"Hmm, you're sure these two are right for this assignment?" asked the man in the room, looking down at the report displayed on his monitor.
"They're some of the toughest soldiers I've ever seen, and I mean since the beginning," responded the other man, an image of him and a the woman beside him being projected from the desk the first man was sitting at.
"Combat wise, they're the best of the best. I wouldn't have minded having them at my back during the Robotech War," admitted the green haired woman to her the two men, and the projection beside her, a man with half his face missing, nodded thoughtfully. She wouldn't have made that sort of declaration lightly.
"So they're good at combat. That's not the only point to this assignment," commented the man behind the desk, pulling out an old solid state file, a piece of paper in an envelop that he carefully opened and slid across to the two of them.
"I will admit, Sargent Shepard can be a handful, but Legion has proven quite personable, for a aggregant intelligence, and with their recent performance, I think she and Charn will prove to be quite the team," argued the woman.
"As for Commander Shepard, he and Tali have led mixed units before. Heck, that whole affair on Mindoir had him lead a team consisting of mostly Council races, including an asari matriarch, against the pirates. Those two together are some of our best battlefield strategist, and they inspire others with their confidence," added the metal faced man, and the one behind the desk nodded thoughtfully.
"Still, are they the sort of people we want out there, protecting the galaxy, and representing the Federation? Wasn't the whole point of this project to show we can cooperate, and not be violent savages everyone seems to think we are?" asked the desk man, dark violet fingers running through light purple hair as he leaned back in his chair.
"I believe they are. Unless you know of someone else you'd rather add to the crew," offered the masked man, and the one sitting behind the desk quickly shook his head.
"No, I believe they are as well, but I wanted to make certain we were in agreement. This is a position of some repute, after all, and as the youngest of our little group, it behooves me to make sure we're not making the wrong decision for our children," said the man, smirking at his compatriots. He and they represented fully half of the remaining Zentraedi in the universe, and they were making choices that would reverberate across the galaxy for years to come.
"Then it's decided. I suppose we should let you go to greet them, and explain their posting to them," said the woman, standing from her seat, and then bowing towards both her host, and the half faced man, before vanishing. The half faced man himself did much the same a moment later, leaving the one in charge of the base to stare at the empty space for several minutes, before finally his comm buzzed, telling him two shuttles had arrived, carrying the newest crewmen.
OoOoO
"SCP-914, the Gearbox. Weird place to station combat personnel, isn't it?" said Tali as she stepped off the shuttle that had brought them here. They had decided to greet their new post at the proper size for it, with Tali in her pod projecting an image of herself. She was even wearing her hood down today, to let her black hair hang freely, hopefully making her look more friendly and open than she did when she wore it up.
"I'll admit, it seems odd to me as well. Still, perhaps this is just a layover?" proposed Shepard as they walked towards one of the doors together. Around them they spotted several Terrans of scale with them, as well as hundreds of micronian workers scurrying about. Oddly, Tali made note of many of them not being Federation races, which was an odd sight on a Space Construction Platform. Typically one of those would be off limits for anyone other than a Federation Fleet officer. Still, the place seemed familiar to them, as they kept out of the way, never running underfoot or the like.
"Well, no time like the present to find out. The pilot said we'd be meeting the station commander in bay four," said Shepard, leading the way to a gravtube, and then letting Tali go first as they pulled themselves up three decks to meet their destiny.
OoOoO
"So, what's this SCP's job anyway?" asked Charn as he laid back in his pod, which was attached to Shepard's back. He'd spent half the ride over complaining about her shaking up his nice, quiet lifestyle back on Virmire, but, it seemed the complaints were more out of habit than any actual distaste for a change in his circumstances.
"SCP-914 has been designated, the Gearbox. It serves as a test bed for designs that are improvements to previous generations, or combine them in new ways. It is responsible for many innovations over the last twenty-four years, as its primary research line has been in regards to element zero, both the technology and refining it further," answered Legion, as he and Shepard stepped off the shuttle that had brought them here.
"Which probably means we're going to be assigned some new ship they've never tested...before?" Shepard's train of thought was interrupted by a sight she'd seen often enough back on Virmire, was still odd to see off that world. Namely it was a turian driving an old loader destroid unit, helping some Terrans to move freight. Typically, an SCP was staffed solely by Terrans, with the occasional geth, quarian, and every great once in awhile, batarians. Here, however, everywhere she looked was a Council race, mostly turians, but she saw several salarians, and even an asari, some of them at stations that implied they were researching things.
"Given the presence of micronians, this unit would agree," said Legion, shocking Shepard out of her haze, and the two quickly made their way across the bay to a nearby door. Once outside, it was only a few minutes walk to the gravtubes, and a drop of three decks to where they were supposed to meet the SCP's commander.
OoOoO
Four figures walked along the causeway above a ship in dry dock. Below them was a vessel of familiar design, yet one that really shouldn't be there. So surprised were they seeing the ship, that not one of the four seemed to acknowledge the others, or the figure they were all walking towards, at least until they were standing right in front of him. At that moment, seeing him as if for the first time, all four suddenly snapped alert, their fists pounding over their hearts, or at least where his heart would be, in the case of Legion.
"General Skarrde, we weren't told you'd be the one giving us our briefing," commented Tali as she stood at attention, and the man in front of her nodded, saluting back, and then gesturing for them to be at ease.
"My presence here is something of an open secret right now, as well as the ship and the crewmen manning this SCP. Tell me, what do you think of her?" he asked, waving his hand towards the ship below, a cruiser by weight, and a design of a most turian nature, which was most unusual to see anywhere in Federation space, let alone inside a research facility.
