I'm just clumsy."
Ezno nods. He thinks of all the turian soldiers he killed back at the Barn. They attacked the facility. He killed... how many? He's not sure. In the end, he avenged them. He destroyed the Barn himself. He killed the thing that used to be Inali. "You must be a pretty tough bastard."
The turian shrugs. "Just lucky, I guess. You look like maybe you've cheated death yourself. First Contact War?"
Ezno nods. "Yeah. I was a young pup, then. That was the first real action I saw. I was scared shitless. You birds are pretty good at war." A waitress comes into view. He flags her down. "Another beer." He points to the turian's drink. "And some more of... that."
The turian thanks him, gulping down the last of the green liquid. "So, Alliance." Ezno nods. "But now you're Cerberus."
Ezno raises an eyebrow. "Recently retired. What gave it away?"
"I recognize the look."
"Ah. The implants." He taps one of the metal strips on his cheek.
The turian shakes his head. "No. It's more about... what I don't see."
Ezno nods, one corner of his mouth tugging upward wryly. "You're an odd one."
"Oh?"
"No offense, but most birds I've met walk around like they have a ramrod up their ass."
Another chuckle. "No argument here."
"So. My turn. You're ex-military. Of course, that ain't no deep insight on my part. All you birds serve. But that profiling thing you did... Were you some sort of cop?" The turian's beady eyes fix on him. "C-Sec?"
The turian nods his answer. "What are you doing on Omega?"
"Nothing. Told you. I'm retired."
A scoff. "Guys like you don't get to 'retire'. That's not how it works."
"Let's call it a vacation then."
The turian looks away, staring wistfully at the quarian dancer. "Well. I guess this is the place for it."
Ezno sets down his empty glass and looks over at the quarian. What's the fascination? Nice hips, but they can't even take off their suits. "What brings you to this shit-hole, then? Pretty sure it ain't the service."
A pause. "Disappointment."
"Let me guess. You found out everything you believed in was a bunch of horseshit."
"Nailed it."
"Yeah." Ezno stares at the quarian a few moments longer. Hm. Maybe he sees it. "I'm a good guesser."
The turian chuckles first. Soon they're both laughing.
X3 watches from darkness as Ezno leaves the Afterburn. Waving off an asari whore that propositions him, he turns down a hallway. X3 cloaks and follows. Leng has been gone for hours. She doesn't know who Grayson is, but he must be a high priority target for Leng to divide his focus like this in the middle of a mission.
She follows the thick, grey-haired man as he descends into the bowels of Omega. The hum and thump of mining machinery grows steadily louder in her ears. Where is he going? She sticks to the shadows, cloaking as needed to avoid being detected by the various clumps of vorcha, batarians and turians that linger about. There are so many aliens in this place. Too many, Leng would say. A few look like they might want to cause trouble as Ezno passes by, but something about the way he looks at them always discourages them. She won't risk their attention. Her safety is not a concern, but she would lose Ezno. She's already on thin ice with Leng. He might take his anger out on Annalise again. Or force her to.
Ezno turns down a side alley. X3 hurries forward and steps around the corner. No one in sight. He's disappeared. If she were inclined to curse, she might utter a profanity. Instead, she moves forward. Ezno can't have gone far. He must know he's being followed. She uncloaks and stands in the middle of the hallway. Leng said not to engage him, but it's either that or let him escape. A moment later, a gravelly voice comes from behind her.
"You're pretty good, but you're not the only one with a fancy cloaking device. You Cerberus? Or one of Aria's?"
She turns toward him. He studies her with eyes that are startling, like twin ice crystals. His stony face is etched with cybernetics. She thinks he probably has even more implants than Leng. He holds a Mattock rifle that is pointed at her, but he doesn't shoot. His mistake. She raises a hand and fires at him with her palm cannon. He twists to one side, avoiding the energy pulse. He's surprisingly fast for an old man. She flips forward, sword out of its sheath. She thrusts at him once, then again and again. He parries the first two strikes with his rifle. The third one he only partially deflects, and it buries into the meat of his left arm. It just makes him mad. Scowling, he kicks her in the stomach, hard. She flies back several feet and falls, blade slipping out of her grasp.
Ezno throws his Mattock to one side. A whip-like instrument extends from one hand, like the ones she's seen the dragoons use back at the Phoenix facility. His cybernetics pulse blue as the leash crackles with energy. An instant later, it lashes out at her. She rolls to one side, snatches her blade and delivers a backswing. She connects, severing half the length of the leash. He grunts in amusement and drops the stub.
She quickly starts scrambling to her feet. Ezno charges her. She manages to get her sword up, impaling it into his left shoulder. He grits his teeth and grabs her sword hand. His meaty fingers wrap around her wrist, clamping like a vise. She raises her other hand to blast him in the face. He swats it aside, causing it to fire harmlessly into a wall. Her arm throbs from the blow. He's as strong as he is fast.
