Eyes part 1

Finally, the cocoon of "stasis" releases Alenko, but the man does not go limp in the chair, but assumes a normal pose that does not indicate post-stress relaxation.

Chapter 6. A conversation with Captain Anderson about the Reapers.

Shepard doesn't feel like grinning. The captain barely has time to think that if the bureaucrats of the Alliance of Systems MSF decided to load him, the commander of the landing crew, with the position of XO, then they themselves did not know which airlock and what they had opened.

Pilot Jeff Moro became the third on Shepard's list for educational work. On the screen of his mind, Shepard habitually "went through" his personal file. A colorful character. He hijacked the Normandy during flight tests, doing something like this on it... That for three weeks in a row made all the officers of the three Alliance MSF bases, from the platoon commander and above, tremble with fear of the consequences. Anyone who had anything to do with Lieutenant Moro and his escapade. And in the army, all reasonable organics wearing shoulder straps are involved in such antics. Even the innocent ones. Even the innocent ones.

Because when there is no one to punish, everyone has to be punished.

"Are you getting used to the status of the senior assistant commander of the frigate?" Captain Anderson's calm and somewhat matter-of-fact voice rang out from behind Shepard. After finishing the work with Alenko and Jenkins. Although, almost any reasonable organic would hardly have forced himself to even try to understand exactly what kind of work the new senior assistant and at the same time commander of the amphibious crew of the prototype frigate had done with their colleagues. After finishing his work, Shepard, taking advantage of his new opportunities — he had to somehow master what he had been given, or rather, what he now had at his disposal, began to get acquainted with materials that could be conditionally called "information for reflection."

These reflections were already difficult, even for him, a high-class special forces officer. They firmly discouraged any desire to classify themselves, human, earthling, man, to some kind of "perfection". Now Shepard, quite possibly, did not understand himself what information he had gathered and from where — not only his consciousness, but also his subconscious mind was working at full capacity. The latter is even more so. Shepard already understood something. And this realization was even more bitter. The appearance of the frigate commander in the cabin did not interrupt the process of receiving and processing information for a second. As the XO realized, he had to parallelize, and he managed to do this without much effort and without the expected problems.

"That's right, sir." Shepard spun around on the spot and stood at attention in front of the frigate's senior officer. His boss.

Now the captain clearly remembered that the door to the cabin had not been locked. And even if he had locked it, the commander of the Normandy has plenty of opportunities to open any room and any container on the ship entrusted to him.

"Are you trying to make Jenkins sweat?" Anderson continued to ask, without moving from his seat and looking at the senior assistant with interest. The commander of the landing crew had no doubt that the commander of the ship was sufficiently aware of the changes that had taken place with Shepard. That's right, sir," Shepard agonized over whether he should say something now or whether this explanation could be postponed. Finally, he made up his mind.

"I beg your permission, sir, to speak frankly."

"You are my senior assistant. So you shouldn't ask for permission to do this. I don't like misunderstandings with the officers who make up the command of the ship's crew," Anderson replied, gesturing for his junior colleague to sit on the jump seat and taking another seat next to it. "I'm listening to you, Captain."

"I am put in a situation where I will have to combine two positions." After a few seconds of silence, the XO said. "It doesn't scare me. I was taught that. I've learned that." Shepard noticed that the door to the salon was now securely closed and the hologram of the lock was glowing red. This meant that the frigate commander, who entered the cabin, had already assumed something like such a conversation. This turn of events was encouraging. "Of course, I was more trained to be a paratrooper. And I know that the senior assistant commander of the ship is responsible for most of the practical work with the ship and the crew. I also know, sir, that the invisibility system test is a legend. In fact, we're following Eden Prime for a completely different reason."

"And Shepard, can you even name that reason?" Anderson asked calmly.

