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—
Arcturus Stream
Fifth Fleet
SSV Orizaba
Admiral Steven Hackett, commanding officer of the Alliance Fifth Fleet, attained his current rank after the campaign in the Terminus systems and held a chip in his hand.
A chip, sent by Commander Shepard to help him with his workload.
Hackett's eye twitched in irritation, but he inserted the chip in the computer as the instructions said. The computer restarted itself with lines of code springing up on the holo screen before they all gathered together to form a cube on the screen.
As it spoke, the cube rippled. "Greetings, Admiral Hackett. I am Hannah, your personalized assistant. You have one message from Commander Shepard."
"Play it."
"Good morning or good evening, Admiral. I coded this VI to assist you with your workload. You let her handle everything and just lay back down to enjoy yourself. Now, she is smarter than any other VI you'll find out there, but don't worry, there will be no AI trouble since the Council gets pissy about it. As for the laser weapons, if I just hand them over to the Alliance or any other government's R&D, it will take a decade for anything substantial to change. Instead, I'll rework them into ship-sized weapons and get back to you. Have a nice day."
Steven took a really deep breath and exhaled loudly.
—
Perhaps he had been too hasty in his first look at the VI.
Hannah wasn't just smarter than the other VIs; she was a miracle. Barely the size of his omni-tool, yet her processing power was off the charts, all without the massive power draw and the hardware requirements.
The VI blitzed through the administrative work, not only analyzing everything but also offering the best possible courses, creating alternative choices for the suggestions made by the Navy, summarizing everything as briefly as possible, and fixing every single mistake overlooked to streamline the work.
Steven Hackett did not remember the last time he got work done this fast and had some time for himself.
—
Attican Beta
Theseus System
Feros
Just as they were about to leave Lizbeth and go find out more about this Thorian, a pack of Varren attacked them.
Shepard pulled his pistols and rained laser bolts on them, killing all the creatures in the blink of an eye, and then headed to the ExoGeni headquarters.
Entering through the door, they heard a Krogan having a shouting match with a VI and silently made their way up the stairs.
"Damn it. Tell me what I want, or I'll blast your virtual ass into actual dust." The Krogan threatened the VI, which refused to carry out whatever orders the Krogan gave. The VI warned the Krogan about a queue forming up, though by the time the massive alien turned around to check, Shepard was already behind him and shot the alien in the face as soon as he turned.
Instead of using Lizbeth's ID, Shepard hacked the VI. The avatar kept glitching out before it stabilized, and Shepard asked about the Thorian.
Turns out it was a giant sentient fungal life form and has been on this planet for a long time and, through its spores, could control organics, just like Lizbeth had said. Colonists of Zhu's Hope were also test subjects, and the majority of them were infected with the spores, which explained their behavior.
The field set up by the Geth was blocking comms, so the team headed to deal with it first and came across quite a disturbing sight. Some Geth units were on their knees, bowing before an orb of light, as if they were worshipping it.
Jenkins pulled up first, firing two shots that destroyed the synthetics. Inspecting the claws, Shepard didn't really have the means to cut them off the building, and they headed ahead to search for a weak point.
Four Geth were waiting for them in the next room, leaving each member of the team a single target that was quickly dispatched. Up the stairs two Krogan were stationed to keep an eye on the entrance and opened fire on the team. Garrus bisected them both with the beam mode of his rifle, and the Krogan fell to the ground in pieces. Another Krogan came from the back and charged with a bellow and fell with holes all across his body courtesy of Liara.
Further up the stairs, three Geth were gathered around a console and deployed their shields and took cover to open fire, though Shepard shot the first one, the deployed mass effect shield proving just as ineffective as always, and the other two took cover, waiting for an opportunity to shoot.
The team approached slowly, with Garrus and Jenkins concentrating on the synthetics, waiting for them to come out, though Shepard wasn't willing to waste time and pulled them out of cover with a singularity, letting the two of them do their jobs.
The docking claws in this place didn't have a weak point either, so they pressed forward, coming across more Geth further ahead. Garrus shot the Geth Hopper, and using the high ground, Shepard, Jenkins, and Liara easily dispatched the remaining synthetics below.
The room had a shuttle door, which one of the claws was passing through, and it gave Shepard an idea. Increasing the pressure to dangerous levels with the touch of some buttons, the door shot up with enough force to cut down the claw and dislodge the ship from the building, sending it crashing down.
There was also a Geth terminal in the room, and Shepard thought it might be good to take a look at it and download the information stored in it.
Just in time, Joker's voice rang over the comms, calling for Shepard.
"What's going on, Joker? Is it the colonists?"
"Yeah, we are in lockdown here, Commander. Something happened to them. They're banging on the hull, trying to claw their way inside the ship. They're freaking out." Joker was more likely annoyed at the thought of Normandy's paint getting chipped than any danger, since the colonists would need heavy explosive charges to breach Normandy's hull.
Shepard took a deep breath, already imagining the things he would do to that Thorian. "They are being mind controlled. Just sit tight; it's not like they can get in. We'll deal with them and the root cause of the problem."
"Mind control?" Joker sounded taken aback before replying in his usual nonchalant attitude, "Freaky. Aye aye, Commander. We'll be waiting to hear from you."
They found Lizbeth again, who, upon hearing the state of the colonists, requested to come along to help. With Joker reporting Geth was heading his way, Shepard took the woman on the Mako, which made a tight fit with five people, as she was stuck between Garrus and Jenkins.
—
Geth was getting desperate.
As soon as he was out on the highway, Mako met with a hail of rockets, cannon shots from the Armatures, and small arms fire. Swerving wildly to dodge, Shepard swept Mako's laser beam over the enemy forces, cutting them down, and sped up ahead to get back to the ExoGeni personnel.
