Chapter 1: Freedom's Progress

"The Illusive Man is very impressed with you," said Miranda, an undertone of doubt in her voice. "I'm eager to see if you can live up to his expectations on this mission."

"I never got a chance to say how much I appreciate what the Lazarus Project did for me," said Shepard, grateful to be alive, even if the circumstances were less than ideal. And Miranda was apparently the person to thank.

"I just hope it was worth it. A lot of people lost their lives on that station."

"With all that time you spent bringing me back," said Shepard, "you don't seem to like me very much."

"I have the utmost respect for your abilities, Shepard," replied the beautiful, but ice cold woman who stood before him. "It's your motivations that concern me. I believe in what Cerberus stands for. Only time will tell if you're going to be an asset, or a liability to our cause."

"Tell me about yourself, Miranda," said Shepard, changing the subject, desperately trying to get a bead on a woman who was attached to the mission that he was about to embark upon, and whom he might have to work with for the foreseeable future. Also, as the face of Cerberus, he wanted to know her as thoroughly as he could.

"Worried about my qualifications?" she asked tersely. "I can shoot a mech's head off from 100 meters away or just as easily crush it with my biotics; take your pick."

Shepard shook his head. He had been cordial, even friendly with the woman from the first moment they had met. He would be lying if he said that he did not find her attractive, but he had treated Jacob the same. He had been able to establish a bit of a rapport with Jacob; perhaps joining him in a firefight against the mechs had helped, but try as he might, he could not make any kind of connection with Miranda.

"It's obvious you're not interested in talking," he said in frustration.

"I'm not here to make friends," she retorted. "We've got an assignment. We can talk about it, or we can do it."

Miranda turned away, abruptly ending the conversation. Shepard walked away, shaking his head. If she's going to act like this on the mission, he thought, she's going to be useless.

Shepard engaged in some light conversation with Jacob before they boarded the shuttle to go to Freedom's Progress. Jacob seemed like a pleasant enough man, but also a bitter man; based on what Jacob said, he had served in the Alliance Navy and had seen the bureaucracy trump good sense and paperwork mire good men and women. Political correctness and career concerns outweighed military readiness, and nobody wanted to do anything for fear of ending up with egg on their face. Shepard had seen his share of this himself, and it was amplified greatly once the Council was involved. It was the very reason he had been forced to conspire with Captain Anderson and steal the Normandy in order to go to Ilos. He had saved the Council, Humanity, and the galaxy, but he had also deep sixed any prospect of advancement. Udina made sure of that. He was "promoted to captain" while simultaneously being busted down to lieutenant, which netted him his original rank of commander.

Jacob had been excited after Shepard and his team stopped Sovereign, but once Shepard was gone, the Alliance and the Council had backslidden on everything. Or so Jacob said; so far, the only thing he had to go on was the word of Miranda and Jacob, and Miranda was not very forthcoming at this juncture. As he pondered these things, Miranda spoke to him.

"We should be there shortly, Shepard. The Illusive Man put us under your command. Do you have any orders?"

It really grated on him the level of familiarity that Miranda had assumed with him. He held a rank, and even putting that aside, calling someone by their last name so casually was just rude; she could address him as 'sir' or just mister. He noticed that Jacob was picking up the habit as well, though when Jacob did it, it did not bother him quite as much. Orders … before orders could be given, information needed to be shared.

"What did you find at the other colonies?" he asked, as he felt that this was important to know.

"Nothing," said Jacob with frustration. "No signs of attack, no corpses, not even a trace of unusual genetic material to give us a clue. They just … disappeared. We've got no target to go after."

"What makes you think this investigation will turn up anything new?" He really hoped that Jacob or Miranda had a concrete answer. But it was not to be.

"At other colonies, official investigators got there first," replied the former Alliance soldier. "Sometimes looters or salvage teams as well. We're hoping to be the first ones there this time; maybe find clues before somebody else disturbs the scene."

Great, he thought; the 'it'll be different because we'll be there first' attitude. In fairness, getting there first did often make a crucial difference in an investigation, but still, they had nothing concrete, no clues whatsoever.

