Author's Note: This story is getting harder and harder to write, I don't mind telling you all. I don't think I'm gonna last through the full nine yards that I had planned out originally.

Chapter 80: The Great Rift Part 1

?M ?D ?H Until the Colossus Fires

Aratoht had seen better days, before being swallowed up by the Astral Rift that was where their home made planet was located the planet had a... not amicable relationship but at the very least the Unbidden had been leaving the planet alone.

The Unbidden hadn't taken the lost of their home made planet very well. Instead working to recoup their losses with whatever Reaper Schmuck they can catch. Unfortunately the inhabitants of Aratoht, that is to say Shepard and her associates, were also schmucks, and the Unbidden were just as willing to hunt them as well. And Shepard's group was just as willing to hunt them back, a process that currently consisted of trapping them in containment cells and running them through the reconstructors that Lawson made, in a way that would hopefully be a bit more humane.

"We got another pile of Zro dust." Grunt's voice echoed from a console. Grunt was working on a ship, one designed to use mass effect fields to scoop up Zro dust from the shattered Unbidden world and dump it here and produce more Formless or more Formless ships. Once they'd have enough Formless they could begin working on making their way out from this pocket dimension.

"So you guys are taking the Astral Threads and building a path back to civilisation?" Miranda asked looking at the hologram depicting the Formless's construction project from her mission control centre, where they were in the process of building a bridge for lack of better term, one that would lead them back into civilisation, one that was not lost in another dimension.

In the mean time, there were still Reapers to deal with. Shepard and her associates were hiding/fighting underground inside of Lawson's bunker, which was also full of choke points to use against the invading Collectors. The bastards had gotten an upgrade since Lawson had piped his mad science into the Reaper's hands. They were more organic looking now, as organic as a creature with metal skin and circuit board lines running through their bodies could get at least. reminded Shepard of the Protheans that Shepard saw back in the Alpha Rift, before she, Grunt and Mordin turned them all into Parshati.

"Yet another example of my people being mutilated and abused at the hands of others!" Javik's voice snapped from a nearby screen as he loosed a warp enhanced particle beam into the enemy forces as they charged down the hall.

The bastards were tougher than the Collector's Shepard knew, the metal dragon scale skin that Lawson had given them was probably responsible for that happening. They hadn't quite popped yet though either, their exotic gas laced flesh had yet to detonate, which either means that they don't have any or they figured out a way of protecting themselves, if the number of fire balls that they've had to dodge today was a indication as to why then the answer was probably psionics, pyrokinesis to be more precise. The 'normal' Collector's were relatively easy to handle. Telekinesis can't catch bullets after all, and when those bullets are paired with exotic plasma Mass Effect barriers can't do much against them either. No it was when a possessed came down here was the real problem.

"I. Understand. That. You. Are. Having. A. Bad. Time!" Shepard gave a knee to the guts of the possessed Collector every time that she spoke, not that it was doing much other than temporarily inconvenience the Reaper possessed drone. "But I would appreciate you not taking it out. On. Me!"

With the melee attacks not working, Shepard switched over to the claymore shot gun and landed a point blank blast onto the glowing alien's head, pulping it in the process. And few short minutes later another one just like it will appear. No Harbinger appeared above the planet yet. Maybe all the ones they had were busy elsewhere, maybe the dirt ball of a world wasn't worth it, or maybe since it was already covered in synthorganic goo they just weren't bothering. Regardless the familiar glow of a possessed was making its way down the hallway and Shepard sighed as she loosened up for another fight.

11M 22D 12H Until the Colossus Fires

The Eden system was being rapidly turned into the front line, of evacuations of Council forces, of preparation against the Reaper forces, of everything that they would need to fight. The Great Rift was the official same of the massive phenomena that had swallowed the Citadel government territory, and the effects of reality becoming unzipped was showing itself in the people who were evacuating. Evacuation ships that had been turned into literal ghost ships after its crews had been temporarily unstitched from their bodies and rebound to the resulting corpses. Mineral constructs that had become sapient. Ship VI programs that had been 'liberated' by the Animator of Clay. Refugees had been wrung through the ringer of Time Tides. Large scale mutations changing skin colour, body shape, and affecting the mind and health had occurred.

This is just a few pieces of phenomena stemming from the effects of travel through the Great Rift.

Teams of Formless being escorted by Union craft had been making their way through trying to stitch reality back together again to mixed results. In the mean time the waves of refugees and ongoing conflict with the Reaper's were providing insight into what the ancient war machines had been doing.

"Is this information accurate?" Hackett had temporarily taken up post in the Eden sector, which also meant that he was responsible for sniping any enemy ships that try to force or sneak their way through and receiving intelligence reports from the entities coming out of the rift. Case in point.

"We believe so." Envoy replied bluntly as it's head flaps quirked.

