Shepard walked into a darkened room with a blue ring on the floor. As soon as She stepped onto the ring a scan activated and saw the Illusive Man sitting in a chair in front of a view of a dying sun. TIM took a puff of his cigarette.
"Commander Shepard," he said while releasing the smoke from his lungs.
Zenna said nothing as she looked around. "Quantum entanglement communications, reflective surface, random star," she muttered. "You really don't want to be found,"
"A necessary precaution," he shrugged. "Not unusual for people who know what we know,"
Shepard scoffed. "And what exactly do 'you and I know'?" she asked with a sarcastic tone. "Or is this all for show?"
"What we know, is that our place in the universe is more fragile than we'd like to think. That one woman—one specific woman—is all that stands between humanity and the greatest threat in our brief existence," he said pointing at her, "That's you. You stand between that threat and our extinction,"
"The Reapers," Zenna muttered her brow raised.
"Good to see that your memory's still intact. How are you feeling?" he asked trying to make her feel comfortable.
"Skip the pleasantries," Zenna snapped. "You are solely responsible for making hundreds of Chimeras," as she spoke her fangs bared. "Now you are asking for my help against the Reapers? You better have a damn good reason for me to join scum like you,"
"We're at war" TIM said. "No one wants to admit it, but Humanity is under attack. While you've been sleeping, entire colonies have been disappearing. Human colonies. We believe it is someone working for the Reapers. Just as Saren and the Geth aided Sovereign. You've seen it yourself. You bested all of them. That's just one reason we chose you,"
"Humanity? Or just Cerberus?" Zenna spat. "Your human centrist views sicken me,"
"Cerberus is humanity," he defended. "Tens of thousands of humans have gone missing. I'd say that fits the definition of harvesting. The attacks have been random and isolated. Blaming the attacks on mercenaries or pirates is simple for the Alliance,"
That made sense, given how diverse humans were and what they did to Sovereign it was likely that the Reapers targeted humans for that. But something about it didn't add up.
"If what you say is true. That the Reapers are behind this... I'd consider helping you," But as she said that he made it a point to know how the organisation operated so that she could take it down.
"I'd be disappointed if you just took me at my word. I have a shuttle to take you to Freedom's Progress, the latest Human colony to be abducted," he said diplomatically.
"Is this a volunteer job or am I being volunteered?" Zenna asked sarcastically.
"You always have a choice, Shepard. If you don't find what you're looking for, we can part ways. But first go to Freedom's Progress. Find any clues you can. Who's abducting the colonists? Do they have a connection to the Reapers? I brought you back. It's up to you to do the rest," TIM took another puff before tapping the ashtray.
"Fine, I see where this is going. But mark my words what happens with me and anyone from your group is between us and none of your business," she said before turning and walking away.
Zenna walked back up the set of stairs she used to get to the QEC. As she did, she noticed Miranda and Jacob readying themselves for combat. But the minotaur stopped and looked at the golem. She was still in her white and black bodysuit.
"Why are you still wearing that?" Zenna asked indicating to the suit.
"Because of my role as an agent," the golem replied, but that got a shake of the head from the minotaur.
"You maybe a golem, but you are not faster than a bullet," she passed the two. "If you work for me after this, I want you to find a more suitable set of armour,"
OOOOO
As the Kodiak flew towards Freedom's Progress Zenna checked her weapons before the golem started to talk. "We should be there shortly," Miranda announced. "The Illusive Man put us under your command. Do you have any orders?"
"Our primary objective is to look for look for survivors-" Zenna tried to say but Miranda interrupted her.
"Highly unlikely," Miranda interrupted with a scoff but she fell silent as Zenna stared her down.
"Miranda, don't interrupt me," she said calmly. "Is that clear?" Miranda nodded and let Shepard continue. "If there are no survivors, we need to find any signs of battle, scorch marks from a ship thruster, or any other evidence that may suggest what happened. We clear?" she asked as she slid the ammo block back into her weapon
"Yes, sir," they both said.
The shuttle soon landed and the three got off onto the landing platform with their weapons up. But Zenna shook a bit due to the chill of the colony. Minotaur's never liked the cold. The three moved slowly up into a pre-fab unit which appeared to be the main space control tower. As they approached the doors opened. The unit was spacious with two main lanes set next to an office to look for contraband and other things. But it was most likely just to check people's details.
Small colonies didn't really care who came by as long as they didn't cause trouble. Zenna walked over to the office door and opened it. Inside wasn't as large as the main room, but a table had been set up with several meals ready to be eaten. She walked up to one and held her hand over it.
"Still warm," she noted.
