[Book One] Chapter 15: Acceptance leads to growing up

[Book One] Chapter 15: Acceptance leads to growing upChapter 15: Acceptance leads to growing up

When they arrived at Peak 15, the Mako was left outside as the vehicle entrance was not only locked but obstructed by a flaming destroyed M29 Grizzly. It was a bit unfortunate as it would have been useful against the geths inside which were guarding the complex access but not that much. Going deeper, they saw two heavy turrets guarding the door, but the exit one not the entrance one.

“Aren’t turrets supposed to point the other way around to stop any intruders from coming in?” Liara asked.

“After the difficulty we had to come here and the secrecy of things on Noveria...” Began Rick

“I think it’s to keep in what’s inside.” Garrus finished the thought.

“Which in normal time would not bode well but with a mind controlled asari matriarch....” Shepard.

She didn’t have to finish her sentence, everyone understood where she was going with her line of thinking. The knowledge that something really awful was inside this complex made them even more tense.

Passing the turrets, the way was straightforward, only one small elevator. Shepard’s team went first.

The elevator was fast, to the surprise of everyone. In no time they arrived in a very spacious area which was sadly occupied by numerous geths. The group naturally separated into two smaller ones, with Wrex and Rick each going their own way to deal with the enemies at hand. Liara followed her krogan friend, providing support with her biotics. Shepard for her part was doing much of the same with her assault rifle, gunning down the geths too far for Rick to get to. It only took two minutes for the place to be clean and when the commander went ahead to explore in detail the surroundings she was stopped.

“Wait!” Rick called out to her.

“What is it?”

“Look at your radar.”

She did so and found something abnormal. Two red dots were still present on it, meaning there were two enemies left. The thing was... There was nothing when she looked with her own eyes. It couldn’t have been a geth hunter as their invisibility is not perfect and the refracted light visually ‘glitch’ a bit, making it possible to spot them easily if you’re looking for it.

“Is the radar malfunctioning somehow?” she asked.

“No, I checked. Something is there.” Rick replied.

“Well there is only one way to draw them out.” Wrex declared while walking slowly towards one of the red dots.

When he was close enough to a duct vent it burst open and from inside of it came a hideous giant insect with a really tough shell and two tentacles on each side of her body. Wrex fired his shotgun instinctively making the thing hiss in pain and retaliate by spewing a green liquid from the tip of his two appendages. The krogan dodged barely and the liquid hit the metal ramp behind, melting it.

At the same time another insect came from another vent, the one with the other red dot and made a bee line for Liara who was at the back of the group. Rick charged on the spot and unleashed his shotgun on it until his weapon overheated. Despite that, it was still alive. A throw from Liara sent him away, saving the helmet man from a nasty puncture wound from one of the tentacles; picking his gun he shot at it until the thing was dead.

Shepard and Wrex were done with theirs too.

“What the heck was that?!” Asked a voice from below them.

Team Kaidan had finally arrived and the first thing they saw was the other team taking care of some kind of monsters.Geett the latest novels at novelhall.com

“My guess is... What the turrets were there for.” Wrex replied.

“Any idea?” Shepard asked, looking at Rick.

“Why are you asking me?”

“You’re the nerd, the one who knows things.”

“First off. The term nerd is offensive. Second, I’m not the only one here who knows things. Third... Third, I don’t know. I mean... I recognize it from somewhere but... can’t remember.”

“You already encountered one of those things?” Ashley inquired.

“No, I would have remembered that. I probably saw it on the extranet.”

He began to think for a moment, mumbling some words.

“You know, somehow, it always creeps me out a bit when he talks to himself like that.” Garrus confessed.

“You’re not alone.” Kaidan joined in the confession.

“I find it cute.” Shepard said, her eyes locked on her crew’s troublemaker as both Garrus and Kaidan looked at her like she had sprouted a second head.

“There is nothing wrong with that!”

“Yeah!”