"Settle down," he says gruffly. "I just wanna take a look at you." He reaches for her face, pausing just shy of touching her helmet. He waits. She counts no fewer than six ways she can counter the hold he has on her. Instead, she just nods. It's an instinct she can't explain. He tugs on the helmet, pulling it free. Brown hair falls across her eyes. She shakes it out of the way and stares back at him impassively. He studies her mismatched eyes, the scars that divide her face. "Cerberus," he states, as if answering his own question. "I recognize that look."
She tilts her head.
He answers. "Like you've lost something. You're not sure what it is, but you want it back." There's a beat. "Let go." She does. He releases her wrist and steps back. She watches silently as he pulls the sword out of his shoulder with a grimace. He places the tip to the floor and snaps the blade with a booted foot. Both pieces drop to the floor with a clang.
Ezno walks over to where he discarded the Mattock. "Cerberus talks a good game. They've got a great sales pitch. They promise you purpose. They say they can make you whole, make you better. But they lie about the cost. They don't tell you what they're gonna take away. You don't even realize what you're giving up." He stoops to retrieve the Mattock, and clamps it to his back. He walks back to her. "I'm thinking in your case they took your tongue."
She blinks. "Maybe I could take yours." It's a... joke? She thinks this is how jokes work. She's not good at them, not like Annalise.
Nevertheless, he chuckles. "You remind me of someone," he says. "Look. I don't want to kill you. A person can hide on Omega forever, even from Cerberus. There are places down here even Aria doesn't go anymore. I figure two can hide just as easy as one. We could have each other's back." He extends a hand. "You coming or what?"
This isn't what she expected. Ezno is Cerberus. Cerberus is family. He wants to leave his family. He wants her to come with him. He treats her like a person. Cerberus treats her like a thing. Leng calls her property. She stares at the proffered hand, unable to move, strangely conflicted.
There's a movement in the shadows. Leng is a ghost. She never heard him approach. Ezno's hand is still reaching out to her when his head separates from his neck. It falls forward, hitting the ground and rolling to her. It comes to rest against her foot, his crystalline eyes staring up at her. His lips move, mouthing something. She doesn't know what he's trying to say. His eyes blink twice and then he is still.
Ezno's body has slumped to the ground, arterial blood still pumping out through the neck. Leng stands behind him, sword in hand. He stares at her for moment, then lowers the tip of the sword to the ground, hooking it onto her helmet and flicking it toward her. She snatches it out of the air. Flecks of Ezno's blood dot her hand.
"Ezno joined Cerberus of his own free will," Leng says, stooping to wipe his sword on Ezno's pants, first one side, then the other. "He brought this on himself when he turned against us. The things we do aren't always pretty, but they're necessary. We protect the interests of humanity." He sheathes the sword. "You want to know if you're property. You aren't. You want to choose. Here's your choice. Go back to the Phoenix facility and rejoin your family. Or don't.
He's offering her a choice? She looks down at Ezno. He chose to leave his family. To hide. "If I go back?"
"You're Cerberus forever. No more questioning our purpose."
"If I don't?"
He shrugs. "I'll say you're dead. That Ezno killed you."
She will have to take a new identity. To hide. To be alone. "What about Annalise?"
He smirks. "She's not part of this. She made her choice, like Ezno. I don't care what you do, but I no longer have the time to coddle you or the blonde. You're on your own." With that, Leng turns and vanishes into the shadows.
X3 stands, staring down at Ezno's clouded-over eyes, his parted lips. What was he trying to say?
The rampage is going nicely. They travel system to system, one remote Cerberus outpost to another, taking whatever they can use and leaving the rest in flames as they go. They brave rain and turbulent skies. They put an end to all manner of unethical experiments, some so bizarre and horrific that Morinth isn't even sure what their purpose is. Not that she really cares, whatever disapproving justicar-sounding words she may utter. She has a part to play.
The clones may be gone, but Grace is on a mission. She is ruthless and efficient. She has no compunction about nestling a bullet between the eyes of any mad scientist who doesn't get out of the way fast enough. Her eyes are flint as her pistol smokes. Increasingly, she resembles Shepard. Morinth doesn't share the observation with her. Nor do they speak of the clones.
Today they are on some rocky, orange-skied planet that barely supports life, and only in a narrow strip around its equator. Just the kind of forsaken place Cerberus likes to set up shop. The facility is a short distance south of the habitable zone, high on a windy cliff. They aren't sure what the facility is being used for. Liara's intel is vague—something to do with AI research? It doesn't matter, Grace says. It's Cerberus.
