Semper Vigilo

by CunkToad

Due to a drive core malfunction, a human vessel arrives just in time to save the Council Envoy from the yahg. What happens when humanity enters the galactic stage not as the race that got attacked by the turians for breaking a law they weren't aware of, but as the race that saved a turian platoon from certain death? M for wartime violence, pre ME1 - ME3, no OP humanity.

122. Do Ut Des

Chapter 122. Do Ut Des

8. May 2417 AD, Arcadia, Engram-City

"It would seem that your little stint in politics has you distracted. This type of failure is untypical for you and certainly not in line with the kind of outcome you advertised," the distorted voice of one on of Henry Lawson's associates stated, causing the man to point a middle finger at his screen, a gesture the other side sadly could not see.

After the Ardat-Yakshi had failed (and luckily also died) while trying to kill the commander, Lawson, in a spur of a moment decision, had decided to give Nagato the go-ahead and also puledl his ace in the hole to make sure the next attempt stuck.

Things hadn't worked out quite like anticipated though, in no short part thanks to the commander's own abilities. And now here he was, having to explain to his partners how his mole had failed and died while simultaneously neglecting to mention that his side project had also failed (but luckily not died).

The reason he had to lie about the latter was rather simple.

He hadn't told his supposed allies about the other professional killer he'd sent to put a bullet in Shepard's head because he might have to send him after his allies too at a not-too-distant point in the future.

While some might attribute that decision to a deeply mistrusting and vengeful personality and draw a correlation between those implications and himself, Lawson simply liked to think of it as being a showcase of his ability to forward-think.

"It's a minor setback," the darkhaired man offered before inspecting his shoes and noticing the smallest smudge on their black shine.

He'd have to get someone to fix that as soon as the call was over. Now that his appearance on Terra Nova's favorite night-time show and the political implications it brought had ensured that he was firmly within the media's sights, even more so than before when he'd just been the CEO of Lawson-Future-Tech, he couldn't offer any imperfections to exploit. Those people were vultures and they'd dive on him the first chance they'd get … sort of like the people he was talking to right now, actually.

"That's what you said last time and back then we just had a little trouble in the Migrant Fleet to worry about. Now it's not just HSAIS that's involved. C-SEC too. That's a lot of heat," another, female-sounding voice offered.

"Yeah, like they weren't involved before," Lawson replied with a wave of his hand, thinking back to the time an HSA spy had successfully assaulted the headquarters of the guys PGI was paying to keep their operations safe. A lot of good that'd done them…

"You're losing control of the situation," she accused him while Lawson swiped across his terminal to broadcast a highlight reel of all of his appearances on all types of mass media currently being consumed in HSA space.

He was blowing up, metaphorically at least.

A part of him was worried it might happen literally too, though, if he got too popular with the people or too unpopular with PGI. Hence the increased security as of lately.

"Really? Doesn't feel like it from where I'm sitting," he shrugged.

"This operation isn't about allowing you to live out your childhood fantasies of chancellorship," a third, distorted voice with a slight flanging to it pointed out. "Need I remind you of what we set out to do?"

"No, you do not," Lawson stated before pausing the highlight reel and suddenly sitting up straight. "I am fully aware of our goals and you can rest assured that everything I have done up to now has been in service of those goals," he went on. "Our failure to stop the commander has been… regrettable. But as far as usefulness to our cause goes, my success with this campaign outweighs it tenfold, if not more. The no-man-left-behind campaign will be our way out of the shadows. It will give us the basis of power we've always been looking for and once we have that, we won't have to worry about one pesky marine much longer."

There was a moment of silence after his statement.

Then the first voice spoke up again.

"Your little zombie-commando program has been nothing but a deep financial sinkhole up to now. Every time you deployed them, they either had to run away or they got killed. How can we know that your new approach with the Hardline and the veterans of the Blitz will be different?"

"Simple. Quantity over quality. Why waste years of time and millions of credits to recover a couple of missing ASOC and NSOC guys who really don't want to work for us when we can simply have them come to us on their own free will?" Lawson questioned, quickly thinking about how much it had cost him to find the missing soldiers and then smuggle them off Eden Prime.

It had been expensive beyond believe, but still not nearly as troublesome as the process required to finally get them to shoot at what they were supposed to shoot at instead of blowing up PGI facilities and killing expendable mad, moral-less medical technicians and equally depraved security personal by the dozens.

Say what you want about the HSA's military, the quality of its SERE-training and its ability to indoctrinate its elite operatives to the point of suicidal fanaticism was beyond impressive.

"Have a little faith, will you?" he offered finally.

"Your marketing tactics might have convinced us in the past but with the latest developments, we won't take your word for it anymore," the female voice replied. "Until we see the results, I'm afraid we can't appreciate your efforts."

Lawson repeated his obscene gesture from earlier and then let out a sigh.

Their loss.

"Well in that case I think we might as well move on to the second piece of bad news, eh?" he offered.

"The impending HSAIS visit to our GM facilities?" the first of the voices asked. GM was HK speak for Galilean Moons and with that little slip-up, the idiot had just rendered his voice-scrambler pointless.

"Exactly," Lawson nodded to no one in particular. "This little operation is going to come crashing down real fast if they find what you've been doing there. And while I don't know about you, I'd rather not have the military police kick in my door with a federal warrant… God knows I've already evaded enough taxes to go away for three lifetimes already… no need to add high-treason and terrorism to my list of charges."

"That won't happen," the voice reassured him, unwillingly giving him the window he'd been looking for.

"While your marketing tactics might've convinced me in the past, I'm afraid the latest developments of the Shadow Broker being caught red-handed with a literal cargo-hold of your tech sort of makes me not want to take your word for it anymore," Lawson responded, gleefully mirroring the remark of the other PGI member. Now he could finally turn this conversation around and away from him.

"… that issue is being handled."

"… as in its being handed into secure evidence lockers back on Cronos, or what? Face it, you screwed up and now HSAIS is coming for you. Like a shark when there's blood in the water," Lawson placed a finger over the part of the hologram reading 'end call'. "Make sure you don't drag us down. Otherwise you'll find out first hand that my … what did you call them? Ah right… My zombie commandos are perfectly capable of doing their jobs when their targets aren't Spectres."

Satisfied with having had the last word, Lawson hung up and returned to viewing his own highlight reel.

Despite a little setback with Shepard, things were still going just fine.

---

8. May 2417 AD, HSASV Gilligan's Cape, Enroute to the Sol-System

It had been two days since Redford had come knocking on her door to tell her that the two of them were being sent to the Sol System, or as Yo-yo liked to call it, home. Their orders came straight form the top. Director Rei, at the request of Deputy-Director Moravek (or as Yo-yo liked to call him, the snake who for some godforsaken reason had put a burn notice on Morneau's head) wanted them to go to the Galilean Moons, the home of Hahne-Kedar's most advanced labs.

Once there, they were supposed to figure out how experimental HK tech had ended up in the hands of the Broker and the heads of his Final Wave mercs and how both of those things were connected to Project Group Insight, a hostile element that her partner had uncovered while risking his life to stop the Broker … before suddenly deciding to turn his back on the HSA because he was supposedly in cahoots with the disgraced and deceased Keiji Okuda.

Needless to say, she still wasn't buying it.

The lousy fugitive poster HSAIS had distributed among its field operatives, which Yo-yo was looking at in this instant, wasn't helping either.

'Known associates: Keiji Okuda (deceased), Emily Wong, various unidentified Final Wave operatives. Known family: None (orphaned, raised in HSA foster system and Grissom Academy),' she read before looking at the young, hazel-eyed, clean-shaven, tanned man staring straight at the camera with a sly grin that regulations technically forbade from being present on military IDs.

Given the red-white and gold banner hanging in the background and the black HSAIS dress uniform he was wearing, the picture was most certainly taken from Magic's HSAIS file and while she wasn't exactly sure when it had been taken, it had to have been over three years ago for one single plain reason:

This version of Magic didn't have the post-Akuze stare yet.

The man she was looking at appeared well-adjusted. Sure, he looked somewhat roguish thanks to his non-regulation smile and gave off the impression that he was a bit too full of himself. But overall he seemed happy and at peace with himself, all things she wasn't ready to say about present-day Daniel Morneau.

The difference was made especially noticeable when comparing this photo to the more recent picture added below.

It was dated the day her partner had returned to Cronos and showed him stepping out of the Scott's airlock and glancing at the security camera with a weary look on his face. While the uniform he was wearing was the same, the sly grin was absent and the happy glint in his eyes was gone, replaced by an exhausted but still laser-focused stare of a person who by all means probably should've hit his breaking point twice over already but was still somehow not just going on but speeding up.

The contrast between the pictures left it to anyone's guess as to what had happened to the man in between the two pictures.

She had a good idea what he'd been through, obviously, which was also why she knew for a fact that he wouldn't have ever gone rogue. The only thing keeping Morneau going was his dedication to the cause, his believe that him putting himself through the grinder was going to produce a favorable outcome for the one thing he ultimately cared about the most: the HSA.

Someone who could do that could never go rogue.

But most people out looking for him right now did not have that insight. So they probably wouldn't hesitate to do what they thought was necessary if they (somehow) managed to corner Morneau.

