History Recap / MassEffect2

* Jacob can be romanced by a female Shepard. He's not considered the most compelling option in the cast (quite the opposite) because of his stalwart, unflinching ability to choose right from wrong -- something basically no other character has -- but that makes him a good person for Shepard to unburden herself to. She admits that she feels abandoned by her crew -- one is dead, but another half of the ''ME1'' PlayerParty is off doing their own thing -- but also guilty because her death is what caused them all to fracture. Jacob reassures her that her compassion is what makes her better than, say, TIM, and kisses her on the cheek. When coming up for their Pre-Climax Climax, though, he gets hit with another case of {{narm}}: "Look at this -- like sneaking into the captain's quarters. Heavy risk... But the ''prize''..."

At some point, EDI will finish the Reaper IFF integration. When she does, she will tell you that the full shakedown requires the ''Normandy'' to sit dead in space and twiddle its thumbs. As such, on your next visit to the Galaxy Map, Shepard will go on a mission and take the ''entire PlayerParty'' -- as many as 12 other people -- with them on the shuttle. ''Normandy'' is now conspicuously empty of people who specialize in shooting guns.

At this point, it will hopefully become clear why most guides advise, and why this recap assumes, that Shepard does all the side quests and things ''before'' recruiting Legion: when you get the Reaper IFF, this event shows up. Even worse, TakeYourTime is ''averted'': If you go through the Omega-4 Relay now, you can save the entire crew, but if you stop to do up to 3 missions -- missions being defined as, "Leaving the ship for a combat situation" -- half of them get eaten by the Collectors. If you do 4 or more, ''all'' of them do, with Dr. Chakwas as the SoleSurvivor. But if some of your squadmates aren't loyal yet, the entire endgame gets harder. No, better to get everything squared away during the unstructured Sandbox III phase. Meanwhile, you can still run around, do shopping, harvest resources for upgrades, and even go talk to EDI. Because Jeff officially unshackled her, she can now provide full disclosure on things she was formerly programmed to hide: she can now tell you that Cerberus consists of about 150 agents organized into three cells (the ''Normandy'' herself being one of them), and was able to obtain top-secret cutting-edge schematics for the ''Normandy'', which was co-developed with the turians, because Cerberus was one of the lobbyist groups pushing for its design and creation in the first place. Jeff and EDI also (do not) acknowledge that they have moved to a FirstNameBasis with each other, or in Jeff's case referring to EDI with "she/her" pronouns instead of "[[ItIsDehumanizing it]]".

The team splits again. Shepard nominates a Leader to head up another diversion, and then chooses a Biotic who will guard Shepard's fireteam using a biotic bubble while the four of them head down the main path. Lastly, Chakwas and whatever crew survivors remain need someone to EscortMission them back to the ''Normandy''. The Escort character will ''stay'' at the ''Normandy'' throughout the rest of the mission, so Shepard can also tell the crew that they need all hands on deck and that the {{Red Shirt}}s will have to risk it. (If so, you get an Escort Mission with no bodyguards and the escortees die.) This is when completed Loyalty Missions start really coming into play: if your Biotic isn't loyal, you lose one of the two squadmates you took with you; if the Escort (exists and) isn't loyal, they perform a HeroicSacrifice to get Chakwas ''et al'' back to the ship; and if the Leader isn't chosen correctly, they also die as the diversionary team rejoins Shepard.

-->PS: Don't tell her I sent you this. It would just make her angry.

-->'''Garrus''': I remember this one mission, me and this recon scout had been at each other's throats, nerves mostly. She suggested we settle it in the ring.
'''Shepard''': I take it you went easy on her?
'''Garrus''': Actually, she and I were the two best hand-to-hand combatants on the ship. I had reach, she had flexibility. It was brutal. After 9 rounds, the judges declared it a draw. A lot of unhappy bettors in the other room. We, uh, ended up having a tiebreaker in her quarters. I had reach, [[FlexibilityEqualsSexAbility she had flexibility]]. More than one way to work off stress, I guess...
(later conversation)

-->'''Joker''': Argh! You want me to go crawling through the ducts again.
'''EDI''': I enjoy the sight of humans on their knees.
({{beat}}. Joker's expression includes a QuizzicalTilt, a FascinatingEyebrow and a FlatWhat.)

