What did you do today in ME?

Jeph Shepard:

- Went to Jarrahe Station to find out what the hell was going on with the exploding mechs. Took Kasumi and Garrus, since they were the closest thing I had to tech expects besides myself. A PDA next to a corpse said the VI had turned on them. Killed everyone on station. It was a Cerberus facility, so likely something shady was going on, but the way it was spreading the infection meant it had to be stopped. Seems like the MSV Corsica had come from a Hahne-Kedar facility on Capek. Could be the source of the problem. The VI tried to kill us and infect the Normandy but I was able to shut it down.

- Grunt, Jacob and I landed on Capek. We were attacked by mechs as soon as we landed. Investigation said a new circuit board seemed to be the source of the problem. This facility was gonna have to go. Not a difficult decision when everyone is dead. Sent a self-destruct code to all the mechs which caused the destruction of the facility. Good riddance.

- Jack wanted to blow up the Cerberus facility where she was raised. I was okay with that. Mordin wanted to track down on former colleague who helped with the genophage project who was being helped captive on Tuchanka. Invade Tuchanka. Got it. But Grunt gave me an excuse since he said he wasn't feeling normal, so we had to go there anyway.

- Blue Suns activity on the planet Joab. I don't mind taking out mercs and I'm sure Zaeed and Garrus felt the same. Still loving that the Collector particle beam does this to mercs:

This turned out to be an ExoGeni facility and they had requested help from the Blue Suns. Idiots. Well, they're all dead now and I made sure the Blue Suns followed. They were meant to take an artifact to the MSV Strontium Mule. However, inside I found a mini pyramid, Prothean-style. Right in front of it was a Prothean video log. It gave me another warning about the Reapers. I wonder if the Council would consider this legitimate or find a reason to dismiss it.

- Garrus found that someone on the Citadel named Fade had given Sidonis a new identity. He wanted revenge bad and I wasn't going to stand in his way. I sure didn't when went after Dr. Saleon.

- 2175 Aeia. That was the innovative name for the world where a message beacon from Jacob's father's ship was located. Jacob wasn't too bad for Cerberus. I think he just didn't know who he was working for. He said he did but signed up anyway. Me, I'm only doing this mission to end the Collector threat. Jacob had signed up before that. Anyway, maybe I could lure him away after this was over.
- Found a log suggesting that the crew were being abused but unaware of what was happening. Others said that the food was causing degradation of intellect. That made no sense since an active beacon would have rescued them long before their food supply ran out. If someone was capable of activating the beacon 10 years later then it meant there was food that was safe. Also turns out that the captain had died and Jacob's father took command. But this wasn't military and he wasn't trained in leadership. Ronald Taylor had also disabled the beacon over 8 years ago.
- The women we encountered were mostly docile and indicated they "pleased" Taylor. The men were feral and attacked. I could tell right now Taylor wasn't going to be lucky to survive my meeting him. Every word, every log, said that Taylor had been responsible, eventually turning on his officers as well. I don't normally feel bad killing someone but these people had their intelligence stripped away and were acting on instinct. They couldn't help themselves. In the end, Jacob handed his father a half-charged pistol. It wouldn't save him from the men but it had enough juice to end his life. Jacob assumed TIM was behind it, and it seemed like something he would do, but it was actually Miranda. She said something about keeping an old promise. I'll try to avoid extracting promises from her.

- TIM told me that there was an inert Collector ship that was seemingly disabled by the turians, who happened to have been destroyed in the fight. This sounded unlikely to me but still necessary to check out. It might give us our way through the Omega 4 relay. Brought Grunt and Jack with me to what Jack rightly described as an insect hive. EDI said it was the same ship as the one that had been on Horizon. Had trap written all over it. We were finding piles of dead bodies that were used for experiments. We also found an experiment run on a Collector. EDI analyzed it and learned that that had a quad strange genetic structure like the Protheans. And now we knew the fate of that once-great race. They weren't extinct so much as transformed. Had Saren got his way, this could have been our fate as well, if we weren't killed off.
- Saw a lot of the same types of pods seen on Horizon that were used to transport victims. There were no life signs in these. Joker had EDI compare this ship to the original Normandy's scans of the Collector ship that attacked it: it was a match. This ship was specifically after me, and had been for two years now. Then we entered another room with more pods than every colonist in the Terminus Systems could contain. The conclusion that Earth was their ultimate target. When we made a link between the Normandy and the Collector vessel, something attacked EDI's system and the ship started to come online. Like I said before: trap. We had to fend of a Collector attack. When it was done, EDI analyzed the data. She said TIM knew 100% that this was a trap but sent us in without warning anyway. Then we had to hightail it out of there before the weapons came online and destroyed the new Normandy. We escaped in time.