Liara and Tali united in defense of her fellow nerdy friend. They too had tendencies to speak to themselves when they were focused on something, be they protheans ruins or whatever technologic the quarian was working on.

“For your information, I talk to myself because I need the opinion of an expert. Hearing the words has a different impact on the thinking process than just thinking them. Had it been something about protheans I would have listened to baby blue. Something about tech? Centerfold. This.” he said, putting the dead insect with his thumb. “ I don’t think anyone here knows how to help. By the way, did you know that someone talking to themselves is either a sign of mental instability or a sign of above average intelligence? Most of the time, it’s actually...”

“Rick, did you think of something? We’ll have time for a lesson later.” Shepard interjected. She liked listening to him but now was not the time.

“Oh, yeah. Hmm. The only thing I can think of... Well it’s improbable...” he began mumbling again and Shepard immediately pulled him back.

“Rick.”

“Rachni.”

“That’s impossible, they are extinct.” Liara said.

“My people saw to that.” Wrex added to the asari statement.

“And yet. I remember seeing it somewhere because I saw a sketch of it while studying krogan’s history. Everything checks too. Big, dangerous, hostile insects that spit very corrosive acid? All check. Mind you, it may be not actual rachnis but a cross breeding? Who knows what those idiots scientists did here.”

“Why would anyone recreate the rachnis?” asked Liara.

“““““Weapons.”””””

“Rachnis reproduce fast, faster than Krogans pre-genophage, and are very dangerous and hard to kill. What tyrant or megalomaniac wouldn’t want a strong, big and expandable army like that?” Rick explained.

The conversation stopped there and the group moved deeper into the complex. After two elevator rides they arrived in some sort of hub area. Each door leading to a part of the building was locked, a result from a power outage. Looking around for a solution they found a deactivated VI core. Shepard looked at Rick and Tali, who looked at each other.

“Want to decide that, on rock, paper, scissors?”

“What’s that?” Tali replied curiously.

Rick just sighed and went onto the platform going down. There he found the console to activate back online the VI. He bypassed in no time the many security in place and went back up to the others.

“You know. I wonder what you would do with us two tech wiz?” he said to Shepard.

“Omni-gel.” she replied with a proud grin.

“You mean the omni-gel that would be obsolete in a few years because it’s a major security breach?”

“What?!”

“From what I heard, a salarian is working on new types of locks and softwares that would make the omni-gel useless. Lots of money to make there. Anyway, I do advise you to learn how to hack a bit.”

The VI had been a great source of information. If they wanted to go on they would have to do two things. One: reactivated the landlines. Two : repair the reactor.

Shepard patted herself on the back for going with two teams instead of just one. Her team went to the reactor. Its task was easy: open some helium-3 valves. What was not easy was the half a dozen geths stalkers with some troopers and one destroyer in the way. Thankfully the space was cramped and they had taken cover into a narrow corridor. Wrex was frustrated to have to use his biotics the way he did as he couldn’t charge right into the fray, not if he liked living. Meanwhile Rick, by Shepard’s side, was practicing his aim with a sniper rifle. Unusual for a vanguard to use one. Once the room cleared they repaired the reactor and went back the way they came.

“This mission sucks.” Wrex said during the elevator ride.

“Big time.” Rick agreed.

“And it’s only the beginning.” Shepard absentmindedly added.

“Yay.” Liara said with fake enthusiasm.

They were the second team to make it back. Kaidan’s had just come in a few minutes earlier. Apparently they faced rachnis and Aside Tali, they all had no problem dealing with them with their mid to long range weapons. The power restored; they took the tram in the direction to the sub-lab Benezia went to. Benezia and her commandos.

