-Matthew’s P.O.V.-

I blinked in confusion for a second as an alert message popped up in the corner of my vision. Ordinarily messages would only tickle the edge of my consciousness, but I’d tinkered with some of my settings in order to be certain that truly important messages didn’t fall by the wayside.

This, I realized with a start, was one such message.

The others at the table didn’t seem to notice anything out of the ordinary, so it must have been something specific. Quickly, I brought up the message to the forefront of my attention and checked the contents.

‘The wolf?’ I paused, digesting the information that came through, specifically that the wolf demonstrated unusual behavior and a minor shift in physical appearance. I felt my blood run cold at that, my mind immediately defaulting to the most likely culprit.

‘The King? I suppose it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch.’ I felt a tightness in my gut at the idea that our newest weapon was exposed. If we hadn’t used the biotic in testing - ‘What’s done is done. Now we prepare.’

“Matt? What’s up?” I looked up to see Daniel frowning quizzically in my direction. The others turned, no doubt noting the fact that my mood had just plummeted.

“There’s an emergency, a security breach with the latest lab project.” I stood up from the table, “We’re going to high alert.”

Fran was the one who mastered her shock first, “Is there a need to contact our allies?”

I paused momentarily in thought before nodding, “Yeah, best that we do. This… could get messy.”

“How messy?” Fran asked quizzically as I began to send her information on the project and what we knew about the security breach so far. As the others began to rise, she skimmed the topic rapidly before her body tensed, “Ah, I see.” She stood, taking a deep breath before meeting my gaze, “I’ll keep the warning general for now, but I think it would be proper to have our outposts and bases on maximum combat readiness.”

I nodded, “That’s the plan. Make sure our allies understand the stakes. If our project is even half as dangerous as I hope it is to biotics, I doubt The King is going to let us go unhindered.”

“I’ll go to the Academy, we’ll start prepping anyone capable of being ready to evacuate non-combatants.” Daniel slowed, “Shit, what about Sunvilla?”

“Alice and Richard are there,” I answered, leaving unspoken that I was nervous about what they might have to deal with, “I’ll let them know shortly what’s going on. I’d prefer them to be here to help with the defense, but I’ll leave the choice to them.”

Rachel and Terry exchanged glances, “We’ll get back to the labs. Looks like we might be on a timeline.”

At that, we began to split up. Fran, Daniel, and I would be going to the Tower, or Daniel to the nearby Academy. Rachel and Terry moved off quickly to the labs once more, and I wished them the best of luck as they went.

I hoped that there wouldn’t be any real amount of biotics that could threaten New Damond, but I couldn’t rely on that. In the first place, we’d never fully exterminated the Centaur biotics that it utilized personally, and I doubted that there weren’t other options at its disposal.

“How much should I tell our allies,” Fran asked even as she compiled a report to send our fellow Terra-Union members.

I clicked my tongue, considering the question. On the one hand, if our project went nowhere and The King did nothing, our credibility would be shot. On the other hand, though, if weaponizing psionic power was a genuine threat to the biotics as a whole, and The King moved against us, we’d need to have as much help as possible. Even besides that, if we didn’t issue a warning to the others and something had happened, we’d certainly be held responsible. I could, of course, gloss over some of the details, but I felt it would be better to play everything above board for this.

“We can’t risk any blowback from concealing things right now.” I explained, “Tell them everything, including the possibility that The King, a high tier biotic, might be behind this. Urge any and all members to take steps to monitor their regions with the Bulwark while Legion forces are patrolling.”

She nodded, even as Daniel busied himself with contacting other mentors and faculty. None of us needed to debate how dangerous this situation was, nor how large it could be. We’d all been present for the fight in Argedwall and knew full well how dangerous the Centaurs had been. At the time, they were dumb, unskilled, and relied almost entirely on their overwhelming numbers to win. But, they’d had plenty of time to come into their own, and potentially be improved upon. I was far less than eager to test humanity against whatever they’d become now.

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Worse yet, if it was capable of manipulating biotics at great distances, there was the distinct possibility that every major settlement was now the target of concentrated attacks. If it weren’t for the fact that the Legion, Artorian Company, and other extermination forces had been hard at work clearing out major pockets of infestation, I would have been forced to admit that most cities wouldn’t be able to survive a potential organized en masse attack.

