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Slaves of Cerberus	By : NakedOwlMan Category: +M through R > Mass Effect Views: 138076 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: Mass Effect and all the characters in it are owned by people that are not me. I have not made a cent off this work of fiction

Chapter List
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The woman's proclamation echoed briefly across the high ceilings of the office, before being swallowed up by the quiet sounds of the music playing. For a moment, no one spoke. The woman calling herself Cordelia stared down with seething fury at Miranda and Oriana, her eyes studying them for their reaction.

"That's... that isn't possible!" Oriana finally spoke up. She looked over at Miranda, confused. "Miranda told me that all of the other clones were killed by our fath..." She paused, remembering the angry reaction from earlier at Miranda's reference to Henry Lawson as their father. "...were disposed of."

"And I was right, Ori," Miranda said, taking a step towards Cordelia's platform. "But that's not what you are, is it... Cordelia, was it? I wonder how long you've been using that name. Couldn't be more than a few years, I imagine. After all, if your identity had been so overt before, those rumors I had heard before would not have just remained rumors, would they?"

"Miri, I don't understand," Oriana said. "Are you saying that... she's really..."

Miranda nodded. "Yes. She's no clone at all. No product of any science except humanity's own natural biological process." She looked up at Cordelia with narrowed eyes. "Cordelia Lawson, as she chooses to call herself, is Henry Lawson's bastard daughter."

Cordelia coldly nodded. "You have the right of it, Miranda. That genetically perfect brain of yours isn't going to waste, I suppose," she said. "My father may have been a genius... perhaps one of the greatest men who ever lived... but he was still human. He was a young man living on Earth back then, still rising up in the world when he had a brief moment of weakness with my mother. He left her after that. Left Earth entirely, in fact, moving on to bigger and better things. But eventually my mother was able to contact him. Let him know that he had a daughter... and asking for credits to help raise me."

Miranda scoffed. "Yes, and I imagine that, kind soul that he was, Henry was only too willing to provide for you and your mother."

A sneer crept onto Cordelia's face, and Miranda thought at first that it was meant for her and Oriana. But Cordelia's next words made the target of Cordelia's scorn clear. "My mother. If you could call her that. A greedy, selfish worm of a human being, leeching off of others because she was too lazy to provide for herself." She gave Miranda a slight smirk. "But despite your doubts, yes. My father did send my mother a regular allowance. Even though I'm quite sure that, even then, he was putting plans in motion to create you two freaks of nature, he was always a man who liked to keep his options open. And so he made sure that I was raised in relative comfort on Earth. Given one of the best educations credits could buy, but all while making my mother promise to never reveal who my father really was."

"Such a warm, compassionate father figure," Miranda said with a scowl. "I can see why you would be so eager to take up his name once you found out the truth."

"Lear made his mistakes, Goneril," Cordelia said. Miranda let out an annoyed grunt as her captor went back to the tortured Shakespeare metaphor, but Cordelia paid it no mind. "But he regretted them in the end. I found that out the day that Earth was invaded by the Reapers three years ago. In the confusion of the evacuation, he came out of the crowd. He told me that his name was Arthur Quinlan, and that he would take me someplace where I would be safe." A brief smile crossed her face. "Naturally, I was suspicious. A strange man coming out of nowhere and offering sanctuary to me, a young attractive woman barely in her twenties. But then he told me that he was an agent of my father. And that if I came with him, he would tell me the truth about where I had come from. And so I accepted."

"And what of your mother?" Miranda asked. "I suppose she wasn't granted the same offer of safety."

Cordelia barked out a harsh laugh. "Of course not! What had she done to deserve it? Sucking up credits from my father for the past twenty years? Eating and drinking herself into a fat, disgusting mess? I doubt she survived the invasion of Earth, but to be honest I never cared enough to even check. Even if she lived... I am not her daughter anymore. I do not carry the name she gave me. That silly little girl is dead now, and only Cordelia Lawson remains."

"So he rescued you from Earth. That's why you have a damn statue of him in your office?" Miranda asked, gesturing toward the disgusting eyesore. "After twenty years of no word, you think he saved your life... out of the goodness of his own heart? If he saved you, it was only because he thought you might still serve a purpose to him."

Cordelia shook her head. "But that's where you're wrong, Miranda. Father cared about me all along. He just... had his ways of showing it. After Mr. Quinlan pulled me away from the crowd, he took me to a private shuttle pad. On the way up to the ship that would be my home for the next two years, he told me that he was an employee of my father's. And that ever since I was born, my father had assigned him to one single task: ensure my safety. Make sure I was doing alright, that my mother wasn't neglecting me or wasting all the credits that Father was sending to her." A dreamy smile came to her face. "He even told me that, when I was ten years old, an unsavory individual had set his sights on me. Arthur personally ensured that the man was dealt with. If he hadn't been there... well, I'm sure you can imagine. So even if my father wasn't in my life personally... he was still looking out for my well-being."

Miranda was at a loss for words. This woman had been saved from a horrific fate at the hands of a perverted pedophile... and what does she do with her life? Help capture women in order for them to be subjected to an even worse fate.