The trip wasn’t long, ten minutes at best and everyone just sat in silence, waiting with their head focused on the mission. A room after the terminus, they were met with a few security guards. The poor guys had been defending this position for months now and were exhausted even if there was a regular shift. Taking care of two rachnis bursting out of the ventilation system the teams went to what seemed to be a camp with survivors. Mainly scientists and some guards. Shepard and Kaidan questioned everyone about the situation and Liara’s mother but they were all vague and refused to answer quoting a Non-Disclosure Agreement. Meanwhile, Rick stood in the corner observing everyone. From the one guard constantly looking at the group furtively, or so he thought, to the Asari shepard spoke to; he watched with interest. His mind was racing, trying to make sense of what he was seeing and what he knew. The further he thought, the less he liked the situation. Finally, he went to talk to Mira, the VI.

“Mira, do you know anything about the rachnis infestation?”

“I’m sorry, I do not know what you’re referring to.”

“Hmmm. The organic life forms attacking the personnel of the complex?” He tried to ask in a roundabout way, thinking that maybe she was restricted to what she could talk about or simply didn’t know the term rachnis.

“The loose contaminants escaped from their confinement three months ago.”

“Do you know how they got loose?”

“I’m sorry, I do not know.”

“How many are they?”

“My scans indicated that there are currently 598 loose contaminants.”

“Shit. What are their locations?”

“Most of them are at the hot labs at this moment.”

“Is there any measure to eliminate those contaminants?”

“The neutron purge would extinguish all organic life forms in the area of activation so that no trace are left.”

“And that neutron purge is in the hot labs?”

“It is.”

“Thank god. Thank you Mira. What about the activation console for it? Where is it?”

“The hot labs.”

“... Well, double shit.”

Leaving the VI alone, he saw Shepard exiting a door and make her way straight to him.

“Learn anything new?”

“You have no idea.” he replied in a forlorn tone that made Shepard raise one of her eyebrows in a questioning gesture. He signaled her to follow her and went to the corridor that separated the area and the room they found the guards on duty. Looking around to be sure no one was eavesdropping he whispered what he knew in her ear.

“I don’t have much time. The indoctrination, it’s too strong! He still whispers in my mind; I can fight him, his words but not for long.”

“Then let’s not waste time. Where are you here? He can’t be for the rachni, not after three months.”

“The Mu relay, Saren wanted its location, the queen knows where it is.”

“How can you lose a relay?” asked Shepard.

“Not now red! Where is it? Will the relay lead to the conduit?”

“He believes so and the information is here.” She said picking a OSD from a pocket and handing it to the commander.

Before she could ask any more questions Rick sprayed Benezia with some gas contained in a metal canister. The matriarch coughed a bit and fell to the ground.

“WHAT THE HELL?!” Shepard yelled as Liara ran towards her mother.

“What?” Rick replied nonchalantly.

“You obstructed me in my questioning and then you killed her without my order?!” The redhead was clearly not happy.

“What are you talking about? She's alive.”

“He’s telling the truth, Shepard. She’s asleep.”

“What was that then?”

“Of course. Babies need their mother after all.” he said in a joking manner looking at Liara then turning to Shepard, he signaled her to follow him. He had to justify himself but that would put her in a pinch in front of Wrex and Liara. She had warned him to not do that again and so walked to the other side of the room.

“You heard her, she couldn’t fight the brainwashing for long and here you were asking stupid, irrelevant questions, wasting everyone’s time and her efforts. And before you protest, the disparition of a Mass Relay is that big of a deal that there is no way there’s no record of that.” he explained. Shepard could see the point for this question but she had more and wasn’t satisfied.

“She could have told us, how the rachnis found it, how the queen knew about it and what Saren's plan is. She can’t now!”

“I have the answer to the first two as for the third, I didn’t think she knew.”

“Oh? You’re a mind reader now M. know-it-all?!” she said in anger, almost yelling even.

“That’s uncalled for, especially when me being knowledgeable makes your job easier...”

“I fail to see how you made my job easier! I know nothing, now! Thanks to you!”