- I had words with TIM and made it clear that I could no longer trust his intel. He was clearly manipulating me and those I cared about and I wasn't having any more of it. He told us about a derelict Reaper that might have an IFF that would allow safe passage through the Omega 4 relay but we weren't ready. Some of my squadmates were moody and I hadn't even found my last three recruits. I'd rather wait than go in unprepared. Also had a friendly dinner with Kelly. We flirted plenty but my head was elsewhere when it came to romance. I wasn't convinced things were over with Kaidan, especially not after the message he sent me.

"Hey Alec,
today Kaidan, Wrex and I saved Terra Nova from a disaster. We had been to the Citadel and prepped the Normandy for leaving for the Hades Gamma cluster to take care of another mission Hackett assigned me to, but we didn't get this far. When we passed the Exodus cluster, scans picked up some alarming movement from a mining asteroid, X57. It was accelerating towards Terra Nova, hitting it within 4 hours if no one stopped it. We landed there immediately. We received a distress call from a woman who said she's in hiding from someone and begged us to shut down the fusion torches.
We found a body, executed violenty, so we knew there must've been mercs or someone else out there. In order to shut down the fusion torches we hit the first facility. Well, guess what. It was fucking batarians hijacking X57. We dealt with them and shut down the first fusion torch. The woman contacted us and told us her name. Kate Bowman, part of a team of engineers to bring this asteroid close to Terra Nova. The batarians had attacked her and the others yesterday, so they were all in hiding.
When we were on our way out of the facility, a human was hanging around the entrance. It was the chief engineer. We had a small chat to get a grasp of the situation, then went out to deal with the remaining torches. The second facility was the same as the first, batarians everywhere. And we also found more bodies at some outposts away from the main sites. It was ugly.
In the last facility, one of the batarians tried to talk to us. He probably just wanted to save his hide. We killed him and the others, took a key card off his body and headed towards the main bunker. Earlier we were contacted again by Kate, saying we really pissed the batarians off and that they rigged the place with explosives. Those batarian fucks had found her, and we knew someone had already been shot. We needed to get to her and the others quickly.
When we arrived at the main bunker, we killed the batarians there, then their leader finally showed. Scumbag called Balak. He wanted to get off this asteroid and spewed some shit about how the expanding of humanity is to blame that batarians resort to terrorism. I wanted to kill him so badly, but we made a deal. I let him go to save Kate and the other hostages. I disabled the explosives and got them out.
Kate is a brave woman. She kept silent about us shutting down the torches when the batarians asked her. It was her brother that was shot.
It's good to know the others got out of this safely, I want to save all the people I can from those bloody terrorists, but...
Frankly, I don't know if I made the right decision. I was convinced I did, I saved that woman and the others, and they might have a good life. But now? What about others this asshole is going to hurt? What if I can't catch him in time? Or ever? It's one of those damn days that make me question everything.
That's why I asked Ash to join me for another round of drinks. I needed that after everything that happened. She and I had a really good time. I like being around her, and I keep thinking about...
Alec, I don't know what I'm doing here. I'm playing with fire right now and the only thing that's holding me back are the damn regs. And even then, I get to the point where I simply don't care about them anymore. Ash's company is doing me some good. I just don't know if that's really what I want. I don't want any sort of commitment, but I don't just want to play with her either.
Fuck.