"Obsessing over it won't help, you know?" Redford muttered from behind her. The brunette specialist turned around and looked at her sandy-haired, older colleague. She hadn't even noticed him enter the room. "At least they picked a good picture. Lord knows he's not the most photogenic bloke around," the man observed before sitting down on the desk opposite to her. They'd been given an officer's room to prep for the mission, something only made possible by the fact that the frigate they were travelling on was flying with a skeleton crew.

"You're awfully casual about all of this, you know?" Yo-yo observed.

Ever since they'd left Cronos, she'd picked up on Redford's distinctive lack of worry for his protégé. He'd seemed concerned enough back when the news had first dropped but ever since they'd been given this mission, Redford seemed unbothered by the fact that the agent he'd spent years turning into a dark-haired version of himself was on the run from the entirety of HSAIS. Sort of like he knew something she didn't, something that would make worrying inconsequential.

Well that or he was even better at compartmentalization than she'd suspected.

"Because I'm trying really hard," Redford admitted before putting on a serious face, seemingly confirming the latter. "Trust me, I want this to get cleared up as much as you… but the matter of fact is that as long as Morneau's off the grid, there's nothing I can do. No matter how much I wanna help him, nothing I can do right now is going to make this any better for him."

"Except for hijacking this frigate and tracking him down," she mumbled before looking at the specialist. "I'm joking. Naturally."

"I know."

"I was talking to IA," she offered before looking around this room. "Come on. You know as much as me that this whole place is bugged. I'm his partner and you're his training agent," she stated before thinking. 'And the only agent you've ever trained,' that part went unsaid, though. Yo-yo knew full and well that Redford was the only Section 13 operative of his level of experience to have only trained a single other operative and she also had a guess why he'd never instructed someone else after Morneau and it wasn't (just) because HSAIS couldn't afford the property damage. Morneau and Redford were very alike. Pretty much the same person with a thirty-year age gap. If she was feeling like a hobby psychiatrist, she'd say they'd found a surrogate role in one another, one neither of them were looking to replace. But it wasn't her place to point that out. "No way in hell Section 10 doesn't have us on their watchlist right now waiting for Magic to hit up either of us," she added off-mindedly.

"You raise a fair point," Redford admitted before suspiciously eying the ceiling light and then his HSAIS-issued watch. "But that doesn't change the fact that there's nothing I can do about… whatever Morneau's gotten himself into," he pushed his hands into his pockets and plopped down in the chair opposite to her, seemingly weighing his next words carefully. "So until he resurfaces and explains what the hell's going on… I'm just going to have to trust that even after everything that's happened to him, Morneau's still the bloke I nicked from Grissom and that he's got a bloody good reason for doing what he did."

Yo-yo looked at the man sitting across from her.

"If he was going to change because of what happened, it would've happened years ago. After-"

"-Akuze. Yeah. I know," Redford ran a hand through his medium-length hair and as he did so, Yo-yo noticed that the man was actually going gray and in doing so, remembered that Grant Redford, for all his quips and vigor, was still not immune to getting old. He'd be sixty in August and by all accounts, he probably would've already retired from field ops ten years ago if 25th century medicine hadn't turned sixty into the new forty.

Even so, forty-three years in Section 13 were a long time. Far longer than most people managed to hold on and if not for people like Rei who were pushing seventy, damn near record setting.

"If Akuze didn't throw him off-course, nothing will," Yo-yo stated confidently, knowing all too well that Akuze had in fact not just thrown Magic off-course but catapulted him into an entirely different world. The guy who'd left her standing at the shooting range that day with Alec hadn't come back from the op. He'd died in those ruins, same as Alec.

"So now that we've firmly established that I'm successfully gaslighting myself to see this through, how about we talk about you?" Redford suddenly injected. "How you holding up?

'As you'd expect after hearing that the guy I've spent the last fourteen years working with is suddenly supposed to be my enemy,' was what Yo-yo would've liked to say. But given her earlier comment about their role in this whole situation… "If you don't mind, I'd rather not have a heart-to-heart between you, me and IA," the specialist offered quickly before nodding at him. "So. What'd you need?"

"Huh? Who says I needed something? Can't I just show up to have a little chat?"

"You can… but you basically never do that. You've got a lot of talents Redford… not as many as you think but still plenty. Chit-chat isn't one of them, though, and you know it."

The specialist cracked a smile.

"Alright you caught me. I came by to say that I just got word that they've finished taking inventory of the Broker's ship."

"Took 'em long enough," the brunette specialist figured. The BAR and Morneau had taken over the ship two weeks ago. "I take it you got that word because they found something interesting?" she went on.

"You could say that," the older, sandy-haired man stated before sitting down opposite to her. "A ton of gear with Hahne-Kedar's printed all over it for starters. Weapons, armor, robotics, the Broker's armor, it all made using HK tech."

"So what you're saying is that one of HSAIS' most-wanted was loaded with stuff from the biggest military contractor of our government?" Redford nodded. Yo-yo frowned. "Remind me why exactly aren't we kicking their door in right away? What's the point of all this sneaking around if they could just have the DFI and the MPs knocking with a warrant?"

"Because they're one ofour biggest government contractors and because there's still a chance it was stolen or that the Broker blackmailed or otherwise got to a couple of employees and not the whole company," the older man stated. "As long as those options are on the table, Arcturus doesn't want a mess. And if they involved the federal investigators and the military police, it will get messy. You know how marine MPs are when they serve warrants. There'll be a lot of broken noses and even more lawsuits after they're done tossing up an HK lab."

"… not if HK really is working with freaking terrorists," she argued.

"Even if they are, the people working for them don't have to know," Redford pointed out. "Don't get me wrong. I'm with you, Yo-yo. A good chunk of HK is probably neck deep in this, otherwise they would've come running the moment they knew something was missing… but since we're about to enter HSA-heartland, we have to assume that most of them aren't until we know for sure. You know how HSAIS gets when the ops start touching the core worlds. Get in a shootout on Shanxi or a skycar chase on Illium? No one cares as long as you didn't leave a trail and didn't do anything too illegal… but try and investigate someone near the core or god forbid in spitting range of Earth and all of the sudden all that legal red tape us field agents usually get to ignore starts being relevant again," Redford mused before looking at her. "Before we boarded the ship, they had the balls to actually ask me if we really needed to bring guns on this op. Can you believe that shit? The last time I had to explain why I needed to be armed for a job was a theoretical exam way back in basic field agent training… Forty years on the job and I haven't gotten that question thrown my way once since. Until now."

"Well… you know how it is. Earth mostly handles its stuff by itself," the earthern woman responded.

"Yeah… I hate that about Earth," the older, colonial-born man replied. "The administrative zones want all the benefits of the HSA but when it's time to play by the rules, they start getting touchy with an exception here and an exclusion there," Redford went on. "Speaking of the AZs. This is basically a trip home for you, isn't it?"

"Yup. Polynesian AZ, born and raised."

"Ah. That's the one where all the islands sank after the poles melted and people had to start building the artificial ones instead, isn't it?"

"… yes. But the one I'm from didn't actually sink. Hawaii managed to get the seawalls up in time. But all of that was way before I was born. Two hundred years before, actually," she pointed out. Earth's ice melting hadn't been an issue for a long time, mostly because most of it was gone now, replaced by harsh winters and brutal Terra Novan-like summers that swept the human home world every couple years but still didn't deter twelve billion people from living on it.

"Well, like you said. Chit-chat isn't for me," Redford shrugged before starting to tilt his chair. "In my defense, I'm pretty sure you don't know shit about New Folsom either."

"I know it's crime-central of Arcadia despite being right across the river from Engram-City. And I know it's Arcadia's largest alloy and eezo engine producer. Oh and it's got a sub-urban district called Peak Ninty One which is called that way because the UN-admin who got charged with naming it literally didn't know how to write 'ninety' in English. So instead of looking it up, he filed it as that in way too many systems before someone noticed and then Arcadia just sort of had to deal with it because fixing it would've been way more expensive," Yo-yo retorted with a grin. "Yeah, in retrospective it probably wasn't the most op-sec idea of you to run urban tracking exercises in your childhood neighborhood."

"That's by the way still only the second most expensive spelling mistake in HSA history."

"Really? What's the first, then?"

"I keep sending mail to that magical place called Arcturs, but somehow they just never answer me," Redford retorted before catching her skeptical look.

"You're making that up," she said plainly.

"Nope."

"Yes."

"Nope. You can look it up. Our glorious forbearers totally blundered writing Arcturus correctly way back when they were announcing the place. hundreds of millions of promo articles paid for by billions of tax money, all straight into the waste basket because someone didn't bother reading what he was typing. In retrospective, I start to get why the IFS was always going on about poor fiscal management. Between that and the whole setting Amaterasu on fire by accident and then spending trillions to try and fix what used to be a perfectly working eco system, I'm willing to admit that the HSA really, really sucks at spending money responsibly."

"You remember what I said about us being eavesdropped on?"

"Oh I do and if you think that's bad, just wait till I admit how I have been going against regs by not hanging my uniform into the locker the right way around sometimes," Redford joked.

Yo-yo faked a gasp.

"Oh no, you haven't."

"Oh but I did… and if that wasn't bad enough already… I've also been leaving jackets over chairs for years…" Redford went on, mocking yet another distinctively weird HSAIS rule of conduct that seemingly no one conformed with and even less people could explain the point of…

"You vile, vile criminal," Yo-yo said before shaking her head in faked sadness. "What are we going to do with you?"