Cordelia, on a roll at this point and barely acknowledging the two naked women standing below her, continued. "By the time we reached the vessel that Father prepared for me, Mr. Quinlan had told me all about the life of Henry Lawson. The credits he had accumulated through his sharp business sense. The power he wielded throughout the galaxy. I listened to it all with rapt attention. To think that such a great man was my father, after spending my whole life thinking of myself as the bastard daughter that had been cast away... it was revelatory. At the time, I had hoped that the spacecraft we had boarded was set to deliver me directly to my father's side. But, Mr. Quinlan informed me, it was not to be. My father was far away, and even though the ship we had boarded had an IES stealth system similar to the Normandy's, there was still a danger of being caught by the Reapers. So instead, we laid low in the Local Cluster, until the day would come when it was safe enough for me and my father to be..."

Miranda couldn't help it anymore, and suddenly started laughing. Cordelia cut off her story with a glare, as Miranda struggled to compose herself. "You poor, silly little girl," Miranda said. "Of course that's what he told you. But you have to know the real reason why you weren't taken to Henry directly, right? It was because he was at Sanctuary, rounding up experimental test subjects to be warped into Cerberus slaves and horrific beasts. Don't you see how calculated this was? How deliberately he made sure you were only exposed to this myth of Henry Lawson, scientific and financial genius? All of that would have been wiped clean if you had seen what your beloved father was actually up to."

"I know full well what Father was doing," Cordelia said coldly. "He was trying to save our species from extinction. If he had been allowed to succeed, we wouldn't have needed that Prothean contraption that left us without the mass relays for more than a year. Yes, the experiments were horrific at times. But they..."

"At times?" Miranda interrupted, voice filled with disbelief. "Open your damn eyes! He butchered people! Slaughtered them by the hundreds! He was no great man, he was a monster!"

"Interrupt me one more time, and by God I will make you watch while those brutes downstairs have their way with that doppelganger you call a sister!" Cordelia suddenly rose from her chair and exclaimed, her loud voice overpowering the music still playing. As Miranda shut her mouth, Cordelia slowly sat back down. "Father did what he thought he had to do, for the good of the galaxy. And he was repaid with betrayal. A fact that you two are well aware of."

Calming herself, Cordelia hit a button on her desk, and the music abruptly stopped. "A few months after Mr. Quinlan found me, as our ship hid away from the Reapers, he paid me a visit in my quarters. Told me that he had an important message... and that I would want to sit down for it."

Cordelia hit another button on her desk, and Miranda heard a sound she hoped to never hear again in her life: the voice of her father.

If you are hearing this message, than I, Henry Lawson, am dead. Strange to consider my own demise, even after the many deaths that have occurred in the wake of the Reaper invasion. But as I speak, my two daughters are on their way to this office. My associate Kai Leng is doing his best to slow Miranda down, but even if he stops them both, it appears that Commander Shepard and the Normandy are on their way as well. It may yet be possible for me to discover a means of escape. I hope that I can. But if you are hearing this message, my daughter, then it means that I have not checked in with Mr. Quinlan at our appointed time, and I have not survived this predicament.

At this time, I wanted to say... I am sorry. For so long, I wanted to believe that Miranda and Oriana would prove to be worthy successors. That they would carry forward my legacy into the future. But they have been turned against me. I gave them everything. Every last piece of my DNA, I granted to them. And they respond with betrayal. I created them to be perfect, but in the end I have realized that perfection is something that may be impossible to achieve. That maybe... maybe in the end, I must look to other methods to carry on my legacy.

My daughter... I have watched you grow up all these years. The man who is there with you, Mr. Quinlan, has sent me regular updates on your life over the years. I am sorry that I was not there to see it personally. I realize now that, in the end... these clones coming to kill me are not my daughters. You... you were my only true daughter. And I had hoped that, once all this insanity was finished, that I would be able to make it up to you. But since you're listening to this message... well, I suppose it is not to be.

I only hope that, late as it may be, my help in giving you an escape from the horrors currently happening on Earth will allow you to survive this war. And that, even without my contributions, humanity will defeat the Reapers. If we should triumph, and our species lives on past the expiration that the Reapers are attempting to set for us... I have instructed Mr. Quinlan to give you full access to all of the resources formerly at my disposal. This includes not only a vast sum of credits, but ships. Dummy corporations. Resources beyond what you could even possibly imagine. And people. People who are loyal to me, and will continue to demonstrate that same loyalty to you, my precious daughter.

And what will you do with those resources? I leave that entirely up to you. There was a time when I would have imposed my will upon you. Told Mr. Quinlan to only grant you access to these resources on one condition or another. But it seems that life is too short to worry about such matters anymore. So do whatever you wish with the inheritance I pass on to you. Invest the resources wisely, or waste them all on frivolities. I will make no demands on you one way or the other. However... I will make one request. If you should choose to repay me for what I have gifted to you, I ask you to take this ship through the Omega 4 relay. There is a station there, Avernus Station. Formerly operated by Cerberus, although I believe that the Illusive Man is pulling most of his people from there to help defend his main base of operations. But hidden away at that station, in a place no one would think to look... are the tools that will allow you to continue my legacy the way it deserves. Should you choose to grant this favor, let Mr. Quinlan know, and he will provide you with further details.