-Dee"

Pics:


5 derpy deaths from either rocket drones, blasting cap section, or turrets It was glorious! Other than that I did enjoy the DLC again. I really have no idea what kept me so long from playing it. It's rather good, especially if you are a Colonist.
I mentioned armour in the pics section, and I honestly can't believe I already got 3 different quarian ones, including the Colossus!! Of course, this run I barely used Tali at all, I could've really used those in my last run
Now on to some more sidequesting and then I'll hopefully tackle Virmire later today, yay!

Is it Armax Arsenal Predator M armour?  That is very good armour, competitive with Colossus (lower damage protection, but better shields and power protection).

Jeph Shepard:

- More followup on Cayce and O'Loy at the lovely volcano station on Karumto. The place was shot to hell. A log said they were tracking down a Prothean artifact. I turned on the power. It triggered the volcano. This was Therum and Liara all over again. Now it was running for my life and hoping that Hammerhead could stay ahead of the lava. We made it out in time but it was close.

- Good news! Kelly is feeding my fish.

- Restored the shielding to the Sinmara colony. It was a good thing I came across this while planet scanning because they were doomed.

- Hit up the MSV Strontium Mule, which had been taken by the Blue Suns. Final entry log from the captain says the SM answered a distress call that was actually a Blue Suns trap. And this is why I hate mercs. They're not just guns for hire, but actual criminals. Recovered some sensitive intel and a substantial payload but none of it was worth the cost of the crew lives.

- The colony on Franklin was attacked by batarian terrorists. I had to stop them. They launched two missiles but I only had one kill switch. Had to choose between spaceport or civilians. Either way, the colony couldn't survive, but at least the colonists could be relocated elsewhere.

- Fake distress signal from the Blue Suns on Sanctum. I was going to put it, and them, out of commission. From what I can tell, this was an abandoned mining facility. At least the Blue Suns hadn't murdered them.

- Went to Haestrom to pick up a former squadmate, Tali. Don't know why TIM believed she'd join us but I was willing to give it a shot. It was tough deciding who to bring along. Garrus is a given but no Cerberus apologists. I think Mordin seems least threatening on the surface so I went with him. The solar radiation was harsh, frying shields when in direct sunlight. A quarian marine named Kal'Reegar said Tali was still alive despite the overwhelming number of geth on planet. Then I got to a console and made contact. The only thing that stood between us was a geth Colossus. Unlike the normal ones, this thing could ball up while its shields recovered, making it extremely difficult to kill. Kal'Reegar was the last of his squad and wanted to stupidly sacrifice himself. I'm all for that when there are no other options but we weren't that desperate yet. Besides, Tali asked me to keep him alive so it was the least I could do. In the end, I got Tali to come along with me. Grateful to have another trusted squadmate. Though Jacob was a bit of a dick in mentioning EDI to her when she came on board. I think he was okay but this made no sense. However, Tali did upgrade our shields with Cyclonic Barrier Technology. Should help us against Collector attacks.

- Decided to deal with Jack's problem and blow that Cerberus facility. It was abandoned so I shouldn't catch too much flak for it. Jack was frazzled but I put it to her like this was a mission and we were going to finish it. Was messed up, though. Kids had been brought there in crates, not always alive. What we learned, something even Jack didn't know, was that the facility was designed to turn her into a super-biotic. They ran experiments on those kids, often killing them, learning what they could and could not do to Jack. Even if TIM ultimately shut this place down, he also created it. Monstrous. We found a guy named Aresh who had been a survivor of Teltin. Only this guy was insane, deluding himself into thinking he could restart Teltin and figure out what the researchers had been searching for. The answer was Jack. She wasn't a mistake but what was done to her was. There'd be no more of this and getting rid of him would help Jack get her head on straight. Aresh died and we blew the facility. No one was resurrecting it.

