Javik awoke to a headache. He'd expected that. His last conscious thought was about telling Victory to preserve as many of his soldiers as he could. Javik regretted the necessity of the decision, but his troops were more important than the civilians. They knew the risk, after all. Besides, with part of the facility broken into by those Husks, probably half the pods would be offline regardless. With those thoughts, the gas had sent him to sleep, and now with them, he awoke.
He waited there, in the darkness, expecting the download of the beacon to begin any moment, to tell him anything it had recorded during their sleep. When it didn't come, Javik tensed. He knew the beacon must have been disconnected. That boded ill for him, and he gripped his hands tightly, sending a small biotic pulse into his armor, so it was stored in his gauntlet. Just in case whatever outside the pod proved to be hostile, he would be ready.
"Victory, open my pod," he ordered into the darkness, and was surprised when nothing happened. The VI should have responded the instant he said something, it literally couldn't do anything else. That told him it was worse than he'd feared, and he quickly built up three more pulses, storing them in his gauntlets as well. With a calming breath, knowing he was prepared, Javik waited as the world shuddered a bit, and finally the pod opened up, his eyes adjusting in a heartbeat, and he leapt from his lying position.
Right into Jsalana's arms. Her face was twisted. Not in pain, but in conflicted emotions, as she reached out a hand to him. Instantly, he took her offered appendage, and the two Embraced. Years of memories stolen from another, and an hour of her own experiences, flooded into Javik's mind. He tensed again, as he knew things that would have shattered a lesser mind, things that were truly difficult to believe, before he finally stepped back from her, and took a look around the room.
He was in a large open space, easily capable of holding a gladiatorial event inside. This was a hangar bay, the deployment deck, of the SRV-Normandy. Around him, in a circle, was her crew, wearing armor, or inside giant machines, all pointing weapons at him, should he prove hostile. Javik checked the memories, and realized quickly that, despite his superior training and abilities, this much firepower would have vaporized him. That earned him a chuckle, as he looked at the armored figures, and then up at their support.
Squat things, looking like headless torsos with limbs poking out of them at odd angles were wanzers. Each was a unique machine, with their arms and legs being separate components from their core units. Some were hovering slightly, on little flickering lights of ME fields. Others were on legs like an insect's, multiple jointed, and ending in spears. Others had wheeled feet. All were armed, however, either with weapons held in hands, or with arms that held built in weapons. Thirty-five units in all.
Beside the wanzer were veritechs. Taller, seventy feet to the wanzers forty five, they were also sleeker, and with limbs that seemed more in proportion to their bodies. Each had a head as well, where the wanzers had tiny ones that weren't readily visible, these were off the main body, with different shapes for sensors to tell them apart. All were in battloid mode, each with gunpods pointing at him. Only five of them, however, though probably far deadlier than the greater number of wanzers.
The last was a single unit. Or rather, a single person. It was a woman inside an armored shell, standing as tall as the veritechs. Her face looked smooth, without features like a nose or eyes, though he knew from the stolen memories how many sensors were on that helmet. The smoothed front face plate showed no emotion, but he knew her thanks to Jon's memories. She was tense. The way she stood on her right foot, with her palms open, ready to be pointed at him at any moment.
"This is far outside what we expected," he said, turning his head to Jsalana, who nodded at him, before getting on her knees, as was expected of her station. Javik considered allowing her to remain in that position, as it was customary, but he was dealing with a new people, and one who held much of the power in this galaxy right now. Going over the stolen memories with a few cycles of thought, he decided to motion for her to rise, and then stepped forward.
"I am Javik, former Lord of Edenia. You may put your weapons down. I will do no harm to you, nor will I attempt to take this vessel," as he spoke, he did something he would never have even considered under normal circumstances. He reached up, and with a twist, undid the bindings on his gauntlets, feeling the short burst as the charges built within it were dissipated. When he got the first one off, he then used his free hand to do the other, before setting them down in a cross fashion in front of him, and then staring up at his current benefactors.
"EDI, store our guest's gear as best you can," said a voice over the loudspeaker. It was Skarrde, Javick remembered, and then watched as his gauntlets were lifted off the ground in a light blue field of sparkling light. The ME field then shifted rapidly across the floor, before gently setting the things into a locker on the far side of the hanger, which opened to receive them, and then slammed shut hard, to show they weren't coming out anytime soon.
"We have a set of robes ready for you in the lift to the meeting deck. Please remove your armor, and we'll have a 'face to face' talk," said the voice of Skarrde, and Javik nodded. He was still processing some of what Jsalana had passed to him, especially the Terran's memories as they felt disordered and chaotic in ways that showed mental defenses. Still, he knew enough that he would not be harmed, at least not for now. If it came to it, he doubted the biotic echo chambers of his armor would provide much assistance anyway.