"Probably a DFI warrant the minute I step out at the moon labs," Redford stated, bringing the conversation back to its start. "Okay, in all seriousness though. I'm completely with you on the whole 'HK is in on this' line of thought, which is why I think it's important that we establish a certain set of operational perimeters that maybe no one else needs to know about."

Yo-yo once again pointed at the ceiling lights.

"Ah come off it. I swept this place clean while you were still checking in your gear. You're not talking to an amateur, you know?" the blonde specialist said with a wave of his hand.

"Alright… I'll mention as much in the IA hearing," Yo-yo replied with a smirk. "Okay. Seriousness. What perimeters are you talking about?"

"No-go-criteria," Redford said, plain and simple. "We might be going back to HSA heartland but even if Earth's in spitting range, we'll be right in the lion's den. So the minute it seems like somethings off or that they know that we are looking for something specific instead of just doing a general HSAIS-backed inspection," that was their cover story, "we ditch and come back with the MP cavalry."

"Sounds reasonable enough… Want me to play devil's advocate though?"

"Yes, please."

"What if they already know why we're really there before we ever make it to the Sol System?" Yo-yo narrowed her eyes.

"Why would they know that?"

"Because if we assume that HK and the Broker are working together, then the people who supplied him had to have been high enough on HK's food chain to get him top-shelf stuff while also keeping everyone involved in it quiet too. That's some serious soft-power we're talking about. The kind that could touch HSAIS."

"This is a Section-internal op, Yo-yo. The real reason we're going has never left the Bureau's walls. HK won't know what hit them."

"Fair enough. But what if they do?"

"Well if they do… we're obviously screwed beyond belief."

"Very reassuring."

"It's one of my many redeeming qualities," the older man stated before getting up and making a move out the door. Then he turned on his feet, clearly remembering something. "Ah. Right," he mumbled. "If you've got plenty of free time on your hands, I suggest you look up that exposition piece Morneau's undercover girlfriend wrote."

"Wong?"

"Yes. The one about HK, naturally. If push comes to shove, we can always use that story as an unofficial excuse for our visit," the man stated. "And it's a good read too. If you don't mind the hint of self-assured smugness she puts into every paragraph."

Yo-yo thought back to her own, private investigation into the person of Emily Wong and the obnoxious Extranet accounts she'd discovered while conducting said investigation.

"I'll skim over it. Anything in particular I should look at?"

"Other than the fact that HK wants to make the big bucks by selling the Sentinel system they're using in the Confederation to colonial law enforcement? Nah. Not really. They hire a ton of mercs for asset protection and probably for industrial espionage too, but anyone with a half a brain already could've guessed that."

"Right, yeah," Yo-yo nodded before looking at Redford and remembering something just as he was about to leave the room.

"Hey Grant, wait," she said, instinctively using Redford's first name.

"Yes?"

"I read about the Normandy incident in today's briefing… you probably did too…"

"Yes."

"… how is she?" she being Redford's god niece and Alec's daughter: Commander Shepard.

"Alive, which is already the most important part," the man sighed before closing the door again and leaning against the wall. "Other than that, I can't say. Haven't talked to her yet. Hard to get through to someone on a top-secret Cerberus op when you're busy coordinating a covert-op in Earth's backyard."

"They lost two crew members, didn't they?"

"Mess sergeant and medical chief. Three if you count that inside-man Nagato," that was the detail that was bothering HSAIS. A rogue stealth-frigate-program officer… that hadn't happened since the Fringe Wars. Their security vetting was as intense as Section 13's… Well, that and the fact that Hahne-Kedar's Vanguard mech had been used in the attack.

"But we don't do that," she clarified.

"No, we do not. Traitorous cunts go in the ground, not the record," Redford nodded, uncharacteristically angry. Then again, the guy had tried to kill his niece… "Could've ended much worse, if you ask me… but even so. Two's two too many for Emily to find peace over."

Yo-yo thought back to the time they'd been on the Normandy after Noveria. She hadn't interacted much with the mess sergeant. But Chakwas had seemed like a good woman. A good officer too.

"Damn whoever ordered that," she muttered.

"Damn them indeed. Although I got a pretty good guess who it was already anyway," Redford rubbed his neck.

"PGI?" she guessed, into the blue.

"They've been popping up everywhere lately… so yeah. Them," the man glanced at his watch, more as a force of habit and a distraction than a means to tell the time. "The doctor went out fighting, apparently. Word is they'll slap her with a Maroon Star and a combat medic badge for trying to stab the guy who led the drones," the Maroon Star was the third highest military-honor in the HSA, just behind the Colonial Cross and the Star of Valor.

"That wasn't in the report," she pointed out.

"I got access to the surveillance footage," Redford admitted.

"You did?" Yo-yo asked, somewhat surprised. She hadn't.

"Yes. Rei wanted me to see."

"Sounds like someone's getting groomed for a promotion," Yo-yo observed. It was an open secret anyway. Like previously established, few people had been on the job as long as Redford and he was getting a bit too old to be running around the field, even if sixty was the new forty. But since Thirteen wanted to retain him and his experiences, they wouldn't shelf him just yet.

"God I hope not," the blonde specialist muttered. "Anyways. The guy who did that… he used some familiar moves. Bureau moves."

Yo-yo raised another eyebrow. "You saying he's a rogue field agent?"

"Or just a former one. Not all Sections have our retention rates," Redford shrugged. "Either way. I told Rei and the moment the casefile hits Arcturus, Internal Affairs will take it from the MPs and send it the way of the PGI taskforce. Just in case I'm right…"

Yo-yo bit her lip and thought back to the brief impression she'd gotten of Alec's daughter.

"Losing crew in combat's bad enough. Losing them during shore leave…"

"Yeah…"

"I don't really know Emily. We only talked for a couple of minutes back after the Noveria op… but I think she could use someone to talk to… and this ship's definitely got an encrypted com-link so there really aren't any excuses not to try…" she trailed off. "This isn't my first op. I can hold down the fort on the coordination front. Take as long as you need."

Redford offered a sympathetic smile.

"You sure?"

"Of course I'm sure. Otherwise I wouldn't have said it."

"You'll ring if something comes up?"

"Naturally."

"Alright then. I'll see if I can get through then," he opened the door. "And Yo-yo?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks."

"No worries. She's family. And that comes first."

---

2158 CE, Menae, Installation 237

"What's your impression then?" Desolas asked before looking at the brown-plated turian to his left. His eyes were fixated on the screen depicting the prothean currently meditating inside one of the officer quarters.

"He's certainly … an individual," the former Oma-Ker officer stated formally, even if the statement didn't say anything at all.

"We're the same rank now, General. You can be honest with me."

"Well in that case… If I wanted to be constantly insulted, I'd just go back to my old regiment on Oma Ker. This Javik… I can see why you and Doctor T'Soni think he might hold the key to the answers we're looking for and why you put as much hope in him as you do… but even with all that, I can't help but feel like I'm looking at someone that's essentially a combination of the worst traits of our current cycle. Batarian fanaticism, krogan brutality, asari arrogance… human ambition…turian stubbornness…" the SLD leader listed before turning his head to look at Desolas. "Spirits forgive me for what I'm about to say, but if Javik here is a good representation of the average prothean, it's for the best that they're extinct."

"A harsh statement," Desolas observed.

"For a harsh being," Kryik countered. "Everything he's told us suggests that his people were violent, xenophobic imperialists who would've seen Palaven either in shackles or under ashes. I mean he basically just told us to commit genocide if we can't make the rest of the Council see reason… I know we're desperate… but is this really the kind of person we should listen to?"

Desolas nudged his head and returned his attention to the prothean silently sitting in the otherwise mostly empty room.

"I can see why you don't trust him, but at the end of the day, we have to remember what made him the way he is. He's a soldier weary from the war he's fought."

"So are we. Yet I somehow doubt either you or me are ever going to become insane enough to think that the best way to get allies is to bomb them into submission. No matter how desperate we get, no Hierarchy officer worth his rank would ever dishonor themselves by following his playbook."

Desolas blinked.

"It's easy to say that when we didn't have to fight the kind of war he's lost. Javik's suggestions seem radical and most of what he says isn't applicable to our situation. I agree with you on that. But there's still some underlying truth to what he's told us up to now."

"I feel like the emphasis here should be on the war he lost, not the underlying truths he might still give us." Kryik countered. "How do we even know if we can trust him? For all we know he could be a double-agent planted by the Reapers."

"Inside a sealed prothean bunker? Fifty thousand years ago? When Eden Prime wasn't even a colony and the humans were nowhere close to being spacefaring?"

"They left behind Sovereign, didn't they? Besides. Who's to say there isn't one like that on every inhabitable planet in the galaxy? I wouldn't put it past the Reapers to have that kind of fallback plan."

The Blackwatch officer folded his hands behind his back.

"I see your point," Desolas offered. He did. Kryik was right to be suspicious, especially with the kind of enemy they were facing, "but Captain Alenko vouches for him."

"The same captain that might've gotten corrupted by a tainted Collector beacon?" the brown-plated Oma-Ker retorted. "I know that I'm leaning into paranoia here a lot but you have to admit that the chances of you just stumbling upon the last living prothean who just so happens to have fought the Reapers on a human colony at the very end of the war seem rather too good to be true."

"Yes. And if he'd have all the answers to the questions we're asking, I'd agree with you and have him shipped off to the dissection table," the white-plated elaprian answered. "But as things are, Javik just really seems to want to get another chance to spill some Reaper blood before he dies for good this time around. And while it seems he'd rather not do it with us filthy primitives, I can see where his desire for vengeance comes from."

