The surrender of Lymrase marked the end of any significant resistance from the attacking pirates.
A small security force would be left behind to both reassure the miners and deal with any stragglers that managed to hide from the marines, as unlikely as it was that any escaped, while the rest would return to the fleet in orbit.
But as pleased as Revan was that her goal of luring out and dealing with the pirate fleet attacking her logistics network had been completed, and that she had successfully secured the Jedi leading it as well, it was still a distraction from dealing with the main threat to the galaxy. She simply couldn't afford to spend much more time on such a remote planet when there were so many other demands on her time throughout the Empire.
So receiving an urgent message from Tali'Zorah almost immediately after entering her shuttle immediately had Revan on edge.
Only, in an extremely rare moment for her, to be rendered speechless by the contents of the message.
-o-
"Give me a full report, Admiral Zorah." Revan demanded as she marched past the Quarian into the Harrower's hanger.
Understanding how serious the matter was, Tali'Zorah simply fell in step with the Empress even though Revan could tell she was very curious about the sudden appearance of an Asari on the Sith's shuttle.
The newly promoted Admiral was good at following sudden orders though, and immediately launched into a much fuller report than the summary she forwarded earlier. "Of course, Empress Revan. As I said earlier, the infiltrator was first identified by the Geth noticing an unknown that appeared in several systems but had never been caught on the security cameras outside of today despite the time she was supposedly here.
"I had the Geth search through all recordings of her and discovered her storing an object that was very similar to one of your lightsabers. Between that and another incident caught on camera I had to assume she was one of the Jedi you warned us about."
Revan accepted a datapad with the images Tali'Zorah had described. An Asari storing what looked like a Lightsaber hilt and a short video of the same Asari performing a Mind Trick to integrate with another group.
"Lymrase, do you recognize her?" Revan asked the new Acolyte.
"Teveezra Nuraora," Lymrase said, confusion radiating off her through the Force. "She was the Knight that helped me uncover the location of the Saint– holocron when we heard about it being used for a potential weapon. I had asked her to accompany me at the time, but she claimed she had another mission to attend to. So why…?"
Revan made a noise of acknowledgement.
There were several reasons why this Teveezra could have hid her presence from her fellow Jedi, but the most likely one to Revan was that this other Asari was something similar to a Jedi Shadow and had planned to use Lymrase's attack on the mining facility to more easily infiltrate deeper into the Empire.
All newcomers would be under a certain amount of scrutiny thanks to the condition of the rest of the galaxy, but there would be worlds of difference between a random Asari coming from Citadel or Republic space and one that had been displaced because of a pirate attack on an Imperial world.
Lymrase shook her head and said in a clearly conflicted tone, "We should try to capture her now before she discovers she was exposed. Teveezra is very adept at concealing herself even in places where Asari stick out."
"About that," Tali'Zorah shifted awkwardly, "we captured her not long before you boarded the shuttle. We just don't know how to keep someone like her prisoner for long, which is why we urgently requested Revan, er, Empress Revan to help deal with her."
"How the hells did you manage that?" Lymrase exclaimed, just as shocked at the outcome as Revan had been when she got Tali'Zorah's message.
"She had joined up with a group of miners so we needed to separate her from potential hostages. Half of them were easily separated by loading them into two separate shuttles with the excuse that we were evacuating all civilians to either one of the two other facilities or to one of the ships in orbit." Tali'Zorah began to explain. "It helped that it was the truth and I directed her shuttle here. Then when they were going through decontamination I ordered the Geth to add an aerosolized soporific to knock her out, but it didn't work.
"We managed to separate another few more of the workers when the shuttle landed by saying they would be getting checkups from the medical staff. Splitting them into Levo and Dextro based groups wouldn't raise too many suspicions but there were still four around her and from what we could see she was getting suspicious. Especially when the rest of her group started falling asleep."
"If she didn't know you had discovered her for certain, Teveezra would likely try to avoid anything that would draw attention to her. But she would still be able to sense danger coming her way through the Force, even passively." Lymrase said. "I'd have expected her to try slipping away at that point and concealing herself again."
Tali'Zorah nodded. "We expected that, which is why once we got as many people as far away as we could, six squads of Geth and a few combat drones engaged her with Stunners and Knockout Grenades."
So to put it simply, Tali'Zorah drugged the Jedi with a sleeping agent, separated her from as many hostages and complications as possible, isolated her from any leverage or potential distractions, and then overwhelmed her with disposable numbers.
"Well done, Admiral Zorah." Revan complimented.
By no means was it a particularly inspired strategy, but Revan wouldn't dismiss it as trivial because while it was simple Tali'Zorah's method was also something that hundreds of commander's strategies when dealing with Force Adepts from any sect were not.
Successful.
She would have to come up with a proper reward some other time.
That would have to wait, however, because the three of them had arrived at the brig where Teveezra was being held. And while the Asari was currently still unconscious, Revan could see several problems that would need to be addressed if they wanted to keep a Jedi contained for long.