Whatever you decide, my daughter, know that I face my death a bit more gracefully, knowing that you are still out there. That even if I may die, the Lawson name will live on through you. And even though we may never meet face-to-face... know that I am so proud of you.

The message abruptly ended. And the realization hit Miranda even harder, of just how naïve and gullible this woman was. Of course, she hadn't had the "privilege" of hearing Henry's false promises and insincere praise over the course of several years, as Miranda had. The man could be charming when he needed to be, but Miranda had reached the point where she could hear the lie in his voice from a mile away. This woman calling herself Cordelia, however, had bought his bullshit completely. Even now, she could see the dreamy look in Cordelia's eyes as she listened to Henry's words. No doubt for the hundredth time or more.

Eventually, quite some time after the message stopped, Cordelia had regained her composure. "You see?" she said, her voice filled with awe. "In the end, he realized how he had miscalculated. How foolish it had been to place all of his hopes on you two. And he accepted me as his only daughter. His true daughter. Needless to say, I was ready to fulfill his request immediately. But just as we were finishing our preparations to head through the Charon relay... our sensors picked up a massive reading. It was the Citadel, being towed to Earth by the Reapers. Not long after that, Shepard came through along with the Crucible, and once it was fired... well, needless to say, heading for the Omega 4 relay was no longer an option."

"So instead, I did what I could in the Local Cluster," Cordelia continued. "With my father's resources and connections, I played a major role in the rebuilding of Earth, and the repair of the Charon relay. I'm sure that my business acumen was nothing compared to Father's, but with all of the assets he had granted me, it wasn't long until many of Earth's corporations were connected to me, directly or indirectly. Their gratitude for my assistance turned into loyalty, and by the time the Charon relay was finally repaired I controlled the vast majority of economic activity on Earth." She smirked down at Miranda and Oriana. "You see? For all your talk of Father's supposed cruelty, if it wasn't for him Earth would no doubt still be burning. But due to him, and to me, it thrives."

Miranda said nothing. By now, she realized that it was pointless to argue with this woman. She had built up Henry Lawson in her mind to near-godlike status, and no persuasion from the women who had "betrayed" him would do any good.

"Once the relay was up, I made my way straight to this station. Only to find Maya Brooks and her Shepard clone... "squatting" here, for lack of a better word. To be honest, I had enough ships and resources at that point to blow this entire station into rubble if they had presented me with a threat. But I needed to gain access to the... information that Father had left on this station. So I came to them with an offer of alliance. If they allowed me access to this station, I would provide them with enough resources to completely rebuild the might of Cerberus. Turn it from a target of scorn and hatred into the respected, pro-human organization it deserved to be.

"Oh, and there was one more condition to our deal, of course," Cordelia added, a sinister look creasing her face. "That they would help me get my revenge on the people who had killed my father. On Commander Shepard, her friends and allies... and on you two in particular."

"So that's what this is all about?" Miranda finally spoke up again. "Petty revenge?"

"What can I say? Like my father, I have my own human weaknesses," Cordelia said with a shrug. "And one of them is the thrill I'm going to get watching Henneman and his people torment, brutalize, and eventually break you all. He assures me that, by the time he's finished with you two, you're going to be nothing more than mewling, pathetic whores. That your minds will be warped until the only thing you can think about is bending over for every last man, or woman, and begging them to use you for their pleasure."

A smile came to Cordelia's stern face. "Dr. Henneman says he intends to start his... testing very soon. I've instructed him to make it slow for you two. To drag it out as long as possible, make the pain of being broken last for as long as he can manage. So while you're going through that, just remember my father. Remember how you betrayed and murdered him... and then beg him for forgiveness." Cordelia chuckled to herself. "Considering where he is right now, he is unlikely to grant it, of course. But I suppose it is worth a try."

Cordelia hit a button on her desk again, and the elevator door behind Miranda and Oriana slid open. "That is all," she said coldly "Mr. Quinlan will take you back to your cell. I don't imagine I'll be seeing you two again for a good long while... and when I do, you will be much different people."

Still a bit shaken from the revelations she had received, Oriana turned and began numbly walking back to the lift. Only to be stopped when Miranda put a hand on her shoulder. "Wait," Miranda said, before turning her attention back to Cordelia. "Just one thing before we go back to that hell-hole your credits bought. You call yourself Cordelia. Name yourself after the character from King Lear. I trust you remember what happened to Cordelia by the end of that play. She ends up defeated, imprisoned, and eventually executed. I only hope you're prepared to face a similar fate. Because you know that what you and your people have done... it will not stand. Someone will come for you eventually, and when they do... your father won't be there to mourn over your body. Nor will anyone else."

And before Cordelia could offer a response, Miranda ushered Oriana into the lift.
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Slaves of Cerberus