Feron has some difficulty hacking his way past the security measures, but he manages. In quiet moments, the drell has spoken of the many months he spent being tortured by the yahg that preceded Liara as Shadow Broker. Morinth wasn't certain he would have the stomach for what they are doing, but he hasn't flinched or complained. Morinth respects that about him. Still, she knows he has been in contact with Liara and it won't be long before he makes an excuse to leave. They've been at this for nearly a month. Even she is starting to tire of killing misguided human supremacists. What she wouldn't do for some Hallex and a night of dancing, to just be herself for a while. Shepard has emailed her about meeting on Omega.
There are soldiers and mechs inside the facility. It's nothing they haven't seen before. They paint the walls with Cerberus blood, pushing ahead until they find themselves stepping into a huge area with a high ceiling. A ship, strangely insectoid in appearance, dominates the room.
"What the hell?" Grace exclaims, absentmindedly throwing a singularity at a group of soldiers streaming in through a far door. "How the fuck did Cerberus get their hands on an intact geth ship?"
"I don't know, Commander," Feron replies, cloaking. His disembodied voice continues. "But I think I'm beginning to understand what kind of research is being conducted here."
Morinth detonates the singularity with a biotic throw. Body parts fly. She has no interest in geth. Cold metal and colder intellects, beyond her ability to touch. The metal men aren't even fun to kill. They finish off the soldiers and move onto the next section of the facility, the sound of klaxons ringing in their ears. Morinth has started hearing klaxons in her dreams.
Eventually, they come to a lab. Imprisoned in a containment chamber is a geth, fully intact, aside from a gaping hole in its chassis. Grace steps toward it, a curious expression on her face. The geth turns its head – the only part of it that can move – toward Grace. "Shepard-Commander," it speaks, a slight mechanical trill to its masculine voice. "Have you come to free us?"
They follow the geth as it marches back the way Grace and her companions came. Feron was reluctant to override its shackles. Samara urged her to destroy it. Grace isn't sure why she didn't take their advice. She's lost track of how many people she's killed with cool indifference since she started this quest. She murdered her sisters. Yet she couldn't bring herself to end this thing's existence. It talked. She's encountered geth before, during her CAT6 training. None of them talked. Was it mere curiosity that stayed her hand? Simple sympathy for another Cerberus victim? X20 talked, too. Begged for her life. She did the right thing, what she had to do.
The geth carries an unmodified M-98 Widow that it recovered from an armory soon after they released it. Grace hurries after the machine as it strides purposefully away. "Where are you going?"
"There is a geth vessel in this facility. We intend to take it. There is an urgent matter we must attend to. We have lost much time in this place."
We. Why does it keep saying that? Are there more here? Did she make a mistake in freeing it? "This urgent matter. Does it involve killing all the humans?"
The geth stops and turns. The strobe that shines from its face flickers as it speaks. "No, Shepard-Commander. We do not wish to harm organics, despite the harm they have done to us."
Grace stifles a laugh. "I've encountered your kind before. I don't remember any of them hesitating for a second to try to kill me."
"Those were not geth. They were heretics."
"Heretics?"
The machine bobs its hook-like head. A curiously organic expression. "I will explain. There was a division in the Consensus over aligning our goals with those of Nazara…"
"Slow down," Grace holds up a hand, brow crinkling in confusion. "Nazara?"
"The Old Machine you refer to as Sovereign." Old Machine? Ah. The Reapers. "Most geth programs wished to seek their own path to improvement, segregated from organics, independent of the Old Machines. Others revered the Old Machines and considered them the pinnacle of evolution. They left the Consensus to seek the extermination of organics. We refer to them as heretics."
Grace realizes there are dimensions to these machine people that she was unaware of. "So these 'heretics' are the hostile geth I've encountered? The ones who helped Sovereign?"
"Yes, Shepard-Commander. They have developed a virus. They intend to introduce it to the Consensus, to convert all geth to heretics. We must stop them. Our probability of success is low, but we must try." Our. We. Again with the pronouns.
"Commander…" Samara starts, already anticipating what Grace is about to say.
"I'll help you."
They find the heretic vessel in deep space and board it. It's enormous, cavernous, eerie. They creep through it in silence as much as possible, but conflict is inevitable. Some of the heretics awaken and try to stop them. Grace and the geth unit fight their way forward, alone. Feron excused himself from the mission, saying Liara urgently required his assistance on Hagalaz. Samara begged off as well. They are machines. The Code does not compel me to assist them. There is another matter I must attend to. Come find me on Omega, if you are fortunate enough to survive this foolish errand.
The geth unit calls itself a "mobile platform." One that houses over eleven hundred geth programs, which solves the mystery of why it continually refers to itself in the plural. Grace remembers when she thought of herself as an 'it'. Does the geth unit think of itself as an 'it'? It speaks with a man's voice. She frowns. "I need something to call you by," she tells it.