"Our first priority is to look for survivors," declared Shepard.

"That isn't likely, Commander," interjected Miranda. "All of the other colonies have been empty."

Yeah, genius; tell me something we don't already know, he thought, shaking his head.

"Still, it would be nice to find something other than a ghost town," said Jacob hopefully.

The mission, as it turned out, did bear fruit and offer clues; big ones. It seemed that a Quarian named Veetor had been visiting Freedom's Progress as part of his pilgrimage. And Tali Zorah Na Raya, now Tali Zorah Vas Neema, was there with a team to try to recover him. Tali agreed to work with Shepard, much to the distress of the rest of her team, who continually reminded her that Cerberus was an enemy.

Most of Tali's team died because they broke with the plan and were ambushed by mechs, mechs programed by Veetor to attack anything that moved. Shepard and his two teammates took out the mechs fairly easily, and then found Veetor. In questioning him, they learned that the Collectors were behind the attacks on the human colonies, employing seeker swarms; swarms of bug-like robots that immobilized the entire colony, allowing the Collectors to just collect the colonists at their leisure.

Miranda had moved to take Veetor back with them, but Tali objected, offering to forward Veetor's omni-tool data to Cerberus. Shepard's authority would now be tested. He decided that there was nothing that further they could get from Veetor that would be of any benefit to them, and he wanted to work with Tali, not against her.

"Veetor goes with Tali," Shepard declared.

To his surprise, Miranda demurred. In fact, she had been cooperative and very helpful throughout the mission. Though he hated to admit it, the two worked well in the field together. She reminded him a lot of Kaiden with regards to her abilities and skill set, though Kaiden was a soldier, not an operative. Still, he did find that she complemented him well in the field, much more so than Jacob, who was also like Kaiden in his own way, but not nearly as capable as the late lieutenant.

Upon returning, the Illusive Man and Shepard discussed the Collectors and the implications for humanity. Most importantly, both of them agreed that the Collectors were agents for the Reapers. But Shepard would need a team and a ship. The Illusive Man conveniently had dossiers at the ready. A little too conveniently, Shepard thought, but it was what it was.

"You'll need a ship," said the Illusive Man. Shepard heard footsteps behind him. "And I think we've found a pilot you can trust." He turned to see Joker standing there, wearing a Cerberus uniform.

"Hey Commander."

As amazed and overjoyed as he was to be reunited with an old friend, he was even more amazed at the revelation that Cerberus had built a new Normandy; the SR-2. Bigger, more powerful, and much faster than the old Normandy. But it was what was aboard the ship that deepened the plot; an AI named Edi, who was little more than an electronic spy from what Shepard could tell, and Doctor Chakwas, another old friend.

Like Jacob, both Joker and Chakwas told of how the Alliance was ignoring the Reaper threat, and how they had covered up all of the evidence and essentially told the public that the threat was no greater than the Geth. That had been going on before the old Normandy had been destroyed, but apparently, once they thought he was gone, they threw Shepard under the bus, saying that his warnings of greater danger were mistaken and/or delusional.

The rest of the crew was like any Alliance crew, and as it turned out, many were former Alliance sailors. His engineers, Gabby and Ken, had flown in the Battle of the Citadel. When Ken had been outspoken in his defense of Shepard's warnings to the point of insubordination, Cerberus had noticed and picked up the couple to serve under Shepard aboard the new Normandy. Both of them confirmed that the Alliance and the Council were doing nothing; they wanted to fight the real enemy, and only Cerberus seemed to be doing that. Interestingly, aside from Miranda and Jacob, the rest of the crew knew very little about the greater Cerberus organization. Shepard knew far more than he wished; killing Admiral Kohoku, Rachni and Thorian Creeper experimentation, and all manner of genetic experiments in order to create some kind of super soldier in what had been dubbed the Hades' Dogs project.

Whatever the circumstances though, Shepard knew that he had to fight the Reapers and the Collectors. He knew firsthand how recalcitrant the Alliance brass and the Council were. No, he thought, I can't go to them. Looks like I'll be using Cerberus to get the job done.