Paying the Price

Heh i got off lucky, i didn't lose any squad members, but i lost Kelly and the two engineers from delaying my trip through the relay >.< I ended up redoing the ending the next night to save them. Glad you're still liking the story though, hopefully i can keep it good and enjoyable :D

Eh, not much of a chapter sadly >.< Short and mostly filler. But i wanted a bit of a break before leaping into the next mission. Plus it helps set up a couple of possible plot twists/advancements for alter (Depending on how things pan out. I"m making it up as i go at this point after all :P )

Anyway i need to update my warning here. From this point until the missions over. The story will be dealing with the Project Overlord DLC. Spoilers abound from this point forwards. So if you haven't played said DLC and don't want the plot spoiled. I suggest stopping here and playing it first, then coming back.

Hope you all enjoy :D

Paying the Price

Chapter Ten
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Shepard sighed heavily for what felt like the eighth time in the past hour as she scanned the report the Illusive Man had sent to her. The base they were supposed to check up on was out in the middle of nowhere, and in turn everything but the barest of details had been kept secret from her. She hated surprises, especially ones set up by Cerberus.

The only thing she had to go on was that it was a research facility, and the name of its latest work, Project Overlord…

"Overlord…What the hell does that stand for?" She mumbled, before finally closing the file, she'd stared at it long enough, and unless more information was sent to her she was running into this mission blind.

Cursing quietly, she switched the terminal off and stood slowly, her leg was still giving her trouble. Two days after she'd managed to get out of the medical wing and get back on her feet. At this rate she'd still be walking with a limp when they reached the base.

Much to her protest, the doctor had dragged her back for more checkups a few hours ago, and had informed her that she was still in bad shape, but that did little to slow her down. Once the Normandy was space worthy again, they'd be heading out, whether she had recovered or not.

Shepard offered a weak groan as she collapsed onto her bed. At the rate things were going, she'd be lucky to still be standing at that point, let alone leading the damn mission…

"I am NOT in the mood for this. Just tell me what you know before I lose my patience." Shepard growled as she glared impatiently at Miranda, as she'd expected, turning to the agent for information was about as easy as bringing an active geth onto the qurian flotilla.

Even Shepard hadn't been that stupid.

Pushing the thought from her head, she carefully shifted back in her seat, hands unclenching as she received another string of *classified this* and *Lack of knowledge that* she'd been getting for the past fifteen minutes.

After a few seconds she lifted a hand and waved her second in command into silence. "Fine, I can see talking to you is as productive as ever." She mumbled before standing, another wince crossed her face, but she was able to mask it well.

"With all due respect Shepard…I think the mission is the least of you're worries." Not well enough it seemed.

"I'll be fine in a few days, long before we hit you're precious research lab. And if I find out you knew what were walking into. I'll be leaving you there." She snapped, before storming out the door and leaving the Cerberus agent to consider her threat.

Honestly, she wouldn't do that. As much as she hated Cerberus, Miranda had proven a somewhat loyal soldier throughout the past few months. And despite her xenophobic attitude and second guessing, she was a faithful and talented individual, and Shepard needed everyone she could, especially with half the squad gone.

She hesitated for a moment, before shaking the thought from her head and continuing to the elevator, she needed another drink…

Thankfully it seemed Kasumi wasn't home when she arrived. And she was able to raid the bar and leave again without trouble, the last thing she wanted as another string of questions about her drinking habits.

Returning to her quarters, she found her way back to her terminal and out of boredom flipped the screen on; surprisingly she had another message waiting. This one from an unknown source.

A quick scan however caused her to halt midway through pouring her first glass. The message was obviously not meant for her, and contained a much more detailed description of Project Overlord.

Sadly it still wasn't much to go on, telling little more then it being research into the geth and AI as a whole. But it was far more then the Illusive Man and Miranda had told her of.

The source of the message was cleverly masked, but she could tell this had originally been sent to her second in command, and somehow been forwarded to her.

A simple message had been attached to the end.

She can't be trusted…Watch you're back Shepard.

She wasn't sure whether the knowledge that someone was hacking into their private files was good, or bad. After all they'd seen fit to give her what she wanted, but what else had they been hacking into?

That thought alone made the commander shiver.

An hour and three drinks later, and Shepard was still as nonplussed as to who sent her the message as she had been before numbing her brain with alcohol.

She hadn't taken chances with it, after reading it, she'd erased the message and taken steps to remove all data, an easy task considering most of the work had been done by the mysterious sender.

It was a tough call to say the least. On one hand, clearly she was meant to walk into this mission blind for some reason, on the other, it was possible the message had been altered and/or fabricated to cause friction between her and her second in command.

It that were the case, who was behind it, and why?

Shepard decided not to dwell on it. The ship was almost repaired enough to make the trip, and they'd be arriving at Aite within a few hours afterward.

