Shepard heard the loud voice of a young corporal standing next to a woman medic.
In the speaker, the captain easily recognized Richard Jenkins — a member of the ship’s team’s enlisted complement.
And in the woman — the ship’s doctor, Major of the Systems Alliance Navy Medical Service, Karin Chakwas.
The corporal was getting heated, trying to prove that he was fully ready to display his best qualities on the battlefield.
To which the ship’s doctor caustically remarked, to the effect that Jenkins’s ardor had already forced her more than once to “patch up” the corporal in the medbay.
When exactly the corporal had managed to distinguish himself during his time aboard the frigate — of that, oddly enough, there was no information in the files of either reader Shepard had reviewed.
It didn’t matter right now: he was about to personally meet both frigate men.
Seeing the approaching officers, the corporal snapped to attention.
“At ease, Jenkins,” Anderson said.
Having waited until the corporal had moved a considerable distance away, the ship’s commander added quietly, addressing Shepard:
“Actually, Lieutenant Alenko was supposed to take charge of him — and take charge very well.
But…
as I already mentioned, because of the constant severe headaches, he has big problems fulfilling all the duties assigned to him.” Having made sure the elevator doors had already closed behind Jenkins, heading down, Anderson continued.
“Karin…
This is Captain John Shepard, a graduate of the N7 Academy.
Assigned to the post of executive officer.
In parallel, as I was told at the division headquarters, he is to perform the duties of the landing unit commander.”
“Pleased to meet you.” The major-medic nodded amiably to Shepard.
“By tradition, you must undergo a medical check.
So — please, to me in the Medbay.” She looked questioningly at Anderson.
He nodded:
“Go, Shepard.
Departure is soon; you’ll start work after the medical check.
There’s time for now…” The frigate’s commander turned toward the pilot’s cabin.
“I’ll be waiting for you at the Galaxy Map in the CIC.”
“Yes, sir.” Shepard saluted the commander, assuming the parade stance of “attention” for a few seconds.
In the medbay, Chakwas asked Shepard to bare himself to the waist, quickly performed the medical check and, having waited for the captain to put himself in order, offered him a seat in the chair beside her work desk.
In conversation with the ship’s doctor, Shepard gleaned no small amount of new, valuable, and useful information for himself.
Formally, Karin Chakwas outranked the ship’s commander.
But, as a physician, she belonged to a different department of the Alliance Navy.
And, moreover, she specialized in treating aliens, while, as Shepard became convinced during the conversation, understanding the treatment of humans perfectly well as well.
She also told him a great deal of interest about Nihlus Kryik — the Spectre of the Citadel Council — supplementing with her account the information already known to Shepard.
Half an hour of conversation flew by completely unnoticed.
“Go to your cabin for now, John.
Everything’s prepared for you there,” Chakwas said.
“This little ship is small in size, so it’s not really a cabin but, well, a cubby.
Those of us who are entitled to cabins by the table of organization calmly and freely call them ‘cubbies.’ Perhaps it’s against all written rules.
But we work.
We don’t just blindly follow rules.
The upcoming voyage, as I understand it, is also going to be very tense and specific.
It wouldn’t hurt you to review many of the documents once more.
And after launch…
The practical, real work will begin.”
Nodding to the ship’s doctor, Shepard left the Medbay.
Outwardly he showed nothing, but inwardly…
It seemed to him that he hadn’t spoken with the ship’s doctor, not with a senior officer of the Alliance Navy medical service, but with a mother.
It was no accident that Anderson had immediately addressed her by her first name.
Karin Chakwas was important to all the Normandovtsy.
So important that neither the frigate’s unclear status nor the special mission could exert a destructive influence on that importance.
Glancing at the clock of his wrist omni-tool, the captain noted that there wasn’t much time left until launch.
He entered his cabin-cubby, immediately noticing on the work desk a pile of readers and a switched-on omni-tool.
Shepard didn’t close the door to his cabin tightly.
If he’d been assigned to this ship and this crew, then he should immediately make it clear to the frigate men that the new senior officer was available for communication.
Let them see that the door to the executive officer’s cabin was ajar, that he hid nothing from his new colleagues, was always ready to help, always ready to answer a question or to socialize, to talk.
Even as Shepard walked from Chakwas, he’d felt on himself the wary, studying, questioning, and bewildered — in a word, the most varied — looks of his new shipmates.
He considered this normal: a new man in such a post always arouses heightened interest among the old hands.
