The hospital ceiling was exactly the kind of white that existed to remind you where you were. Sterile. Fluorescent. The kind of light that made healthy people look sick and sick people look dead.
Nolan — Webb, he had to think of himself as Webb — had been staring at it for six hours.
The Alliance field hospital on Eden Prime was efficient and impersonal. A curtained bay, a monitoring station tracking his vitals, and a guard posted outside the partition who pretended to be reading a datapad. The migraine had downgraded from railroad spike to persistent ice pick behind his left eye. Progress.
The nosebleed had stopped somewhere around hour three. Small mercies.
[BINDING PROGRESS: 18%]
[MANDATE POINTS: 14/100]
[REGENERATION RATE: 1 MP/HOUR (BASE)]
The System display hovered in his peripheral vision. Nobody else could see it — he'd tested that by asking the nurse if she'd noticed "anything unusual" with his omni-tool. She'd given him a look reserved for patients suspected of brain damage and adjusted his painkillers.
The curtain snapped open.
"Lieutenant Webb."
The man who stepped through was Alliance Intelligence in everything but a neon sign. Civilian clothes — expensive, understated. Hair cut regulation-short despite not being military. Eyes that catalogued and filed every detail they touched.
"Agent Harlow. Alliance Intelligence, Eden Prime Division."
He pulled up a chair without asking. Set a datapad on the bedside table. Sat. Crossed his legs. Everything calibrated to project calm authority.
"How's the head, Lieutenant?"
"Terrible."
"Dr. Chakwas reviewed your scans. Significant neural activity in regions associated with the Prothean beacon exposure on Shanxi in '57. Congratulations — you're the second known human to survive direct beacon contact."
"Shanxi. The First Contact War. Someone touched a beacon during that mess too."
"I don't feel special," Nolan said.
Harlow's mouth twitched. Not a smile.
"Walk me through it. You're on patrol, Dr. Yusuf activates the beacon, then what?"
"Green light. Pain. A lot of pain. Images — cities burning, things I didn't understand. Then I was on the ground."
"And the device?"
"What device?"
Harlow lifted the datapad. Turned it so Nolan could see the screen. Security footage — grainy, partially corrupted by the beacon's electromagnetic discharge, but clear enough. A mass accelerator turret assembling itself from nothing in front of a pillar.
"That device."
Nolan's mouth went dry. He'd hoped the footage was destroyed. Stupid hope.
"I don't remember building anything. The beacon did something to my head — you just said that yourself. I blacked out. Next thing I knew, Chen was hitting me."
"You didn't black out, Lieutenant. Footage shows you conscious and moving throughout the engagement. You extended your hand, and a military-grade turret materialized."
"Then the beacon did it."
"Beacons are data storage devices. They don't create matter."
"This one did."
Silence. Harlow studied him with the patient focus of a man who got paid to wait people out. Nolan held his gaze and said nothing. The migraine pulsed. The System display flickered in his periphery.
[SOCIAL ENCOUNTER: DECEPTION CHECK — NO SYSTEM ASSISTANCE AVAILABLE AT CURRENT LEVEL]
"Great. I'm on my own for this one."
"Lieutenant Chen corroborates the timeline," Harlow said after a long pause. "Corporal Vega's statement matches. Dr. Yusuf remains unconscious. The Geth platforms have been secured for analysis." He uncrossed his legs. Leaned forward. "Here's my problem, Webb. I have footage of impossible technology manifesting in front of an Alliance officer with a history of... let's call it independent judgment. An officer currently under review for insubordination. Do you understand why that concerns me?"
"I saved Chen's life. And Vega's."
"Nobody's disputing that. I'm disputing the how."
"The beacon activated something. I don't understand it. Test me, scan me, do whatever you need. I'm not hiding anything."
A lie. Every word of it, except the part about not understanding. He understood enough to know that the truth — I'm a dead man from another universe possessing this body, and a Prothean AI gave me a kingdom-building system — would end with him in a research facility for the rest of Webb's natural life.
Harlow stared at him for five more seconds. Then he stood, collected his datapad, and left without another word.
The curtain swished shut.
Nolan exhaled. His hands were fists under the blanket. He unclenched them, one finger at a time.
---
[Eden Prime Alliance Field Hospital — March 16, 2180, 11:47 PM]
The guard changed shifts at midnight. Nolan had thirty minutes of reduced attention.
He activated Webb's omni-tool — the orange holographic interface wrapping around his forearm like a glove. Standard Alliance issue, locked with Webb's biometrics. His biometrics now.
Personnel file. Marcus Webb. Service Number 4471-Alpha-Kilo.
Born 2148. Grew up on Arcturus Station. Enlisted at eighteen. Rose fast — Lieutenant Commander by thirty, decorated for valor during a batarian skirmish near Torfan. Then the slaver interdiction. The one that ended everything.