"You can?"

"If everyone you'd ever known were killed and everything you've ever believed in was destroyed and lost to history just before you were put into cryo… what would you look for when you woke up again against all odds?"

"A purpose, I suppose."

"And there you have why I think we can trust Javik. He found his purpose in revenge and who are we to take that from him?" Arterius replied before his omni buzzed, reminding him of the other conversation he had scheduled for today. Ractus Xzander, Callius' TNI associate, wanted to speak to him and while there was a lot of personal animosity between them… he'd oblige. "I'm needed elsewhere," the turian stated before pulling on his helmet, "Send for me if our guest suddenly feels like talking about prothean super weapons again," he said, his voice now filtered through his helmet.

"Understood."

After leaving behind General Kryik, Desolas began walking through the tight corridors of the SLD-base, drawing the eyes of everyone he passed since he was doing so in full combat armor. In addition to him having decided that he'd not enter a room with Javik outside of powered armor – no matter how much he wanted to trust the prothean, Kryik had a point about him being potentially dangerous – Desolas had also decided to wear his armor wherever he went because of the simple fact that everywhere in turian space, high-ranking Hierarchy officers were still dying from mysterious circumstances at a far higher rate than last year.

A dreadnought commander killed in a shuttle crash here, an armored-legion general crushed by falling spare parts there … three Armiger staff officers and fifteen lower ranking soldiers killed in a suicide bombing of a dishonorably discharged shock trooper who'd seen action on Virmire … and all of that just in the last ten days.

Incidents were growing more frequent and since he'd always been the paranoid type, he was taking the necessary steps to avoid becoming another critical-incident headline in tomorrow's daily general-staff officer updates.

The trip from the room where they were keeping Javik to his own quarters where he intended to speak to Xzander took Desolas less than two minutes and when he was inside his room and had made sure it hadn't been rigged to blow in his absence, he dialed in the frequency given to him by Callius. Upon finishing, the face of a familiar intelligence officer appeared.

"Arterius," the taetrian greeted.

"Xzander," the Blackwatch officer returned. Then their words hang in the air for a few awkward seconds.

Truth be told, he could've gone for the rest of his life without speaking to the former TNI liaison of Blackwatch.

Ten years were a long time, yes, but not nearly long enough as far as Desolas was concerned. Despite what Callius and many others who'd been present that day probably believed, his actions against Ractus Xzander hadn't been motivated by spite. There'd been a reason for the … drastic … steps Desolas had taken and if he was ever asked to justify himself for the decision, he would do so with his head held high.

But none of that mattered now.

And neither did what had actually happened.

"Since you actually called, I assume Nilia told you what's at stake?"

"She's mentioned that you suspect Primarch Valen and Judicator Tanus are both indoctrinated and that you're worried Facinus next attempt at uprooting the Hierarchy from Taetrus is going to be more in line with an apocalypse than a war."

"And conveniently left out the part where I need you to be the one to go see Fedorian about it?"

"No, she mentioned that as well. I just needed to hear it from you too."

The turian's black plates locked into a serious expression, one that highlighted the green facial markings all taetrians shared.

"This isn't the time for games, Arterius," he said with a low growl and despite what he thought about Xzander, Desolas had to admit that he was right.

"No it's not, which is why I need you to get right to the point. What do you think Facinus is planning and how do we stop it?"

The now-lieutenant closed his eyes and lifted his hands to cover his mouth.

"From what we've gathered up to now, their target is our capital. They want to strike Vallum. Decapitate Taetrus-Command and erase the Radiatum in one go."

The Radiatum was the Taetrian parliamentary building. A relic of the Unification Wars that had survived the Hierarchy's attempts at streamlining turian culture in a vein similar to the strange religious practices of the Oma-Ker, albeit in an equally ceremonial role as said practices. The Radiatum didn't hold any political power anymore. They were just an administrative office essentially, one that worked closely with the local colonial cluster government stationed in the Taetrian Signis – a building that had been attacked in every single taetrian insurgency up to now.

"Vallum's a fortress. Even by our cities' standards. And the Radiatum is located right next to the Signis, which might as well be the most protected place in the entire Mactare system. It would take a lot of firepower to destroy all of that in one blow."

"Which is precisely what worries me so much," Xzander responded. "My sources tell me that they've been preparing for this for years, so it isn't as much as the usual Facinus fever dream as it is an actual operation. They even appear to have outside help this time around," the black-plated turian stated.

"Is this connected to the whole Omega thread Callius uncovered?"

"The Terminus is one source, yes … but not the one that worries me most," Xzander's face was suddenly replaced by a human one. He was a tan skinned male of the species, one with short hair and trimmed facial hair. Desolas would've asked if this was someone he should worry about, but underneath his picture it read 'deceased'. Hence he didn't ask.

"Thanks to some of my friends at HSAIS, I have credible leads suggesting that this man, Donovan Hock, supplied Facinus with some serious human firepower as far back as last year. Luckily for us, HSAIS removed him from the equation about a month ago…"

Desolas' eyes narrowed.

"What kind of firepower are we talking about?"

"We don't know any confirmed details yet, sadly … but the humans voiced a careful suspicion. One they weren't all to eager to admit…" Xzander paused. "They think that this Donovan Hock character somehow got his hands on two human-made antimatter warheads."

"Humans don't use antimatter weapons."

"The HSA doesn't. Their own separatists however dabbled with the technology. A lot of the ideas that the IFS' Experimental Weapons Division came up with remain unaccounted for, even thirty-five years after the war. HSAIS thinks that these antimatter warheads are among them. And they think that Hock handed them over to Facinus."

Desolas narrowed his eyes.

"What kind of yield are we talking about?"

"Even if it's a small one, it'll wipe Vallum off the map."

Desolas thought back to the reports of Virmire.

"But it'll be detectable, no? AM-bombs need time to build up to their explosion," it was why they were so impractical as weapons of terrorism. They were easily traced.

"There's a detectable surge prior to the detonation, yes, which is why I advised Primarch Valen to greenlight a constant air-recon operation scanning for the kind of surges we'd expect."

"Advice I presume he didn't listen to."

"No evidence and no reason to rile up the public, he said," Xzander stated, mocking Primarch Valen's particularly low voice and once again showing one of the reasons why he was back to being a lieutenant. A critical lack of respect and a flawed understanding for how their society functioned. While he realized it was ironic coming from an Elaprian of all people… Xzander was just bad at being turian.

"Which then led you to believe that he has to be indoctrinated?" Desolas guessed, returning to his earlier line of thought about this being the product of the TNI officer's well-known paranoia.

"Well… that and the fact that he seems content to let Facinus do whatever the want. I could give you a couple of examples, starting with cutting down the patrols into the badlands or closing down the local anti-separatism task force… but if I start now, we'll be here right until I'm annihilated alongside the rest of Vallum. My point is, someone needs to get Fedorian's attention and it won't be me. For obvious reasons."

Desolas considered the spy's words for a few moments.

"You've made a file composing your findings?"

"I was told not to. But yes. I made a file. A couple actually."

Desolas sighed, in parts wondering if he was about to become a pawn in some taetrian power struggle or end up as the bud of a bad joke. It was certainly plausible that Xzander was simply doing all of this to get back at him for ten years ago and that there was reasonable explanation for all of Valen's actions… but even so, if there was a chance Xzander was right, which Callius certainly believed, then what he was saying needed to be looked into.

"Send them my way. If I'm supposed to take this to Fedorian, I need to know what exactly I'm accusing who off."

"Will do… and Arterius?" the taetrian offered.

"Yes?" Desolas replied, knowing full and well that what would come next wasn't going to be a 'thank you' or a 'watch your back'. Xzander wasn't the type. Especially not in regard to the general who'd effectively killed his career.

"You're still insufferable. But even so, I knew I wasn't wrong about you still being capable of seeing reason. It's one of your few redeeming qualities," the turian offered before cutting the feed, managing to sneak in the last word and a compliment to both himself and Desolas at the same time.

After the hologram vanished, Desolas glanced at the holoprojector, sat down at the desk that he had turned around so that it faced the door, placed his Carnifex handgun on its top … and started to read the files.

Xzander, for all his flaws, worked detailed.

It'd be a long night.

---

Two Hours Later, 8. May 2417 AD, Mirage of Halegeuse

22.

23.

24.

… god damn this sucked …

25.

After struggling to pull his chin over the make-shift pull-up bar for the last time, the blonde ASOC captain gently set himself back on the ground and shook himself to get rid of the stinging sensation in his forearms.

If there ever had been an upside to going from spending several months on 1.2g Mindoir to then spending several months in less-than-one-g environments (the Mirage, being a salarian ship naturally only flew with 0.94g, the gravity of Sur'Kesh) it was that he'd finally been able to increase his reps again … even if doing it with less g was technically cheating.

"Have I mentioned that I still find it funny that out of all the species in the galaxy, humans are the only ones who work out similarly to batarians?" his companion for the day, Sergeant Undrak, muttered before grabbing the bar and effortlessly repeating what Haugen had just done plus adding another five seemingly to show off. "You'd think," he groaned in between pull ups, "that with how much our people are supposed," another groan, "to hate each other," the red-brown striped batarian hang at the low end of the bar for a moment, "we'd be more different."

Haugen wiped the sweat off his brown and shrugged.

