He carried himself like an ONI officer.

"You shouldn't have come here, human."

Like John.

He kept himself propped up with an invincible swagger. The kind of walk used not by someone who thought they were untouchable, but knew it.

It was easy to see why – from up there, stood atop his hoverbout, he was shrouded in a barrier strong enough to take sustained fire from all sides.

Cortana watched as the Normandy crew members, the Salarians, and her geth plus her splinters, fired at Saren's hovercraft. Over the closed radio channels, it was pandemonium.

"It's not working – the bullets are evaporating!"

"Not evaporating. That barrier is modulating in such a way that it's grinding them down to atoms."

"Technology like that is possible, but not compact enough to fit in that craft according to what the geth have access to. He must've picked it off Nazara."

"Girls," Cortana calmly radioed over the comm channels. "Remain calm. Options?"

"Sustained fire."

"We might grind his shields down, but if they drop too low in time, they'll give him time to retreat. Plus, we have to worry about the Krogan."

"Aerial strikes and tank shells."

"The explosive damage could harm friendly organics. But the tank shells are an option." She glanced up, as Saren's Krogan army shuffled and lifted their weapons.

"Gentlemen, we're surrounded!" Kirrahe hollered as he lifted his pistol.

"We have bubble shields, don't we?" Cortana questioned.

Another splinter responded over the channel. "We look almost identical. If we shuffle ourselves around a bit, we can evenly distribute those pieces of equipment, and get everyone into protective huddles. Then we can get our tanks to fire on Saren."

"It might work – but we're going to need to make sure the timing is perfect. If we get the timing wrong, it's going to hurt more than a little bit. Ideally… we don't want to have to attack."

The Krogan rumbled… but remained standing by.

Saren's eyes flickered with fury and electricity, as his hoverbout lowered, allowing Cortana to get a good look at him. His left arm was replaced with a prosthesis of geth make, fused to the flesh of the socket. His armor appeared broken in parts, allowing snaking tubes – almost like mechanical roots – to grow across and sink into portions of his body.

His eyes, too, were actually flickering – glowing from within by a pale blue-purple light. The same light radiated from inside his body, specifically on the strange tubes and artificial muscles deep within.

"I must admit – face to face with Captain Anderson's star protégé…" Saren rattled as he sneered down at Commander Shepard. "The Hero of Elysium," He scoffed. "A lone, lucky survivor."

"You're damn right I'm a survivor!" Shepard called out in response as she popped the heat-vents on her rifle. "And even if I weren't, me – and everyone with me – is willing to lay down our lives to end you!"

While Shepard busied herself with the main attraction, Cortana examined and targeted the Krogan.

They were outnumbered, by a lot, yes. But in terms of raw hitting power, they had the advantage.

"All units," Cortana directed as she took in the sensory information at lightspeed. "Get together into groups, one bubble shield module per group. I'm going to try and see if we can get him alive."

"Is that a good idea?"

"He's been working with a Reaper. We would be stupid to pass up the opportunity to pick his brain."

"Ah." Saren hummed. "And you would do it, too. The 'Butcher of Torfan.' Oh, don't look surprised. The Council may have tried me in-absentia, but I kept a close watch on things." The turian turned up his head. "Quite disappointing, that you would go running to hide behind a shield of synthetic bodies."

"Rich, coming from you," Gamma huffed audibly.

"They have impressive abilities, of course," Saren granted somewhat begrudgingly as he turned to look at Cortana proper. "Sovereign's technology is light-years beyond anything the Citadel races have been able to produce. In you destroyed it in three shots."

"And observe the military mind," Cortana turned up her head. "You can't win, so now you're going to appeal to ego. Why'd you even come here? We can fight your men like they're not even there."

"Should we?" Wrex inquired, glancing over at her. "They have the cure for the genophage. If we kill them-"

"Don't be ridiculous!" Tali raised her voice. "His geth were running upgrades that made them fully sapient without the need for networking, and Cortana's geth didn't take it!"

"Wrex, we can sort this out later." Shepard tried to regain control. "For right now, though, try not to sympathize with the people pointing guns at us."

