Chapter 74
Saren Arterius was not a happy Turian. After the debacle with the attempted invasion of Alliance space the Council had sent him back to Kar'shan to keep him under the radar and from his office in the capital he was forced to watch from afar as the fools the council had hitched their wagons to fell outpost by outpost. If that wasn't enough ever since he'd set foot on this filthy, stinking dirt ball he'd had a minor but nagging headache, like an itch inside his brain that he couldn't scratch and it had been getting worse and worse.
"Do you still have the package?" a disguised Salarian voice asked over his communication screen.
"Yes, for the Spirit's sake I've got it. When can I get out of here, I can't stand this hellhole." Saren said.
"Whining now, Saren? The venerable Specter bellyaching like a newborn babe? Oh what would your father think." The Salarian asked.
"He wouldn't think much of anything since I put a bullet in his brain." Saren snarled, threateningly.
"Easy there, Saren. We have it on good authority that Kar'Shan's sovereignty is not long for this universe, your ship will arrive by week's end. You will quietly make your way across the Turian border and await further orders, understood?" The Salarian said
"What are you going to stick me with next?" Saren growled.
"You will quietly make your way across the Turian border and await further orders. I don't know how much more clearly I can say that." The salarian said, before severing the communication.
"You should kill him slowly." A quiet voice inside his mind suggested.
"Oh don't you worry I will." Saren replied absentmindedly as he gathered his things, hoping to leave as soon as he possibly could. He was careful when placing the package into his bags, almost reverential. That stupid black chunk of metal was the only good thing about his trip to Kar'Shan. When he held it he felt powerful, enlightened, strong. There was no way he was leaving it to the four-eyed dirt bunnies. He still didn't know why Valern was so insistent that he carry it and keep it safe but he wasn't going to say no to a good thing.
As he was zipping the bag shut the state-run vidscreen in his office came to life and displayed a stream of text in Batarian script that basically announced one of the four daily mandatory broadcasts. Then the screen cut to a Batarian with a scimitar dressed all in black and four crying Batarians restrained on a platform. Saren never bothered watching the daily executions, they knew better than to try to arrest him for thought crimes. He also didn't have a slave chip that required programming updates that were carried on a subcarrier wave that would render you a twitching pile of nerve agony if you failed to watch the broadcast. He did admire the Batarian government's methods however.
Hannah Shepard along with Admirals Hackett, Chambers and Anderson, the Quarian Admirals, Rothschild with the Geth and the Krogan Battlemasters all met, many via QEC hologram in Shepard's office, which had been repurposed to accommodate more people. Ambassadors Castis an T'Soni were also in attendance. As the size of the Alliance grew with each new alliance race there were more representatives to include in decision making, so the room had been expanded and more seating along with QEC connections and holo-emitters were installed.
"So we're agreed on switching to a decapitation strategy rather than the stranglehold we'd originally planned." Admiral Korris said. Everyone else nodded.
"If we take each outpost world one by one that just encourages them to start culling more slaves. If we hope to save as many as possible, our next strike should be to take their capital and remove their government." Shepard elaborated.
"I believe you have unanimous consensus on that." Bakara said, and got no argument.
"Very well. Outpost 2 is a short distance from Kar'Shan for our FTL, we should use it as a staging area. They'll probably assume we're preparing to take another outer world." Admiral Gerrel said
"It will take at least a month before the required repairs and resupply are completed. That will give the Geth plenty of time to sneak into the capital and secure the slaves." Anderson said.
"Plus the second outpost gave us an opportunity to test the new power suits. Have we heard back on the results?" Chambers asked.
"It was mostly successful, though some of the Krogan variants had neural link issues. The original Prothean designs were anticipating a single neurological system, so their secondary and tertiary nervous systems confuse the computers. It didn't slow them down though, the Krogan basically just ride the suit down to the surface and then exit them to proceed conventionally. The power suits they come down in can and were piloted successfully by Geth, using them as makeshift platforms when theirs were damaged or destroyed." Admiral Xen reported
"Excellent, let's bring them up to full use, they're so small they're almost impossible to be intercepted with AA fire, it will mean less risk for shuttle crews." Hackett said. Everyone agreed.
"So we're moving forward with this plan. Geth, when you are prepared, please begin dropping quietly onto Kar'Shan and move into position. Aria T'loak thorough her contacts has obtained vital intel on sensitive positions all over their capital. The Colossi are going to be too big to hide in the dense population centers so they'll need to stay on the outskirts. We're starting with hunters and cloaked primes in the cities, its vital that you stay in constant contact with the nearest colossus, we don't want to lose any Geth if we can avoid it." Hannah said
"Understood Shepard Prime Minister." The Geth representative said.
