Prologue

Javik stands in the Normandy hold with Braith at the door, he at his table-basin of water, gazing at her amid the dark stuffiness of that room.

The air is filled with things he finds unsettling: Krogan, Drell, Asari, Quarian, Human, more…He speaks to Braith Shepard, the one who opened his stasis pod on Eden Prime.

"Earth's been destroyed," Braith fills him in, "…We have nowhere to go…I feel like the drell, who had to leave Rakhana to Kahje to escape the destruction they caused themselves…Earth is not inhabitable though because of the Reapers…They're everywhere, the husks, the monsters, the machines as big as towers, some as large as countries in the way they span across the ground…They're all dead, aren't they?"

Javik shakes his head, "…I cannot tell you if that is true, Shepard. I would believe the Crucible did what it was meant to do and broadcast the signal to shut everything down. You would know, would you not…After all, you are the final decisive wielder of the tool against them."

"The radiation, the machines that broadcast the signal that indoctrinates people, those things, Javik, those things I can't shut off. The machines, the commands being issued—were being issued, Javik, those things are gone, silenced for now."

"What do you need from me, Shepard." He takes his hands from the water, looking at the doorframe, seeing her by his shard of memories.

Floating in phantasm beside it, he can see her, feel her, know she is not there bodily but her spirit somehow persists.

"I need to know what I can give my people for their sacrifice, Javik," her form pleads, "…We brought the war to Earth and fought the final battle, rescuing the rest of the galaxy…There has to be some place to start anew."

Javik closes all four eyes and thinks quietly a while, "…There is a place…I remember we found it late in our cycle, Shepard…It is doubtful it still exists if our theories about it proves true in one theatre, but in another…" His eyes reopen to her remaining presence, a vestige of what exists still in the Citadel ruins floating and fallen on Earth, "…If the other theatre of theories proves to be true, you will have a place from which to rebuild your civilization's Earth."

"Where is it," Braith's transparent lips move, "…I don't know how much time I have left to send the message to whomever a hope might exist with, Javik."

Javik swipes his hand through her, to see if she will dissipate or if he is only imagining her ghost, and she does not go away or vary in her state, "…It is Lothairaxl…Listen to me, Shepard, while you can, and through whatever means you have at your disposal to do this impossible I see by my eyes and speak to by my lips, you may try to send this to your kind, and those among your friends."

Braith listens, and as she begins to fade, one last broadcast is sent throughout the galaxy to notify everyone there is a place to start and it is attainable.

#

The Citadel continues to crumble apart and explode over Earth, littering itself and burning through the atmosphere, its bits of shell and part crumbling and falling over both land and ocean…Adding to the graveyard of Human civilization and Reaper bodies scattered everywhere.

For this, Shepard, Javik thinks, …I give you our greatest secret…You have earned it…

#

"A sym-planet is not organic in its creation. It is a seed of synthetic genesis. From its roots, it learns how to grow and protect itself. Year after year, century upon century it changes and evolves. It takes from the universe that swells and ebbs around us. If you think of a pearl, you will understand how this works. The mystery is what starts the pearl."

#

Braith spins in space, the Citadel Tower's upper observatory floating around her in a continuous carousel of debris…The engines of the Crucible among them, the station's core weapons itself that make the world translate from one to the next…From her fingers issue the lights that form into countless variations of language, tangible and not, and in one final broadcast from her enduring spirit herself, her body sends the message, seeking everywhere throughout the Milky Way Galaxy and beyond.

#

"My people claim we found it. We called it Lothairaxl. It was silver and green as opposed to anything that makes a Primitive think a planet capable of life. Lothairaxl generates water from the air. The atmosphere it creates of its mechanism. It is not understood how. Throughout the world exist the Pool Gardens."

#

Their feet set down on silver streets, a city aglow with bright gleams of walls and fluorescent lights under a purple night sky…It is dark when they first arrive on the sym-planet and venture from their ships and shuttles to the ground, the city itself.

Flowers bloom from gardens high above the skyscraper's turrets and spires, all mirrored in majestic splendor in a life that opens at night…The air is cold up there and ice forms across the platforms that float in perfect coordination, permanent in their heaven of cold space, breathable air, rushing gusts of constant venting among the frozen surfaces of water capping the pipes that disappear with the sound of waterfalls to nowhere.

It is both eerie, beautiful, and surreal.

#

"At night, the Pool Gardens glow with flowers that react in contrast to organic counterparts. They hide from sunlight, open to darkness, dislike heat, welcome cold to their petals. Let that caution you, Shepard, nothing good comes from darkness and cold."