"Easy for you to say," Wrex turned to glare at her, as the grip on his shotgun tightened. "It's not your people-"

Williams instantly broke the line-of-sight to her target. "Drop it!" She commanded.

"Williams!" Shepard gasped out. "Stand down!"

"Not until he stops thinking with his babymaker and points the gun somewhere else."

Emotions flickered across Gamma's artificial face, as she leveled her gun, to point it at Williams. "I appreciate the soldier's typical practice of 'break it to solve the problem,' but friendly fire isn't something that is usually part of it."

"He's sympathizing with the enemy!"

"You haven't had to witness entire hospitals filled with the corpses of newborn children!" Wrex raged, turning his gun onto Williams now. "Hundreds of thousands of mothers, walking into the wastes to die because the shame of being unable to deliver consumed them! Fathers fighting and slaughtering each other like animals because that's the only way they know how work out the grief!"

"They made you a Spectre, but you can't even control your own people," Saren shook his head. "How can you expect to make the tough choices for the galaxy?"

"Tough choices like you made?" Shepard refuted. "Going around the galaxy, spreading terror? I didn't want this gig, but I took it – just so I could stop you."

Saren's cybernetic eyes flashed with cold fury. "That's what all this is about!? Vengeance!? You have no idea what's in store – you don't understand the first iota of what's really at stake!"

Cortana crossed her arms, looking up. "Then make us understand." She glanced over at Gamma. "Make sure one of you gets this – we're probably not gonna get an opportunity like this again."

Gamma blinked, and gently elbowed Tali, before the Quarian's omni-tool switched on."

Saren looked down upon her with contempt. "Synthetic. Your ship may have incapacitated one Reaper, but more are coming. Tens of thousands of them. The Protheans and countless civilizations before fell before their might – and now, the Reapers are coming. vengeful, and furious."

Cortana frowned. "Didn't you just belittle her for feeling vengeful?"

"The anger of one lone, insignificant human is nothing but posturing and self-importance," Saren retorted. "But Sovereign was their vanguard. The most important of their number! Do you really believe they'll let such a thing stand!? I assisted Sovereign because I knew I could prove to it that organic life was worthy of preservation. Of being allowed to remain alive in servitude, rather than be rendered extinct. But you've rendered that all for nothing. Now when the Reapers arrive, there will be nothing to prove to them we are worth keeping around. You've consigned us all to destruction."

Legion clicked. "Old Machine thought processes are unknown to us. It is just as likely they will pursue organic targets anyway."

"Sovereign recognized the geth's utility," Saren gestured to Legion to make his point. "Why not ours?" He looked ahead, harshly regarding the people standing below him. "The Reapers are coming; Sovereign was but the first. Their arrival cannot be stopped, only delayed, and when they arrive, they will do to us as they did the Protheans. Our worlds will burn. Trillions of lives will be extinguished."

"Then join us!" Shepard offered. "Tell us what you know, and we can work out a way to stop them!"

Saren shook his head. "A simple handful of them is enough to destroy a civilization. If we hope to survive, we must make ourselves too valuable to kill. Assisting Sovereign in finding the Conduit would've ensured our place in the coming events. But you've thrown everything into chaos."

"Okay, so stop. If we're fucked anyway, stop fighting, and come with us," Cortana narrowed her eyes as she took a step toward Saren. "Gamma, get everyone around me. All other units, stay in your groups. Get those bubble shields good and ready. Pick targets – prioritize the ones targeting our vehicle operators. Tanks, focus on Saren and his stupid hoverboard. Warthogs and Mongooses, focus on everyone else. Aerial units, hold position around us, and be prepared to receive my signal – light armaments only."

The expressions of the splinters serving as vehicle operators twitched ever-so-slightly.

"Do I wanna say how much I think this plan is a bad idea? Calling in an airstrike on our own position!?"

"You won't lead me astray that easily," Saren haughtily replied. "Sovereign might be disabled, but the situation is still salvageable."