"Who gets up half way through a meal?" Jacob asked. "That makes no sense
Shrugging at the question Zenna picked up a drumstick and rapidly chewed all the meat off of it before spitting out the bone. The other two just looked at her.
"What? I've been on ice for 2 years. I'm hungry," she defended
"We ate before we came," Miranda said. "How can you still be hungry?"
"Errr I'm a minotaur remember? And a Chimera to boot," she said. "That meal, was a snack, not a meal,"
Shaking her head Miranda and Jacob moved on with Zenna following behind. They walked down a set of stairs and spotted a blast door the three approached it and the door started to open and lead to a large open area. Once fully open three mechs on pre-fab units activated. The three heard it and dived for cover fast. Miranda was the first one to pop up and fired at the first mech with her burst fire but the armour gave her trouble. The mech fired back at her making her duck back into cover.
As she did, she began to talk to herself. Zenna didn't hear all, but what she did hear was complex engineering maths that she couldn't understand. Miranda the exited over and fired again, this time she used shock rounds and bounded them from a wall behind the mech. It registered and its systems became confused as it turned to look behind it allowing Miranda to unload her thermal clip into the back of its head taking it out.
Jacob just pulled his mech forward before unloading several shotgun blasts into it taking it's legs off. Zenna quickly popped out of cover and leapt at the mech pinning it down and ripping it's head off. She then pulled the front armour panel off and pulled out its power core shutting it down.
"Something's not right." Miranda spoke up. "On the other worlds there was nothing even security didn't activate. We're not alone here"
Zenna said nothing as she connected to the mech's head and began to look though it's programming. "It's on a locate and kill function," she said before disconnecting. "Whoever's here is spooked to the point that they see anything as a threat,"
"So, someone is here," Jacob said with relief but Zenna looked to Miranda.
"How's your nose?" she asked.
"Not as good as yours," the golem replied.
Jacob looked between the two demi-humans. "Ok, so you smell something," he concluded.
"Yeah," Zenna said as she looked over to a pre-fab unit with lights still on. "Non humans,"
Jacob and Miranda looked to each other before reloading their pistols. The three of them walked to another blast door which opened and approached a pre-fab door. The door opened and they soon came face to face with a group of Quarrian troops sitting at one of the tables. As soon as the door opened, the Quarrians jumped up and both groups brought their weapons up.
"Stop right there!" one of them said.
"Prazza you said you'd let me handle this," a familiar sounding female Quarrian said as she moved forwards but she stopped as her eyes fell on Zenna. "Wait Zenna?"
Zenna's eyes widened as well and indicated for Jacob and Miranda to lower their weapons
"I'm not taking any chance with Cerberus operatives." Prazza said.
"PUT YOUR WEAPONS DOWN!" Tali ordered forcefully before turning to the minotaur. "Shepard is that... your alive?"
"Yeah, Cerberus rebuilt me, in return they asked me to take a look at these disappearing colonies," Zenna replied unsure about how the young Quarrian would take this news.
To her surprise, Tali faced her soldiers again. "Weapons down Prazza whatever's going on I don't think we need another fight," she said before turning to Zenna. "We came here looking for one of our own, his name is Veetor,"
"That explains the mechs," Zenna nodded. "I assume he's jumpy,"
"Not quite," Tali said. "He always liked the idea of helping a small settlement but he's always been unstable,"
"What she means is that if normal oxygen has entered in his suit, that coupled with problems from his CO2 scrubbers and he's likely delirious from an infection," Prazza said.
"So, first time he sees you, he activates the mechs and ran," Zenna nodded.
"More or less," Tali said.
"Colonies have about 60 mechs. Used for policing and defensive operations. It's likely that they also have an atlas mech. We could work together Tali," Zenna offered.
"Agreed I was thinking the same thing," Tali nodded in agreement.
"Now we're working with Cerberus?" Prazza asked with a surprised and insulted tone.
"No Praz…" Tali said but Zenna moved her out of the way and walked up to Prazza.
"Let me make something clear," she said calmly but letting the presence do the threatening for her. "I do not work for Cerbrus, nor am I a fan of them. I am here to investigate what happened to the colony here. If you can't deal with that, then I suggest you go and wait at the ship like the coward you are," she leaned in and bared are fangs. "Do I make myself clear?"
The others backed up unconsciously as Prazza nodded. "Perfectly," he said slowly and nervously.
"Good," Zenna said as she pulled back up. "Tali, we'll take east, you take north,"
Tali nodded. "Keep in radio contact," she said as her group moved to their door.
"Will do," Kira said as she and Tali walked through their respective doors.
