Chapter 1: A new mission confirmed
Jane Shepard groaned as she crawled out of bed, briefly grabbing her photo of Liara and gazing lovingly at it. However her memories was interrupted by EDI's avatar popping up.
"Shepard, the Illusive man is waiting for you in the communications room." EDI chimed helpfully.
"The hell does he want this time? We were about to go retrieve Tali…" Shepard asked before giving an exasperated sigh and pouring herself some coffee. "Fine, I'll go talk to TIM. Tell him I'll be there as soon as I've had my coffee."
"Shepard…While I understand that is your acronym for him. I would advise against calling him that in person."
"So say it to his face. Noted EDI, thanks for the idea." Shepard beamed. The commander of the SR-2 Normandy groaned as she downed her coffee a bit before setting the Galaxy's #1 commander mug down and threw on her tacky Cerberus uniform. What she wouldn't give for Alliance blues.
"Shepard That's not a-"
"That will be all EDI." Shepard retorted, making the AI pause.
"Understood Shepard." Then the AI left her alone. The former N7 commando sighed, rubbing the back of her neck before fetching her coffee and casually making her way to the elevator to head down to the CIC. Shepard sighed as she wondered what it could be. The crew was still on edge about the trap at the collector ship. They still had to recruit Tali and collect the Reaper IFF.
The elevator dinged quietly as the elevator doors opened and Shepard went out and walked briskly to the left. The human commander made her way swiftly into the ship's armory, giving Jacob a polite nod before making her way to the communications chamber and meeting room.
"Shepard!"
"Jacob. As you were." The ship's armory officer gave her a quick salute before getting back to his squats.
Once she was through that door she moved into the meeting chamber. Almost instantaneously the Illusive man appeared.
"Shepard." TIM said while taking a drag from his usual vice.
"The hell do you want TIM, we were going to be heading after the Engineer next."
"And while this is unrelated, I'm afraid it can't be ignored. Batarians tried activating a dormant mass relay on the outer edge of the terminus system, near the perseus veil. So in the general neighborhood of your current destination."
"Then it can wait." Shepard said, crossing her arms. "But you're about to tell me it can't. Why would batarians be that far out in the middle of nowhere?"
"Correct. And the right question. Batarians are greedy, we both know this. But it seems this particular bunch bit off more than they could chew."
Shepard glared at how TIM took his sweet time every. Single. Call.
"Collectors or reapers?" She asked seriously.
"Normally I'd commend you for taking that threat so seriously. But I'm afraid the matter is…" He paused, seemingly tapping away, likely transferring a file or several. "Complicated."
EDI received the data files and promptly opened them. Footage from a stealth satellite for sure. Shepard could easily make out the batarian vessels along with intercepted radio chatter. What happened next astounded her. By the end of the footage she looked from the intel to TIM.
"And. This is my problem how?" Shepard asked with an annoyed look.
"Shepard, that was first contact. And shots were fired. We need to make sure the Batarians didn't go and poke something much worse than Reapers."
"And I do this, this benefits your organization in some way. I've no interest in helping Cerberus."
"But you are interested in saving humanity. Helping Cerberus is helping humanity. We're on the same side, Shepard."
"No, Illusive man, I don't think we are." Jane crossed her arms and stared pointedly through the Illusive man who sighed and shrugged.
"Go there for yourself. The Normandy's stealth systems should be enough to get you close. And try to establish diplomatic relations. Who knows, maybe that small task force could help protect human colonies."
Now it was shepard's time to sigh. What wasn't he telling her. The more she thought about it, the more suspicious it seemed.
"I'll leave you to it Shepard." The Illusive Man said simply before hanging up.
"EDI, call the others to the meeting room. We have a lot to discuss."
"Right away Shepard."
Mordin Solus and Jacob were the first to arrive.
"Shepard? What's up?" Jacob asked, looking confused.
"Odd for meeting to be called out of the blue. Illusive man?" Shepard held up her hand to indicate for questions to be held for the moment as one by one her deployment team and lastly Joker showed up in the conference room.
Miranda was the first to speak up.
"Shepard, What's going on?"
"The Illusive man ordered a change in our schedule. Apparently some batarian pirates activated a dormant mass relay." Shepard paused, letting her words sink in. "EDI, bring up the recorded footage."
The shore party of the Normandy watched as the small collection of batarian vessels waited while a corvette activated the relay. A sensor readout from the drone detected an anomaly in the relay before a warship winked into existence. Followed shortly by three others of similar size. And the final warship seemed about the size of Sovereign.
"Spirits…look at the size of that final ship…" Garrus pointed out. "That's got to be as big as Sovereign. And I don't like the look of that bow." A few moments after listening to the intercepted transmission the batarian craft fanned out in an effort to flank the aliens.
"Are they thinking of trying to take them on?" Sure enough the white and red vessel charged up a warning shot. A bright beam streaked across space. The crew of the Normandy was stunned. Mordin solus broke the silence.