Clicking the terminal off once again, she downed the last glass of drink and decided to call it a night; she'd need some rest before they landed.

Garrus instinctively glanced over his shoulder when the door slid open. He wasn't that shocked to discover it was Shepard standing in the doorway. "Shepard, need me for something?" He asked quietly, before focusing on the terminal once again.

"Have you got a minute?" His typing halted as he picked up on the mixed tone, concern and anger, not a good mix. After a brief pause he decided the guns could wait and focused entirely on the commander.

"Sure. Something on your mind?" The commander took her usual place in the corner of the small room and seemed to toy with her thoughts before finally speaking.

"Plenty…Don't know where to start." The turian had a good idea what was wrong, though he was reluctant to make assumptions, if he was wrong he didn't want to upset her further, still, after a minute he knew she wasn't about to say anything.

"This is about the base isn't it?" Shepard nodded after a moment, her eyes dropping downwards.

"You've got to stop beating yourself up about that. If it wasn't for you none of us would have made it back alive. I know Tali meant a lot to you." He saw her wince, and hesitated for a moment, before continuing. "But you can't blame yourself for what happened. She knew the risks, we all did. I miss her too, but you can't keep dwelling on the past, what happened, happened!"

"She trusted me!" Shepard suddenly snapped, her eyes instantly snapping back up to meet Garrus', he noted they now, even in the dim light they were bloodshot and shining as a fresh wave of tears crept into her vision. "She trusted me with her life and I let her down! Just like Jacob, Thane, Mordin…Ashley." He winced slightly at that, though she obviously missed it. Spirits, she was still blaming herself for Virmire?

"Sorry…Sorry, I shouldn't have bothered you." Melina muttered hastily, before abruptly heading for the door.

"Shepard…" The door automatically closed a moment later, leaving the sniper staring at it, or rather through it as he considered what she'd said. Finally, he turned back to the console, though his typing was much more slower, and his concentration wasn't in it anymore.

"Commander, we'll be reaching Aite in twenty minutes." Melina groaned as she was rudely awoken. A hand moved to rub her eyes as she sat up and tossed the blankets to one side.

Sparing a glance towards the clock, she groaned at the fact that only three hours had gone by since she'd fallen asleep in the first place. "Alright, I'm up!" She called out in response to Jokers announcement; though she knew he wouldn't have left the comm. on to hear her reply.

Luckily, tired or not, Shepard was out of bed and in her armour in no time. Within five minutes of the announcement she was out of bed and in her armour. The elevator swiftly opened a few moments later and she soon made her way to the briefing room, the rest of her squad was already assembled thankfully, and she offered a slight nod to each in turn, though Miranda obviously picked up on the slight glare before her own.

"Good to see everyone's ready to go." The cheer in her voice was definitely fake, but no one commented on it. She gave each person a careful glance, Garrus a shorter one then the rest, turian's were hard to read, but even she picked up on the concerned stare she was getting. Miranda too she dodged past as quickly as possible, she still wasn't sure whether to believe the message or not, she needed more proof Miranda was hiding something.

Placing her hands on the table, she offered a quiet sigh before speaking. "I'm sure you all know what I've been told. Project Overlord, whatever the hell it is." Her gaze snapped to the Cerberus agent again, before returning to the group as a whole. "Was taking place here." She hit a button and a holographic image of Aite materialized. "We don't know for sure what's happened, but communications have been cut, and the Illusive Man wants answers."

A few murmured comments passed through the crew, and she let them finish before continuing. "Much as I want to say screw it and leave Cerberus for good." She caught Miranda stiffening slightly out of the corner of her eye. "This facility must be important if the Illusive Man wants us to investigate. So I'm going down there to check it out. Anyone who doesn't want to continue helping Cerberus can stay on the ship, I'll be more then happy to drop you off somewhere once were done."

She was surprised to find everyone still standing pledging their support. The biggest ones she'd been worrying about were Zaeed, Kasumi and Samara.

The first two had been given a sizeable paycheck to stick around for the mission, and now that that was over they had no reason to stay. Samara had pledged her support for the mission, but now that her contract was done, she had every right to leave, or kill Shepard if she disapproved of her methods.

"I'm glad you're all still willing to follow, especially after what happened last time." She stood up straight and ignored Garrus' sigh as she offered a slight nod to the group. "We'll be touching down planet side in fifteen minutes…Miranda, Garrus, you'll be coming with me in the Firewalker. The rest of you will wait aboard the Normandy. As soon as we've secured a landing zone at the labs you'll be coming down as well to join the fight. I don't know what's down there. But lets hope it won't take all of us to finish the job."
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Like last time, i can't help but feel i went overboard with the line/scene breaks. But eh i had a lot of ground to cover and little idea how to do it. Suppose i could have fleshed out a few scenes more, or cut them for later. But i think it came out, alright. Hope it's a good read regardless :)