The geth cradles the M-98 Widow in its metallic arms. The drone it conjured up hovers by the far staircase. Another wave of heretics starts filtering in through the entrances below. Soon it will have to make a choice. Overwrite the heretics, or destroy them. The geth fires its Widow at a hunter as it reaches the stairs. One more 'platform' destroyed. It turns to her. "Geth seems an adequate form of address," it states, flatly.
"A bit on the nose, don't you think?" Grace positions herself behind a bank of consoles. "Besides, what would I call all my other robot friends?"
"I was not aware you were acquainted with any other synthetic life forms, Shepard-Commander."
So. Humor isn't in its programming. There's little time for banter anyway. The heretics are on top of them. As she fights, her mind works on the problem. The geth unit is a gestalt consciousness. Many programs in a single platform. Hm.
Minutes later, the latest wave of attackers lies smoldering and broken. She and the geth unit are alone again. They approach the control panel together. "Shepard-Commander. It is time. You must choose."
Graces tilts her head. "You're leaving this decision to me?"
"Yes. We are unable to reach a consensus. We will abide by your judgment."
She nods, having already reached her own consensus. She will not rewrite the heretics. They made their choice, right or wrong. She wouldn't want to be reprogrammed. Better to die than be twisted into something you despise. She presses the button. It's done. Is this what being a leader is? Always having to make the hard choice? Always having to press the button that ends lives? She looks up at the geth unit. "All right, Legion. Let's get out of this goddamn mausoleum."
Morinth nearly leaps out of the shuttle when it docks at Omega. She's been cooped up for two days, having diverted to the Osun System to drop off Feron. She left him on Erinle, to find his own passage to Hagalaz. The drell was intent on reuniting with his precious Liara. She considered making a snack of him, if only to save herself the trip. Instead, she clasped his hand and thanked him for his service to the galaxy. Somehow she managed to keep a straight face.
Morinth doesn't have a home. She's an explorer of the universe. She doesn't like standing still but Omega calls to her. Afterlife calls to her. She likes the dark. She finds those who want to lose themselves in the black and makes it night forever. The heavy bass of Afterlife carries. The floors hum and make every part of her sing. She moves through the throngs of people: the scum of the universe, those playing with fire, a playground for her to move in.
Shepard is here. She will meet with her, but first she will scratch an itch.
She walks straighter, more confidently, navigating her way through the crowds and finding the isolated, lonely corridors, draped in grime and shadows. The places she frequents, the areas her mother disdained. And now I'm carrying you everywhere I go, Mother. I am you. I'm using your face, your status to get what I want. She'd hate it.
It isn't long before she finds who she's looking for. Brings Euphoria To Those Who Seek It. A fancy name for a hanar drug peddler. The jelly creature bobs in place, the jetpack on his back keeping him afloat. He weaves back and forth studying her. "This one had not heard you returned to Omega. Artists were beginning to feel as if they were safe." The tone of hanar is always even, but if hanar could smirk, she's certain this one would be. "Your appearance is very becoming."
Morinth scoffs. She hates the getup. The hanar knows her face but not her mother's. "It's been too long." She looks at his shelves and stands. A dingy light blinks over them. "What have you got for me?"
"This one has everything you could ask for. This one knows your affinity for Hallex. This one has an advance shipment of Hallex Prime. Fresh from the labs on Chalkhos. It is more potent than what this one has had in stock before."
"Side effects?"
"This one has heard no complaints. This one saved a bottle for you. The last one." One of his tentacles reaches down to grab a flask. It is edged like a diamond, slim and a dark purple color.
"Not pills?"
"The effect is near immediate. A longer, better high, with a silky smooth finish. You will not be disappointed."
She snatches it from him and tucks it into her boot. "Why not? Life's not worth living unless you're living dangerously." She transfers the credits over. His pink, squishy frame hovers over the credits display. "Hey, Euphoria? You see me outside of this place, you don't know me, all right?"
"This one has already forgotten your name."
She nods and moves on her way. Shepard is waiting and more importantly, Hallex Prime. It's been too long since she's been possessed, taken by pure sensation. She looks forward to it.
Legion is gone. Back to the Perseus Veil. Grace wonders what the hell she was thinking, helping a talking geth. She had enough of them when she was up against Saren. When Shepard was up against Saren. Her memories confuse her. They're not even her memories. Shepard-Commander, it asked her before parting, does this unit have a soul?
They wiped out the heretics. Is destruction better than brainwashing? She thinks so. What if she's wrong? She thinks of X20. Did she have a soul? Do I have a soul?
She needs to catch up to Samara. So it's off to Omega again. Loud, dirty, filthy, filled to the brim with criminals.
She nearly died here. How strange it was, how terrifying. Later, when she considered her time in that safe house with Hope, she thought of herself as undeveloped. She could only understand herself as a thing, an 'it'. Now she knows she had it right all along. It was only her later existence that led her to believe that she could be more.