- Tali got a message saying she was being accused of treason. She'd gotten leave to serve on the Normandy so it wasn't that. I decided to make this a priority and we went right to the Migrant Fleet. I figured she'd appreciate me not bringing anyone from Cerberus on board, so Garrus it was. She was being charged with bringing active geth to the fleet, which she denied ever doing. I believed her. Everything I knew about Tali said she'd never risk the lives of her people. Hell, she was mad about all the quarians who had died on Haestrom. They also renamed her Tali'Zorah vas Normandy, a strong indicator that they already considered her exiled. It was during the trial they said that geth had seized the lab ship Alarei and that all aboard, her father included, were dead. When we talked to Admiral Xen, she made it clear what the true purpose of the trial was: attempt to reclaim the quarian homeworld from the geth or find a new one. One option led to war and the other would help them start over. I didn't want them going to war. When the Reapers eventually showed up I needed this fleet intact. That wouldn't happen if they were all dead in space.
- We went to the Alarei. Dead quarians were everywhere and the geth were very active. Logs said that the quarians, Tali's father included, had intentionally activated the geth to test weapons on them. But they'd been careless and it had gotten out of control. Actually, Tali's father had done the worst of it and the other researchers sacrificed themselves to protect the rest of the fleet. We were able to find a master console to shut down any geth we'd missed. It also provided direct evidence that Tali's father was responsible for what had happened. It also stated that Tali did not send active geth. Tali begged me not to use that evidence, preferring exile over his name being disgraced and stricken from quarian records. At the trial, I decided to do as Tali said, but I had no evidence. So I rallied the crowd. Veetor and Kal'Reegar said if Tali were exiled, they wanted the same for themselves. Painted the admirals into a corner and they had no choice but to exonerate her due to lack of evidence. Damn lucky I saved those two. I also had a soft spot for Tali. I wasn't going to date her but I'd do anything to help her.

- Speaking of helping my friends, I decided it was time to help Garrus take out Sidonis before he disappeared. That meant going back to the Citadel. Captain Bailey pointed us to where we might find Fade. Turns out Fade was Harkin, the disgraced C-Sec asshole we'd met at Chora's Den. He was in the Factor District, defended by Eclipse mercs and mechs. All of which was useless. [To be continued due to a random glitch where I found myself in mid-air and unable to move.  For the record, I'm a Sentinel not a Vanguard so I have no idea what's causing this.]