As Zenna drew her rifle, she and her companions then moved forward. They pressed on as they came to a pre-fab section several drones attacked Zenna rolled into cover with Miranda and Jacob following. Zenna grabbed her grenade launcher out and fired a high explosive at the drones. It detonated destroying one but only caused the other two to fly away due to the blast. Jacob and Miranda finished them off. The three then made their way down, but that's when Tali chimed in on the comm.
"Zenna, Prazza went off on his own," she said panic in her voice. "I told him to wait but he wouldn't listen, he's planning to take Veetor away before you get here,"
"Double time it!" Zenna growled.
They ran fast down a spiral staircase to the loading bay. The door was blasted open by two heavy mech's Tali and some of her team came through the hole firing on the mechs with all their might. Tali landed next to Shepard with smg in hand.
"Just like old time huh?" Zenna asked.
"Yeah, just like old times," Tali smiled.
The blast door was soon damaged enough for mechs to get through. The fist mech came in only to be met by a hail of lead. Its shields died allowing for Jacob and Miranda to use their biotics to weaken it's armour by using singularity blasts. Tali then overloaded its systems causing it to blow, just then a heavy came though. It fired both its machine guns pinning everyone down.
"Fuck!" Zenna yelled as Miranda started muttering again.
"What's wrong with her?" Tali asked.
"Golem," the minotaur replied. "They are essentially human computers,"
"Ah," Tali nodded as Miranda moved up next to the commander.
"I have an idea," she said. "Power in back, we can take down it's shields as you can jump on its back. It's weakest point,"
"Let's do it," Zenna said and everyone opened fired at the mech taking it's shields down.
Once they were down Zenna ran and jumped onto the mech. It tried to throw her off as she moved to it's back. She held on tightly onto some wires as she grabbed onto a part of the armour. And slowly pulled it off. I was attached to the mech so well, that she had to use all of her strength to rip it off. It didn't fall off, but it was bent enough that she could get into the powerpack of the machine. Reaching in she pulled out several wires, coolant pipes and finally the power pack itself.
The machine finally shut down and went limp. Zenna jumped off as Tali ran over to her marines. The commander moved over as well and looked down at Prazza.
"This is what happens when you disobey orders," she spat, but Prazza just hung his head. "Where's Veetor?" one of the marines pointed to the pre-fab unit in the back of the area.
Shepard, Jacob and Miranda entered the pre-fab unit and saw Veetor typing away at a console.
"Veetor," Shepard called out.
Veetor babbled while typing. "Monsters... Mechs will protect..."
"I don't think he can hear you," Miranda said. "Remember, delirious,"
Shepard activated her omni-tool and waved it causing the screens to go into sleep mode. That broke Veetor's concentration. He turned around and stood up, surprised to see Shepard, Jacob and Miranda.
"Y-You're human," he realised. "Where did you hide? How did they not find you?"
"Who didn't find him?" Jacob asked.
"T-The monsters," Veetor's voice was panicked, but it was clear he was trying to keep his mind straight. "The swarms. They took everyone."
"I wasn't here, Veetor. I just got here," Zenna said calmly and gently. "We just got here,"
"Then you don't know about the monsters," he reaised. "You didn't see. But I see everything" Veetor activated the console and security footage started playing.
"What is that?" Jacob asked when an insect-like alien walked by the camera.
"Not possible, but not other race matches that outline," Miranda said her tone turning even more emotionless. "It's a Collector. This complicates matters,"
"A what?" Zenna asked looking to the golem
"They're this race that comes from a system past the Omega-4 relay," Jacob answered. "They come through and make trades with various organizations for unusual requests like a certain number of twins and people with genetic disorders. Since only they can use the Omega-4 relay, means they are able to manipulate them. If they are working for the Reapers, then this makes explains why they are harvesting the colonies,"
"The seekers find you," Veetor said. "No one can hide. They freeze you and then the monsters take you away,"
"Sounds like come kind of stasis," Zenna muttered. "What happened after that?"
"The monsters took them onto their ship and then they flew away. But they'll be back for me. No one escapes!" he explained but panicked and held his head.
Zenna walked up to him, lowered herself to his eye level and placed her hand on his shoulder. "Thank you, Veetor. You were very helpful,"
"I studied them. The monsters. The swarms. I recorded them with my omni-tool. Lots of readings. Electromagnetic. Dark energy," he said sending her the information.
"We got what we need, grabb" Miranda was about to say but Zenna took hold of her and pined her to the wall.
"Don't even finish that sentence," Kira said before letting Miranda go.
Miranda said nothing as Tali came in. She took Veetor away and with that the three made their way back to the ship to report.