After all, he was now effectively the second officer after the ship’s commander.
All the frigate men below him in rank and status would, one way or another, be resolving an important question for themselves: how now to interact with John Shepard.
Of course, they wouldn’t reach that decision right away or anytime soon.
For far from all members of the ship’s crew would that decision be final.
Anderson had helped him a great deal by giving him the opportunity to work beforehand with the “large” reader and study the materials of the “small” one.
And now he’d provided him the materials of both the small and large readers for his personal, so to speak, use.
Copies of the materials were contained in one of the ordinary readers, lying at the very top of a neat stack.
The new, never-before-used officer-class desk omni-tool also pleased Shepard — the commander valued his assistant and wanted him to have the very best tools for his work.
The bag packed by Dana, already delivered to the cabin by the frigate’s watchmen, Shepard unpacked.
Part of the provisions he put into a small refrigerator, part he stowed on the shelves of the kitchen cabinet.
The cabin, as was proper, had a small dinner set for six — just right for arranging a tea party or a shared meal for the ship’s officers.
It would be very good to use the set during discussions of many questions and problems — beautiful dishes, created to civilian standards, relax one somewhat.
And at the same time — create a more acceptable atmosphere for communication.
Settling into the chair, Shepard spent a few minutes getting comfortable — from now on this chair would become his working one for a very long time; he was to spend many hours in a row in it.
He needed to get used to it.
Having prepared himself a large half-liter cup of herbal tea, Shepard took the cup by the handle, stood up, and walked over to the porthole, covered by an armored shutter.
He could, of course, have entered a code on the omni-tool — whether desk or wrist — and removed the shutter, but the captain switched on the wall screen and selected from the menu the sensor-camera built into the cabin’s porthole.
It turned out faster, and the image of Arcturus Station could now be varied within wide limits.
For several minutes Shepard stood motionless, getting used to this view, coming to terms with the thought that the assignment to a ship had once again taken place and that he was now the landing unit commander of a special scout frigate.
And — not just a special forces officer with the rank of captain, but the executive officer of the ship’s commander.
There was no need to force the acclimatization, so Shepard calmly and unhurriedly slid his gaze along the contours of the Station’s hull.
He watched as military combat and auxiliary ships, cutters, and shuttles approached and departed from the giant “pancake” of the station’s docking complex.
When he’d followed Anderson like a “shadow” during the commander’s rounds, he’d tried to stay mostly silent but had looked around attentively, memorizing as many details as possible.
Anderson, quite possibly, liked such behavior from the new executive officer: he clearly valued taciturnity over eloquence, though, as it turned out, he also valued people who could speak clearly and to the point.
If he, the best graduate of the N7 Academy, had had to take command of the crew and team of a problematic ship, then, as the rounds had shown, Anderson had fully coped with the difficult task.
In a short time he’d managed to bring both the ship and the crew and the team “to their senses,” to the norm, to fit them into frameworks and to spur — not just force — them to work properly.
Now Shepard was to maintain and develop this state of affairs.
And he, as he himself felt, was ready to do it as it should be done.
He was ready to learn a great deal from Anderson.
Tearing himself away from contemplating Arcturus Station, Shepard activated most of the cabin’s systems and control panels, adjusting them to his own needs and requirements.
Perhaps Major Chakwas did consider the executive officer’s cabin that had fallen to Shepard a cubby.
Every person has their own perception of surrounding reality and their own priorities.
Dimming the general and overhead lighting to a minimum, the captain switched on the spotlight above the desk, sat down in the chair, and pulled the stack of readers toward himself.
Working with documents was now becoming one of his main activities in his new post.
For now, he tried not to think about how abnormal it was to combine the post of executive officer with that of the frigate’s landing group commander.
Yes, he’d been taught to treat such situations calmly, for in a critical situation there’s no time to think about plasti-paper bureaucratic norms.
And yet a certain worm in the depths of his consciousness clearly signaled: abnormal, abnormal, abnormal.
Reading through the lines of text files, Shepard typed texts on the keyboard of his desk omni-tool, filled out document “forms,” noting that, passing by the door of his cabin, members of the crew and the frigate’s team involuntarily slowed their steps, sometimes even trying to peek inside the cabin.
Well, he didn’t mind; that’s why he’d left the slit.
Let them look, let them listen, let them get used to it.
The watch officer over the ship’s loudspeaker informed the crew and team of the Normandy that fifteen minutes remained until departure.