"You are what you hate," he figured as the batarian dropped to the ground, visibly less bothered by the exercise than Haugen. Then again, he was fifteen years younger than the ASOC officer and batarians were, on average, somewhat stronger than humans. According to Miller, it was because they'd spent more time whipping their slaves instead of walking around the savannah. But that was just the sergeant's opinion and nowhere near rooted in science.

"Wise words," the Recon NCO replied before looking at his hands and flexing them into fists several times. "I'm still not sure if I trust this jerry-rigged thing," he went on while looking at the construction Mav had built the very day they'd boarded the Mirage. Salarians, being vastly different from humans, naturally didn't have a pull-up bar in their gym and as such Mav had improvised with a pair of weird exercise pillars (which salarians apparently climbed like lizards?) and a long metal bar he'd borrowed, or maybe stolen, from wherever. Haugen didn't want to know where because that might make him liable if the Mirage suddenly fell apart underneath their asses.

"I do. If it holds you, it holds me," the blonde man figured while looking at the poor welding job. Mav had never been a craftsman and just because he knew how to cut through a fence with a blowtorch clearly didn't mean that he could weld worth shit.

"You calling me fat, Captain?" the burly batarian asked with a needle-teeth grin.

"More like… big-boned," the officer responded before grabbing the bar again. When he was about to pull himself up, he heard the door open behind them, which was strange in the fact that it was early in the morning and during the main sleeping hours of the salarian crew, which he'd learned by now were vastly different from human ones.

He would have expected the rest of his team, if he didn't know for a fact that he'd scheduled his work-out with Undrak on the one day he knew Phantom wouldn't be hitting the weights as to avoid unnecessary confrontation. So with his team eliminated… he turned his head to check and saw the raven-haired Cerberus officer walk in.

While he wasn't surprised to find her here, she was the type to rise early, she wasn't wearing PT gear. That in turn could mean only one thing…

"Captain Haugen? A minute please."

The man sighed and dropped from the bar.

"Don't lap me," he said while pointing at Undrak and grabbing a towel to wipe the sweat of his face. Then he walked over to Lawson and looked at the Cerberus officer. They'd parted on semi-friendly terms after their brief chat on Unification Day but they'd still ended things formally.

"Morning. How can I help you, Miss Lawson?" he greeted, noticing that the Cerberus officer seemed to throw a rather strange look at the batarian behind him.

"I hate to interrupt your daily routine, Captain, but I'm afraid I need you to go over some details of the upcoming mission with me," the woman responded before gesturing for him to follow her out of the gym and then leading him into the officer quarter she'd claimed as her office. When the door shut behind her, she sat down and sighed.

"I don't like the sound of that," Haugen observed.

"You shouldn't," Lawson stated before frowning.

"Something about the plan not working as intended?" the captain asked, knowing full and well that if the turian estimates were correct – which he had no doubt they were - they had just fifteen days until the Reapers hit the Bahak system.

"You could say that," she replied before turning around a terminal to show Haugen some numbers he could make no sense of.

"What am I looking at?"

"Recon data that's been giving us a huge headache," she explained. "While the plan's still solid, it's been nearly ten years since Blue Solstice was drawn up. A lot has changed since, starting with the batarian presence in the system. Compared to back during the war, they've upped their number of patrol ships by a figure of three and their ground troops by four… and they've also built a new sensor array on the planet and a ring of defensive orbital stations around it."

Haugen considered the data on the screen.

"I'd say they knew we were planning something… but you don't draw up that kind of firepower in a week. They've been at this for a while, haven't they?"

"Yes. Our current assumption is that they've either been aware of or anticipated an operation like Blue Solstice for quite some time now. Maybe ever since the Blitz… Or that maybe they are prepping for something else entirely…"

"You thinking Reapers?" Haugen figured. "I thought the batarians were a lost cause. Fully indoctrinated already and what not."

"Large parts of the Hegemony's leadership are but as you know, there have been reports of infighting between Amon-loyalists and splinter groups from the military-nobility."

"Like Balak."

"Not just like him," Lawson tapped a button on her screen and showed Haugen an image of a batarian warship with three yellow stripes drawn over the Batarian State Arms insignia. "The Bahak system's not occupied by the Hegemony, Captain. It's occupied by the remainder of Balak's separatists," Lawson sighed. "While our intel into the Hegemony has gotten very scarce, we are positive that they are one of the only organized groups left that are still capable of actively resisting the indoctrinated loyalists. And while that sounds good on paper considering what we want to achieve here…"

"… Balak's guys are never going to even consider listening to us, let alone willingly give up their stronghold so we can blow up the relay," Haugen concluded and Lawson nodded. "Back when we were sent after Balak, his guys were mostly External Forces. Battle-tested Blitz veterans with proper equipment and proper training. I take it this is also the case here?"

"We don't have any solid intel on the composition of his troops, but since most of the Internal Forces we've encountered up to now were neck-deep in reaper-tech and actively working with husks... it stands to reason that Balak's group won't be IF but EF, yes."

Haugen scratched the stubble on his face and sighed.

Fighting indoctrinated Internal Forces on their own turf would've been bad enough already but going up against desperate EF vets who were defending their last stronghold against what they might consider a human intervention into a nearly decade-long civil war?

That'd be a piece of work…

"Great…" he mumbled before looking at the terminal sitting in front of the raven-haired operative. "Any more bad news I should know about?"

"Surprisingly, no, everything else about Blue Solstice is going according to the plan," Lawson retorted. "Our liaison with the Blue Suns reported back earlier today. They'll provide the deniable distraction we need and all they're asking for in return is that we continue to leave them to their own devices in regards to the little empire-building they've been doing in the Terminus. So despite what we were initially expecting, we don't actually need to find a stand-in for them."

Haugen folded his arms and frowned. While he appreciated their slaver-killing skills, he couldn't exactly claim to be a big fan of whatever the Suns were doing in the Terminus. Despite their questionably close ties to the HSA-government, letting them do as they pleased it seemed like a problem in the making to just let the Suns carve out an empire.

But that was a political question he wasn't tasked with or qualified to answer.

"Considering how much black ink there is all over this task force, I could probably guess the answer, but I still gotta ask. The Suns don't know our real objective, do they?"

The Cerberus officer folded her hands and smiled.

"Of course not. Telling them would be… unadvisable. I was very specific on what they should be told when I passed on the assignment to Cronos Station."

"And you really think they listened?"

"Why wouldn't they?"

Haugen swiped some more sweat of his face and looked at Lawson, a bit dumbstruck by her apparent naivety.

"… because they're Cronos?"

---

Meanwhile, 8. May 2417 AD, Zorya, Colonial Capital Thun

"And you really think this is a good idea?" Kuril, the bare-faced, grey-brown plated turian who'd been at his side since the beginning of this whole operation asked.

Zaeed Massani chewed on the butt of his cigarette, his eyes still glued to the monitors showing how the latest addition to his outfit, the perfect krogan he'd stolen out of that bastard Okeer's dead hands, was breezing through hordes of (expensive) training mechs generously provided for by the now disbanded Zoryan Security Forces.

"Damn right it is. Look at him. He's a damn death machine," Zaeed responded before pushing his thumb on the intercom as the krogan (the old guard had taken to calling him 'Grunt') was about to toss one of the burning mechs into the direction of the bunker from which Kuril and him were observing.

"Cut the shit, Grunt, or I'll come down there and give you another shiner!" he called, his voice booming through the adjacent wall. In response, the krogan grimaced and then dropped the mech with an angry grunt. "Back to the start now. We'll run it again with ten more enemies," he added before typing in fifteen to throw Grunt off. After the krogan had complied, Zaeed smirked at Kuril. "And they say beating kids don't work. Heh. Ever since I beat the kid's ass, he's listening like a champ."

The turian rolled his eyes and looked at the protective cast that Zaeed was still wearing on his left arm.

"If you giving the krogan a black eye after he broke your arm in three places counts as a win in your book, I'd hate to see how you'll look if you lose against him," Kuril responded as they both watched Grunt march through the training course. "Ignoring your deeply disturbing views on domestic violence against kids … and how that krogan's not a kid but a cloned super soldier… I wasn't talking about you sending Grunt on this mission. I was talking about sending anyone at all. A lot's changed since we agreed to that plan and me and a lot of the guys agree that the times of us marching after Cerberus' war drums are long behind us."

"They are. But this ain't about dancing after any whistles, old friend. You heard Holderman. We don't do this, the big scary murder-bots from two years ago are gonna come back for round two and blow up way more than the fuckin' Citadel this time 'round. Besides. We got a deal with Arcturus, remember? They help us toss up the Terminus, we give 'em a hand every once in a while."

"I know that… but like I said. A lot's changed since we made those deals and we stand to lose a lot more than we did ten years ago," Kuril tapped the white circle on his chest. "We're not just vigilantes anymore, Zaeed. We've got people counting on our protection now. Protection we won't be able to provide if we bleed ourselves dry trying to help a strike-team insert into Hegemony space."

Zaeed squinted, lowered his cigar and looked at Kuril. He knew what this was. The turian had always played devil's advocate, even when he didn't actually want to. It had kept them alive.

"You're not wrong. We've got more to lose now," the old merc muttered. "But if Holderman's right and those things are about to pour in the galaxy, the people relying on us are dead anyway. So if you're really serious about protecting them, first thing first has got to be to buy them those couple of months."

"I get that."

"But you still don't agree. Why?"