"Hey there.
I'm still in shock about what just happened. We made progress, but at a terrible cost.
Everything's changed. And I'm sitting here in my cabin, it's late, I can't sleep. I drink.
Here's to Ash.
Well, I should tell you everything from the start, huh.
Kaidan, Wrex and I were dropped off with the Mako. We had to disable one of the AA guns on Virmire so that the Normandy could land at the salarian camp. Everything was crawling with geth, but we had no trouble getting through.
When we arrived at the camp, the salarian captain, Kirrahe, informed us about the situation. It was bad, Alec. Saren had used a facility on Virmire to breed a krogan army. He actually found a way to cure the genophage! We had to destroy the cure, and those krogan, before it was too late. But Wrex overheard it and got upset. I talked to him to calm him down. He is my friend, but things got kinda heated for a moment. He couldn't understand why I wanted to destroy those krogan. I really feel for him, what the genophage does to his people is terrible, but he got what I was saying to him. Saren only wanted to use those krogan as tools.
After that, Kirrahe laid out his plans. Their ship's drive system was to be converted to a bomb and brought into the facility with the Normandy to blow it up. He would use his teams as a distraction and attack the facility from the front, while me and my team sneaked in from the back to take care of any resistance. I liked this plan until he said he wanted one of my men to help coordinate the attack. I ended up choosing Kaidan because he had experience with aliens, and he was an outstanding soldier I had seen in action many times. We've been through much together up to this point and I trusted his abilities, and knew he was a total team player.
Ash would set up the bomb, so I sent her to the Normandy for the debriefing on how to do it. In the worst case I could set it up too, but I knew Ash could do it.
My team and the Normandy had their orders, so Wrex, Tali and I were off to deal with lots of geth in our way. We soon entered the facility, and it was horrible. We found salarians in holding cells, not all there anymore. They were part of Kirrahe's team. I let them all out so they could try and make it back, but some of them attacked us. One of them told us this bastard Saren studied indoctrination and had experimented on those poor salarians.
Further in we met an asari scientist, Rana Thanoptis. She told us more about Saren's studies and the indoctrination process and offered to let us into Saren's private lab in exchange for letting her go. I wasn't gonna kill her, so she was free to leave. No time to deal with her anyway.
Inside Saren's lab we found another Prothean beacon, and when I got close the same thing as on Eden Prime happened. The vision now included even more images, vividly, more clearly, but still I couldn't make out anything in these images or understand what the vision was supposed to tell me.
When we were about to leave, a hologram of Sovereign spoke to us. It isn't just a ship, Alec, Sovereign is a Reaper! And it mentioned cycles, all of this happening before, wiping out organic life over and over. That it wasn't the Protheans that built the relays and the Citadel, it was the Reapers. And they were about to return, even more of them! Sovereign is only one Reaper... imagine what they could do with a whole fleet of them. I put on a brave face, but man, I was scared shitless.
After this conversation we headed towards the rendezvous point as fast as we could and met up with the Normandy. The bomb was ready, Ash was ready. Everything went smoothly up to that point. But then Kaidan called. They were pinned down at the tower and he couldn't make it back, so Ash urged us to get him out of there and meet up with her again after that.
When we were halfway at Kaidan's position, we saw a geth dropship heading to the bomb site. I was gonna go back to help Ash because they couldn't fight off the geth, but then this mad woman activated the bomb. Kirrahe said little could stop it once it was activated. Ash knew it, and she knew how this would end. She sacrificed herself so all of us could get out...
I had no choice but to go for Kaidan and get the hell out of this place before the bomb would obliterate everything.
We got to Kaidan in time, but then Saren showed up. We fought, and I fell. He got me, grabbed my throat and held me into the air. He was strong, but when he was distracted by a sounding alarm, I hit him as hard as I could. He let go and escaped. And we ran to the Normandy as fast as we could.
Kaidan felt guilty about what happened to Ash, but what was I supposed to do? There would have been no happy end no matter what.
Why is all this fucking shit always happening to me?! What did I ever do to deserve this?
I'm sick of losing people close to me. You, my family, my unit, Ash... it's not fair.
I should be used to it by now, shouldn't I? But I'm not. It hurts like hell every fucking time, and the only thing I'm doing to get over it? Drowning my sorrow in booze again. Again and again. If Captain Anderson could see me right now he'd be so disappointed. I'm a drunken idiot, not the soldier he put all his hopes in. I should come to terms that things like these can and will happen. I knew they would when I signed up for the Alliance. I'm thinking that maybe I was never ready to join. It's just that frigging promise you and I made. Sometimes I wish I had never survived.
Forget it. Don't worry. I won't give up.
We have our next destination. Liara joined our minds again and recognised Ilos in the vision. We are heading for the Citadel to discuss further steps with Udina and the Council. Looks like they're finally listening, providing a fleet to help deal with Saren and the geth.
I guess I should probably try to get some sleep, or at least sober up. It would be pretty embarrassing showing up in front of the Council and Anderson with red eyes and bad breath, huh?

Miss you, now more than ever.
-Dee"

Pics:


End run has begun! I'm so excited to start ME2 again! Playing ME is such a vicious cycle I'm always way too excited to start the next game. Such a shame I won't finish ME1 until tomorrow (it's starting to get late, but I will at least play a little more until it's time for bed).

Jeph Shepard:

- Finally did track down Harkin and made him arrange a meeting with Sidonis. Then Garrus shot him in the knees. He was a two-bit criminal now, rather than just a drunken disgrace, so I think he got off easy. Not much to it. Garrus had me serve as a distraction while Garrus lined up the shot. Bang, end of story. As a Spectre - and one well-liked by the head of C-Sec - this assassination was a non-issue.