"What the hell are you babbling about!?" Shepard demanded with a tone that suggested she found it completely, utterly nuts. "That ship killed Sovereign in three shots! We can resist the Reapers!"

"What you call 'death' is merely an oscillation." Saren stood tall, and untouchable. "A brain in a jar would seem dead to the outside world, even if its consciousness and thoughts continued on."

Cortana straightened up. "You're saying Sovereign is still functional?" She scoffed in disbelief. "It's floating in orbit, shattered into its component chunks! As we speak portions of it are going to be making landfall."

Saren tilted his head to the side. "I would expect a synthetic to understand that the line between non-functionality and irreparable damage is not so clearly labeled." He turned to the geth platforms accompanying her and the Normandy's team. "Can you really not sense it?"

"Sense what?" Garrus began to sound fed up, as his grip on his sniper rifle tightened.

"The vast mind that continues to dream. The eternal consciousness etched into the fabric of existence itself. The body is broken; shattered. But its will lives on." Saren gestured to his head. "I can feel it. We exist together now…"

Cortana took a step back, back into the grouping as she swallowed. "Two corpses in one grave."

Saren quizzically tilted his head to the side. "A strange analogy. But not incorrect."

"You're indoctrinated!" Shiala finally called out from the crowd. "You've fallen to Sovereign's will, the same as the rest of us!"

"That is a risk, to be sure," Saren clasped his hands behind his back. "But I built this facility to study the process. The more control that is exerted, the less capable the subject becomes. Now more than ever, Sovereign needs my mind and my body intact. That is my saving grace."

"Don't you get it!?" Shepard raised her voice. "You're talking about selling out all organic life to save it! You've already been indoctrinated! What did it promise you!? Riches!? Power!?"

Saren shook his head. "What I do, I do for the good of the galaxy. In the name of peace, and sanity."

"And yet, you're talking about letting a bunch of mechanical, mass-murdering psychopaths into the galaxy!" Shepard refuted. "Someone concerned for the galaxy would be trying to find a way to stop them! You know that, I know that! So if it's not offering you anything, and you know it's going to kill everyone including you, why are you helping it!?"

Saren's face relaxed into an expression of slight doubt, before his eyes glowed brighter, and he angrily fired back. "You can't possibly know what I'm planning! If the Conduit is the key, then once I find it, I can destroy it!"

"Except that still requires you finding it," Shepard hissed as she glared at the Turian. "Exactly like Sovereign wants."

"No!" Saren furiously retorted. "I can stop it! I can convince them! When the Reapers destroyed the Protheans, they left us around – just like they left the Protheans in the cycle before last! We can persuade them to do so again, all we need is to prove our usefulness!"

"He doesn't sound like he really believes that," Gamma noted. "Keep pushing him! We might be able to convince him to stand down, regardless of the Indoctrination!"

"Saren," Cortana addressed, warily looking up at him as she held her weapons away. "We can help you. Shiala's been freed from Sovereign's will – I can do the same for you. We can work together, figure out how to stop the Reapers, but you need to step down."

Saren's hovercraft floated higher. "I'm no fool. If I resign myself over to you, I'm as good as dead."

"No, you're not!" Cortana insisted, looking to the others. "Shepard, you wouldn't harm Saren, would you?"

Shepard looked up at the Turian. "Listen to yourself. You're desperately switching justifications to explain sticking by Sovereign even though you know it's wrong. Sovereign is no longer a threat. We have time now that we didn't before. But if you throw it away now, you'll be throwing away the best shot we have at working out a plan."

Saren, at least, looked unsure, even while his geth and Krogan appeared to grow more agitated. "They're too strong, Shepard. You know that. You've seen the beacon."

"They're not too strong." Shepard answered. "That ship killed one of them. They're not invincible, and it's been proven."

Saren's ocular implants dimmed, "Perhaps you're right…" They returned to full strength, as a flash of light went through the cybernetic tubing and muscles in his body. Saren let out a pained wheeze, and he shook his head. "But one ship can hardly stand against an entire race!"