"Because what if Cerberus is playing us? What if they are making all of this shit up knowing we'll believe it just to get us to invade Hegemony space?"

"Now why would they do that?"

"Because things have changed," the turian repeated. "We aren't just a deniable hit squad anymore. We've got colonies. Fleets. We're a force to be reckoned with, competition in the Terminus. And the way I've come to know Cerberus, competition is something they don't like."

Zaeed stuffed his cigar back into his mouth and pulled in a breath of smoke.

"If they want to get rid of us, there's easier ways to," he retorted before pushing down the mic-button. "Alright. Run it again, Grunt!" he said. Then he turned back to Kuril. "I ain't gonna make you go through that relay with me. You know that, Kuril. So if you really think that Cerberus is trying to fuck us, you should stay behind and pick up the torch after I get smoked."

The turian narrowed his eyes.

"I'm not going to sit here and let you ride to your own funeral, Zaeed."

"Then stop me."

"We both know that's not happening."

"Fine. Then tag along and make sure it's their funeral, not mine."

The turian sighed and turned his eyes to where the krogan was currently dismantling another squad of training mechs.

"Cremation and save the plates," he stated.

"Huh?"

"If I get killed protecting, whether it's by protecting your gullible ass or by saving the galaxy, you make sure they burn my body and when they're done, you're sending the plate-chips back to Palaven so they can go into a military mausoleum. It's a custom."

"I know how you turians bury your dead… but didn't they court martial your ass out of the army?"

"Yes. And?"

"And doesn't that sort of disqualify you from a military funeral?"

"I should hope that saving the fucking galaxy sort of overshadows a little court martial."

Zaeed puffed out a cloud of smoke and realized something crucial he had never asked about in the twenty years he'd known the turian.

"The fuck they kick you for anyway?"

"Insubordination, unlawful use of force, conduct unbecoming of a non-commissioned officer… six dress uniform infractions…"

"Hmm. Yeah… I think they might save you a seat if you go out in a heroic blaze of gory fucking glory."

"If the fire's large enough that is."

"Weren't you a spec ops sapper?"

"Hostage Rescue Element demo-specialist," the turian corrected.

"Fucking hastati prima-donna squad," Zaeed remembered. In his defense, back when Kuril had joined, Cerberus had still be picking the recruits and Kuril had been a top of the crop sort of pick, at least when compared to the run-of-the-mill grunts that Zaeed and the other Suns had been.

"Then you can manage a big fucking fire, ay?"

"I should hope so," the vigilante retorted before watching Grunt continue with the course. "When are we rolling out?"

"Five days. Ops going down in two weeks."

Kuril nodded and probably did some quick math in his head. Then his mandibles clicked.

"Isn't the point of no return in two weeks?"

"Fifteen days," he corrected. "You know Cerberus. They like to make things dramatic."

"Fucking brilliant."

---

Ten Hours Later, 2158 CE, Sur'Kesh, Outer Districts of Talat

"And this is confirmed?" the pale, near-Lystheni salarian asked while looking at Ginon. They were seated in their usual meeting place, a teashop right underneath the noses of the Dalatrasses. Ginon had only recently returned from his visit to the Dalatrass Raeka and been ready to content himself to waiting for the next step of their revolution… but then word from a friend in the Apien Crest had reached him.

"The turians are mobilizing their first wave reservists and the humans also appear to be acting on the intel, under a pretext of expected batarian aggression, but still. So yes. It is confirmed."

The pale salarian's mouth turned into a frown.

"We've always suspected that we were in a race against time. The forerunners' research suggested that there was a cyclical nature to galactic annihilation. Now we know that they were right," he said, relatively slowly for a salarian, before putting a cup down in front of the third member of their triad, Finat, the yellowish, biotic youngster who'd been last to join their ranks some seventy years ago and who only had two sleeping periods to his name up to now.

He'd missed out the least on their history and that made him valuable in Ginon's mind. Whereas the teal salarian already scarcely remembered growing up after the Fall of Rannoch and had to go through great lengths to adapt to the world around him, Finat's memories were still clear, devoid of the cryo-induced mind-fog that tended to rest upon the League members who predated first contact with the Hierarchy. Finat had an understanding of their current times that Ginon, Abalash or the remaining ten simply did not.

Ginon picked up his cup.

"What does this mean for our plan?" he asked off-mindedly.

"With Linron dead and Raeka on our side, the wheel of change has been set in motion. There is no stopping its turning. We will have freedom, even if we have to take it from them while these Reapers bear down on our worlds," Abalash offered before slowly sitting down. Even with cryo-stasis sleeps and rejuvenating medical procedures, age was getting to him.

"Throwing the Union into civil war while genocidal machines bear down on us," Finat murmured. "I know that freedom is paid for in blood," he quoted one of the League's core philosophies, "but is this really the best time for us to bring down the dalatrasses? I mean I'll be the first to tell you that they deserve all that's coming for them… but just how many more of our people are going to die if we don't succeed before they arrive?"

"Many. The streets will run green with the blood of traitors and martyrs alike," Abalash stated. "But a short life lived free and ended violently is worth more than a million eternities spent under peaceful slavery."

The young, yellow salarian looked at the pale near-Lystheni and chugged down his cup of alcohol.

"Easy for you to say when everyone you've ever known been dead for one and a half millennia."

Ginon sat down his cup.

In salarian society, disobeying or offending your elders or senior members of your group was one of the harshest slights you could afford. It was considered an offense that could lead you to be banished from your clan.

If he'd spoken to a Dalatrass the way he'd just spoken to Abalash, he'd be jailed and whipped.

Luckily for Finat, the League believed in full equality and uninfringed liberty to do and say as you pleased. And Abalash, being one of the most senior members, fully embodied that ideology.

"I understand your reluctance, my young jesting friend," the old, pale salarian said before closing his eyes. "Ever since I learned of the implications of the discoveries of our forerunners, I dreaded the day where we had to choose to take action precisely because I worried that we might just choose the time of the return of those which ended the protheans. And now that we are here… I see that my dread was fully justified," he sighed. "We've sat the wheel in motion and now we are rolling towards a cataclysm that will make the Breaking of the Wheel and the Rebellions look like a pleasantry in comparison," he went on. "But there is one thing you are not considering."

"And what might that be?"

"If the Reapers arrive while we are at peace, the Union will fall. The greed and indecision of the Dalatrasses will ensure that they do not act in line with our allies. They will not commit to a war outside of our borders but rather concern themselves with their own instincts of self-preservation. They will hide behind our navy, hesitate to commit it to the war effort and alienate our allies for it… and when the Reapers are done with them, they will reach our worlds. Then we'll be left to face them alone. And in that moment, we will have failed. There will be some resistance, yes, but in the end, we will die. As the last, maybe, but still die," he explained.

"However if the Reapers arrive at a time where we have forced the Dalatrasses to allow the Union to use its full military might for reasons that serve their self-interest, namely the preservation of the power they consider to be their birthright… the Union will be under arms and ready to face the Reapers. And when the soldiers and politicians that kneel before the Dalatrasses realise that they are ordering them to kill their own people while the Reapers slaughter the galaxy… they will rise up. The Dalatrasses will be deposed off and our people will be free to help stop the end our forerunners feared and when we succeed… they will then be free to choose their own future. One without the yolk of nobility resting on their necks," Abalash finished before lifting up his cup again.

"You are right. The bones of everyone I have ever known have turned to dust a hundred times over already… yet that which they believed in, that which they died for… is immortal," he ran a finger over the edge of his cup.

"You are young, dear jester, so I can see why you struggle to remember… yet you must never forget. As the Jeshesh must blossom, the Jeshesh must also wither. There can be no new beginning without an end and no life without death… no creation without destruction…" Ginon took another sip form his cup. "Our timing was poor, so there will be ashes and there will be death. Many times over the amount we anticipated. But from the field of destruction that we've sowed, a new future for our people will grow. And that is all that matters."

Finat visibly swallowed.

"You know that you can always withdraw from our ranks if you are not comfortable with what we need to do," Abalash reminded him, neglecting to mention that no one had ever turned their back on the League before… their selection criteria were after all rather specific.

"I'd never dream of it," the yellow salarian responded before looking at his cup. "I think I just need some time to process what we are about to unleash on our people."

Abalash rose from his seat with a groan and put a hand on the shoulders of the young biotic.

"We'd have chosen poorly if you did not. Your love for your people honors you and I have faith that the knowledge of where all this will lead them will help you persevere through the path we're about to send them on. Go then. Find your peace, while its still to be found."

Finat nodded and then quickly left the tea-shop, leaving Abalash and Ginon alone.

"He's not wrong," the teal salarian observed, to which his elder nodded.

"Indeed not…" Abalash paused and glanced at the medallion dangling freely over his working clothes. "The STG operative he approached, Major Kirrahe… he has not surfaced again."

"If he's anything like Valern, he will… in time that is."

Ginon felt a hand on his shoulder, its grip tight and strong. Much stronger than the ancient muscles in Abalash's body should allow for.

"See to it that he chooses the right path before the wrong one is chosen for him."

Ginon nodded.

"I will."

---

9. May 2417 AD, Attican Traverse, Enroute to Batarian Space, Repurposed IFS Stealth craft

After Petrovsky had brought them together in the infirmary of the New Dawn in the wake of the June-attack and christened them 'Delta-Squad', Vega and his new associates, the IFS soldiers Mason, Essex, Nicky, Kamille and Milque had been whipped back into shape with a load of expensive medical care a movement like the IFS definitely shouldn't have access to and subsequently been ordered aboard a stealth corvette that if the HSA ever found out the IFS had in its arsenal would terrify them.