* Jack is available to a male Shepard... if you work at it. If he speaks to her enough, Jack will offer to have casual sex with him, resulting in what [[TheWikiRule the Fandom.com wiki]] calls "a feisty sex scene". Thereafter, though, she'll refuse to speak to Shepard again -- even about things like wanting to do her Loyalty mission, which can make this a truly problematic path to pursue. The alternative is to pull a LetsWaitAWhile, at which point Jack -- slowly -- begins to open up about her SurvivorsGuilt concerning, well, the entire world, not to mention previous people she loved who have since died. Shortly before the endgame, Jack will visit Shepard in his quarters and admit her emotional turmoil. Where basically every other character has a PreClimaxClimax scene, she and Shepard spend the night fully clothed, just holding each other.

We open in 2183, a few weeks after the first game left off. The ''Normandy'' SR-1 is on the hunt for the geth. Officially, the Reapers -- a BadassArmy of {{Eldritch Abomination}}s bent on waging a RobotWar on the entire Milky Way Galaxy -- are nothing but a rumor, even though Shepard verifiably slew one during the FinalBattle of the previous game; instead, it was just a massive geth incursion, and Shepard is out here to put a stop to it.\\
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While investigating, the ''Normandy'' becomes the victim of a surprise attack from an unknown cruiser with powerful weapons; just one shot cripples the ship. Navigator Pressly is slain immediately (via a case of the old ExplosiveInstrumentation), and more casualties follow. One of the previous game's party members -- either the Virmire Survivor (either Kaidan or Ashley, the MutuallyExclusivePartyMembers who cannot both live through the first game) or, if you didn't import a ''Mass Effect 1'' campaign or had a relationship with her, [[GreenSkinnedSpaceBabe Blue-Skinned Space Babe]] Liara T'Soni -- runs to Shepard belowdecks; the commander is activating a distress beacon, and declares the AbandonShip, charging their lieutenant with getting everyone else off. Shepard, meanwhile, heads up to the bridge, where Joker is still trying to keep the crippled ship moving. Shepard tosses him into an EscapePod and hits the button, just as the cruiser fires one last shot that destroys the ''Normandy'' for good.\\
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Shepard, floating in space, feels shrapnel piercing their hardsuit. The commander plummets towards a nearby planet, suffocating. TheHeroDies.\\
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Shepard, potentially edited from the first game, awakens on an operating table. A VoiceWithAnInternetConnection, a woman, tells them to hustle up, grab a gun and some armor: apparently, the... wherever-Shepard-is... is under attack. Someone has sabotaged the place, and the automated security mechs which are supposed to be defending everyone are, instead, murdering them. There are no aliens, and everyone is wearing white-and-black uniforms with a six-sided yellow icon on them.\\
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In addition to the adjustments mentioned above, Shepard gets accustomed to the new shooting system. AsYouKnow, guns in the ''Mass Effect'' universe are MagneticWeapons with {{Justified}} BottomlessMagazines: the gun contains a block of metal, and shaves off tiny slivers to fire at very high velocity; the ammo block is typically rated for about 10,000 rounds. Since no player would realistically fire -- and no opposing force would have HitPoints enough to realistically require -- 10,000 rounds, the first game replaced the normal reloading situation with an {{Overheating}} mechanic to limit the player's effective DPS, requiring them to space out their shots and focus on accuracy. This game discards that entirely and goes back to reloading your guns using "thermal clips". (In the third game, Shepard will {{Handwave}} this by claiming that this allows guns to fire with more power, and stops people from having to wait until their guns cool down... but required the older heat-vent system to be removed to make room for the thermal clips, locking gameplay into one mode or the other. The person they're talking to, Conrad Verner, scoffs, "Okay, that's just... [[LampshadeHanging you might as well be going back to limited ammunition.]]" As an AuthorsSavingThrow, the third game has a couple guns that use the old overheating mechanic, and the GaidenGame ''VideoGame/MassEffectAndromeda'' allowed it to be installed to ''any'' weapon via GunAccessories.)\\
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Shepard links up with a living human: Jacob Taylor, who seems to be a Vanguard if he's anything at all. (In every game except the first, each party member has a unique class that does not necessarily correspond to something Shepard is or could be.) Jacob assures Shepard he's on their side, though he observes that things must be pretty bad if "Miranda" has Shepard up and about. He promises to answer as many of Shepard's questions as possible, after they survive the current situation, but he does drop one important fact: Shepard has come BackFromTheDead, and it's now 2185 because of how long it took to do it.\\