"Yes, Commander," Shepard dispensed with the legal and protocol formula for addressing the officer in charge of the ship. "Having accepted the status of senior assistant, I have no right not to know this reason and cannot but understand what is behind it. But I won't name her out loud. This is neither the time nor the place." he emphasized. — "According to my preliminary calculations, there are less than two days left before the arrival in the Eden Prime orbit. Commander, why isn't the Systems Alliance Fleet monitoring Eden Prime and the surrounding space if our frigate is heading there? We're intelligence."

"You're right. We are intelligence. And Eden Prime is an agricultural colony of humans. And, to be honest, it is one of the most valuable for humanity. Shepard, you know perfectly well that protocol prohibits the Alliance of Systems Fleet from "hanging" military tracking satellites in the orbit of a purely peaceful planet."

"Commander, when did you receive the latest information on the situation around the planet?" Captain Shepard asked, maintaining calmness and indifference in both posture and voice.

"Half an hour ago. When I came to you, I studied them again. There are no changes. And by the way, what changes do you expect, Captain?" He looked at the XO carefully.

"Big changes, Commander," Shepard replied. "The agricultural planet Eden Prime is marked in all catalogs as a planet with Prothean ruins. Very different. Even those that archaeologists have not yet reached."

"As for the ruins, I agree. I even know what you're getting at, Captain." Anderson said softly.

"May I use the Alliance Network, Captain? I want to show you something using both military and civilian net resources."

"Permission granted." Anderson clicked his instrumentron, ran his fingers over the virtual keyboard, giving the command to the frigate's VI.

Shepard clicked his omny-tool, opened his keyboard, and typed in a few commands. The picture of the depths of space on the observation window faded. The inner "cabin" curtain rose to its working position, covering the glass, and a screen lit up on its surface. With several commands, Shepard called up an image received from a number of Alliance surveillance posts and from sensors of several civilian tracking systems.

In the center of the screen, which replaced the observation window, the main screen unfolded, around which smaller screens were placed. A few commands were typed on the command console, and all the small screens were combined in the center of the main screen.

"This cloud of cosmic dust is now being observed by manual and automatic systems from thirty points," said Shepard. "Its dimensions exceed six kilometers in diameter. The cloud is moving slowly," he typed in several commands, tracing a course line. "His final destination is Eden Prime, Commander. You can check the calculation. The course has been accurate and unchanged for the last half a day."

"Willingly." Anderson clicked on the keyboard of his omny-tool. "You're right, Captain. What are your conclusions?"

"Here is a table of motion characteristics of this cloud." Shepard called up the named table on the screen, linking it to the image of the cloud and its course. "It tends to appear natural, but in fact its movement obeys artificial algorithms." he brought up another table on the screen. "Here is the proof of what I said using five formulas. Different formulas, Commander."

"There are also some space objects that move according to a textbook," said Anderson.

"I agree. But only in one case." Shepard typed a few more commands on the keyboard of his omny-tool. The image of the cloud began to spread across the entire area of the screen. "If it remains what it wants to appear under the scan filters. A cloud of cosmic dust." The senior assistant typed in a few more commands. "I ordered the military and civilian tracking systems to change the filter grid at this facility for a few seconds. The systems are switched on from sixteen points," he spread the central screen across the sixteen lobe screens, on which the same cloud appeared from different angles. And under it...

"Reflection, play of light, unevenness" Anderson said, clicking off commands on his omny-tool. "So what? People can see anything there! Including the "shrimp"."

"I agree." Shepard tapped out a few more commands. "I have connected to the Extranet databases on archeology." Next to the first, a second screen flashed with the same "daisy" of small screens. "Images of such "shrimps" are found on a wide variety of material surfaces, which date back thousands and sometimes millions of years." With several commands, he brought together the "petals" of the archaeological "daisy". Look, if you superimpose an archaeological image on "this", it will be "one-on-one". So this, Commander, is not a trick of the light." Shepard remained calm and spoke steadily. This is an artificial object. More precisely, a ship.

"A ship traveling under the cover of a cloud of cosmic dust to Eden Prime?" Anderson asked, clicking off more commands on his omny-tool. "And how did the tracking services miss this? Wait, Shepard. My calculation shows..."