Now here they were, enroute to batarian space for their first ever mission: figure out why the fuck ASOC appeared to be moonlighting with husks.

Why they were going to batarian space to figure that out?

Damned if Vega knew.

He wasn't the intel guy and truth be told, he was still looking for a way out of this shitshow.

As the fist swung for his head, the burly man with the mohawk easily ducked under the punch of the blonde biotic.

"Woah, nearly got him there, Essex. Only missed by like… two meters," Kamille, the sole woman of their squad, called from the edge of the ring.

"Intentionally," the biotic said before suppressing a cough "Wouldn't want to take his head off, you know?"

"Like you could," Kamille retorted before Vega ducked under another punch, swung hist fist low and with a single blow, sent the biotic flat on his ass.

"Less talking, more fighting. And watch your guard." Vega suggested. If he was stuck going on special assignments with a bunch of people who probably should've died back on June, he at the very least wanted to make sure they were competent enough to keep him alive.

Essex coughed up a little blood, which didn't worry Vega anymore now that he'd watched him do it for the last week and been told it was simply the after-effect of his biotic implants going haywire, and wiped his mouth.

"Yeah, no, I think I'm good, Vega," he stated before looking over at the engineer of their squad, Nicky. His encounter with a camouflaged foe had started this whole mess to begin with. "He could use the practice though."

"I'm good on CQC. Trust me," Nicky retorted before scratching his chest where he'd been injured.

"Didn't you get your ass kicked by some dude just a couple of days ago?" Essex teased before rolling his neck.

"Didn't you get yours kicked by Vega a second ago?" Milque responded in his place.

"Ha. Ha. Very funny, Lactose."

"'Course it's funny. I said it," Milque shrugged. "That nickname's still not going to catch on, by the way."

"We'll see, we'll see," the former BAR trooper stated before throwing a look at the dark-skinned, older Mason and the blue-eyed Kamille. "How about Mason and Kamille have a go with Mohawk, eh? Beats shit talking from the sidelines or brooding in the corner, eh big guy?"

"I'm not brooding," Mason muttered.

"Yet that's the first thing you've said in an hour," Essex retorted.

"He got you there, man," Nicky said with a shrug before adjusting his glasses.

"I think I'd rather outshoot you Vega, no offense, but you're not my weight class," Kamille stated before pointing back at Nicky. "Now that Essex's brought it up … There's something I've been meaning to ask you about."

"Lemme guess, June?"

"Yes," Kamille nodded. "You're the only one around here who actually went up against our mystery cloaker. So… what's he like?"

Nicky sighed audibly.

"Deadly," he summarized brief and to the point.

"How many of you were there again?" Kamille pressed on.

"Two techs, me and a militia fireteam," Nicky retorted. "So eight."

"And he cut all of you down in what did you say? Five seconds?"

Nicky squinted. "Yes."

"That's… not bad."

"Like I said, I only ever saw one kind of solider move over a battlefield like that."

"And that was an ASOC trooper," Vega recalled Mason's words.

"But those guys work in teams to do what they do," Kamille offered before twirling a dull practice knife in her hand and suddenly flinging it at Essex, who caught it more thanks to luck than to skill. "Yours didn't."

"What are you getting at?"

"I didn't exactly get to it when we were introducing ourselves… but I've worked with HSA spec-ops as well. Before I saw through their bullshit that is."

"Doing what exactly?" Milque inquired. At this point everyone else had come clean about their background. Vega had been a marine, Nicky an airborne soldier, Essex obviously a BAR trooper, Mason had kicked dirt with the infantry for ten and been an NCO like Vega and Milque himself had been a marksman in the marines. Only Kamille hadn't said what she'd done prior to joining the IFS that had qualified her for Delta Squad.

The brunette with the blue eyes frowned and leaned against a wall.

"It pains me to admit it… but I was an MP on Arcturus. Close protection squad."

"So you had the chance to take a shot at the queen-bitch and you didn't?" Essex murmured. "The fuck you doing here?" he said before tossing the knife her way with a hint of biotic help that resulted in the dull blade embedding itself in the wall behind Kamille. Vega still wasn't clear on the details, but despite his AMP being busted, the blonde solider could apparently still use his powers. They were slowly but surely killing him, but they were usable.

"Same thing as you. Making amends for drinking their bullshit," Kamille offered calmly before looking back at Nicky. Essex was meanwhile moving to retrieve the knife, which had clearly captivated his attention. "What I was getting at was that I ran into a lot of SOC guys when I worked on Arcturus… and into even more HSAIS-black-op-spooks. And if your guy really was alone… I'd bet that he was part of the spooky-series of government-goons, not the operator-brand. Field operatives work alone. ASOC doesn't."

"Just to clarify. By run in you mean got fuck-" Essex started before Kamille smacked him where his amp used to be and caused the BAR trooper to flinch in pain. In Vega's mind, he'd had that one coming. The guy really had a foul mouth and coming from him, that said a lot.

"So you think HSAIS was responsible for June?" Mason stated, breaking his long silence.

"It fits their MO, doesn't it? Hire a few mercs, unleash a few monsters… kill a whole lot of innocent people to cover up some bullshit?" Kamille stated with a shrug.

"Operators or spies. They're HSA-drones. Everything you just described applies to all of them," Milque figured. "Why does it matter anyway who iced Nicky's pals?"

"Because going up against a couple of spec-ops is way different from going up against HSAIS field agents or their black-op offshoots," Vega murmured, thinking back to Eden Prime…

"How so?"

"Because HSAIS won't think twice about tracking down you family after they ID-ed you and putting two in the back of your mum's head before they dump her in the river and call it another increase in frontier crime," Milque offered to which Vega had to suppress a confused expression. That's not what he meant and no matter how little he thought of the HSA, he was pretty sure they weren't going to do that… without a reason. "That's what you were going to say, right?" the man with the bowl-cut asked before looking at Vega.

"HSAIS is dangerous in another way than the military," Vega replied diplomatically. "Unlike the army, HSAIS doesn't tell Arcturus what they're doing half the time. They've got more leeway than boots on the ground do. And if they're really the ones running the show…"

"The show's gonna get messy," Kamille finished.

"Exactly," Vega nodded. "You figure Petrovsky knows?" he asked into the room.

"Picked us misfits for a reason, didn't he?" Essex replied after recovering from the smack against his neck. When everyone looked at him in confusion, he explained. "No one's gonna shed any tears over losing the rag-tag bunch of misfits who already have an expiration date anyway."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that. The colonel said qualified soldiers are a rare currency right now, didn't he?" Nicky injected. "Besides, you're the only one with an expiration date."

"Thanks for reminding me."

"You started it. Anyway. I don't think this is a suicide run. Petrovsky was too specific on our usefulness for that to be the case."

"Kid… officers always say that shit before they sent you on a suicide run," Mason offered before jumping off the crates he sat on. "But thinking about it won't do us any good either. We're soldiers. We'll do what we're asked to. Nothing more, nothing less," the dark-skinned man stated before looking at Vega, who was growing all the more confident that this special assignment was going to be the death of him. Unlike him, these guys actually seemed like they bought into the IFS' crap the same way they'd bought into the HSA's bullshit.

From one end of the fanatic-scale to the next.

… fucking great.

He was drawn from his thoughts when he was punched on the shoulder ever so slightly.

"Essex's right about it being my turn though. Come on. Knuckle up, Vega. Gotta get ready, eh?"

"… right."

---

One Day Later, 2158 CE, Thessia, Serrice

"And how accurate are these reports?" one of the matriarchs seated at the round table inside the large, luxurious mansion situated on an island in the Bay of Serrice, asked. Her name was Helata B'Tavir and as of right now, she was the fifth most wealthy person in the Republics and the ruler of Serrice and all its associated city-states.

"Our liaison at the Reaper Task Force reported in again earlier today. She says the turians are losing their blue over this. They're mobilizing the first wave reservist and they're ordering their patrol flotillas to rally into pre-planned combat fleets," Matriarch Aethyta, a high-ranking official in the Republican Navy, offered in return. "For context's sake, the last time they did that, they were about to invade the Hegemony and seriously considered glassing Khar'shan."

"I remember," B'Tavir offered.

"Oh really? The way you've been acting the last decade, I figured you'd have forgotten…" Aethyta retorted.

"I-" B'Tavir started before looking at the homeowner, who'd been idly listening up to now. Her squinting alone was enough to silence whatever remark the matriarch had been about to offer. So instead of arguing with Aethyta, B'Tavir instead turned to the representative of the Athame Doctrine, Matriarch D'Valki. "Matriarch," she started. "What of the temple beacon? Have you made any progress in your search?"

That small sentence was spoken with such a casualness that one would not dare to think that the asari that had spoken it had just started the discussion on the best kept secret in asari history: the fully intact, fully functional prothean beacon installed in the Temple of Athame that was the source of the asari's galactic dominance.

"No, we've just begun the process," the light-blue elder responded before interlacing her finger. "It was …. more difficult than anticipated to find an excuse to lock the public out of the temple. With the celebrations of the goddess' graceful week upon us, we've had to answer some … difficult questions… as to why we suddenly don't allow visitors to the main temple anymore. There've even been protestors."