"We can make more," Cortana retorted. "Whatever Sovereign is telling you, it's wrong. We can win."

Saren grunted, clutching both sides of his head as his eyes glowed a blinding, cold blue. Like twin, miniature neutron stars.

"You can't, can you?" Shiala recognized. "Sovereign won't let you."

Saren growled, as his arm snapped down to his side. A pistol was removed from its holster, and unfolded, being pointed right at Cortana. Shakily, the turian switched targets between her, and Shepard. "I can repair Sovereign. The geth and I. But I can't have you trying to stop me again!"

"You could do that," Shepard nodded. "But look at the situation. Do you really think you'll be able to make it out of here with that ship ready to shoot you down?"

The arm holding the gun dropped, as the other went up to grab his head.

Saren's mandibles flared. "It's in my mind…"

"And doesn't it just burn?" Cortana asked, from the perspective of someone who knew. That kind of intrusion – that kind of violation… It spoke to just how deviously far the Reaper indoctrination went.

The hoverbout drifted closer to the group – within grabbing range of Cortana's platform.

"Gamma – tell me you picked up a bubble shield from one of the others before this."

"You're lucky I did."

"Good. Get ready to deploy it, on my signal."

"Which signal?"

"You'll know it."

Saren's gun arm snapped back up. "I can't make it stop."

"Sure you can." Cortana replied, looking him right in the eyes. "You know how."

Saren's eyes flickered uncertainly, dimming – and he pointed the gun up.

"NOW!"

Upon receiving Cortana's command, the splinters keeping the geth and Krogan targeting the vehicle operators in-sight fired their weapons, dropping the bodies before they could react. This freed up the vehicles to begin moving.

Then, Cortana moved. Perceiving the twitch of Saren's muscles faster than any organic, Cortana sent her hand forward, and grabbed Saren by the arm. She knocked his gun away, before pulling him off his hovercraft, and throwing him to the ground.

Gamma, witnessing the motion, tossed the bubble shield's generator down into the water.

A glowing golden dome of tessellated hexagons appeared around the group, while Cortana threw Saren to the water, and pinned him down with her foot.

Twenty-five nanoseconds later, projectiles slammed against the protective bubble of the energy shield, on account of the enemy geth and Krogan opening fire, whilst the vehicle operators threw their mounts into gear, and began pursuing the enemy combatants. The Normandy team, unused to the bubble shield, lifted their weapons to fire.

"Don't shoot!" Gamma advised. "It's solid both ways – a round could ricochet!"

"Okay, so that was impulsive," Shepard turned to Cortana, as Saren grunted and struggled.

The Turian snarled, grabbing Cortana by the ankle. "You were speaking garbage the entire time.

She grunted, as Saren attempted to pull her off-balance. "If one of you has tranquilizer that works on Turians, now would be a very good time to use it!" She clicked on her radio. "Aerial units, you're cleared to attack! Watch the crossfire!"

"Understood," One of her splinters radioed back, before the roaring rumble of Longsword engines rippled through the air, followed by the whistle of Pelican thrusters.

The attack craft swooped overhead, vastly outpacing the dropships, as they began to unload their chaingun payloads.

The Krogan scattered, attempting to use their small arms to return fire at the fighters, only to succeed in doing absolutely nothing whilst they left themselves out in the open. The heavy-caliber rounds of the Longswords tore through their thick armor after repeated impacts, reducing them to bloody pulp, trying to desperately hold onto life and regenerate.

"Here!" Garrus dashed over, as Saren threw his arm out in Garrus's direction, trying to knock the other Turian away. Garrus jumped back, glancing down at Saren. "Lift him up!"

"You can't stop the inevitable!" Saren bellowed as his Krogan were obliterated, and his geth were right behind. A geth prime charged its weapon, taking aim at the flickering bubble shield, before it was reduced to silver glitter in the impact of a tank shell.

"All right," Cortana bent down, picked Saren up by the chest, and lifted him. "Sorry about this."

"You-"

Garrus's omni-tool jumped to life, and he sent it into Saren's neck. Instantly, the Turian began to cease his struggling, and he went limp.