Even now, I wasn’t certain. New Damond, Basilisk Port, and other major capital cities would probably be the safest places for people. As I considered that, I suspected it might be better to have every settlement nearby begin to evacuate into New Damond and Gilramore. If nothing else, I’d feel better about not having to worry about anything happening to people outside the cities. If nothing happened, then we’d just have to chalk it up to just being a drill. But, if an attack did happen…

Daniel’s car slowed to a stop as we all moved out, each of us taking slightly different paths and wishing each other luck as we departed. The lobby of the Tower was similar to how it had been before, fractal shimmering of black and red, with inlays of silver shining along edges to highlight certain features, or guide the eye. Overall, our capabilities for aesthetic construction had ascended by leaps and bounds, and momentarily I let myself feel pride at the sight.

Then I dragged myself to the elevator, my subconscious mind still relaying information and orders to my teams and the handpicked few that I trusted to handle carrying out my will. The black pod-like elevator hummed as I walked in, quickly ascending with a mild pull before inertial dampeners entirely sapped away with even that.

It wasn’t the top floor that the elevator stopped at, but instead a few floors beneath it. Every part of the building was reinforced such that I doubted anything shy of a meteor could reasonably bring it down. Though, that was not something I would be willing to test...

Given the way the Tower tapered to a smaller and smaller point as it rose, this floor was actually not as massive as one might expect of such a building. In fact, the elevator opened only to a small preparatory room just before a large pair of double doors, both of which were currently open. As I stepped out, I vaguely noted the pair of other elevators on either side of the prep room, a reasonabe twenty meters by twenty meters in size. Currently, several men and women, not all of whom were human, were busy setting up on tables that emerged from the floors, leaving the center column empty for anyone to move through towards the council room. There was a brief pause as they looked up to me, almost as one entity, before they quickly resumed work.

They’d been briefed on the situation, and these people would be assisting both myself and the others of my council, advisors and otherwise, of what was going on. We were rapidly ticking up for war-time readiness, something that we’d run plenty of drills for over the last few months. Still, it was different to actually have it happen. Luckily, these individuals were some of the best analysts and strategists we had available to us, none of whom hadn’t been tested in The Crucible time and again.

As I entered the main strategy room, I could see the rest of my inner circle already at work. Doug surprised me by being there, given that I thought he was still in Gilramore. Besides him was Charlie Song, the current leader of Bulwark, whom was having an animated conversation with Yamak Rettle, the head of the Artorian Company. Querax, now one of three Reaper’s that I knew of, was busy looking over the information available, flanked by Uthakka and Princess Arianna, neither of whom I’d known was back on world.

As much as I was curious, I decided that answers could wait at least until we had a better idea of what was going on. Other more standard members of my Legion were present; sub-commanders that I had faith could run much of my organization without me even being present.

One such young man snapped me a salute, to which the woman next to him simply shook her head helplessly.

I couldn’t blame her.

“At ease,” I spoke quickly, knowing that Samuel wasn’t likely to ever stop doing that, as much as I’d tried to get him to. His family had been very big on the military before The Fall, whereas Sierra, the woman next to him, hadn’t been fond of organizations or governments in general.

Strange how things happen sometimes.

Querax greeted me next, clasping my arm at the forearm. He currently didn’t wear his armor, letting me see his narrower, bone-like skull in full. He himself had multifaceted compound eyes and reptilian skin, definitely one of the more harrowing images of an alien that I’d ever seen. But, he was a good man, and I trusted his judgement. He and the other two Reapers that I’d met had helped out on high-threat zones for little more than maintenance, food, and lodging. At some point, I imagined that they might request something from me in return beyond that, but so far they hadn’t.

A part of me was wary of that, but apparently this was considered normal for them. The fact that there weren’t more Reapers on site, Querax insisted, was the more uncommon occurrence, considering I was one of them.

“Reaper,” Querax greeted, “It is good to see you again.”

“You as well, Reaper,” I nodded to him, “Have you read the information I sent ahead.”

He nodded, “I have. It’s quite the ambitious technology you’re developing, though I… must admit I’m skeptical that it will be of use.”

I quirked an eyebrow at that, and he explained, “I would have to imagine that someone has attempted the same, but I haven’t heard of any results on biotics.”

“It appears to have had an effect this time,” Arianna interjected with a wry smirk, “Greetings, Matthew.”

“Princess,” I inclined my head, “Uthakka.”

The crocodilian-like man rumbled back, “We got back just in time for the fun, it seems.”

Charlie Song and Doug joined us then, “I wouldn’t call the potential risk of millions of lives ‘fun’, Uthakka.”

The large scaled man looked annoyed for a moment before he took a breath, and calmed himself. He turned his gaze on the Bulwark’s leader, “I meant no offense.”

“In any case,” I cut in before whatever that was could continue, “I’m glad you’re all here. I’d like your opinions on a few things…”