"Alert the fleets, I want to cycle the fleet in stages back to port for repair and resupply. What is the status of the Turian and Asari fleets?" Shepard said.
"The Turian fleet ha sustained minimal damage and losses. Ten fighters and a support cruiser went down. Of the thirty fighters that sustained damage 28 have already been repaired by the crew of the Mayhem. I will relay your plans to command but I doubt they'll disagree." Castis said.
"The Asari lost a medical cruiser, and five frigates were heavily damaged, and eight fighters were damaged severely. They are still aboard the Mayhem undergoing repair and retrofit. Given the state of the Asari government, I have been given authorization to approve or deny any military requests, so you can consider the Asari on board for your plans." Benezia said.
"How many people have we lost?" Shepard said, her expression saddening.
"215 Turian soldiers." Castis sad
"115 Asari soldiers and 30 Civilian medic volunteers." Benezia said.
"438 Alliance personnel, all military." Anderson contributed.
"I want their names for the memorial." Shepard said. Anderson nodded but Benezia and Castis looked surprised.
"Memorial?" Castis asked. Shepard nodded.
"After this nightmare has passed, we're going to construct a memorial on Earth to commemorate those who died, Alliance, Asari and Turian as well as the Batarians and Vorcha who have been volunteering at the slave sites. It's revolting and horrible that circumstances in this galaxy require so many people to lay down their lives and I'll be damned if my people don't remember them all." Shepard said.
Liara T'soni was sitting at her desk feverishly plowing through a data set sent to her by a Lieutenant Lawson from LOCATION REDACTED. She was so excited her crests were tingling. Her area of interest had always focused on the Protheans, primarily because so little of the races that preceeded them had survived the millions of years, but anything that pointed to evidence of previous civilizations made her positively giddy. To see that there was a strong possibility that these Inusannon had encountered and modified prehistoric Humans, Quarians and Turians was remarkable. While she had an advanced understanding of biology she was no geneticist, so the preliminary findings were of little use to her, however the Lieutenant had promised to send more data as they found it.
A thought crossed her mind, she brought up a galaxy map and highlighted Earth, Palaven and Rannoch and drew lines between them intersecting in a right triangle. She pondered it for a minute. The hypotenuse of the triangle traveled through the galactic core, and the dead center point between all three points was still close enough to the core to be basically uninhabitable, however if she ignored the hypotenuse and drew parallel lines from the other sides to create a rectangle the imaginary point opposite the 90 degree angle of the triangle happened to be a star Liara had never heard of before. It had a numerical designation, meaning that no significant Citadel or Alliance expedition had surveyed it extensively, though it was noted to have several rocky planets.
"Geth, do the Alliance or Asari have any assets within range of that system?" Liara asked the room. A holographic representation of the Geth unit currently stationed on the roof appeared, slightly miniaturized to fit in the room, and answered.
"Affirmative, there are fifty-three manned starships within 200 light years of the selected system, as well as one thousand, two-hundred fifty unmanned Geth drones." The unit said
"Have any of them captured any scans from habitable planets in the system?" Liara asked.
"None yet. The system has been tagged for future survey, but none have explored it. Would you like to divert resources?" The Geth asked. Liara looked at the image gobsmacked.
"Of course not, I don't presume the authority to rearrange Alliance resources like that, Geth." Liara said
"You may not, Liara T'soni, but we do. We have diverted a small swarm, roughly a hundred drones to explore the planets in that system. We anticipate preliminary results within four hours." The Geth said
"Oh dear, I didn't mean to take you away from your work like that..." Liara said. The platform shrugged
"Liara T'soni, it is our pleasure. Your proposal did not go against the tenets of either the Geth or the Alliance, you have been a friend to us, and the swarm of drones will not be missed on its current assignment. Alliance command has already acknowledged the change" The Geth said
"I truly appreciate that Geth." Liara said, the hologram nodded then disappeared. Lara looked down at her workstation and saved the circled image of that system on her star map.
"Now what I am I going to do for four hours?" Liara asked herself. Then her gaze wandered over to her end table where she'd left a book she'd been devouring. She smiled and decided that some tea and an afternoon reading Earth smut might be just what the doctor ordered.
Shepard barely left Tali's side for the days after she awoke. It had been determined that Hegemony loyalists had attempted to sabotage the reactor but had run out of time, though their efforts did manage to destabilize the heat exchanger slightly, an error that even a heavily skilled engineer like Tali could be excused for missing it. Her hands were back to full dexterity, which she was overjoyed to demonstrate for Jane, leaving the taller woman walking unsteadily for the rest of that day.