- While we were out this way, it made sense to stop by Tuchanka. Head Wrex was in charge these days and I could take care of whatever it was that was bothering Grunt and Mordin. I figured Mordin's issue first. The sooner I could get him off of Tuchanka the better. Mordin and Tali were with me to start. I seem to recall Wrex liking her and we weren't exactly going into territory friendly to salarians. Wrex pointed me to his Chief Scout for directions on finding the salarian. Sounded like the Blood Pack had him. Good. You know I love killing mercenaries.
- Once we got their, the Clan Weyrloc (Blood Pack) Clanspeaker sure lived up to his name. Wouldn't shut up. Was too stupid to know that my "missed" shot had hit a gas line. At least until my next shot ignited it and set the bastard on fire.
- Tali was surprised when I dressed down a missing Urdnot scout and called him a vorcha grub worked to motivate him to leave. Clearly she didn't understand how sensitive krogan were. Their pride was easily hurt and they'd do anything to prove they were strong. Later, I got to beat the Weyrloc clan leader to death. Does that mean I take control of the Blood Pack? When we made it to the lab it was clear Maelon was not a captive. He wanted to cure the genophage. Mordin shot him in the head for that betrayal but hung on to the data. Never knew when it might prove useful. Besides, I might just want a krogan army next to me when the Reapers showed up.

- Now it was time to deal with Grunt's issues. He thought he was acting strange but I thought he was a typical krogan. Brought Miranda along on this one for the heck of it. Oh, and I learned that pyjaks are space monkeys. Never liked those things. Thieving bastards stealing data modules.
- Wrex gave permission for Grunt to undergo his Rite of Passage, essentially a puberty ritual. Some asshole from another clan tried to stop it but I wasn't having it. The shaman told me I understood krogan ways better than some krogan, including the one who had come whining to him to prevent the ritual. I set him right with a headbutt.
- Looked like we'd be doing a lot of fighting. First up was a pack of varren. I'm pretty sure Miranda was enjoying herself here. Might make me bump up her mission to save her sister to the next one. Then there were the klixen, those fire breathing bugs. Loved how the gases inside of them cause them to explode when killed. Last up? A damn thresher maw. Don't get me wrong. I've killed my share of these bastards but always using the Mako cannon. On food was going to make it interesting. The asshole showed up when it was over, impressed we'd done what no one had since Wrex in not just surviving but killing the thresher maw. He wanted him to join his clan, but with massive restrictions, including inability to serve on alien ships (mine) or to breed. I wasn't surprised when Grunt told him to go to hell. And then that guy was dead. For the record, Grunt was offered several breeding requests, and I got one as well. Almost tempting but I think sex with a krogan could be lethal to me.

- Landed on Illium. Docking fees were paid for by Liara. I wondered where she got the money to do that sort of thing but was told she was one of their most respected information brokers. That's quite the leap from archaeologist in only two years. In any case, I wanted to meet with Miranda's contact first. Before that happened, I ran into Gianna Parasini and once again helped her take down some white collar criminal. News said my mother turned down an admiral's star, calling it a political ploy, and would serve my memory best by captaining a ship. Go Mom!
- Got sidetracked when I saw Conrad Verner trying to get a bartender at Eternity to hand over the deed. He'd been duped by an asari vendor into believing that Eternity was selling red sand and that taking the lounge would help crack the ring. Which was all bullshit. I went to that asari and made her tell Conrad that he'd done a good job.

Now I've finished ME1 with Paragon Amy Shepard, and I've got some nice screens from the final moments of the game:

Kaidan in Shepard's office before Ilos. I think they really care about each other. Kaidan is a great guy; I didn't appreciate him at first, but he's been growing on me. That's really one type I consistently like in Bioware games - relatively straightforward and untroubled people who just do their best and don't have any crazy drama behind (or ahead) of them. Drama is nice but sometimes you need a break, and Kaidan is good for that purpose



In Ilos, where everything went to hell. The view of the Conduit is pretty epic:



Shepard trying to convince Saren to fight Sovereign.



When Shepard is involved, everything explodes and hell breaks out.



In the end, I chose to save the Council and appoint Udina as Councilor. I always felt that sorry guy was misunderstood It's a shame that BW made him a traitor, I think humanity really needed someone like him - an ass, but a shrewd politician Someone's gotta do the dirty work...

Although I'm tempted to storm the Collectors right away, I think I'll take a break from the Trilogy and replay Andromeda. Shepard can have a much-deserved break. I'll have to play MEA with more care and with a more completionist attitude, maybe then I'll start to appreciate it more. Believe it or not, I actually liked Andromeda more than the Trilogy when I first played it in March, but replaying MET this summer has completely changed my opinion  Now MEA feels more or less like a disgrace.