Intelligence reports on planets lost in the Rift, the ones that they have been able to get to, to be more precise the ones that had been visited by the Reapers, or more precisely the Harbingers. Far from looking dire, the worlds in question were thriving. A rich Synthorganic environment had emerged with the buildings having been remade into fully functional Synthorganic constructs based on trees, existing dockyards that previously had been dedicated to the building and maintenance of Citadel ships were now assembling synthorganic constructs, likely ships themselves. The more important aspect was who was doing the assembly work. Union spy scopes were powerful enough to make out the details of a human's face from orbit after all, and in this case they weren't faces that any of them recognised. Neither the Union or the Citadel knew anything about seven foot tall one eyed humanoids with multiple arms and tentacles.

"I don't recognise them." Hackett stated his hand on his chin.

"Nor does the Animator of Clay." Which wasn't saying anything, as the majority of the Animator of Clay's knowledge of the Galaxy comes from the Zha'til.

"We were able to get close to two other planets as well."

A large creature with skin resembling tree bark, and a aquatic race resembling Crayfish.

"I don't recognise either of these races. If we keep looking we're likely to find other examples of extinct races being brought back as well."

"Inquiry." Envoy conveyed a look of confusion. "If as you say these races are extinct, pass even the Animator of Clay's memories, then where did they come from?"

"The Reaper's call themselves preservers." If you can call melting down entire cities worth of people into semi-sentient goo, pumping them into a cybernetic shell, and turning that into a civilisation destroying super weapon 'preservation' then yeah, the Reapers have 'preserved' literally countless races from across their entire insane existence. "Perhaps now they're cracking open their ol' pickle jars." The brief images they picked up from Rannoch and Tuchanka before the planet's got hit with the Reaper's weapons indicated that they had done something with the bodies that they hurled at the various planets they attacked, now Hackett had an idea of what he was looking at.

"Sir?" Envoy didn't quite get the metaphor.

"The variety and number of the enemy's ground forces have significantly increased." Hackett replied bluntly. "Your intelligence reports should start coming back with a vast number of individual races that none of us have ever seen before." Specifically various examples of races from the previous cycles that the Reapers found suitable to be 'preserved.' Now the question here was are they doing it because they have no other choice, because they feel on the cusp of victory or because they don't want to waste anymore resources? Further more they also needed to confirm that they are truly under the Reaper's permanent and irrevocable control, something that the Animator of Clay should be moving to confirm right about now. Moving on. "The status of the Pre FTL's that we discussed before?"

There were four Pre FTL civilisations in Council space. The Vorcha, The Yahg, The Drell, and the Raloi. Two of these had already been dragged away from their home-worlds by other parties and spread throughout the stars the Vorcha and the Drell, a third had interacted heavily with the Salarians, the Yahg, and a fourth was about to take to the stars when they were politely told to stay on their home planet if they didn't want to be dragged into the Reaper's war.

"The Formless have successfully erected Astral Thread Barriers around their homeworlds. Influence from break down of reality should be minimal." Minimal, but not zero. Without the laws of physics things like suns became very difficult to work correctly, which were also chiefly responsible for sustaining life on those worlds.

"We'll see if the Formless can do anything for them, but we shouldn't have our hopes up for what we'll be able to do for them." For one thing, they were trapped in a region of space that had become extremely difficult to navigate, for another they also had bigger problems that needed their full attention, and the problems were getting bigger by the day. "How's construction coming along?"

Partly as a measure to deal with the refugee crisis, mostly to fortify the region from possible Reaper invasion, Orbital Ring's were being constructed around the worlds/moons of the Eden Sector. Normal construction at this pace should be impossible. However the Formless proved themselves to be highly motivated and very effective. Extracting memories of thousands of different common items from Union minds gave them access to a unlimited supply of standardised components, from the minds of the refugees from citadel space thousands of common items were being melted down into omni-gel. The majority of these items were being transformed into construction ships. To be clear, these were not ships that acted as construction vehicles: they were ships whose job was to be composed of and store a large amount of material resources, travel the vast distance across space, and then release their payloads, dismantle themselves, break what is not immediately useful into Omni-gel, and under the direction of vast construction AI's inhabiting organic Thorian based computers use psionics and biotics to manipulate the materials and shape/assemble them into larger constructs with the intention of speed building the numerous individual components of the orbital rings being built and then pull them into place.

