Finding a Way: Mass Effect 2

The Einstein docked with the Citadel a few days later and Admiral Anderson met them as they disembarked. The little girl, Charlotte, had insisted he carry her again and John put on a brave face and dropped his hand when the doors opened. The other children clustered behind him.

"Admiral," he said, saluting. John mimicked him and Charlotte buried her face shyly in his neck. Anderson shook his hand and told John to stand at ease, smiling at him.

They made their way to Anderson's office where a member of the board of Colonial Affairs was waiting to take the children's names and statements. Anderson said that once they contacted their families, they would work to get the children into the Ascension Project at Grissom Academy for biotic training.

Charlotte had fallen asleep in his lap, but he finally somewhat reluctantly handed her off to one of the social workers that would be looking after them and sat back down across from Anderson for a debriefing.

"I think we're going to need some help with this one, Alenko," he said, pulling out two glasses and a bottle of whiskey from inside his desk drawer.

The last time they had shared a drink was after Aubrey's memorial. They were both red eyed from crying and ended up sharing most of the bottle instead of just one glass. Anderson had confessed that he had thought of her as a daughter and not just a mentee. He had confessed to their relationship and that he had been planning on resigning his commission and asking her to marry him. Hell, he still had the ring he had bought during their shore leave on Earth.

"What the hell was Cerberus doing with a bunch of biotic children?" Anderson asked, somewhat rhetorically.

"None of them were old enough that they should even be able to wield biotics, sir. My guess is that they were researching ways to make kids exposed to eezo in-utero manifest their abilities sooner than puberty."

"Jesus," he mumbled, taking a sip from his glass.

"Was the Fifth Fleet able to secure the non-combatants, sir?" he asked, taking a sip from his own glass.

"Sadly, no. They arrived to find only a debris field."

"What?!"

"The station apparently self-destructed. We don't know if the people you left for extraction were on it when it did, or not."

They had left close to thirty people unconscious and tied up on that station. He liked to think that Cerberus would've come and evacuated their people, but somehow, he doubted it. It was far more likely that they triggered a remote self-destruct when they realized the facility had been breached and all those people had died.

"You didn't have room on the shuttle to evacuate that many, Commander," Anderson said, reading his thoughts.

"I know, sir. Doesn't make it suck any less," he replied, realizing it was the line Aubrey had used when he had tried to console her about the loss of Jenkins on their first mission together.

"Oh," he said, remembering the OSD in his pocket, "Here's the data we were able to extract from the director's computer."

"I'll get the decryption specialists on it."

They sat in silence for a moment before Anderson spoke again. "If you're game to keep hitting these assholes where it hurts, I got another tip from my informant."

"So, we have an actual mole in the group? The research station wasn't just a one-off anonymous tip?"

"It's.... complicated," he said, "But, yeah, you could say we have someone on the inside."

"I'm willing to act on anything you want to give me, sir."

"Good," he slid him another data pad with details about an assassination attempt on a high-ranking member of the Turian Hierarchy that was visiting Earth. Anderson had pulled strings and gotten Kaidan and Wilson assigned to the security detail of the venue that was hosting the welcoming gala. They'd have to leave first thing in the morning to get back to Earth in time.