Oh well... I'll talk about Andromeda more in another thread. Meanwhile, I'll let Shepard rest in the gentle embrace of the Lazarus Programme

This is also a favorite moment of mine. Don't know what happens if Anderson tries to go the other route but I love seeing Udina getting a punch in the face. He's a backstabber and seeing him get what's coming to him is the best.

fraggle: I have to admit that I love seeing Kaidan survive, and in that lovely Colossus armor. I'm used to everyone killing Kaidan who isn't a gay guy(or the occasional woman who romances him) so it's nice to see him around.

I think you've inspired me to do an infiltrator in my next playthrough (and I, too, have deleted games that don't fit alongside the MET). You've given me a decent reason to wear something other than the crappy Onyx IV armor that I use for looks alone (can't find better Onyx - maybe VIII once, but never X).

So far my PS3 is still working, so here we go

"Dear Alec,
you're probably wondering why I didn't write for two years.
Well, some really bad things happened. The Normandy was attacked by an unknown enemy, and ripped to shreds while we were out in space to fight remaining geth pockets.
I don't remember much. I remember I managed to get Joker in one of the escape pods, but I didn't make it off the Normandy. I passed out drifting in space.
I woke up in an unfamiliar facility, a woman giving me orders over the comms and guiding me through the station. The facility had been attacked by security mechs and I had no clue what was going on. Just that someone was trying to kill me. After I had lost contact with her I met one of the station's personnel, a man named Jacob Taylor.
He said I died.
I don't feel like I did, but if that was dying, it was nothing like I had imagined. I didn't see you... Guess there's no afterlife, huh. Well, I'm not sure I ever believed in this kind of thing anyway, but it helped to pretend.
I got confirmation my old team got out. Most of them, anyway. Pressly died. A few others from the lower deck.
Jacob answered some more of my questions, when someone called Wilson radioed for help. I remembered him from when I gained consciousness once. He was wounded and we headed his way to help him.
That's when Jacob dropped the bomb. They were Cerberus, and I was inside a Cerberus facility. Said their boss wanted to talk to me and that we needed to leave the station immediately. But just before we arrived at the shuttles, this woman that helped me (and actually was in charge of reviving me) appeared and shot Wilson, claiming he was a traitor that had let the mechs loose. Her name's Miranda Lawson. There wasn't much I could do but to follow them, and we took a shuttle to another station. That's where I met their boss, or rather his holo.
The Illusive Man. My hatred for Cerberus was boiling up, but this man claimed that entire human colonies just vanished, and that whoever did this was working for the Reapers. He asked me to at least check out one of the colonies, and if I didn't find any evidence to prove he was right, I could part ways with him.
Sounded like a good deal, and since I didn't trust him anyway I thought we wouldn't find anything of relevance. I suspected this would be an easy way out for me, but I couldn't have been more wrong.
The colony, Freedom's Progress, was completely deserted. Not a single person left. Just some mechs to fight. We only ran into a quarian team led by Tali. It was so good to see her alive and well. She told us that they were looking for a quarian named Veetor, who stayed at this colony for his pilgrimage.
I didn't think we'd find him alive, but Tali told me he had hidden and was never taken away like the colonists. We found him unharmed and he showed us some security footage. Miranda suspected the aliens shown in the footage abducting the colonists are Collectors. Never heard of them, but apparently they live beyond the unmapped Omega 4 relay and often trade specimens of various species with genetic mutations with slavers or mercs in exchange for their technology. Pretty weird if you ask me. Wonder what they do with them.
Veetor had some data on the Collectors we could take back to the Illusive Man, and I asked Tali if she'd come with me, but she was on a mission of her own, so I was stuck with Miranda and Jacob. I wasn't happy it came to this, but the Illusive Man was right. Reluctantly I agreed to work with him for now so I could help to maybe get back those colonists, and prevent others from being abducted.
The Illusive Man gave me a list of candidates for this mission and did everything to make me feel comfortable enough to cooperate. He presented a new Normandy, Joker as my pilot, and Dr. Chakwas as the ship's doctor. It already feels like I'm falling for some kind of trap, but my hands are tied for now. I will try and get in contact with the Council though, maybe I can convince them to help me. If there's any way to get out of this mess, I'd take it in a heartbeat. I don't expect much though, seeing how Joker told me they tried to sweep everything I've uncovered under the rug. Man, I really want my team back, but all of them have moved on. It's been 2 fucking years...
It was strange boarding the new Normandy. It's different, but still close enough to the old one. She also was upgraded with an AI, which is rather interesting for me. I've always been interested in that kind of stuff and I can't wait to see what it does, and how it improves the Normandy.
I saw some other new faces on-board, but for now I retreated to my cabin. First thing I did was to get out of these damn Cerberus clothes they put me in. And I needed some time for myself, to process all this. It was a lot to take in.
Miranda told me they'd made sure I was brought back exactly like I was before. Guess they managed. I still look like myself. My tired brown eyes. The red hair, no denying my Irish roots. The broken nose from when I fell out the window and down on my face like an idiot when I was 13, trying to sneak out in the middle of the night to meet you.
Remember that? Mum was so mad at me I thought she'd keep me in my room forever. And Kait with her wise-ass comments, "told you you'd get caught someday" on repeat. Man, I miss those times. I miss my childhood. I miss you. Everything was so much easier back then.
I have some scars from when they put me back together, and I also find my body feels stronger, more aware. More agile. My senses are heightened. I don't know what they did to me, and it feels strange, but it's quite an asset in combat. It's probably best not to think about what Cerberus did with me while "rebuilding" me. I'm just one more of their fucked up experiments I guess.
Allright. I think I'm ready to check out the new crew. If I'm in their hands now, I'd like to know what I'm getting into.