Shepard looked down at Saren's body, as Cortana let the turian down. Her head popped back up, and she turned to Garrus in shock. "What was that!?"

"Just a basic depressant from your standard Turian First Aid Kit," Garrus's mandibles flared proudly. "We use them mainly to calm down rowdy patients."

Shepard's eyebrows shot up, and she nodded approvingly. "Bet you weren't expecting to be using it on a rogue spectre."

Garrus shrugged, right as the bubble shield flickered and died. Immediately, everyone raised their weapons defensively, only to realize that the fighting was winding to a close.

Kirrahe looked around, at all the synthetics, and the dead enemy combatants, before turning to look ahead. "Well. I can't say this has gone according to plan. But the matter of the facility still remains-"

"Facility!?" Tali raised her voice in disbelief. "We've got a rogue spectre to worry about now!"

Wrex's grip on his shotgun tightened. "You're just seething over something that might help out the Krogan, aren't you?"

"Wrex, we can sort something out. Later." Cortana replied as she leaned down to run a medical scan on Saren. With a connection to the extranet, she could become an expert on turian physiology immediately – his cybernetics, however, were a problem. Aside from the geth arm, they were entirely unfamiliar. Integrated with him. And they looked to be active still.

"You're still worried about the genophage?" Shepard questioned in disbelief. "Wrex, look at Saren – he was working, running this facility, for Sovereign. He was talking about letting people be useful to the Reapers. Like tools. Is that what you want for your people?"

"We'll be alive," Wrex growled in response, leaning dangerously close as Williams's grip on her gun tightened, and she slowly, and silently, began to raise it.

"Right," Cortana sucked in a breath, slapped her knees, and stood up. "Somebody get a pair of cuffs on him. Those cybernetics are filtering the tranquilizer out of his system – we'll need to get him to the Sword of Mercy and prep him for surgery as soon as possible."

"Surgery!?" Tali turned to Gamma, sounding both curious and concerned.

"Why are you looking at me?" Gamma questioned, blinking. "Unless – wait, the Mercy has a whole medbay."

Cortana nodded. "Flash-cloning tanks, sterile field emitters, and most importantly, a surgical team that can go for weeks on a full charge without rest."

"Wait, you're going to put him through surgery?" Alenko questioned. "Why?"

"Because I can undo the indoctrination," Cortana confidently stated. "But all those cybernetics are Reaper technology. As long as those remain in his body, I can't be fully confident that the threat Sovereign poses will ever be fully neutralized."

"But what of the Salarians?" Liara questioned. "And this base?"

"They can evacuate with us. I'll get the teams to round up any other organic life forms in the facility for transport back to the Mercy. We should be able to help them too. As for the facility – a single MAC strike ought to wipe it off the map."

Wrex's face contorted in anger. "We're not destroying this base!"

"Wrex, stand down!" Shepard commanded.

The Krogan barred his teeth, letting a rank breath out right into her face. "I don't take orders from you." He turned around, and began to march off to the shoreline.

Shepard scowled. "That idiot's going to get himself-" She took a step to go pursue him, only to be stopped.

"Shepard," Cortana stepped in front of the Commander, pushing her back. "I've got this, just… let me talk to him." She turned to Gamma. "Prep Saren for transport. This shouldn't take long." Then, she walked right in his wake.

Cortana had seen agitated old soldiers before. Talked them down, a few times. But Wrex was more than just some roid-raging jarhead with a bone to pick. His agitation came from a place of concern for his people.

Still, when she approached, it was to see him unloading shotgun pellets into the pod crabs scuttling around.

"This doesn't feel right," Wrex growled out before she could get a word in edgewise. "So what if Sovereign was some big space boogeyman? If it made a cure for the genophage, I can't let it be destroyed. I won't."

Cortana wordlessly nodded, while she processed his words. "I know. But Wrex, you've got to think. This base was here for – what, a few decades? At most? Kirrahe said it was being used to breed an army of Krogan. You know your people – do they breed that fast?" She already knew the answer.