She'd submitted her report days ago, and casualties had been minimal, especially amongst the slaves. Only three had been lost, and those were directly murdered by loyalists in a failed bid to hold off the breach team at the weapons depot. Plans were already underway for the next step, Kar'Shan. The Geth requested two months of preparation time so that they could effectively infiltrate all of the heavily populated areas. This was longer than the Alliance had expected, but once the Geth brought up detailed cartography of the planet the need for extra time was quite apparent. Kar'Shan was extremely overpopulated. On a planet that was estimated to be capable of supporting five billion humanoids, there were at least nine billion Batarians as well as a billion members of other races kept there as slaves. The remainder of the alliance agreed with the Geth's plan and they all gave the order to proceed, with several thousand heavily cloaked Geth drop ships disembarking for Kar'Shan.
Thanks to the longer than expected downtime, Shepard received orders to cycle all of the local assets, including the Normandy, out for repair and refitting. The newly commissioned battlecruiser Tyrannicide was en route and to be assigned to Commander Shepard's command. She was honored, and proud to have been put in command of such a massive ship, no matter how temporarily, however she felt awkward being the only commander to have control of a capital ship, generally reserved for Captains and Admirals. Shepard had been ordered to remain on the second outpost world to keep an eye on things while Ash had assumed temporary command over the Normandy and took it back to Earth for repair and refit. Tali had opted to remain with Shepard since the ship was fit to fly and was headed towards a huge team of engineers anyway.
"God it's like that one time my mom took my keys away when she caught me driving home drunk when I was 17." Shepard said as she watched the Normandy takeoff and leave the atmosphere.
"I always knew you were a bad girl." Tali said, teasingly. Shepard grinned and kissed her, then walked back to the HQ building.
"Commander Shepard, an Alliance Frigate, the Hagerstown, has requested landing clearance. They are not expected." the communication officer announced.
"Their codes cleared?" Shepard replied
"Yes Ma'am. Diplomatic codes received, there is a head of state aboard." the comm officer said.
"Grant them clearance, and please clear the meeting room in the south building, I'm betting they're going to need to meet with us." Shepard said, the officer acknowledged. Shepard took Tali's hand and guided her outside to greet the landing ship. The Hagerstown, named after a ferocious battle that took place in Hagerstown, Maryland during the great war, was more than a standard frigate. Instead of stealth, it was built for durability and strength and easily carried twice the armor the Normandy enjoyed. As such it made for a less graceful landing, especially since Joker the best pilot in the Alliance was currently piloting the Normandy towards dry dock.
"Who you wanna bet is aboard? My mom or your Dad or Aunt?" Shepard asked.
"No bet, only thing I know is it's neither Bakara nor Wrex, they're up to their necks in babies on Tuchanka at the moment." Tali said. The hatch opened and it turns out Shepard was right in all of her guesses, Prime Minister Shepard led the way down the ramp followed by Admirals Raan, Zorah and Anderson, along with a Geth Unit and a limping Gatatog Uvenk.
"Attention on deck!" Shepard shouted, snapping a salute, all personnel stopped what they were doing and faced the ship, saluting the Prime Minister and her companions.
"As you were." Anderson responded, sending everyone back to their appointed tasks. Shepard and tali approached, greeting them.
"Prime minister, Admirals, what can I do for you today?" Shepard sad
"Stow it Jane, how are you?" Hannah said, stepping forward and grabbing Jane in a hug.
"Not too bad, anxious to get everything ready for Kar'Shan. You?" Jane asked, looking at her mother. While still attractive for an older woman, Hannah appeared ot have aged drastically since the outset of the war, but it didn't seem to slow her down any.
"When I resigned my comission and declared I was running for office, why didn't you stop me?" Hannah asked, smiling.
"I tried. Remember? Your exact words were 'Johnston can suck it, a blind ape could govern better than he can.'" Jane said, grinning.
"Nope, I blame all of this on you. It's your fault. Tali, darling how are you? I was terrified when I found out you were hurt." Hannah said, hugging the smaller Quarian.
"I'm well. Dr. D'inan takes good care of us." Tali said, flexing her three-fingered digits to illustrate the fact.
"I'm glad. Is there a conference room we can use down here?" Hannah asked, passing Tali over to Raan who was clutching to the young woman for dear life.
"Yes, it's being prepped now, come this way." Shepard said, heading towards a large building.
"How are the Urdnot kids? Do we have pictures?" Shepard asked.
"Yes, of course, here's the first one to hatch, and here she is biting Wrex's finger off." Hannah said, bringing up pictures on her omnitool
"Aww, that's precious. Bloodthirsty little demon isn't she?" Shepard asked.
"Oh that's not even the best part. Guess what they named her?" Hannah asked.
"What?" Shepard asked.
"Urdnot Jane." Hannah said. Shepard stumbled, almost falling flat on her face.