The details confirmed what Webb's fragmented memories had already told him. A batarian slaver convoy moving through Alliance space. Orders to maintain blockade — let the convoy pass, don't engage, avoid a diplomatic incident. Webb broke formation, engaged the lead slaver, and freed forty-three civilian captives from six species.
Command called it insubordination. The captives called him a hero. The brass promoted the officer who'd written the original order and demoted Webb to Lieutenant. Three months from now, he'd be discharged. Career over. Life over.
"Webb was a good man in a bad system. And I'm wearing his body like a stolen coat."
He closed the personnel file and opened another.
Dependents: Sara Webb (née Okonkwo). Status: Divorced, 2179. One child: Emma Webb, age 4.
A photo in the personal effects folder. A woman with braided hair and sharp, tired eyes. A little girl with Webb's chin and her mother's smile.
Nolan closed the file. His chest ached with something that didn't belong to him.
The ward was quiet. The guard's shadow hadn't moved in eight minutes. Nolan turned his attention inward, to the translucent interface hovering at the edge of his vision.
Time to learn what this thing actually was.
He focused on the main dashboard. Tabs expanded, each one a doorway into a different function:
[TERRITORY] — Claim and manage locations. Requires physical presence. Build structures, generate resources, grow populations.
[CONSTRUCTION] — Build defensive, economic, and research structures within claimed territories. Uses Mandate Points. Construction times vary.]
[HEROES] — Recruit exceptional individuals. Cost scales with target's value and influence. Recruited heroes gain enhanced abilities and loyalty bonding.]
[WAR COUNCIL] — Strategic threat assessment. Tracks galaxy-level events and provides countdown timers for major crises.]
[RESOURCES] — Current stockpile. Mandate Points: 14/100. Regeneration: 1/hour (base rate increases with territory and achievements).]
Simple enough. A strategy game interface grafted onto reality. Claim territory, build structures, recruit powerful people, prepare for war. The Mandate Points were currency — spent on construction, recruitment, and upgrades. Earned through achievements and territory management.
"Kingdom building. In Mass Effect. With three years until the Reapers start their invasion."
He opened the War Council tab.
[WAR COUNCIL — ACTIVE THREATS]
[THREAT LEVEL: EXTINCTION]
[REAPER INVASION — ESTIMATED ARRIVAL: 3.2 YEARS]
[CURRENT GALACTIC READINESS: 2%]
[CYCLE BREAKER ASSETS: 0]
[RECOMMENDATION: BEGIN TERRITORIAL ACQUISITION IMMEDIATELY]
Three point two years. The number branded itself into his brain. One thousand, one hundred and sixty-eight days, give or take. Before Sovereign attacked the Citadel. Before the Collectors started harvesting colonies. Before Earth burned.
He closed the War Council. The number didn't disappear. It pulsed in the corner of his vision like a second heartbeat — soft, persistent, impossible to ignore.
[BINDING PROGRESS: 22%]
[WARNING: BINDING INCOMPLETE. SYSTEM FUNCTIONALITY LIMITED. AVOID EXCESSIVE MP EXPENDITURE UNTIL BINDING REACHES 100%.]
The migraine spiked. He pressed the heel of his palm against his eye socket until stars bloomed.
A photo from Webb's personal effects sat on the bedside table. Sara and Emma, smiling at a camera Webb had been holding. A family that belonged to a man who didn't exist anymore, taken by a stranger wearing his face.
Nolan turned the photo face-down.
The War Council timer pulsed. 3.2 years. The fluorescent lights hummed. The guard's shadow shifted outside the curtain.
---
Morning came with discharge papers and new orders.
The nurse handed him a datapad while he was pulling on Webb's boots. Administrative Leave, Pending Review. Effective immediately. Report to no duty station. Maintain availability for follow-up investigation.
"You're free to go, Lieutenant. Light duty. No strenuous activity for seventy-two hours."
"And the surveillance?"
She blinked. "What surveillance?"
Nolan glanced at the guard outside the curtain. The guard who was still there, still pretending to read.
"Never mind."
He walked out of the hospital into Eden Prime's pale morning light. The colony of Constant spread below the medical district — prefab housing, commercial strips, a spaceport humming with shuttle traffic. Ordinary. Peaceful. Three years from a Geth invasion that would turn it into a graveyard.
The War Council timer pulsed in his peripheral vision, patient and merciless.
[3.2 YEARS REMAINING]
His omni-tool buzzed. New message.
FROM: ALLIANCE INTELLIGENCE — EDEN PRIME DIVISION RE: Follow-up Interview — Scheduled March 19, 2180 Agent Harlow requests your continued availability.
Nolan deleted the notification and started walking. He needed clothes that weren't a hospital gown over fatigues. He needed food. He needed a plan.
The timer pulsed. Every second counted, and he was standing still.
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