The wanzers moved out of the way heavily, their feet slamming into the decks beneath them, showing off their mass as the whole place seemed to shake with each impact. The veritechs were far lighter as they moved, their guns raising up, allowing him to pass beneath them almost as if they were some kind of honorguard. Meanwhile the Terran in armor moved with a middling tread, neither the harsh impacts of the wanzers, nor the light tread of the veritechs. Instead Jane moved with a deliberate sense of weight behind her, as if to remind the protheans on the ground how much she overpowered them.
Javik actually smiled at that, letting one eye observe her as he and Jsalana crossed the deck. While he was not so foolish as to test it, he could see more than one vulnerability in her stance, leaving her root easy to break. She was confident because she'd never been challenged, at least not by someone smaller than her. She was the sort of warrior that fought with reckless abandon, convinced that her skills would see her through any fight, or at least, allow her to do enough damage to claim a victory from any opponent.
He imagined fighting her, his mind literally allowing him to overlay what was with his own calculations, as his third lobe used predictive equations to make it almost real. He saw himself bouncing around, going for her ankles, striking at her feet. Her hands moved quickly, but without a pod to assist her, she was vulnerable to ME fields, allowing him to actually turn her own mass into his weapon. It wouldn't be an easy victory, but he could see more than a dozen ways to literally sweep her off her feet and slay her.
These thoughts carried him through the hanger, to the lift, where he did indeed find a robe like the white thing that Jsalana wore. It would be a tighter fit for him, as his shoulders were slightly broader, but he would make due with it. Slipping off his armor was time consuming, but it allowed him to look at the pods, noting numbers even from the half a mile away he was, seeing that most of those who remained were higher ranked warriors. Not officers, as leadership was not what would be needed, but instead fighters of the highest caliber.
As he got the chest piece off, he went over plans to open the pods, and let loose his soldiers into the ship. It had a nice chance of success, actually, as the defenses, despite what they thought, weren't nearly enough to stop his people. The Meta had learned that the hard way. He dismissed those plans, however, as he got the boots and then pelvic piece of his armor off, wriggling out of the thing, and exposing his bare chiton to the open air for a moment, before slipping on the robe.
No, these Terrans had mentioned cloning technology. Sadly, while the stolen memories contained whole lobes worth of information on their technology, the cloning tech was outside Jon's area of expertise. For now, he needed to play along. More than half his remaining troops were sterile, and the rest couldn't possibly build a sustainable population. That meant they needed this cloning tech, at least, for the moment, and that meant playing nice.
All in all, he was in the lift less than five minutes after he'd gotten revived, and was on the meeting deck a few seconds later, stepping into the open space to find a shotgun aimed at his hearts by a quarian who looked far too thin to be holding such a weapon. Her grip didn't shake, however, and she kept the barrel right where it would do the most damage as Javik walked forward, feeling the tingle of ME fields on his chiton, being scanned no doubt, and then found his way blocked by Jon, from whom his memories came.
"May the Stars Shine in your Outer Eyes," he said, making a sign with his fingers that should have been done only by the head warrior of a unit. That was very presumptive on his part, but Javik would let it slide, considering the almost flawless Proth he was speaking.
"And may your prey never stray from your Inner Eyes' gaze," he finished, giving the counter sign back to him, and then being shocked as Jon got onto his knees, showing the proper amount of deference due his station. It felt nostalgic to have a being of another race do him this service, and with an almost mechanical stride, he walked forward, and placed his hand on the head of the Terran, letting the glow of his biotic field come out of his palm, and into Jon's skin, the sign of his acceptance of the gesture.
When the moment passed, the room dimmed, and the forms of those on the other meeting deck appeared, while Garrus entered the room as well, followed soon after by Liara, who was typing something into her omnitool. Javik couldn't tell what, thanks to the angle, but he believed it had to be something to do with her study of Protheans, now that she had two specimens to observe. He actually smirked at that train of thought as he took a seat beside Jsalana, and then everyone else sat down as well.
"Lord Javik...is that the right title, in this case?" she asked him as he looked to her, and the prothean took a moment to think about that. To those watching, it would appear he answered instantly. In his mind, he went over a thousand protocols for his situation. He was the highest ranked person in the Empire, that would naturally make him Emperor, but he did not, and could not, sit the Throne of Ichor, thus he'd merely be Emperor-in-Waiting, but even there, he lacked the vestments.
It took his mind almost eight heartbeats to finally process that fact. He was the highest ranked person, but so many ranks beyond his Lordship required honors or markings that were impossible for him to be granted now. The protocols had been written well, however, and soon his mind found a path down one that spoke of what to do with the homeworld destroyed, and all contact cut off with other colonies. It was a…very detailed instruction set he'd never even known he knew before, programmed deep into his psyche.
"Edenia, much as she is missed, is no more, and even were the Terrans to secede it to us, it would not be as it was. My title, properly now, is Exalted, as I am to the last to know the Words, Researcher Liara. I am leader to what remains of my people, and must craft a foundation on which to rebuild ourselves, without the forges that made us," he said simply, and that got a rise out of some of them, as obviously, he had not been told her name at any point. They had assumed he might know it, from the sharing of memories, but that he would give proof so easily seemed to catch them off guard. He chuckled at that, thinking he should strike whilst the eezo was charged.