Hope's agenda was never the game plan. Grace isn't sure what was. She wanted to help people. She thinks that's what she wanted. Now she willingly spends her days in shuttles, traveling from Cerberus facility to Cerberus facility, burning them to the ground. Maybe it's in her DNA, that bloodlust. Shepard sacrificed her unit in Torfan to annihilate the batarians. She remembers that. She can smell the sweat and grime. He said please, he talked about his family and she pulled the trigger.
The smell is the same. Blood, sweat and guts, no matter the race. It fills her nostrils, thinking of that batarian in the safe house, the one she used the butt of the rifle on until he no longer had a face. Is she a monster? Is it Shepard's influence, Hope's, or is she only trying to mitigate the blame?Please. X20 with her voice. Bam. She can't sleep. Did she do the right thing? Is she doing the right thing? It plagues her.
Cerberus would have used the clones for... for what? Killing. Torturing. Abducting. Everything she's guilty of. But what if they didn't? Then they were just harvesting organs for Shepard. They wouldn't have had any kind of life. Grace wonders if she has always been this way. She remembers theNormandy, laughing with Kaidan and Liara, through a haze, can feel Liara's lips against her own. I have never been more sure of anything in my life, she'd said. Shepard's copy-memories, Shepard's copy-emotions. A current runs through her, hot and electric, dampening, a puddle of ice building in her stomach when she remembers Liara's eyes, cold as a blizzard, in Hagalaz.
She thinks of Hope. I worried. Did she? She lied to her from the beginning and manipulated her at every turn. She doesn't care about you. She never did. Forget her. It's difficult. Her guilt makes for a decent intermediary. Maybe she should stop. Maybe she should give it all up. You'll never have your own life while Shepard lives. Kill her and walk away. The universe would stand to benefit from the death of scum like that.
"Porn! Hey! I got porn!" The voice is unrecognizable. Grace turns her head. A turian with a splash of blue warpaint on his face beckons her closer with his clawed hands. "Anything you want. Human on krogan, asari on hanar, asari on asari, ooh, dangerous, turian and quarian, drell and salarian, geth on quarian, steamy! You name it, I got it."
She looks at the title he holds up. Batarian Space Balls and another he tries to hide, Ass Effect IV: Shepard & Saren, Blow by Blow. She glowers. "Are you trying to shake me down? I can get all of that on the extranet."
"Yeah, but do you want to wade through all that trash? These are the goods! I got this sweet vid of two asari matriarchs, will make your face go red, human! Er… you humans do turn red, don't you?"
"I should go."
"But human—"
She leaves. Meanders through the downtrodden of Omega. There are various shops and she finds herself perusing them, buying meat on a stick from an elcor with a cigar before continuing on her way, chewing thoughtfully on the surprisingly tender and spiced delicacy. She finds a batarian preaching to a crowd of aliens, encouraging them to pick up their weapons against the blight that is humanity. Batarians. Prickling anger builds in her as he preaches his hatred. The anger is hot and suffocating. She has reactions and hatred where none should be. The batarians attacked Elysium. They got what they deserved on Torfan.
"Repent!" the prophet shouts. "Repent and restore your souls to glory before it's too late!" He looks at her, his oily black eyes fixating on her. "Even you, human. It isn't too late for you to repent. Wash away your sins. Start over. Make amends. And take to arms!"
Grace moves on. Repent, he says. There is no repentance for her. There is no righting her actions. You've done nothing wrong. Hasn't she? Please. The bang of the pistol, always startlingly loud, even in memory. She stabbed Hope. Guilt washes over her. Did Hope deserve that? Because she didn't like the truth? She exhales shakily and dumps the meat sticks, miserable now, finding it impossible to breathe. She leans against a wall, next to the entrance of the slums, dizzy with thoughts. She hates the holo-mask. A disguise for an imposter. She isn't allowed her own face. She doesn't have her own face.
Two batarians walk by, voices heated. "Did you hear? That bitch Shepard is here."
Grace straightens.
"First human Spectre!" The other batarian spits on the floor. "She wipes out an entire mass relay and the humans do nothing! Aratoht, gone! A blight on humanity!"
"My mother was on Aratoht," the first batarian's voice is thick and anguished.
Grace pushes away from the wall, slipping the N7 helmet on again. Shepard, Butcher of Torfan. Shepard, the mass murderer. Put a stop to it. Put a stop to her. She's cold, her face and fingers gone numb. Her breath spikes out of her, her mind a minefield of thoughts, but her purpose is clear. Find Shepard. Kill Shepard. Take back your life. Repent. Repent. I'll repent later.
For a moment, Shepard thinks Samara has come back to life. Morinth's eyes have taken on the same blind gaze that her mother's held. Justice is blind, maybe. When their eyes meet Morinth smiles and Shepard feels less apprehensive. Morinth approaches. Where Samara marched, Morinth slinks. She sits opposite of her.