#

In the darkness of sewers underfoot, below the streets, along the chunnels that burrow through the city's depths and provide transit by cab or train to other parts of the city, creatures hide and listen to the multitudes above, walking over their homes inside that city above…Lights come on and rainbow prisms dance through the wards that seek those who do not belong where they are lingering in curiosity, perhaps some in hunger, and rushing through the subterranean underground, these "guardians" of the Cities Above and Below take what is too slow or belligerent to move on quickly enough.

The guardians keep to the passages and make sure all is kept where these belong…Cities may not combine their secret civilizations with one and other, but some things must be able to clean up…

#

"It was believed through years of study that the Pool Gardens' phenomena releases a diaspora. Every flower connects to something that runs deep to the seed from which they spring in these arboretums. The product is water that covers the vastness unexposed in the city crust. Below the silver waters, more of Lothairaxl exists to be discovered.

It is accessible so long as the explorer has permission from the sym-planet."

#

A face forms in greeting the many human and asari faces that are permitted into the bay command center of Port, formed of trillions by trillions of small pixy-like lights swarming from the openings of vessels connected to the chamber of Port Mother…She or he or they, the new visitors to Lothairaxl are uncertain of, but the face that Port Mother's sentience creates smiles in benign welcome of those come to learn of Lothairaxl…

A rush of voices, simultaneously loud and soft, all speak up at once as Port Mother initializes the start of introductions.

#

"Port Mother seems to be the one connection to everything in Lothairaxl. Every so often, Port Mother authorizes the layers' managers to invite a species to its outmost layer which is in the process of being built."

#

More expanses and structures for the future inhabitants' needs start to furnish themselves throughout the sky, pink and purple pillars of clouds being revealed with the rise of Lothairaxl's sun…Far off, the star burns brightly and calm, and she is called T-9.

#

"The first manager we made contact with were Surr. They are vile but generous. Helpful, if unappealing…They showed us how to live in the youngest layer of Lothairaxl. The City in which your kind will reside after the Reaper War, Shepard."

#

Millions of upturned faces walk through the silver streets being lit with light and sun, a warmth coming to the coolness that pervades at night, and though there is a smell known of sewers and rot, this is to be expected in a city fit with water, plumbing, and people…Life is possible here, and the Surr are assigned to help them…

They walk in shuffles and crawls, leading the new mass of visitors to their future homes, shops, and businesses. A dream it is, all waiting and possible before you.

#

"There is no way to know what species has lived—might still live—within the deeper layers of the sym-planet. No one has made it beyond the Surrs'. It is forbidden by the Surr who refer us to Port Mother whenever we had questions the Surr could not answer."

#

Prothean faces decline and shake their heads to the offers made by Port Mother, warily moving away and leaving the bay center by which they meet her in years' passed…Whether Port Mother is female or not, they do not trust easily and the protheans depart to study and observe the city from their fleets and later their observational stations left in orbit of the world below.

Between T-9 and the star's sole planet in revolution around its draw, a military installation grows, and the protheans form another city outside Lothairaxl, unaware that what the city draws in, it keeps if even at length from its surface.

#

"My people chose to depart Lothairaxl. Our mistrust in synthetics preventing Protheans from forming the bond with the sym-planet. Until now, Lothairaxl remained a secret, but you Primitives need help. I am the last of my kind, waiting for death to deliver me to my people."

#

Javik walks along a landing dock with an asari—this friend of both love and loyalty to Commander Braithlynn Anne Shepard—he stopping once to gaze up at the cosmic heavens over Thessia, through blue azure clouds agleam with the glow of a new dawn after the Reapers' defeat by the Humans and all their allies in the galaxy. Liara T'Soni looks after her shoulder to see the last prothean staring heavenward, "…Are you well, Javik?"

He turns his face towards her, a fearsome grimace to a species she has made her life's study, "…I am wondering of the stars, Doctor T'Soni…I am wondering of the Commander."

Liara's lips twitch with a memory and, dare she think of it, a hope for her former love and friend in arms of battle, "…We'll see her again, Javik, I think we will."

Javik nods once and commences his reunification with her steps, walking towards the edge of the landing and down into the offices still in rebuild and repair after the fall of the enemy.

#

"I give you this information so one day you harness the mystery of the place. I do not know what else I can offer in thanks for destroying our enemy, Shepard. I hope you take care to use Lothairaxl wisely in restarting your empire. Perhaps in time, you will decide that what knowledge I have given of Lothairaxl, was best kept as it was…a secret."

#

On a table in a lab in Alliance and Council regulated space, Braith's gray eyes open again…She rises off the table and sits with her legs bare, her hands on her knees, and raises her face to the lights and people above her.

"I'm ready," she says, looking at each and every one of them.

There is a murmur of approval, and Admiral Steven Hackett sets his hands on the railing above her grow-lab, "…Welcome back, Braith Shepard."