"You may consider anything you shared with Jsalana to be known to me. She is one of my Adjuncts, an extension of my will, and she freely shares all that she sees and hears with me," he said, before glancing towards Jon.
"You may also consider anything Jon Shepard knows compromised. Where Jsalana's mind is designed to store, but not sort such information, mine is fully able to do so. Every moment of his life is an open book to me. I know of eighteen Red Level Secrets, twenty-six Blue Level, and he has guessed at three Black Level," he said, and watched with his eyes as they tensed. Jane looked ready to march down and smash him, and the others were not so far behind, Jon, for his part, just nodded.
"So, do you believe I'm correct about Dis?" he asked, and the prothean nodded.
"It is doubtless a Reaper, yes, though likely an injured one. I had heard of weapons that could hurt them, and you proved you possess some on this vessel. Even more, three of their corpses lay as naught but ash on Eden Prime as well. They are not the invincible monsters they portray themselves as," he said, as Skarrde, who looked towards Jon with a judging eye, as if wondering what three high level secrets he'd guessed at that were now inside an unknown's mind…but he shook that thought away, as he leaned forward in his chair.
"Given you claim to know all that Jsalana has told us, it would be best, I feel, to move on past what we know, to ask if you have anything to add to what has been said," he told the Prothean, and nodded at that, leaning back in his own chair, and closing his four eyes, obviously in deep thought, before he opened them wide, and began to speak.
"My Adjunct has told you of our war with the enemy, the Reapers, and you have seen one with your own eyes, a Watcher for their kind. I do not know the specifics, but in my cycle, it is the Watcher that opened the Way for the rest of its kind, who dwell in Dark Space, beyond the rim of the galaxy," as he spoke, he let his gaze drift over those in the room. Sadly, the projections were outside his field to observe, but those in the room with him were hanging on his every word, he could feel their heartbeat, and the way they breathed. It was nice to be so commanding, and he took a thought cycle to luxuriate in it, before he let the moment pass and he moved on.
"I can only surmise, as she did, that some project or another interfered with this one, somehow rendering it incapable of calling to its brethren. However, it has servants in this…Saren person that Nihlus spoke of. His kind were not rare in the old times," he motioned with his hand using a coded motion to summon up a control console before him, showing that he was aware of their protocols and had a grasp of their technology, as he swiftly used his fingers to move some of them around, creating an image of the Reaper to hang in the air before them.
"The Reapers generate a signal, a powerful command that overrides the local intelligence of whatever is in proximity to it, be that of biological or synthetic nature," as he spoke, a series of 'pings' came out of the Reaper, and a variety of shapes appeared around it, the ping passing through them, slowly changing the color of the shapes from blue to a deep red.
"The process, called Indoctornation, can take many forms, as the proximity is not the only factor in it. They can…control the level to which they replace the thoughts of others, which caused confusion in my cycle at first, as those they use their power on can show no sign of it, until they stab you in the back for their 'masters'," the last was wa growl, as he continued to update the sim, zooming in on the smaller images to show the various people in shades between blue and red, including some that were outright purple.
"We know that the further they are Indoctrinated, the worse the subjects own thought processes become, eventually rendering them all but shells of their former selves. That stage we call Husks, and are often converted using some form of Reaper technology into the ground troops you encounters on Eden Prime," he said, adjusting the controls to quickly bring up a picture of a healthy Nazaran, using some of the data that was already acquired on them, and adding his own.
When he was done, it was a perfect replica of a standard member of his own race. He then created a copy next to it, and quickly began to adjust things, adding data that he recalled, even a few bits from the scans they'd taken from Edeni…Eden Prime, yes, their colony. The data helped him to focus, and he doubted any save the synthetics were aware of his slight pause, as the second one stood there, looking far less like the original, and more like the abominations they had fought.
"The Reapers in space, invincible and seemingly unstoppable. Their agents mixed into our ranks, undermining efforts and sabotaging defenses. These crude imitations, like us, but mindless, numerous, and strong. With these, an empire that stretched across the stars was undone, a millennia and more of building and growth, turned to dust in a scant few centuries, as we were Reaped," he explained.
"Reaped?" asked Skarrde.
"Indeed. We do not know why, but the Reapers are so named because we are the harvest, the relays acting like tools to make sure we grow in ways they allow, places they can easily come to, like crops in a field. And when we are numerous enough, they come and claim us," he said, and rather than adding data, he brought up something from Nihlus' flyover of the colony center, the pile of desiccated bodies.
"We do not know why they do this. It is a behavior only seen when they feel 'in control' of the situation, meaning we will never get close enough to study the bodies. But every colony would have drained bodies, seemingly random individuals, as well as Husks," he said, and then leaned back in the chair, looking around. About him, everyone was considering his words, as well they might, and obviously thinking up more to ask of this man from the distant past, who might be allowing them to glimpse their future.