"Collector weapon? No. Not instantaneous, beam has velocity. Plasma? But how…Gun barrels would melt under the heat necessary to damage other starships…Some form of casing is required. Magnetic containment?"
"I mean The Thanix cannon on the Normandy is basically the same premise. It could be feasible even with our own technology. Strike with enough force to punch through barriers." Garrus added while watching.
"True. But we only have the two guns plus our point defense, shielding and armor…" Jacob added. "I doubt even the Normandy could take one of those head on without evasive flying. Ablative armor or not."
"I'm a fan of power overwhelming but looking at how those guns popped the barriers of that frigate like a melon is just overkill. The hell do they need that much fire power for?" Jack pointed out at the Batarian frigate getting hit by four different beams from the same cruiser.
"Hang on. Are each of those cruisers also carriers? It looks like they're deploying some form of craft." Miranda asked as Edi paused and zoomed in on one of the machines deployed.
"Edi." Shepard started. "What're we looking at?"
"Unknown. It appears to be some form of walker twenty meters tall. Readings suggest it runs off a thermo nuclear drive of some unknown make."
The largest of the five unknown ships began opening a hatch as more craft could be seen flying out from below. A large bipedal walker was being brought up Red and gold in coloration with a trace amount of White. It seemed like the Batarian cruiser had noticed it as well. A flash came out from the Batarians. The mech seeming to not even notice as the first round slammed into its right pauldron and deflected, leaving a tell tale impact before the round slammed into and obliterated a small asteroid with the force. The second round caught in between the machine's fingers. Everyone paused at that. The very feat defied all known science.
What happened next seemed straight out of science fiction with the round being returned to the batarians at twice the speed it was shot. The frigate the slug impacted, detonated as the mass effect core went critical.
"Whoever is crazy enough to catch a cruiser's main gun. I wanna fight." Grunt chortled eagerly.
"Looks like the Batarians wanted to go down swinging, look. Boarding torpedoes." The video footage started getting grainy but captured the next few moments. A flak screen was put up, destroying most of the torpedoes but one impacted the dreadnought, heavily damaged. The corvettes made a b-line for the dreadnought, only to fall prey to one of the cruisers firing what seemed to be a hidden cannon that ripped right through their shields and hull alike.
As one of the frigates escaped, the four alien cruisers vacated the area in front of the dreadnought as it seemed to charge up some form of rail gun. Energy coalescing at the prow of the ship. The drone read a massive spike in energy outputs before that very weapon fired. The Batarian cruiser attempted to deploy life pods but only a handful made it out of the blast zone. A brief sign of the Mass effect core detonating was detected. By the end of the beam nothing but space dust was left.
What followed after seemed to be routine patrols with various walker-like machines showing up in frame before one noticed the drone and flew up in front of it and destroyed it. Shepard looked among her team.
"Well, thoughts?"
"Shepard, the Normandy is just a stealth frigate, not a warship. Those ships decide to open fire on us, the collectors will be the last thing we're worrying about." Garrus advised.
"We aren't going there looking for a fight. We could use more allies against the collectors." Shepard nodded. "TIM's 'advice'."
"Well…" Miranda started. "If it's what the Illusive man wants, it's what he'll get."
"Of course the cheerleader wants to suck her boss's cock." Jack huffed before rolling her eyes. "Did you see what happened to those Batarians? That could happen to us!"
"Unlikely. Normandy would be approaching, broadcasting our intent to facilitate communications. Batarians likely saw big ship. Got greedy about storming dreadnought. Hm. Should have thought about firepower." Mordin pointed out logically.
"Screw the dreadnought. What about those cruisers? Anyone else see a cruiser DEPLOY anything? Other than missiles?" Jack said loudly, pointing to the wrecked batarian frigates.
"That guy piloting the big mech seemed like a good fight. Hopefully he's not a pushover on foot." Grunt chimed in with a feisty grin.
"Grunt. No." Shepard shot Grunt a look that only encouraged him.
"Grunt yes." Grunt chuckled at that idea of such a fight. Shepard sighed. "We'll go with Mordin's Idea. We'll head to the system and broadcast our intent to open dialogue. I want Garrus and Mordin. The rest of you be ready in case anything goes south."
"Shepard I don't think it's a good idea to take two aliens with-" Miranda protested before clamming up at a shake of Shepard's head.
"Mordin is a scientist. And I trust Garrus more than any Cerberus operative. Dismissed. Joker, set our course to the ones EDI is about to give you. And no one is to fire a shot unless I give the order."
"Aye aye, Commander."
"Uhhhhhhhhhh…" Came Joker's classic confused statement. "Commander. Am I drunk or trippin?"
AN: This chapter was harder since I find particular characters difficult to get into their heads. Miranda, Jacob, and Jack I had a harder time coming up with their reactions. However I look forward to exploring things a bit more. See you guys next time with Normandy meets Dreikruz
Edited the chapter after things got brought to my attention. Should be less typos/repeat words now.