The six planetary bodies, three planets and three moons, formed a circle around the Eden system's sun dipping to and fro the sun with regular frequency as they all shared the same orbit. Experiments with the reproduced Conduits were progressing smoothly on the three worlds, resources were starting to flow between the three of them, they were only prototypes so far, with dedicated receiver and transmitter type conduits. Their experiments with the technology and attempts to modify them revealed crucial details of their design. Quantum entanglement based transmission, because of which they could theoretically send a target across the galaxy so long as there was a appropriate receiver waiting on the other end, but the downside was that each particle could only connect to their corresponding particle. The solution was to connect together multiple Conduits was an alternating slotting system, a switch board to use the old term. Both the Receiver and Sender conduits shared a ring of Entangled particle ports, capable of spinning around, locking the unit into place, and then opening a one way path across the stars. There are expected to be quite a bit of miss-connections from people trying to connect to the same place from multiple points, nothing that proper scheduling and a few management AI's can't fix.

With the presence of a alternative means of delivery in place work was being conducted on building planetary shields, connected directly to the orbital rings that were surrounding the three moons and three planets. They wouldn't do anything too outrageous like covering their entire perimeter in one big shield, for now, but they provided adequate protection and together with the heavy weapons each ring was equipped with, would provide a adequate buffer to keep any invading Reapers from trying any truly outrageous tactic like say causing the sun to go into super nova, so long as the munitions hold out anyway.

With the staging set the show for lack of a better term, began.

The first of the Reapers to successfully navigate the endless horrors of the Great Rift successfully emerged and began entering the Eden system. There were roughly a dozen of them, after what happened the first time the Reaper's started roaming the Galaxy in packs, jumping ships with ten to one odds demanded a lot more resources when the other party already had ten ships to start with. Worse yet, this was not the group of Reapers that the Animator of Clay had placed under it's control, those were dedicated to spreading the Animator's freedom to the rest of the Reapers, no these were a genuine threat.

The nearest Orbital Rings of the Eden system, half built as they were, lit up and fired, slamming into the various Reapers with the full might of multiple space distorting Tachyon lances tearing open the enemy forces in question. The Formless will appreciate the extra source of energy that they can siphon, though that was currently the least of the Union's worries. In simple terms, whatever Reapers were left outside of the galaxy at this point in time had observed the giant hole to hell that the Citadel territory had become, and were choosing to go around it. The entire Union's border was armed with scientific ships that were constantly watching the border, both for any signs of the Reapers and to try and observe the next Galaxy over. Those same research stations were guarded by heavy weapons platforms that would utterly obliterate anything that carelessly tried to approach them, at the very least severely wound it.

11M 15D 07H Until the Colossus Fires

"I suppose we shouldn't be surprised by this." Admiral SpeedJunkie was looking at several pieces of technology. The Formless have the ability to siphon psychic energy and form objects from people's collective consciousness, as an experiment they were using the Reaper Hearts that they've been taking from the various dead Reapers that they've been collecting and see what kinds of objects they can make there. The odds were slim, but perhaps they'd pull something useful that could then be used to fight the enemy off. "It would seem that we've lost the gamble here."

While the items that they've created would be of significant archaeological value to someone like Liara they were effectively worthless overall. Very few of the items they created offered any new technologies, thanks to the Reapers and their endless cycle of technological development, with what few they did create that did offer such insight not fitting with the Union's love of Standardised components.

"The hearts don't seem to be as valuable as we thought." The Formless representative that was talking with SpeedJunkie commented sadly.

SpeedJunkie was beginning to get insight into the Formless. Individuality and identity didn't mean the same thing to them as it does to most of the beings of the galaxy. Each Formless is born with enough comprehension of language and locomotion to function as a individual, enough knowledge of their technology and science to expand the Union's own understanding by leaps and bounds and a detailed understanding of their own people's history.

"Infinite energy is still infinite energy, you should have enough hearts by now to significantly increase your people's numbers and ships by this point in time." Which was true. The Formless would like to reach the point in time where they can stabilise the Spire and restore it's connection to the rest of their lost colonies. In the best case scenario they are in better shape then they are and they can start evacuating people to outside of this universe away from the Reaper's influence.

"Well admittedly it doesn't seem likely that we'll have to evacuate at this point either." That wasn't to say they were going to throw caution to the wind either. "In the mean time are you guys sure that you aren't being indoctrinated either?" The fact that the Formless don't seem to be showing any negative effects from being in contact with the hearts or having Formless born from them was fantastic. However they can't deny the possibility that being in contact with Reaper hearts have some kind of effect on them that they don't know about. So moderation, as a start.

?M ?D ?H Until the Colossus Fires

If it's not one thing it's another in this crazy place, The Animator of Clay was busily ganging up on one of the Reaper's Harbingers when they both showed up in this region of unreal space with their respective forces. It seemed that the Gestalt had also taken a special interest in it and now were trying to take control of the planet, which was fine by Shepard, as it meant there was someone else dealing with the Synthorg Collectors. Right now Shepard had been inside of the morgue equivalent of Lawson's bunker laboratory sitting on a lawn chair that she had been keeping in storage on her own ship up until recently, intending to enjoy the break for a while.