“As I was trying to explain before you rudely interrupted me. She knew nothing because there was no point in her knowing. She was... is brainwashed, making her Saren’s tool, puppet, whatever you want to call her. He needed her for her reputation, resources, connections and nothing else. There was no point in telling anything but his orders. He’s a spectre, well former spectre but that doesn’t change anything. Anyway he’s a spectre, used to be secretive and stealthy for decades, there is no way he would have changed his mindset and revealed his plan when it could create a liability.”

“Perhaps but we certainly won’t know now!”

“Liara could meld with her. It may be dangerous though, so I’d recommend having Chakwas do some brain scans on Benezia first.”

They looked at each other in silence, the commander still fuming, for a long moment. Rick was the one that broke the tension.

“When we began this journey, you didn’t trust me one bit. I understood and you were right to do so. We were strangers after all, but after three months I expected at least a modicum of trust from you after everything I did, especially when I’ve never been wrong.”

He was right and she knew it. Despite his shady past, he’s always been upfront with her. She had reported so to Anderson and thought about it again back at the spaceport earlier in the day when he had disappeared while talking to Parasini. His work was beyond exemplary. It has been so through with it that the best of the alliance’s intelligence branch could learn a thing or two from him she was sure. She trusted him. Yet, a few moments ago she blew up on him because things didn’t go her way but his. He had been undisciplined and acting on his own forgetting the chain of command. That was the real reason she was pissed. Because at the end of it all. She had been lacking and he hadn’t. Her question about the missing relay and the ones he already had the answer for was proof enough. He was so far ahead of her. He probably even knew what questions she was going to ask before she even thought of them. He was undisciplined because she was lacking. The sad thing was... she could do nothing about it. She was born with an above average intellect but he... was a genius and there wasn’t any way to bridge that gap. She could boot him out of the team, of the crew and the Normandy but the mission would become way harder and he would find his own way to get back at Saren. There was no way he was going up on finding the turian not after he cost him everything when he attacked Eden Prime. She wouldn’t and knew after spending three months with him that he wouldn’t either. Not after what he did to Elanos Haliat. The only choice she had left was to accept the fact that he is and always will be undisciplined, always going above her when he deemed it necessary and at the same time do the right thing for the mission. It went against anything she had been told in her training and at that moment she thought back on what Anderson told her on the citadel.

You’ve learned that sometimes going by the book is not always the right choice even if it has been hammered into your head that it's the right thing to do. You’re not a mindless grunt anymore, Shepard, but a soldier and soldiers do what they have to do. It’s soldiers that win wars.

Rick did what he had to do to get the best outcome, he had been a soldier. He went straight to the point with Benezia and incapacitated her before losing her fight against the brainwashing. Despite her hopes, she knew deep down that if that had happened, she would have killed Benezia right there. Now, Liara still has her mother with perhaps some sanity left and perhaps a chance at full recovery thanks to Rick going against the book of the perfect little alliance’s soldier. She needed to accept and be okay with him going above her and to trust him to do it for the right reason.

Closing her eyes, she took a very deep breath then let it out. Looking at him for a few seconds she then spoke.

“Once we’re back in the Normandy you better have the answers I’m looking for.” She received a nod of agreement then both went back to the others. Wrex was looking at them on the side of Liara and her mother. Wondering what was happening. Liara had Benezia’s head on her lap and was lost in thought.

“We need to restrain her and keep her in that state.” Rick said.

“For how long?” Lira asked.

“As long as she’s still brainwashed, unfortunately. We can’t have her awake. I do recommend not telling the council about her situation. I don’t think many will believe that she had been indoctrinated, or if they do, that she can be cured.”

“She will stay with you on the Normandy for now. We can decide about anything else later.”

“What about the rachni queen?” Wrex asked.

“She’s the last of her kind. You kill her and the species is extinct for good.” Liara said, looking up from her mother’s face.

“Good enough for me.” replied the krogan.

“The rachni deserved a second chance Wrex.” Rick stated his opinion.

“They almost brought the galaxy to its knees!”