"That this ship is likely to be over the planet in less than a day." the commander of the landing crew finished. "And we, the Normandy, will arrive there when this ship is already on the planet. As far as I understand, there is no way for us to accelerate for a number of reasons in order to arrive at Eden at the same time as the "guest". For a number of reasons."

"What. Is. he. There. Have you forgotten?" according to the words, Anderson uttered in a completely uncharacteristic manner of speech.

"Sixteen images from the Archaeological Base depict this ship during the time periods preceding the death of most intelligent and unintelligent life forms on planets where such images have been preserved." Shepard said steadily.

"This can only mean one thing — with the arrival of such a ship on the planet, the..." Anderson paused heavily for him. A war in which native forms of intelligent and unintelligent life...

"They were almost completely destroyed. Or enslaved. Without any prospect of liberation or salvation," Shepard finished.

"An invasion?" Anderson gave Shepard a direct and precise look. "How did you manage to unearth this?"

"He was standing. Watched. Thought. I compared the facts. I logged into the Extranet and looked at profile sites" Shepard replied, although he used an Extranet... very specific. Which one — he himself could not have clearly explained to the interlocutor. But certainly not galactic, which is familiar to most intelligent organics.

Now the XO understood that the frigate commander would not "find fault" with the ways, methods and means of obtaining such a conclusion.

"It turns out that we're going..." said Anderson thoughtfully.

"Right into the dragon's mouth," Shepard said. "As far as I know, it's the off-season between harvest periods on most of Eden Prime's surface. And, anticipating your next question, Commander, I will answer: according to all the data that I have been able to find in open sources, there are no fleets on the entire course of this ship capable of stopping or even delaying it. I am not saying now that there are no separate ships capable of it, this "guest"." He pointed with a slight nod of his head at the screen, where a giant "shrimp" was glowing, "destroy. Also." With a few clicks on the keyboard of his omny-tool, Shepard made the lines of responsibility appear on the screen "The guest ship follows exclusively the Earth's areas of responsibility. And for us humans, thanks to the Farixen," The XO said this with ill-concealed malicious irony, "now there are no forces to stop his progress. According to control and surveillance posts, according to hardware tracking systems" He brought up several tables and graphs on the screens. "The armor of this ship is sixteen times more advanced than the armor of the "Path of Destiny" known to us. And this is the best ship in the explored part of the Milky Way, which can still somehow compete with this monster.

"But the Asari won't give it to us. Neither for rent, nor for leasing," Captain Anderson remarked with obvious sadness in his voice. "They won't believe it." The commander was silent for a few seconds, staring at the pictures, diagrams, tables and graphs glowing on the screens. "Quickly, they won't believe you. That's for sure. But slowly... They just won't want to believe it. Among other things, they won't have enough time to realize... full, necessary-full awareness of this fact."

"They will refer to the fact that this problem "climbs" to our planet and our area of responsibility. That's why it's our headache. Therefore, we, earthlings, should deal with all the consequences," concluded Shepard.

"The damned Russian question: "What should I do?"" Anderson said.

"Commander, I am more interested in the answer to another, no less Russian question, "Who is to blame"?" Shepard retorted. "More precisely, who is this guy who is trying to get to us on such a superdreadnought? This is clearly not a taxi like the same "Way of Destination"."

"Jeff," Anderson looked up at the ceiling of the cabin. Shepard remembered that he hated calling his pilot by his nickname, "The Joker."

"Yes, Captain," Moro replied immediately. It seems that the ship's pilot has already developed a conditioned (turning into an unconditional) reflex to respond to the frigate commander's appeal. And, most likely, the pilot has already accustomed himself to connecting to the communication and information systems of the compartment where the "first after god" was located at a particular moment in time.

"The latest update on the presence of Alliance ships in the area of the destination planet," Anderson said.

"Less than a day and a half before the frigate arrives, sir. There are no Alliance ships in the area," the pilot replied and turned off the channel.

"You said it right, Captain," Anderson said after a few seconds of silence. "The Farixens. Using the weakest link..."