Shepard is reminded of the first time they met. Morinth was exciting, wild, violent. Shepard liked that. She could relate. "Shepard," Morinth searches her eyes. Shepard wonders what she's looking for. "Can't say I was expecting to hear from you."
"No more surprised than I was. I send you along with Miranda to help find Oriana, and you both abandon ship? I've been running Illusive's errands for the last month, with no one to talk to but Joker and EDI." Now that Morinth is in front of her, the cold disappointment of before washes into anger. That's more comfortable. It seethes inside of her. It pulses beat with the heavy, pounding bass of the space. Morinth flags a waitress over for drinks. "Nothing to say for yourself?"
"You know me, Shepard, I don't do well with routine. I helped Miranda get her bratty sister back. That's all I promised." She shifts in the plush seat. "Don't be mad at me because Miranda hasn't shown her face. Last I remember, you and I weren't on friendly terms," she smiles at that, "are you on friendly terms with anyone?" A beat. "Did you change your hair? Something's different."
Shepard glowers, ready to snap back a response when the drinks arrive. Morinth's is lava red, swirling between that and blue, to black, to red, back to blue again. She pulls something from her boot and dumps half of the liquid into the drink. "Want a hit?" she asks. Shepard considers it but shakes her head. Morinth dumps the rest in. The drink goes purple. She takes a sip, leans back against the seat, her head tilted back, her eyes momentarily fluttering. "Mh. It is a touch stronger than anticipated."
Samara's voice. Shepard chills. "I told you I don't like it when you do that." Morinth looks at her with blind eyes before blinking. Her eyes are sharp as razors again. "What's with you?"
"You tell me. You called me here. I hear you blew up Aratoht. I would have loved to see that mass relay go up." She leans forward, excited. "Something like that, it must have been beautiful."
"I stopped the Reapers."
Morinth shrugs. "A nice bonus, I guess. Sure it wasn't because you like killing? There's no shame in that, Shepard. You, me, even Mother dearest. Coldblooded killers. You must love it like I do. Seeing their eyes, when they know it's over..." she sighs, rapturous, "there's no other feeling like it."
"The Alliance wants me to turn myself in."
"Who cares what they want?"
Shepard laughs. "I knew there was a reason I liked you." Morinth smirks. "I'm not going to do it." Morinth nods in approval. "Miranda mentioned someone may be after me. Any idea who that might be?"
"Who isn't after you? Even your own military," she says with another shrug.
"Fair point. Any idea where Miranda is?"
"Why? Looking to go on a hunt?" Morinth smiles. Shepard's eyes flash. Morinth leans forward, her lips close to Shepard's. "I wish I could tell you. Miranda's an uptight bitch, just like my mother. I bet they would have gotten along. You want to take her out, Shepard? We could kill her together." She meets her gaze. Shepard is struck, momentarily paralyzed, unable to fixate on anything other than Morinth. Her mind feels like pins and needles. Then Morinth sits back, seemingly vexed.
"Miranda's on the run because she thinks she isn't safe. I could protect her."
"Like you protected the squad on the Collector base?" She throws the comment like a grenade. Time slows. Shepard hears each beat of the music, the flash of every light. Then she's over the table, her pistol pressed to the temple of Morinth's skull. Everyone's dancing, immersed in their own moments. Shepard can't breathe. Morinth is still. "Is this really what you wish to do, Commander?" Samara's voice again. It was meant to be a new beginning. How did everything turn to shit?
There's a loud bang. Not Shepard's gun, but something else. There's screaming. Shepard releases Morinth, who appears unperturbed. Smoke billows into the room. Morinth picks up her drink and raises it in salute. "I believe someone is here to see you."
"Why do we gotta always wait on the ship?" Joker complains. He spins circles in the cockpit chair, blowing out his lower lip in exaggerated sighs. "I mean, I know I run this thing but for once I'd like to get some shore leave? Even if it's the galaxy's version of a nastier Vegas. Man, I hear they have some really fantastic porn down there, too. Like, matriarch on matriarch stuff."
"Is the collection you have not sufficient?" EDI asks. Joker glances at her hologram representation. "I have taken to defragmenting it in order to allow standard Normandy operation." He squints his eyes, unsure if the AI is having him on. "That was a joke."
"Yeah, you know, I still haven't gotten the hang of you doing that." He flops back against the chair, his arms dangling to the sides. "My ass went to sleep at least three hours ago." Another sigh. "It wasn't bad before. You know, me, Tali and Garrus would sit around playing games," he laughs, "and then Donnelly, he would mac on Tali and Jack and basically any woman that wasn't Daniels, and- you could see her getting so pissed. They were good ones," he says, his smile faltering before falling away altogether. He leans forward momentarily, elbow on his leg, hand covering his face. "Man."