"The Reaper Harbinger is a Baol?" Then a new figure had entered the bunker, a familiar green skinned Asari woman, still just as naked as the last time the Thorian mass spawned them as an emergency force against Sovereign's forces. And while Shepard can and will take the free invitation to admire Sha'Ira's body at any time she wanted there was a more pressing situation going on, for now a sizeable opportunity had presented itself against a Harbinger.

"We believe so yes." The Harbingers were originally the first Reapers, the ones formed from the Leviathans of old who had kick started the cycles and gave birth to the Reapers, but being the first didn't mean that they were the last.

On the contrary, they already got to see the Collectors trying to build a new Harbinger using the Prethoryn as materials. So the odds were high that they met other mega life forms that met the requirements needed to be turned into a Reaper. In the previous cycle, the Baol were wide spread, used as a means of galactic communication, at least one for every world and several hundreds of sprouts who would act as replacements in an emergency. The Reaper's could have easily plucked the various trees of life and turned them into synthorganic slurry, fed them into one of their shells and gave birth to a new Harbinger like that, there could actually be a couple out there bearing the Baol's genetic material.

It also makes you wonder as to the exact numbers of Harbingers in existence, so far there have been two races in as many cycles that were suitable to become Harbingers. Also the Collectors had created a new Harbinger Class Reaper after scavenging a few battlefields and collecting a relatively few number of Prethoryn, with that train of thought in mind there could thousands of Harbingers beyond the border, millions even. In the mean time if the Reapers have managed to arm the Harbingers with weapons suitable to ship to ship combat then the devastation they would be capable of if they can sneak around the back door and attack the Union from behind was unimaginable.

"And in the mean time we're spending all this time on getting just one Colossus combat ready." Shepard commented as she let out a sigh. "That's the power of time for you. What's the situation?"

"We need the Animator of Clay to stand down so that we may communicate with the Reaper, the one calling itself Hunter." The naked woman explained in simple terms.

"I'm gonna need an explanation for this one."

In simple terms? The Gestalt were trying to establish communication with its counterpart, the Reaper calling itself 'Hunter.' They hope that they can turn it over to their side, but the Animator of Clay has cut off its psychic connection as part of it's efforts to 'free' it. "And you want me to talk to him instead?" Shepard asked looking at the naked alien woman with blatant suspicion. "Every time we get close to him our connection gets cut off." Which in the mean time means that there will be no Thorian to shield Shepard from the most powerful indoctrination signal possible for the Reapers, from the singularly most powerful Reaper in the entire hoard since the Harbinger itself, sneaking by a monster that calls itself 'the Hunter' to try and converse with a eldritch abomination from another dimension. Fun.

"Cute cute." Shepard looked over to the morgue drawer, with the corpse of the galaxy's most wanted man inside. "You're enjoying this aren't you?" Wander took his time with Lawson, so there wasn't much left of him but a dried corpse, assuming he didn't prepare back up copies of himself and hid them somewhere, small condolences. Much as she suspected that Lawson would enjoy doing so, Shepard had no intention of walking into certain death for the sake of a face to face meeting with Cthulu. "Oi! Get over here you ugly bastard!"

The Animator of Clay's presence did have a positive effect, the various Synthorg Collectors that had been released onto the planet were now free of Reaper influence. Most died on the spot, their life support system cut off. Others merely fell into a coma and were being kept in cryo here where they would thaw them out later and let Javik decide what to do with them. Few however had a true sense of self, retaining memories of their time under their former master's control, and having spent their entire existence under the control of the enemy was put down. Shepard however anticipated having to talk to the Animator of Clay, and each Collector could be programmed, so they grabbed one, gave it a simplified personality good enough for the Animator to bother talking to it, and left it the next room over from the morgue while it waited to be put to use. Which evidently was now.

At Shepard's call the Synthorganic Collector that she had been keeping to the side got up and walked into the room that Shepard was relaxing in.

"Has the Animator of Clay established contact with you yet?"

"Yes." The Collector replied nodding.

"He's having trouble getting through to that giant daisy up there right?" The Collector nodded again. "Give me-" Shepard appeared to run the odds in her head for a moment as she seemed to debate the options in her head. "-five hours without it cutting off every connection in the area and a distraction and I can break this stalemate." Shepard explained as she stood up. "We will let the Animator of Clay know." And then the Collector returned to the chair that he had been sitting in. "What are you planning?" The Thorian Asari that Shepard had been talking to made her confusion known. "I have no idea." Was the honest reply from the Dragoon. "But I can do a lot of damage in five hours."

Review Section:

RonaldM40196867: Good for you. To me the most ideal weapon is one that can eliminate your target, and only your target, with pinpoint precision from a vast distance away. So sniper Rifle.

Monster King: I'm trying.

Guest: Don't worry, he was backed up.

MiniHerc: I only did that as a way of indicating another language was being spoken, I don't do it anymore.