-Dee"

Pics here:


I'm glad I can talk to everyone on the ship this time. It was interesting with Jesse to never talk to the Cerberus crew and only do this late in the game, but now things are back to normal, hehe.

"Heya Alec,
made my rounds and talked with all of the crew. Surprisingly, most of them are alright so far. It's clear that some of them don't even know anything about Cerberus, or not a lot at least. I think many of them just swallow their "Cerberus got humanity's best interests at heart" bullshit without even having the faintest what Cerberus is doing in secret.
So I decided to give most of them a chance. Miranda and Jacob are still the ones I keep my eye on, but even Jacob claims he doesn't trust the Illusive Man. We'll see.
But I learned some interesting things. Miranda is genetically modified, and Jacob and her once stopped a batarian threat on the Citadel that was swept under the rug too.
Then we have two engineers on board, Kenneth Donnelly and Gabby Daniels. They seem like nice kids and I believe them when they say they know nothing about their employer. They were Alliance and are here because they wanted to support me and join the fight against the Reapers. Too bad they chose this side, but at least they're fighting for something they believe in, and I can use the support.
Let's see, who else? We have a cook who joined Cerberus to make a difference after he lost his family to batarian scum. Got that in common.
Then there's also Kelly Chambers, our yeoman and basically a counselor. She seems okay. She's not even anti-alien, which I thought was tough to find among Cerberus.
And I checked out the ship's AI, EDI, and I gotta say it's impressive. We'll see how it fares, but it operates the Normandy's electronic and cyberwarfare suites in combat. It can break through firewalls of other ships' wireless networks, so the ships' systems would be under its control. Pretty neat. I tried to poke it some more about Cerberus, but they put blocks into the AI. Figures.
Also had a chat with Chakwas and Joker. It's good to have these two back with me. Feels at least a little bit like home.
I took a look at the dossiers the Illusive Man put together and decided I want to find Dr. Mordin Solus as soon as possible, a salarian biological weapons expert working at a clinic on Omega. We know from Veetor that the Collectors work with Seeker swarms, some kind of mechanic insects to paralyse people, so finding Mordin Solus sounds like a reasonable plan, because he's hopefully able to create a countermeasure.
But first I want to make sure that Anderson knows what happened, so we're heading to the Citadel. He has sent me an e-mail after hearing rumours about me being alive. I want to talk to him, and I really hope he can somehow help me. Fingers crossed.

-Dee"

Pics!