Disclaimer: See Chapter I - Beginnings

The Rift

Chapter XXI

In The Den of Shadows

Hell. Interesting, but hell. These were the words that came to mind when Anthony through back on the last twenty months he had spent at the Lazarus Research Station. While not an official member of Cerberus, he had been issued the same uniforms as most of the other operatives on the base, although he had taken the time himself to remove the black and gold Cerberus logos from the shoulders. After a few months of taking them off, whoever maintained the uniforms had apparently given up, and the ones that came back in his wardrobe in his small quarters all were devoid of the emblem.

The Chief Medical Officer for the Lazarus Project, Martin Wilson, had taken over his medical training, and with significantly fewer things exploding around him, he had gone through the entire Alliance Field Medic course. His intensity of training was far more than what he had gitten used to, either from his initial training in the Marines, or the tender mercies of Dr. Chakwas. Once he was confident that Anthony knew enough about modern technologies, Wilson focused more on the primary goal of the project, reviving John.

Miranda Lawson was something else, entirely. While she encouraged his skills and would allow him to help with some of the more minor details of the project, she demanded nothing less than perfection. Seeming to have almost a permanent scowl when looking over reports, she was, by far, the toughest superior he had ever worked under, even blowing away his original drill instructor from basic training, CPO Mendez. Once the Alliance had started outfitting weapons with the new thermal clip technology, she reassigned him to assist one of the security leads, Jacob Taylor, in getting the Cerberus weapons up to the same standard.

Thanks to working with Jake, he had gotten himself more than familiar with the weapons from this time, and now had a decent handle on them, even going so far as being able to field strip most of them in under a minute and a half. It was still far slower than the average twenty five seconds that the average grunt that grew up with this kind of technology, muscle memory still reaching for a standard magazine now and then, or a missed bolt that wouldn't allow the weapon to fold up completely into the compact storage mode, leaving it looking awkward.

In his quarters, having just reassembled the Spectre Armory sniper rifle he had held onto since the Battle of the Citadel, he was back to looking over some of the progress reports on John. Physically, the Lazarus Project had been doing what, to him, sounded like the most farfetched science fiction. Dead organs were revived with cybernetics and cloned tissue. Shattered bones mended and reinforced by carbon nanotubes. Muscles rebuilt with synthetic fibers.

"Mr. Snyder, report to med bay one." His omni-tool suddenly lit up with Miranda's voice, catching him slightly off guard. Reaching up, he simply hit a button to acknowledge the message. Letting out a quiet sigh, he stood, pulling the Cerberus-issued top over his undershirt, intentionally leaving it untucked just to mess with Miranda's sense of perfection, knowing full well she couldn't really do anything against him. Exiting his room, he began the trek towards the medical wing, and the heart of Lazarus Station, passing several of the base's security mechs on the way. The robots reminded him of a cross between a Terminator, and a Star Wars battle droid. A little intimidating, but at the same time, completely ridiculous when left to their own devices.

The three heavy mechs that he knew the base had, however, were another story. He had seen test video, and was immediately reminded of an ED-209, a hulking mass of metal and wires, able to kill at a moment's notice. Thankfully, they were kept in a hibernation mode, strategically placed around the base, ready to be activated automatically, or at an order from Miranda.

Walking into the medbay, he was broken from his musings when he saw the procedure table. On it, was unmistakably John. He looked like he had just been through a meat grinder, but it was him. Hair had begun to grow back. A tube down his throat was hooked up to a ventilator, keeping his breathing at a natural rate, if not a little stiff movement. All over, however, were places where his skin had not quite finished growing back, the dim orange glow of cybernetics shining through. Miranda stood off to the side, staring at one of the computer readouts. Wilson was monitoring some kind of experiment of his, off in the side at an isolation pod.

Looking up, Miranda gestured him over. "I thought you might want to see this. Physical reconstruction is almost complete, and we've been slowly working on the neurological rebuilding for a month, now. He's actually been showing some promising brain activity." Anthony nodded and looked over to what just might be his friend, brought back from the abyss.

"Miranda, I won't say it's not amazing. But is it actually John in there?" Miranda didn't answer, instead just looking at the readouts on her screen. Recognizing when she didn't want to say anything either way, simply because she didn't have enough information, he decided to change the subject. "What's Marty working on over there?" That brought a small smile to her lips, as well as a quiet grumble from the doctor, hating the nickname, which is why Anthony used it.

"Actually, that's the reason I called you here. While putting Commander Shepard back together, we had a thought." Miranda stood and walked over to the table, putting a hand lightly on John's bare shoulder. "What if the famous human Spectre was also a biotic? Would that have helped him in any way? Could that have made the fight against Saren, the Geth, and Sovereign any easier? Maybe even a biotic field might have kept him alive?" Anthony raised an eyebrow, looking over.

"But, isn't the whole human biotic thing something that has to happen before you're born? Especially since it's not natural with us like it is for asari, or krogan?" Miranda nodded.