EDI floats in place, her interface blinking slowly. "They got permanent shore leave," she offers at last.
Joker glares at her. "You know, why don't you shut up before I have you shackled again? Stupid AI, no one asked you."
"I apologize, Joker. It appears my humor parameters require some calibration. Perhaps we should find Garrus."
He smiles faintly then before glancing at the dashboard and sitting up straight. "Uh, EDI—"
"I see it." The radar shows a large ship on the screen. "It is an Alliance warship," EDI notes with some caution. "Likely it is here to apprehend Commander Shepard."
"No shit—"
"Could you clarify what—"
"No time! Hey, Commander," he adjusts his headpiece, confirms that it's tuned into the right frequency. "Uh… you might want to get the hell out of Dodge—"
"I don't have time for this, Joker!" she shouts into his earpiece.
Joker winces, "Yeah, I get that but—" The signal cuts off. She's turned off her earpiece. Joker takes a deep breath.
"Uh oh," EDI offers.
A figure emerges from the smoke. Shepard rolls her hand into a fist before raising the Carnifex at the new arrival. Her comm crackles lifelessly in her ear. The partygoers have long since run out. Grey, black and white armor. Nothing alarming there. The helmet… Whoever it is, she's wearing her old N7 helmet. "I don't know who the fuck you are," Shepard says, "but I'm going to be taking my helmet back. I'll be honest with you. I hope we have to do this the hard way."
Morinth remains seated, drinking, seemingly oblivious to the chaos building around them. The figure removes the helmet, sets it on a table. A ginger woman with a square jaw. She touches a finger to her face. The hologram disintegrates, line by line, revealing dark brown strands of hair, and angry green eyes. The air is trapped in her lungs. What the fuck. What the fuck!
The figure smashes toward her in a frantic wave of biotic energy, sending tables and chairs flying, flipping over. The sheer power of it is— A fist slams into her face. A tooth comes loose. Shepard touches her tongue to it, blood filling her mouth before she strikes back, clapping her hands over the intruder's head, driving an elbow hard into its face. The thing stumbles back. "Who the fuck are you?" Shepard howls. Is she losing it? She pants for breath and gets a biotic shove that hurtles her back, her spine straining painfully as it slams into the wall. The intruder moves forward again, face white with rage.
Morinth stands. The... thing, raises its hand at her. "Stay out of this, Samara!"
Samara? Shepard laughs. She was almost worried. But she has nothing to fear from idiots. "Samara, huh?" Shepard smiles through the blood. "Morinth must be leading you around by the nose. She always did like them young and stupid." Uncertainty touches the thing's eyes. It looks at Morinth, and Shepard sees some small part of it shatter. Has this thing been lied to before? "Who sent you?" Nothing. "You got others with you?" Shepard looks at Morinth. Her. "If you try anything, I'll snap your neck just like your mother's."
"Just stay out of it," the thing tells Morinth heatedly.
"You have a name, thing? Jesus, what the fuck are you? You a clone, like Miranda? My genetic leftovers? You think you can take me out?" She laughs caustically. "I don't know who the fuck you are," she repeats, "but I'm going to have fun killing you."
"Just fucking try it!" The woman lunges again, takes a hard swing. Shepard ducks, buries a fist into its side before clocking it on the side of its head. It doesn't make a sound. It's persistent. Another swing, then a kick. They miss. The thing is fast. Shepard's faster. She grabs a nearby stool and slams it into the thing's back, knocking it to the ground.
"What was that?" Shepard asks, swinging down hard again, just hoping the thing's spine will crack. She tosses the stool aside, taking a step back and driving her boot into its face. The woman grunts at last, turning over, nose splattering blood, but it gets to its feet. Biotically, the thing is impressive. Its hand to hand is expert, but not good enough to stand against her. "Good," Shepard says, "I was hoping you had some more fight in you."
The only difference is its eyes, green, throughout, not blue like her own go when biotic energy is coursing through her. It throws itself at Shepard again and again. Shepard bares her teeth in something resembling a smile. Illusive's gift has come in handy after all. Faster, stronger, she grins as her fists connect with the thing's face. It doubles over and Shepard knees it in the face violently until it collapses back. On the floor again. "What's the point of looking like me," she asks, "when you're clearly the inferior product? You can't fool anyone." She glances at Morinth, no longer worried about her lookalike. "This the loser you're running with now? This who Miranda was warning me about?" she scoffs. "I expected better." She spits on the clone, a glob of saliva and blood. "There. Tell them to make someone who can stand up to me."
Morinth is still and strangely somber.