"Yeah," Wrex snorted.

"Do they grow that fast?" Cortana then posited.

Wrex gnashed his teeth. "No."

"Then you know as well as I do there's one explanation. Cloning," Cortana tilted her head to the side. "And the only way to get them to grow that fast is to accelerate the aging process. All that leads to nasty stuff. Tumors, cellular degeneration-"

"Cancer can't kill us," Wrex boasted.

"Maybe not," Cortana granted him that. "But think about it. They'll be birthed out of pods, fully-grown. Manufactured people. There's nothing wrong with that, but think. The underlying problems don't get addressed." She looked him, right in his eyes, one of them scarred over. "What you said about mothers, going off into the wastes to die. And fathers, slaughtering each other because it was the only way they knew how to deal with the pain. Do you really think that would help?"

Wrex went painfully quiet. "You don't understand. This is the last hope our people have. And with Saren gone, it comes with no strings attached."

"You don't know that," Cortana shook her head. "You saw what it did to him, right? The most famous turian spectre, reduced to a slave because of Sovereign's indoctrination. That tech came from Sovereign. Is that what you want for your people? A slave race living a half-life? Because Sovereign was blasted apart, and Saren still couldn't overcome it."

Wrex appeared uncertain. "You helped me kill Fist – more than Shepard's done for me – but that's still peanuts compared to this. You're asking me to throw away the best hope that my people have."

"Not throw it away," Cortana shook her head. "Put it somewhere else." At his suspicious expression, she went on. "Wrex, I've got technology from my people in here that's up to the task. Covenant technology – their lowest caste almost went through their own genophage, actually. Beyond that, Forerunner technology. I can help you, Wrex." She offered him a hand. "I promise."

Wrex looked down at it warily. "You shouldn't go throwing around that word."

"I don't make promises I can't keep." She retorted. "I've got access to the biggest neural network in the galaxy. Give me time, I could cure the genophage. Give me more time, I could turn Tuchanka from a wasteland into a garden paradise."

"Easy for you to say," Wrex shook his head. "You'd say anything to get me to stand down."

"I wouldn't." Cortana answered in a heartbeat.

"When we first met," Wrex growled. "You said you were helping me go after Fist because you wanted to prove your people weren't all bloodthirsty sociopaths. You lied."

"I didn't." Cortana shook her head. "You think I meant the geth? I kind of did. I somewhat did. I bent the truth a little. But no, I meant synthetics." Her look softened. "And you want to do the same thing for the Krogan, too, I can tell. But this isn't the way to do it. The Krogan out of this facility are slaves. And even if they weren't, this isn't a cure. Not really."

"And you would help us cure it? Why?"

"Because I promised."

"And you always honor your promises?"

"I do." Cortana nodded. "I picked that up from a man I knew. A good man. The best man I'd ever known." Her lips twitched. "You remind me of him, just a bit. Quiet. Smart, but you don't show it to people you just met and don't trust."

"And if he was standing where I am?" Wrex demanded. "If it was you?"

Cortana thought it over for a second. "I'd stop him too. And if it were me… I'd hope he'd try to stop me."

Wrex appeared to deliberate with himself. "All right." He took a breath. "All right, fine." He holstered his shotgun, and Cortana relaxed. "If you're sure, I'll go with you. Let you take a crack at it. Besides," He turned to glare at Williams, and at Shepard. "Something tells me I'm not welcome on the Normandy anymore. Not after she tried to order me around like a stray Varren and failed."

"You think that's a problem?" Cortana frowned.

"It will be now." Wrex growled out in response, before the whistle of Pelican engines signalled that the first dropship was coming in for a landing. "Let's go." He mumbled, taking the first strides to the dropship.

Cortana watched, and let out a sigh of relief. That could have gone a lot, lot worse.

So here's the first big, BIG change! Saren is captured ALIVE, Sovereign is destroyed, and work on the Genophage cure is going to begin well in-advance of the Reaper invasion. Oh, and another thing: The Normandy team actually RECORD what they learn about the Reapers.