For one, the door controls would have to be disabled and rerouted to another control panel, preferably one in another room. The cell door mechanisms themselves would need to either be replaced or reinforced with a forcefield. And since keeping the Asari unconscious through sedatives was both costly and inefficient, new physical restraints would be needed.
Revan wasted no time issuing the orders for those and several other smaller issues that would make a cell theoretically inescapable for the Jedi. which would hopefully buy enough time for her to address the issue of suddenly having another captive Jedi for later once she had fully secured Lymrase's loyalty instead of relying on Force Persuasion and the Asari's own unbalanced mentality. And Revan knew from personal experience how quickly a Force shifted mentality could be shifted again with the right levers.
"Once again, very well done Admiral Zorah." Revan said, shaking off those thoughts for now. "Unfortunately, the reward for good work is usually more work. Reorganize the battlegroup and prepare to leave the system. Now that we've destroyed the pirate fleet attacking our logistics, there is another target we need to take care of before we can shift our attention back to the Reapers."
"Aye, ma'am." Tali'Zorah nodded seriously and rushed off to complete her orders, leaving Revan and Lymrase on their own.
"And do not think I've forgotten about you, my new Acolyte. I think it is time I finally get some answers about your old Order…"
-o-
"Well then, can't say I expected to meet a living Prothean today." Garrus remarked dryly. "One that wasn't stuffed full of Reaper-tech and shooting at me anyway."
Shepard let out a long breath at her friend's remark.
She had already been expecting it but Eden Prime hadn't turned out to be an easy mission. Cerberus had destroyed the local Alliance garrison, was actively kidnapping the remaining colonists all over the planet, and had managed to dig up more Prothean artifacts not far from where the Beacon that first warned them about the Reapers had been found – not that she knew it at the time.
One of those artifacts being a stasis pod that not only remained functional for fifty thousand years, but contained a living Prothean had been a twist she never would have seen coming.
Even now, several hours after they had confirmed that their new guest on the ship – Javik – had no complications from his incredibly long nap, Shepard didn't know if he was a blessing or a curse for their fight against the Reapers.
On the one hand, Javik had spent his entire life fighting against the Reapers and would be a treasure trove of information about what strategies were and were not effective.
On the other…once he had shared that information, Javik was just one more gun in the fight.
An important one to be sure, considering not only his personal skill but also what his species represented to the wider galaxy, but Shepard couldn't help but wish they had lucked out and gotten another Revan. A warrior and scientist that would be able to actually explain what the Crucible was for and how it worked. Someone that could convince the Sith Empress that the device's construction was absolutely needed or inform the Alliance they needed to shift the resources elsewhere if the Crucible was just a failed plan to begin with. Or failing that just providing the rest of the Alliance with the scientific breakthroughs the Protheans took for granted during their time that would give the rest of them that much more of an edge over the Reaper forces.
"It was definitely a surprise." She replied.
"Shame that in the few minutes we've got him talking he's also uprooting every commonly held preconception about Prothean civilization." Garrus continued. "Liara is going to be devastated."
"She's taking it pretty well so far." Shepard argued tepidly. Finding out the Protheans hadn't been the benevolent rulers of the galaxy most commonly thought of them was not much a concern for the human Commander. She hadn't thought much about the precursor race her entire life until one of their devices had shoved a bunch of memories into her skull. And even then understanding it had been more about chasing Saren than anything about the Protheans themselves.
Liara had spent almost the same amount of time researching and theorising about their society only for the genuine article to be about as far from the image the galaxy had crafted as possible.
"For now, and that's only because Javik is all shiny and – well not new, but freshly discovered." Garrus argued back. "Once that's worn off I don't think she's going to be thrilled the glorious Prothean Empire was ruled by a 'join up or die' policy."
"I'm sure she'll adapt. But as much as I'd like to keep talking about our newest guest, you said you got a message I needed to see?"
Garrus nodded and was suddenly all business. "Yeah, and I don't think you're going to like it."
"What else is new? Lay it on me."
"We got some news from a shared acquaintance of ours. A Cerberus 'prison' facility where they've been sending anyone that resists them taking over."
Shepard scowled. Garrus was right, she didn't like it. God knew what Cerberus would do to anyone they kept prisoner but the short list was pretty much down to 'unethical science experiment' and 'indoctrination into one of their soldiers' with 'both' as another possible answer.
They were going to have to do something about that.
"I assume the coordinates are already uploaded to the galaxy map?"
"Ready and waiting. I take it that means we are going to assault a heavily defended location on our own again?"
Shepard quirked an eyebrow. "What, getting cold feet on me, Garrus?"
"Oh, not at all. I just wanted to know what the plan was to actually deal with the prisoners once we rescue them. I like screwing with Cerberus as much as the next turian, but I'd rather not spend a few days with panicked civilians packed in like sardines."
"Don't worry about that." Shepard replied, pulling up her omnitool. "I've got some pull with someone that can handle that part of the mission for us."
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