The frigate’s departure time, as the executive officer understood, was constantly being adjusted, but for the first flight of a newest ship retaining the status of “prototype,” this was usual.
Shepard, noting the new departure time on his wrist omni-tool, spent another ten minutes finishing the information from the last reader in the stack — he’d made it after all, though there were very many files in each reader and more than enough information in them.
Rising from the desk, the captain habitually changed into a light armor suit.
Departure is departure.
If he was now to go to the Galaxy Map, he had to be ready for all sorts of surprises.
Yes, perhaps it was unusual for the ship’s crew members.
But he, as executive officer, would now make sure that light armor suits became ordinary for all the frigate’s inhabitants.
Anderson wouldn’t object — he’d understand correctly.
And the rest of the frigate men would have to get used to it.
By the way, why “frigate men”?
“Normandovtsy.” That would be more precise, more resonant, and more correct.
Leaving the cabin, he closed the door fully.
He felt the bewildered looks of the crew members on himself.
Nothing.
They’d get used to it.
And then — they’d themselves wonder how they’d managed before with uniform jackets instead of armor suits.
Helmet — to the belt mount, and — forward, to the Map.
A few dozen steps, and ahead — the pedestal on which the Galaxy Map was installed.
Anderson raises his head from the screens located on the Map’s frame, nods, having glanced over his assistant’s figure with an attentive, even tenacious, gaze.
“There are no chairs,” Shepard thought.
“And there should be at least two chairs here, by the Map.
Standing is fine, of course, even somewhat invigorating, but the upcoming flight…
will be difficult.
So chairs wouldn’t hurt.”
The first mate stood next to the commander and plugged into the ship’s secure comm network.
The usual departure procedure, nothing special.
The turian Spectre doesn’t show up in the CIC.
Either the Normandovtsy have already taught him “not to interfere,” or something else.
Many of the consoles in the CIC’s “necklace” are empty.
Yes, the readers John had studied contained plenty of information about problems that had arisen on board precisely because of the undermanned crew.
They took those without whom it would be hard to get by on board at all, and the rest…
They left them under various pretexts at the Stoyanochnoye Pole, from where the Normandy had come to Arcturus.
At the CIC’s entrance portals, military police stood frozen in their drab uniforms.
They, too, are very interested in the new first mate.
They sense that their presence on the ship doesn’t sit well with him.
They understand themselves that this isn’t normal.
But — orders, service, protocol, ritual.
Twelve policemen instead of the same number of specialists from the ship’s crew division.
This will come back to haunt them very negatively.
Very.
Shepard was sure of this.
Even convinced.
The frigate smoothly pulled away from the station and exited the “outer roadstead” the space set aside for parking ships whose presence in the near approaches to Arcturus wasn’t necessary.
A turn, the ship settles precisely onto a course toward the mass relay, and accelerates.
This maneuvering and acceleration, as Shepard understood, would take several hours.
From Arcturus, one could, of course, leave in “emergency” fashion.
It’s a military station.
But now — that’s not the situation and not the case.
That’s why the Normandy departs calmly.
By the book, as specialists would say.
Anderson watches as the first mate works at the consoles and screens of the Galaxy Map.
Yes, the main space here is taken up by a virtual screen, onto which all navigational information is usually displayed in three dimensions.
There are plenty of ordinary screens and consoles in the “frame.” Some are hidden, some are half-hidden.
Only those currently in use are open.
And those whose information is important right now.
The rest are darkened, switched to “standby” mode.
Or deactivated entirely.
“The ship is on course.
Takeoff and departure are complete,” the frigate’s chief pilot, Moreau, reported over the commander’s speaker audio channel.
The public address system duplicated the report — the information was public, so no isolation was required.
“Received,” Anderson responded, habitually raising his eyes to the ceiling for a few seconds.
That’s where video camera sensors and microphone array “heads” were traditionally located.
“Shepard, you’re free.”
“Aye, sir,” the captain nodded and stepped down from the platform.
That’s it.
Now, for the next few hours, he truly wasn’t involved in anything urgent or mandatory.
He should take a walk around the ship himself, but…
For several minutes now, a feeling of danger hadn’t left him.
No, the danger didn’t threaten the ship or the crew — there were no such signs.
None — of those known to him, even theoretically.
The danger threatened him personally.
Not from the crew members, no.
From within.
And that was unsettling.
Deciding to walk around the ship alone now, Shepard strained to recall whether there was a room on this small reconnaissance frigate that wasn’t, and wouldn’t in the very near future be, occupied by any of the crew members.