"But there have been no difficulties or prying eyes?" the homeowner finally asked.

"No... Matriarch Ulizia's justicars and their acolytes have kept the order."

"Good, good," she replied before brushing her purple hand over the surface of the wooden desk. "If there is any more trouble, I wish that you inform me instantly. I'll… handle any questions the administrators might ask."

"Of course, Matriarch Tevos," D'Valki responded before bowing her head ever so slightly at the former councilor.

Tevos let a small smile cross over her face and then faced Aethyta again.

"Honored Matriarch," she began, enjoying the fact that one of her most outspoken opponents had to agree to attend this Council of Matriarchs, which was hosted in the very halls Aethyta had hoped would turn into Tevos' grave. "After receiving my invitation, I seem to recall that your chief-concern in this matter was the idea that the Reapers might seek to shut down the mass relay network, was it not?"

"You recall correctly… honored Matriach," by asari customs, one Matriarch had to use the prefix if the other did and for all her flaws, Aethyta still conformed to the customs of their people.

"And if I recall even further, I seem to remember that about a hundred years ago, you once proposed an idea that could circumvent our over-reliance on the Realy Network," Tevos went on. Centuries of politics had left her with a perfect memory.

"I did. And you laughed the blue off my ass…" Aethyta responded dryly before looking at D'Valki. "And you and your pet-justicars cried heresy and sacrilege," she added, prompting D'Valki to tense up.

"You proposed to disassemble a mass relay in an attempt to reverse engineer it. If we'd have agreed, you'd have cut off an entire system worth of resources for an idea that might not even work," the ruler of Serrice, B'Tavir, offered.

"An unimportant system," Aethyta countered.

"That several other matriarchs from the Cyone Republics had a vested interest and claim to."

"If it's between them and the future of our people… I say screw 'em," Aethyta murmured, showing her half-krogan heritage and the brashness associated with such a genetic line. "Besides, they could've gotten a payout from all the unreachable systems we'd have found if the tech had worked, which for the record I think it would have considering what we know about the prothean Conduit experiment these days," the blue-skinned matriarch looked at Tevos. "Let me guess… now that there's a very real chance that an enemy might be able to lock-down our main means of transportation, you think the idea isn't all that terrible at all and you want me to pursue it."

"I've never thought that the idea was terrible, Matriarch," Tevos stated. It was the truth, even if Aethyta wouldn't believe it.

"Yet you shut me down a hundred years ago and got us into this mess to begin with."

"My decision was based on politics of the time, not my personal believes. My vote on the matter served our people, not my own self-interest," the former Councilor assured her.

"That would make it the odd one out, doesn't it?" Aethtya responded with a small smirk, a provocation that Tevos would not react to… for now.

"Times have changed," was all she said before looking around the table and the other, silent matriarchs. In total there were thirty of them. The thirty most wealthy, most influential asari in the Republics… "My fellow matriarchs," she began. "I propose that we pursue the idea of honored Matriarch Aethtya. In addition to quickly unrevealing the remaining mysteries of the beacon. Any in disagreement?" the former Councilor asked.

None of those invited to her home spoke up.

"On to the next talking point then."

---

Codex: HSA Military Honors

As with every military institution in the galaxy, the Human Systems Alliance Armed Forces follow the policy of awarding its members with awards for various deeds related to their professions in the military. Ranging from awards for tasks particularly done over hardships endured to recognitions of extraordinary gallantry or uncommon valor, the following list includes a selection of awards bestowed by the HSA upon its soldier and their internal hierarchy.

The highest-ranking award in the HSA's military is the Star of Valor, awarded to soldiers who have gone above and beyond the call of duty and displayed heroics rarely witnessed upon the battlefield. The Star of Valor is one of three military decoration that may be displayed upon the combat apparel of any soldier awarded it in form of a shoulder pauldron.

Notable recipients of the Star of Valor include:

- Commander Emily Shepard (active duty, Naval Special Operations Command, Red Squadron) for her actions during the Skyllian Blitz.

- Gunnery Sergeant Ashley Williams (posthumous, 17th Marine Corps) for her actions during the Battle of the Citadel on 29.01.2415 AD.

- General Ingham Costa Stelios (retired, General of the HSAMC) for his actions during a boarding operation in 2361 AD and his actions during the Siege of Horizon in 2379. Stelios remains one of the few HSA servicemen to have been awarded the Star of Valor twice.

-Specialist Jon Grissom (posthumous, HSAIS-Section 13) for his actions during the Bombing of Illyria on 27.03.2381 AD.

Editorial Note: Due to the nature of HSAIS' operations, it is unknown if any more members of the intelligence agency have been awarded similar awards as Jon Grissom. It should however be noted that the agency maintains a 'wall of the fallen' that is placed under an arch reading 'do ut des', I give so that you may give. It is believed that the names placed upon this wall are those of people who would have been awarded similar awards, if not for the classified nature of their assignments preventing public recognition.

- Vice Admiral Kamur Talantis (active duty, Hierarchy Navy, currently posted as a liaison officer at HSAN Lunar Naval Academy) for his actions while commanding the HSASV Horizon 05.05.2409.

- Staff Sergeant Patrick Thomas 'Pete' Hult (posthumous, Army Special Operations Command, 1st Battalion) for his actions during the Battle of Eden Prime on 04.01.2415 AD.

- Lieutenant Cooper Wells (posthumous, 177th Mechanized Support Company) for his actions during the Battle of Parnack on 04.10.2383 AD.

Following the Star of Valor, the second highest award within the hierarchy of military honors is the Colonial Cross, awarded to soldiers who've displayed extraordinary gallantry in the face of extreme circumstance. Like the Star of Valor, the Colonial Cross may be displayed on the combat apparel of any soldier awarded it. Unlike the Star of Valor, the Colonial Cross may only be displayed upon the collar of the wearer. Notable recipients of the Colonial Cross include Admiral Steven Hackett (Admiral of the Navy, for actions related to his service as a ODG-officer during the Fringe Wars) and Brig. Gen. Serge Ramos (acting commander of the 26th Airborne Brigade, for actions related to his service during the Skyllian Blitz)

The last decoration that may be worn upon the uniform of any service-personal awarded it is the Maroon Star, awarded to any military or military intelligence personal who've displayed uncommon valor in the face of the danger.

The Maroon Star, represented by a ribbon depicting the HSA's coat of arms upon a maroon ribbon, may be worn upon the left side of the chest-armor of any soldier awarded it and has been presented to roughly three percent of combat veterans. A well-known recipient of the Maroon Star is the retired Chancellor of the Human Systems Alliance, Lt. Commander (ret.) Francis Noé, who was bestowed the award during peacetime while serving as squadron commander for the 565th Naval Aviator Squadron. According to the official award citation, Noé was awarded the Maroon Ribbon alongside an Aviator Combat Medal for action related to the hijacking of an eezo freighter in 2362 AD. Due to operational security concerns, the exact details of the incident remain classified. However the incident makes Noé one of the few aviators to be awarded both a Maroon Ribbon and an ACM during peace times.

Other awards of the HSA-AF include but are not limited to:

- Aviator Combat Medal (awarded to helmsman and small craft pilots who've been engaged in

- Combat Personal Badge (awarded to combat-arms who've been engaged in active combat)

- Combat Action Ribbon (awarded to non-combat who've been engaged in active combat)

- Combat Medical Award (awarded to medical personal who've been engaged in active combat)

- Combat Injury Ribbon (awarded for sustaining injuries in active combat)

- Silver Ribbon (awarded for noteworthy valor in the face of danger)

In addition to its own rewards, the HSA also recognizes a selection of Citadel-Nation rewards, including among others:

- the turian Nova Cluster

- the salarian Silver Dagger

- the Citadel Council Palladium Star

Editorial Note: All of the above mentioned awards have been awarded to Captain David Edward Anderson for his actions during the Battle of the Citadel on 29.01.2415 AD. Over the course of his career as a Spectre and an N7 officer, Anderson was awarded all eligible HSA military honors – excluding the Prisoner of War Medal. He remains the only servicemember to have achieved this.

---

A/N:

Hello there.

It's been a while and I assume at least two of you thought I'd bit the dust.

And I've got no excuses other than that it will continue to be a while because I continue to have a lot on my plate.

Remember when I said we'd finish ME2 by the years end?

.

At this point I'll be happy if I get another chapter out before the years through, to be honest.

Which leads me to my first talking point, actually.

Since I am somewhat skeptical of being able to manage a november release, I'll just point it out here.

We're about to hit six years.

Yup.

SV is going to turn six in 29 days and god damn does it not feel like its already been six years...

Since I've done this speech five times over already, I'll spare you the usual "great to have you" and "we'll totally see this through" crap and just say that a lot's changed since 2016 ... but not the fact that I am absolutely going to finish this, even if it takes me another six years and that the lot of you are stuck with it, whether you like it or not.

Speech over.

In line with SV's usual pattern, we now have a setup chapter after the last big setpiece that was the Citadel and the cleanup that was ripple effect.

As with most setup chapters, there's not a lot I can say, other than that with Chapter 121 we've officially hit Part 6 of SV. I forgot to mention that last time around.

So I do it now :) Welcome to Part 6, which in the early draft of the story was going to be its ending... ha. ha. Yeah. I kinda blew it out of proportion, didn't I?

You know the drill. Review and let me know what you think.

For the record we're at 903 reviews, 1480 favorites and 1561 follows.

Seee you around next time.