"Normally, yes. But Wilson and I have developed a process to artificially introduce element zero into the human neurologic systems, creating a biotic out of anyone. That...is where you come in. I want to make sure it works. With you. All of our data suggests it will." Anthony had a bit of a double take between Miranda and Wilson, eyes wide.

"If it wasn't for the fact that I know you don't joke, I'd swear you were joking, Miranda. But since you're not, I'm going to have to say 'hell no' to the guinea pig thing. I appreciate the thought, and definitely have enjoyed my time here, finishing up my training, and really getting fully adjusted to this time. But I'll pass on the whole 'experime..." A beep from one of the computers cut him off, drawing everyone's attention. Wilson went over to the far side of the treatment bed, checking on one of the monitors on that side. Miranda went to the other console, pulling up the recording of the readouts. Suddenly, there was another tone from the equipment, Miranda's gaze shooting up to the readings.

"There. On the monitor. Something's wrong..." Wilson looked over, then hurriedly tapped on his screen, pulling up a real-time brain-wave map of John. As Anthony looked at the screen, he saw the readings starting to spike. Wilson looked over to the two of them.

"He's reacting to outside stimuli...showing an awareness of his surroundings." John's head started to move slowly, eyes cracking open for a moment before closing again at the brightness of the lights. "Oh my god, Miranda. I think he's waking up." All three went to him, Miranda hesitating only a moment, mostly out of shock, before looking up to Martin.

"Damn it, Wilson, he's not ready yet! Give him the sedative!" Shepard's eyes had cracked open again, and looking around the room, his gaze fixed on the one thing he recognized. Anthony. Slowly, his hand reached up, but Anthony walked forward, shaking his head and pushing John's hand slowly back down. Wilson took a syringe, injecting it directly into one of the fluid lines going under the sheet on the table.

"John, it's all right. You're safe. Just lie still. You need to stay calm." The beeping from the machines was steadily increasing. Wilson looked over to his monitors, a bit of panic starting to creep into his voice.

"Heart rate's still increasing. Brain activity is off the charts!" Miranda strode quickly around the table, the movement pulling John's gaze. As the beeping increased, a second beep started sounding. "Stats are pushing into the red zone! We're going to loose him!" Miranda pushed Wilson aside, her fingers flying over the holographic interface. Something in her voice, though, made Anthony nearly snap to attention when she spoke.

"Snyder, another dose, now! Damn it, Wilson, I told you your numbers were off!" Before she even had finished speaking, he had run to the other side of the table, grabbing another syringe, filling it from the bottle, and quickly injecting it into the IV line. After a moment, the beeping started to slow. Looking up at the monitors, Anthony let out a breath he barely knew he was holding.

"Vitals returning to normal range. EEG spikes leveling out. Shit, that was too close." Looking back down, he saw John's eyes slowly drift closed again, his body once again going slack as the doses of anesthesia kicked in. A slap brought his attention back up, seeing Wilson still reeling from the hit, Miranda's voice putting a chill to both men.

"One more slip, Wilson, and you're off this project." Wilson gave an angry glare, to which Miranda responded only with a tightening of her fist, giving off a flare of biotics. "Get your ass back to the lab and run those numbers again. And this time, they had better be right." Wilson glared angrily at the both of them for a moment before turning and stalking from the room, headed off toward the main med lab.

After a moment, Miranda spoke, though not looking at Anthony. "Snyder, I'm going to defer to your judgement on the biotic idea. If this is how close we are to failure, then you're right, it's too big a risk. We'll just have to stick with the adrenaline enhancers." Anthony looked up, as if to say something, but her hand was already up to stop him. "They were one of the first things we put in. Upgrades to the standard Alliance issue implants. No changing it now." Looking down at John, she seemed to be in thought for a moment, and Anthony could tell she wanted to say something.

"What is it, Miranda? I haven't seen that look on your face in a while." The woman looked up, a hard glare shooting back, before she slowly nodded, looking down at John's now resting form.

"Between the three of us, I'm not the medical expert here. You have a lot more experience with these things than I do." Taking a deep breath, she looked up to Anthony, her stance full of resolve. "I'm going to give you backdoor access to everything Wilson is working on. You go over it all with a fine-toothed comb." Turning, she stared him down, as if daring to defy her. "You find anything out of order, you copy the data, fix it, then you report to me, and only to me. Understood?"

He nodded once, which was all he got before she turned and walked from the room, heading down the hall toward the living quarters, her omni-tool already lit. His lit up a moment after, signifying the data access she had just given him.

The timer slowly ticked down on the HUD in his helmet. Only thirty seconds left before the bomb in front of him exploded. Omni-tool up, lines of code flew past him on the screen. Anthony's eyes went back and forth over the jumbled mess of letters and numbers, trying to find the weak points to exploit to shut down the detonator. The basic hacking program Tali had given him two years ago was useless, now, security patches and updates having fixed all of the exploits it used. Now, it was all raw code and trained eyes.