His memory helpfully suggested the coordinates of a small lounge — and the captain decided: if he got worse, he wouldn’t go to the Medbay, but would try to reach that room with the panoramic porthole.
So far, the ship’s commander hadn’t given the order to close all portholes without exception with armored covers, so there, quite possibly, the porthole was also open.
A big porthole, if he remembered correctly.
Probably, because of the “window into space,” they’d called that room a lounge.
Moving from post to post, from compartment to compartment, exchanging short, strictly businesslike phrases with crew and team members, Shepard tried to always keep the route to that lounge in mind.
When he left the engineering compartment, the feeling of danger disappeared.
What remained was the understanding that it could return later.
In a few days.
Maybe — sooner.
It returned.
Exactly a few days later.
At the same hours.
All those days, Shepard had felt the threat of its return inside himself.
And when it hit…
He tried to move to that lounge as quickly as possible.
He stood for several minutes, recovering from the overload caused by the fear of not making it in time.
The feelings and sensations were too new.
This state was too new.
He couldn’t find any analogues for them in his memory, no matter how hard he tried.
Probably, several pages of text could have been filled describing this “cocktail,” but in those minutes when it was crushing him in the lounge, locked with a code and a lock, there was no time for detailed descriptions.
Thankfully, according to the “daily” schedule, he had “free hours” that he could spend as he wished.
Within acceptable limits, of course, but…
Those few days…
Good thing a military reconnaissance ship had no need to race at breakneck speed along the route to the exit point into the operational area.
Shepard consistently, no longer superficially, but deeply and thoroughly, familiarized himself with the ship and crew.
He himself didn’t like to consider himself a know-it-all and found many supporters of that position among those who had taught him at the Academy.
A new ship, a new crew, a new team required getting into the swing of things.
Required study.
Required attention.
So, all of this needed to be given and provided.
That’s what John Shepard had been doing for several days.
Until the moment it “hit” him.
It was hard to describe all the sensations he experienced then, during those few hours.
He had to consider that it was an echo of Akuze.
Most likely, that’s what it was.
Shepard couldn’t remember anything else in his life that was so complex and ambiguous, perhaps not even fully understood by himself as it should be.
Yes, when he, feeling it “hit” him, walked unhurriedly toward that lounge, he already felt that his teammates were looking at him with worry and bewilderment.
Not all of them, some.
They looked with concern, but believed he would cope.
For some reason, Shepard thought then that Chakwas wouldn’t be able to determine precisely and fully what exactly was happening to him.
Good thing he didn’t lose consciousness, didn’t experience particularly strong physical weakness.
But the fact that he noticeably went deaf for a few minutes…
Or maybe even for a few dozen minutes — that happened.
It definitely happened.
And the outward sluggishness — that happened too.
He emerged from that state of sluggishness, that deafness, slowly as well.
He emerged unhurriedly.
And where was there to hurry, if in that lounge he was still alone?
The “free hours” weren’t over yet.
The door to the lounge was closed.
No one was bothering him.
The first mate wanting to be alone not in his own cabin — no questions there.
The lounge was empty, there wasn’t even much furniture here.
So the Normandovtsy didn’t bother him.
They somehow understood.
And how — he didn’t even want to ask; as is known, every sentient being has their own understanding.
Their own, personal one.
Rarely does anyone remember this constantly and clearly, but they should…
What Shepard gained during those few hours, he himself realized far from immediately.
It really wrung him out during those solitary hours.
And learning to use everything he’d gained so quickly and fully, as he understood, he clearly wouldn’t manage.
He’d have to master it gradually.
Maybe even situationally.
Did he know then what he’d received?
No.
He didn’t know, but he had to use part of that gained potential very soon.
As it turned out — to overcome the non-standard situation with the ship, the crew, and the mission that had gotten on his nerves.
And then he went deaf and half-blind, holding himself on his feet with enormous effort and feeling himself being warped.
Warped internally.
Not just physically — but morally, mentally, spiritually.
Transformed, supplemented, changed.
Some things he could track, some he couldn’t, since no human resources or capabilities were enough for everything happening to him then.
Normal human resources and capabilities.
Habitual, standard ones.
Only after not hours — days, did he understand that alongside those resources, he now had completely non-human ones, and by some signs — extra-galactic ones.
And then, in those minutes, he desperately wanted to remain the same person he’d been.
And, as it turned out, he succeeded.