With the last of the Dosiers taken care of, the Normandy suddenly had no destination they needed to rush off to. They were on constant alert for any rumors of the Collectors being spotted again, but even Cerberus’s network had not picked anything up.
Shepard ended up taking a few off the book jobs that trickled in from Admiral Hackett - even if she wasn’t getting any direct help from the Alliance, she both considered it her duty and would need them when the Reapers showed up - that managed to keep them all busy and helped the ground team get used to working together under her, Revan, Miranda and occasionally Garrus.
The Spectre certainly wasn’t going to let him slink back to support only and having a leader focused in stealth and support roles had proven to be very useful.
But after a while the crew had enough free time that Shepard felt it was time to revisit an idea she had back when they first found out where Revan came from.
“You want to do a what?”
“A movie night.” Shepard repeated like it was the most natural thing in the world. “We keep finding evidence of Revan’s galaxy all over ours. I wanted to see how accurate they are.”
“Those records you found were a couple hundred years old.” Jacob pointed out. “I don’t know if we could get a hold of them.”
“I have already downloaded the available files from historical archives.” EDI stated.
“Nevermind then. I’d be up for a movie night.”
“I’ll have to see if Holofax has a translation for some of the classics. The subvocalization doesn’t always come across right on old recordings.” Garrus added his thoughts.
Some members, like Grunt and Thane, didn’t seem particularly excited at the thought of spending time watching fictional films. Though Grunt was easily bribed with promises of explosions and Thane, a simple polite request to join in. While others like Tali seemed positively eager to join in, even if they did suggest videos not related to Revan’s situation.
The last two to speak up were Samara, who was quietly observing the discussion from the side, and Revan, the member of the team Shepard wanted involved the most for several reasons.
She didn’t dismiss the idea out of hand, which was encouraging, but she also seemed to fall into the group that wasn’t exactly thrilled about it.
The Justicar eventually spoke up, saying she would see if she could secure some of the more accurate documentaries about the founding of her order since the last mission seemed to indicate there was a possible link between the Justicars and someone from Revan’s galaxy. With her answer, all attention landed on the Dark Lady.
Revan ignored them all while she poked at a datatablet in front of her.
After a few seconds Shepard cleared her throat, trying to get the Sith’s attention.
Revan sighed. “Yes, fine. I will join in watching poor imitations of my home galaxy and help you determine fact from fiction.”
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“Don’t worry, I’ll be sure to include some local movies too!” Shepard said cheerfully. “Just for fun!”
“Hrm.”
Apparently Revan wasn’t much of a movie fan. Probably a result of spending her childhood in a religious order, but Shepard wouldn’t hold it against her. These things could be corrected with time and care.
-o-
“Okay! I know there's been some debate about what we’re going to watch first.” Shepard called out over the general din of her shipmates. “But this is not a democracy, so I’m claiming Commander’s Rights and telling you all we’re doing the Earth movies first, because we already have them loaded and because I said so!”
“Boo! Down with the Tyrant!”
“Joker, I’ll have EDI cut your Extranet access…”
“Nevermind, all hail our glorious Commander!”
Shepard snorted at the quick attitude change.
“Anyways, settle in boys and girls. EDI, load it up.”
“Affirmative, Commander.”
-o-
The movie started and after an informative text crawl two space ships appeared, one smaller frigate fleeing from a massive battleship. The scale was a little hard to figure out just from that, but Revan quietly asking what the hell someone did to a perfectly good Harrower put everything in perspective.
That was a ship about 800 meters long. And it was primarily using laser armaments. Stuff not even the Geth relied on.
Scary.
And then they got their first look at the Sith Lord in charge.
-o-
“Don’t look down the barrel!”
“Oh god, don’t turn it on!”
“Ahh, I can’t watch!”
Every single person that had seen what Revan’s lightsabers could do cringed in horror as they watched the young farm boy play with the weapon. The lack of any kind of weapon discipline was similar to a horror scene for many of them.
-o-
“Wait, so you can do this Force thing from anywhere? You don’t even need to see them?!”
“Of course not. Seeing you just makes it easier.”
-o-
“They…they just killed them…” Tali took the scene where the main cast discovered the deaths of Luke’s aunt and uncle rather hard. It likely brought up memories from when she was nearly killed for having information on Saren.
“There are always some that take delight in causing others harm.” Thane said philosophically.
“It’s a big part of why the Justicar code is so strict. To ensure those types of people are dealt with.” Samara added.
Shepard turned to Revan, an unspoken question on the tip of her tongue, but she was hesitant to ask just in case it caused them to be unable to work together at all.
Revan seemed to pick up on it anyway. “It was heavily illegal to do that kind of thing in my Empire. I was trying to build it up to stave off an invasion from another galactic power. Unrest would have you sentenced to severe fines or forced labor, but not death unless it was a major crime. Sadly, that wasn't the case when Malak took over. He felt the strong should be able to do whatever they pleased as long as it didn’t affect him.”
“Sounds like a great guy.”
“He used to be…”
-o-
“A space station. The size of a moon.”
“It blew up a planet…”
“Is that even possible?”
All eyes turned to Revan.
Then Sith slowly took a drink to buy herself some time but eventually looked around the room. “...I can confidently say that nothing like that currently exists in my galaxy…but the potential for structures that size is there, and a weapon like that is…plausible.”
“Can we make one?”
Everyone shifted to stare at Grunt.
“What? If it can do that to planets just think what it would do to a Reaper!”
Stares shifted back to Revan.
“I don’t have the plans for a moon sized super-weapon memorized or the infrastructure to even start building one. If any of you do, I'll be happy to help you build it.” she said dryly.
Everyone turned back to the movie, although Mordin was looking worryingly contemplative.
-o-
A few people cheered alongside the movie cast as the Death Star exploded. Despite being horribly old, all things considered, the movie held up well. Shepard certainly enjoyed it. It was the rest that bothered her.
She wasn’t looking forward to explaining to the Alliance that barring a few incidents where Revan called something ‘massively understated’ regarding aspects of the Force or conflicts between users, everything in the film seemed to match her home galaxy. Revan even mentioned she had personally been to Tatooine herself a few times and could confirm it really was a barren desert planet.
So it truly looked like they had a way to look at what Revan might consider normal. Although they would also have to take anything they saw with a handful of salt because just because Revan could see how it would be possible, it didn’t mean she knew how it was done or how to recreate it.
That didn’t stop Joker from needling the Sith for information about every ship he saw. The maneuvers some of the personal fighters pulled off should have turned the pilots to pancakes, but they handled it with no strain at all. Since the resident space elf didn’t seem impressed that must have been at least somewhat believable. Which meant Joker wanted the chance to fly something like that himself.
Shepard wished him luck. Revan certainly knew the price that kind of tech was worth. And even with the new more open to sharing attitude Revan was showing, it was probably more than the ex-lieutenant could afford.
Her musing was interrupted when EDI told her there was a priority call from TIM waiting for her in the comm room. She made her way there and was met with an unusually excited Cerberus leader.
“Shepard - we caught a break.” TIM stated enthusiastically. “I intercepted a distress call from a Turian patrol. They stumbled onto a Collector ship…”