Seventeen seconds.

This was so different from the casual hacking he had done back in his own time. It reminded him a bit of the old movie Hackers, virtual files of information flying past the screen almost faster than he could read them. Picking one out, his screen flashed red as the bomb's programming recognized his attempt, cutting down on the time left.

Five.

Four.

Three. He scrolled through frantically, trying to regain his spot, finding one of the flaws and exploiting it, getting a level deeper into the programming.

Two.

One.

Boom. His vision filled with white as the bomb exploded.

Slowly, he stood, pulling his helmet off as the holograms around him shattered, Jacob's voice coming from the door to the training room. "Tony, what the hell was that? Even I could have hacked that thing. I thought you said you used to be a hacker in your day?" Anthony shook his head, pointing his hand towards where the simulated bomb had been.

"Come on, Jake. I was. Give me a hard-line connection and a few million lines of C to look at, and I'll crack the system in an hour. This is so far beyond what I used to work with. How about we try one that ISN'T behind four firewalls and with turian military-grade encryption?" Stowing his helmet, he walked over to the weapons officer, poking an accusing finger at his chest. "By the way, I call bullshit on you being able to do any better." The two men shared a hard look for a moment before, almost in sync, they cracked into light laughter, Jacob nodding slightly.

"Yeah, alright, that was a crock. Miranda wanted me to push it to a whole other level since you've torn through the basics. She wants to know what your limits are. But how did you know that was Turian encryption? The program was written by a Salarian, but everything was in English." Anthony nodded and pulled his omni-tool up again, resetting the bomb on the sim and pulling up the code. Scrolling through it on a stasis mode, he highlighted a few lines.

"Look at these spots. I've heard Turian without the translator, before. Really rough on the ears. These bits of code are written the way they talk." Jacob looked over at the screen, shrugging as his eyes ran over the code.

"Still looks like jibberish to me. But then again, I was always crap at hacking. I guess it's just not my area." Anthony smirked and nodded, reaching up to unhook his armor. Suddenly, the deck beneath him shook. Jacob looked around at the motion. "The hell was that? Gravity tremor?" Anthony shook his head, a sudden flashback of being back on the Normandy coming to mind.

"No way. Too deep, and the M-E fields should have adjusted. That was inside." Alarms started sounding, confirming his guess. "Something just went up in a big way, and that's our cue. You armed?" Jacob pulled his pistol from it's holster, bringing up his fist, showing it surrounded by the deep blue of a biotic field.

"Always. Come on, let's go secure the bio wing. The mechs should already be on the way to whatevrer that was." Nodding, Anthony pulled his shotgun and readied it, the two soldiers exiting into the hallway. A quick turn brought them to a group of security mechs patrolling the hall, weapons at the ready. Jacob went closer, lowering his pistol. "Status report!"

The three robots turned at the sound, pausing for a split second before raising their pistols at the two. Jake quickly ducked into a doorway on the side, Anthony retreating back behind the corner they just came from as rounds started pinging off the metal around each of them. Anthony looked over to the other ex-soldier, nodding his head towards the metal attackers. "Well, that's just great. Looks like someone disabled their IFF protocols!" Raising his shotgun, he rounded the corner, squeezing off four rounds in quick succession, Jacob joining him with the pistol, shredding the mechs in the confined space.

When they stopped sparking, the men approached the remains, Anthony kicking one lightly with his boot. Jacob frowned down at the pieces of metal, shaking his head. "This is bad. Mech access is highly restricted. Me and Miri only. Come on, we have to get to Shepard."

Nodding, the two picked up their pace, headed for the medlab. Once they came into a small atrium, however, shots started pinging off the metal handrail from across the way, a group of five mechs across the way, each taking potshots at them. Taking cover behind the railing, they began exchanging fire. Both were surprised when one mech exploded from a headshot that neither of them fired. Turning toward the far end of the platform, neither expected the person standing there, fully outfitted, sporting the blood red stripe of N7 on his armor, pistol in hand, helmet off, revealing a face still lightly scarred and glowing with the dull orange of the cybernetics beneath. Anthony's jaw dropped at the sight.

"John?"

AN: Whoooo! I'm back, baby! So sorry it's taken so long to get this up, everyone. This was a very difficult chapter to write, since we know so little about what actually happened during Shepard's nap. I actually had to scrap it and restart several times before I finally ended up with something that I was content with. That, and my computer taking a nosedive didn't help matters. Hopefully now, I'll be able to beat my muse into submission and get the next one out sooner. Again, anyone willing to work with me and make a cover image for the story will be much appreciated! Also, I'm not sure if I mentioned it, but a message from a reader prompted me to say this: This is not going to be an Anthony/Liara story. Just friends, maybe a little unresolved sexual tension. Anthony, I have something else planned for, and maybe Liara as well. Depends on where it goes in my head. Thanks for sticking with me!