“So did the krogan and they got the genophage in return. Are you saying that a cure for it , if one is ever found, should be destroyed because of your people’s past actions? If the rachnis don’t deserve a second chance neither do the krogans.”

Rick’s answer rang true. Rachnis and krogan did the same thing. There was no reason for one to be treated differently than the other. That didn’t please Wrex in the least who growled, but surprisingly didn’t act on his displeasure.

As Shepard was thinking of her course of action she approached the console to determine the fate of the last rachni queen.

“We will live in hiding, never to be seen again.”

Everyone turned around, weapons drawn to see the corpse of an asari commando speak and raised herself up from the ground.”

“What the... Wasn’t she dead?” Wrex asked.

“This one; is our vessel. It helps us sing to you.” said the not so dead asari.

Inside her cage the queen hit the glass to get Shepard’s attention. The zombie asari walked slowly and put herself in front of the queen facing the team.

“Interesting. Taking control of a corpse without contact. Maybe the theory of using pheromones or sub quantum methods of communications was true.” Rick looked in fascination.

Shepard looked at him briefly wondering when he became so knowledgeable about the rachnis when he didn’t know anything about them when they arrived here. Filing this question for later, she spoke to the queen.

“One of my friends is in for killing you, the other for letting you go. Give me one reason why I should listen to the latter, after what your species did to the galaxy?”

“The colorless notes changed our song. Perverted it. We were singing in peace when we heard them. We didn’t want anything else.”

“What?”

“I think she’s saying that someone or something corrupted her means of communication and that led them to attack the rest of the galaxy?” Rick tried to explain.

“Yes. They sang like us but not like us.”

“Rick?” Shepard asked as clearly he was speaking rachnis language and she wasn’t.

“Hmm. Like us but not like us... You mean they communicated the same way but not the same things?”

“Yes. Their notes, dissonant, yellow and sour. Ours, harmonious, colorful. Our children didn’t listen to our song anymore. They couldn’t, their notes were too loud. Our children were led away. Soon other mothers too.”

“So basically those bad notes... What? Brainwashed your children then you, the mothers?” Shepard inquired , understanding this time.

“Yes.”

“Was it the reapers?”

“We do not know.”

“Unlikely. The reapers have been away for fifty thousand years. Another species like the thorian perhaps?” Rick interjected. Though after his reflection on his visions after getting the cipher, the reapers were still a probability. Benezia was the perfect proof.

“So you didn’t want to go to war?”

“No, we wanted to sing peacefully in our world.”

“What about your children here? They were very aggressive and hostile.”

“They were lost to us. Taken before we could sing to them.”

“Something bothers me though. How do you know all that?”

“Genetic memory. They remember through their DNA the memories of her ancestor. That’s why she knows about the location of the Mu Relay.” Rick replied.

“If I release you, what would you do?”

“Hide, birth children, sing in peace. Teach them harmony.”

Shepard didn’t know what to do. She wanted to believe her, but the rachnis had been a plague on the galaxy. If she was lying, then the next few generations will be in big trouble. On one hand she could make her species go extinct, on the other there was the risk of another galactic war. Neither option was good.

Many people say that in a lose-lose situation there is no right choice but I believe that’s not true, it’s all about which choice’s results you will be able to live with.

For the second time today, she remembered what Anderson told her. Opening the console, she set free the queen.

“You only have this one chance, do not waste it.”

“We will remember. We will sing the song of forgiveness to our children. They will learn.”

And with those final words the queen fled.

“I hope it won’t bite us all in the ass, Shepard.” Wrex commented.

“Me too.” replied the commander.

“It’s alright. If they start something again, I bet the turian and salarian would pull all their resources to create a cure for the genophage, hoping that the krogans saved their ass again.” Rick said in a jest.

“Ah! I’m on that bet!” replied the krogan.

Shepard looked at the way the queen went. Yes, she could live with that choice. She was hoping for peace but if war there would be, then they’d be pushed back and defeated again. War was better than extinction, better than genocide.

Yes, she could live with this result.