"She looks like a fine ship. Good hull configuration, weapon's placement optimal for frontal attacks. Not seeing as many point defenses as I would expect. Still, the ME field this thing is giving off is massive. Must be a hell of a core in there," said a voice from one of the armored forms backs, and Skarrde nodded.
"Indeed. She's got the purest core ever forged by known galactic society, forty-eight percent pure eezo," he told them, and everyone seemed shocked for a moment by that news, as not one person there didn't know that such a purity ratio for eezo was impossible, yet none doubted the Admiral's word.
"So, she's got teeth, and she's got scales to boot with that sort of core. Doesn't explain her shape though. Why would a turian vessel be here in an SCP, and given a core like that from us?" asked Jane.
"Because, she's part of a joint project we've been working on for the past four years with the Council military. A ship that can be invisible to all known sensors, allowing the insertion of troops behind enemy lines, or the extraction of VIPs from hot areas," explained Skarrde.
"Project Beachhead," commented Jon, and it was Skarrde's turn to be shocked, as he turned to the male Terran.
"How in the world do you know about that?" he asked, and Jon chuckled beneath his featureless helmet.
"Because I helped design a part of her. The joint system turians use for their engines to give them their mobility wouldn't handle the stress of the core. I made some modifications, at the request of the Prime Thinker," explained Jon, and Skarrde nodded at the man.
"Well, it seems our open secret is a bit more open than I believed. Still, it makes little difference, as the biggest change from one of our ships is the fact that this one is staffed by Federation and Council officers," as he spoke, one could see a few of those officers, some quarians and turians, having lunch on the deck just outside the ship, swapping stories and the like as they awaited what was obviously going to be a launch very soon.
"So, we're letting the Council in on our big secret projects now?" asked Jane, and Skarrde sighed out some frustration with her attitude. He'd figured she might have some objection, after all, they were Terrans, they were the best, why should they share that light with anyone.
"It wasn't originally our project, Sergeant. Beachhead has been in development by the turians for over a century, but they either never had the resources to pull it off, or they just lacked the technology to make it viable. One of their men contacted us about four years ago, almost to the day of the twentieth anniversary of intragalactic contact," explained Skarrde.
"You decided for the cause of peace to combine the efforts we had already made in stealth ship design, perhaps create a bridge among the scientific community that could be expanded out to the rest of society," surmised Tali, and Skarrde nodded in agreement.
"Ah, I can accept that then. So, if you're showing us this, I'm going to assume this ship will be our new posting," said Jane, more a statement than a question.
"Indeed. The five of you recently proved yourselves to be some of our best and brightest. That's the sort of face we want the rest of the galaxy to see. We want respect, not fear. Breetai, Miriya, and myself, along with the Conclave, believe the two of you can indeed bring us that respect," answered the Zentraedi. The two Terrans, geth, and quarian seemed to stand up straighter, at both the names mentioned, and the faith that was apparently being placed on them.
"We won't let you down, sir," said Jon with a salute. Jane mirrored him silently, obviously having her own feelings, but wanting to keep them to herself for now.
"That's what I want to hear from a Shepard," said Skarrde with a chuckle, only to get an odd reaction from both of the armored Terrans, who turned to face each other, looking up and down their suits for a while, as their computers obviously talked to each other to give rank and file information. When that was done, Jon and Jane, in mirror to each other, removed their helmets, revealing faces that neither had seen in a decade.
"Jane," said Jon, staring into his sister's visage. Her emerald green, piercing eyes, skin that had, as she'd grown older, taken on a purple hue to some of it. She was still obviously mostly human in genetics, but she seemed to have an aura of purple around her that complimented the dark, some would say blood red, hair she had cut to neck length, so it could be easily contained by her helmet. She stood almost a head taller than Jon, forcing him to look up to see this.
"Jon," echoed Jane as she stared into his cold, blue eyes of her brother. His face was like hers, one that had seen rough assignments, harsh conditions, and yet remained without a scar, probably thanks to his armor and Tali's quick fingers at the shield controls. However, where her skin had grown darker with purple over the years, his had grown lighter, taking on the almost albino shade of white that marked an engineer, a Terran who often shrank down to micronian size by extracting their protoculture and putting it back in later. His hair was cut to stubble, only a thin layer of dark brown fuzz on top of his head. The two were an interesting contrast to each other.
"Is there some problem I should know about?" asked Skarrde. He was aware, from their records, that the two siblings hadn't spoken in some time, but that was at least somewhat common in the Federation Fleet, especially when you bounced from one assignment to the next the way these two did. He hadn't been told there was any animosity between them however, but one could feel the air was thick now with what could only be described as tension made real.
"Sir, no, sir," they echoed together, placing their helmets back on, and saluting again. The quarian and geth who had been beside them when they entered the room both looked at each other. Oddly, they both appeared to be saying silent apologies to each other over their partner's behavior, and Skarrde made a note to get with the two separately to find out what was going on there. Still, he didn't have time to pick anyone else for this assignment, as a mission they had to jump on had come up in the last few hours, so he could only hope the Shepards' abilities would make up for anything between them.
"Excellent. I think we should proceed straight to the Normandy then. We already have deployment orders," he advised them, and led the way down to another gravtube, and then onto the dock of the Normandy.
(Author's Note:
Next chapter is going to be my Codex and some Q&As with the author. If you have any questions for me, feel free to send them in, and I'll answer as many as I can going forward.)