Who was in the middle of a stand-down, with Jeong getting increasingly erratic and scared, and was seconds away from losing his self-control entirely and killing someone.
He ordered one of his men to take Juliana away, which prompted Shepard to act.
"Shepard? I know it was too much hoping the Geth would…" He didn't get to finish his sentence before Shepard slammed him to the wall with his biotics, knocking the idiot out and silencing him.
A look at the ExoGeni guards, and the one holding Juliana let go of the woman before raising his hands to surrender, followed by the rest doing the same.
Juliana and Lizbeth had a tender moment, and Shepard addressed the guards. "Listen, you are going to stay here until I deal with this Thorian and make sure Jeong doesn't do anything stupid and protect the people here from any harm. Shepard stepped closer to the guard who had surrendered first, his gaze colder than the frigid temperatures of Noveria. The guard looked as if he might cry, grimacing as he averted his gaze.
"If I hear even a single strand of hair on their head is damaged, you won't like what I'll do to you in return."
Juliana, after being informed of the Thorian, offered the use of their resources to make fast-acting gas grenades to neutralize the colonists without killing anyone, which was exactly the thing Shepard needed.
—
Standing before a wall barring their entry back to Zhu's Hope, Shepard scanned the creature he had trapped in stasis.
"First synthetic zombies, now organic ones. What's next, I wonder?" He muttered to himself and shot the creature in the head.
Garrus chuckled. "I have to say, Shepard, things are never boring with you around." The Turian opened the door and pulled himself back as the colonists opened fire.
"Jenkins, Liara, take out those creepers. Garrus and I will neutralize the colonists." Shepard handed over half the gas grenades to the Turian and erected a biotic barrier large enough to cover both of them.
Since all attention was on the two of them, Jenkins and Liara made quick work of the creepers, while Garrus and Shepard began to lob grenades at the colonists.
Shepard didn't know where they came from, but there were a good number of creepers waiting for them, though they might as well be made out of paper since the laser weapons cut through the creatures with ease.
They came across Fai Dan, who looked as if he was trying to fight the mind control, and began a speech about how hard it was to resist before Shepard threw a grenade at him and headed to deal with the remaining colonists.
—
Shepard's first impression of Thorian was that it was ugly.
Really ugly.
"Good thing we have laser weapons." He pulled out his pistol, ready to shoot the ugly brown mass of fungi and tentacles, before it began to shake as if getting ready to regurgitate, before a green Asari came sliding out of its mouth.
She looked familiar, really familiar in fact, and as she looked at them, the green replica recoiled in fear.
"You are Shepard." Shiala, or at least her copycat, replied suddenly, realizing the grave danger she was in.
Liara groaned in despair.
Shepard took a couple steps forward, inspecting the replica of Matriarch Benezia's follower. "And you are?" Since he didn't think Shiala decided to change her color palette and her taste in a mate.
"I speak for the Old Growth…" She launched into a tirade against how great the fugly behind her was and kept yapping on before Shepard stopped her.
"Listen, I don't care. I only want to know why Saren was here and why he wants you dead. Cooperate, and you get to live; don't, and you already know what will happen." Thorian recognized him, which suggested it had Shiala's memories since it could replicate her, and that meant it must know the only thing awaited was death if things turned sour.
It did not cooperate.
Shiala's plant-based clone was shot to death, and Shepard took out a grenade, this one completely lethal, and launched it right on top of the Thorian. It hovered in the air, firing its signature laser grid and shredding the appendages keeping the Thorian stuck to the ceiling, as well as the head itself, causing it to fall to the abyss below.
Which sent the creepers into a frenzy, and they began to attack each other, as well as Shepard and the team.
Taking positions across the room, they waited for the creepers to come rather than go out and face them in these narrow corridors, creating a chokepoint and easily dispatching dozens of creepers with minimal effort.
—
Shepard watched as the fleshy sack in the wall burst open, releasing Shiala, who slowly got up. "I am free. I am free." The Asari commando repeated herself, as if she couldn't believe it.
Shepard crossed his arms, and Liara groaned again, muttering, "Why, goddess? Why?!"
"Yes, you are. Now care to tell me what the hell is going on here, Shiala?"
Her explanation was long-winded. Apparently the Thorian was alive for a long time, as in alive during the era of the Protheans, and had subsumed several of them, taking their memories and learning their culture and language, which Shiala called a cipher to decode the message in the beacon.
She was traded in return for the cipher and had given it to Saren, allowing the rogue Spectre to understand the visions he had taken from the beacon.
One interesting part was that Thorian's control of her had broken the Reaper's indoctrination, muting it enough to free Shiala.
She gave Shepard the cipher and requested to stay in the colony to help them recover. Shepard allowed it since the woman wasn't a danger to anyone, at least not while she wasn't being mind-controlled, and headed back to the colony to speak with the residents before leaving Ferros to go and make sense of the visions with the cipher.
—
Jenkins couldn't contain his curiosity any longer. "Miss T'soni, why were you angry at seeing Shiala?" Since the Asari commando was a follower of Matriarch Benezia, the young corporal thought Liara would be happy to see her.
Liara closed her eyes, breathing deeply. "Well, Shepard wasn't alone in bed with my mother." She muttered, gritting her teeth in frustration.
Jenkins tried really hard not to laugh but burst into howling before he could even go through decon, much to Liara's displeasure.
"In my defense, someone was supposed to tell you to take your mother's room."
Liara slapped her head, remembering her mother's attendant that tried to tell her something, but she, with the influence of alcohol, had blown her off.
Goddess damn it.