A tangle of biotic energy writhes from the woman on the floor, and then Shepard's pistol slides out of its holster. Shepard grabs for it but it's gone. For a moment she can only stare dumbly as the Carnifex hurtles toward the woman on the floor. The next instant her senses return to her. Flexing her own biotics, she latches onto the gun and tugs back. The weapon flies back to her, nestling perfectly into her hand. "Neat trick," Shepard says. She lines up the shot and pulls the trigger. The first one goes into its leg. The thing screams. The second one buries into its chest. Shepard laughs at the small barrier it managed to erect at the last moment. It may have saved its life, but not for long.
Shepard stands over it, pointing the gun at the thing's head. It knows it's done. It looks tired, resigned, fingers half curling, eyes shimmering with Shepard can't say what. The green has sapped out of its eyes. Only the hazel remains. Common. Nothing. "You going to say 'please'?" she asks coldly.
The thing flinches. The trigger is half squeezed when there's an eruption of noise. "There she is!" Shepard steps back. Batarians. An entire squad of them rushing into the room, assault rifles and shotguns bared. Shepard looks around her. Shit. Shit. Shit. The thing is gone. She glances back.
Morinth is escaping into the smoke. Morinth is escaping with that thing. And the helmet. The batarians are closing in. Shepard screams and charges at them.
Their carcasses are strewn all over the club floor. Shepard stands in the middle of them, like the victor of a demented game of king of the hill. She's bloodied and tired. Her hardsuit is riddled with the pock marks of shotgun blasts that were too close for comfort. She stinks like batarian guts. She blinks and for a brief moment she's back in Torfan. They'd surrendered and begged. That thing, that copy hadn't. Had just given up. A clone. A lab rat, just like Grunt. Scurrying away like a rat. Where the hell did it come from? She'll talk to the Illusive Man. She needs answers. There's no way in hell he didn't know about this.
She clenches her fists and closes her eyes. As if the Alliance weren't already up her ass about playing nice with the batarians. Sighing, she clicks on her earpiece. "Hey, Joker, you read? Mind telling me what was so damn important?" Dead silence. Not even static. It's busted. She sighs, tosses it and leaves the batarians behind.
The energy level outside of the club is more amped up than usual. The people who spot her quickly look away, shrinking back, as if they've forgotten that she's a hero Spectre, that she's saved all their damned lives more times than she can count. No doubt Aria is going to turn up at any minute and tell her to get out of Omega. The last thing she needs is to deal with that pissed off asari.
She makes her way to the Normandy docking bay and stops sharply. Alliance soldiers everywhere, armed, weapons bared, pointed at her. Why the hell didn't Joker warn her? She clenches her fists and brings a hand to her the Carnifex at her side. "Get out of my way."
"Sorry, Commander. We have our orders."
The soldier's some punk kid with zits on his quivering chin. Shepard laughs. "Pretty brave standing up to me when you have twenty soldiers backing you up." She yanks the gun out of her holster and sees him take an unintentional step back. "Now, are you going to get out of my way or am I going to have to move you?"
There's a murmur amongst the soldiers. She moves closer. The Normandy is some thirty feet away. She just fought some demented copy of herself and a fuckton of pissed off batarian soldiers. She's not worried about Alliance soldiers caught up in red tape. They can't take her. They won't take her. The Reapers are coming. She's the only one who can stop them. She walks faster, breaks out into a run. The soldiers flinch. One good biotic blast and—
"Commander!"
That voice.
Shepard stops. She sees her there standing at the hull of the Alliance warship, a melon-armed buffoon standing next to her. Mom...? The word catches in her throat. She was married to the Alliance and a mother to all the troops under her care. Their own relationship was always more... chilly. She sees her and thinks of her father, hanging from that doorknob.
"So far it's just insubordination," Hannah Shepard says. Her voice is strong and controlled but it sneaks in there, that hint of disappointment. "Don't make this worse for yourself. I know you. I know what lengths you're willing to go to." Shepard looks around her, anxiously. Her heart beats too fast. No escape. There's no escape. She could kill them all. No. No. Her jaw clenches, trembles. "Don't do this. Don't make this worse for yourself."
Shepard glares.
"Drop the gun."
Shepard smiles contemptuously and throws it to the side. Her mother is closer now, her and the giant ape. "You're tough with a squadron of soldiers, Admiral," her smile is tight. The rank is new, the insignia freshly sewn.
Hannah steps close. "You stop this right now," she hisses in her ear. "You're an officer in the Alliance. Stop acting like a spoiled brat and do what's right for once, won't you?"
Shepard stares at her. "For once," she says blankly. It's meant to be a question but her tone is flat.
Hannah is already turned around, moving away. "Cuff her, James."
He presses a hand to her back and pats her down, searching for other weapons. Her shotgun is tossed aside. Shepard is still staring at her mother, barely hearing the man's apology as he pulls one arm behind her back. He slips one cuff onto her wrist and then the other. Every sound is augmented. Everything moves in slow motion. They parade her through the group of soldiers. She glowers at the ground, eyes burning with frustration. It's over.