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The two link up with Wilson, another living member of the station's team; Wilson seems convinced that Miranda has betrayed the installation. Jacob finds that difficult to believe, given that she's ''in charge'' of the installation; if she is loyal, then this kind of looks bad, and if she isn't, there are easier ways for her to have screwed things up than pulling a BackStab. Before they move forward, Jacob admits the truth to Shepard: he, and everyone else on the station, are agents of Cerberus, the NebulousEvilOrganization of RightWingMilitiaFanatic types that caused so much trouble during the Sovereign campaign.\\
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Shepard investigates the abandoned colony with Jacob and Miranda Lawson as their squadmates. (Miranda is roughly a Sentinel.) They find no colonists, just more security mechs that have been programmed to shoot anything that moves... and the last thing anyone might expect: Tali'Zorah vas ''Neema'', here to find a lost quarian named Veetor who came here on their Pilgrimage. Veetor, it is revealed, is who hijacked the security mechs -- as proved by a BossBattle against a [[GiantMook YMIR Mech]] that slaughters Tali's squad when they LeeroyJenkins in over her objections. Veetor, who has been in hiding, has security-cam footage of what happened to the colonists: they were subdued by insects which Veetor calls "seeker swarms" and then carted away by obscure aliens called "the Collectors." Miranda explains that the Collectors live on the other side of the Omega-4 relay and are very rarely seen. If they're working with the Reapers, it only bodes ill.\\
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Tali requests to take custody of Veetor, offering his omnitool readings in exchange. Shepard can choose to allow it, or to take Veetor into Cerberus custody for closer interrogation.\\
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Shepard reports to TIM and is {{Railroaded}} into accepting Cerberus's help in stopping the Collectors and/or Reapers. To do this, however, TIM has furnished Shepard with some good opportunities: first, there are several dossiers on people Shepard can recruit into the PlayerParty (more on them below). Second, he has provided Shepard with a pilot: none other than Joker, who has been grounded for two years and jumped at the chance to fly again. And third, he has provided a ship: the SSV ''Normandy'' SR-2, which is bigger and better than the original in every way (five decks[[note]]Deck 1 is Shepard's cabin; Decks 2, 3 and 4 correspond to Decks 1, 2 and 3 on the SR-1, with the CIC on 2, the crew quarters on 3 and Engineering on 4; Deck 5, at the bottom, is the hangar and cannot be accessed manually until the sequel.[[/note]], better drive core, same stealth systems). Its only downside is that it's now too large to land the surface of planets by itself, something the SR-1 did repeatedly in the Sovereign campaign. TIM wants Shepard to assemble a crew and go through the Omega-4 Relay, which nobody has ever gone through -- or, rather, which plenty of people have gone through, but no one has ever survived to ''return'' from.\\
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Shepard boards the ''Normandy'' and finds it full of Cerberus crew: engineers Donnely and Daniels, Jacob, Miranda, and even Dr. Chakwas, who is formally on a leave of absence from the Alliance. Many of them are former Alliance members who resigned for the same reason Garrus left C-Sec: too much red tape, too much bureaucracy. As they see it, Cerberus is on the front lines and being ProperlyParanoid against oncoming threats like the Reapers. Miranda reinforces the idea that Cerberus maintains its humans-first Renegade-style FantasticRacism, though she admits that Shepard is in charge and can choose to run the ship in Paragon mode if they so choose. ''Normandy'' is also equipped with something truly illegal: an "Enhanced Defense Intelligence," a genuine AI, mounted to run the ship's cyberwarfare and hacking equipment and also acting as your VoiceWithAnInternetConnection on missions. "EDI" claims she cannot operate anything more, but she also admits that she has computing hardware and subroutines that are currently turned off and whose purpose she does not know. This is also true of the ship: a number of rooms are sealed off and cannot be entered. They will unlock if you recruit a specific party member, who will then live there. Two are, technically, already unlocked: Jacob can be found in the Armory on Deck 2, maintaining the ship's small arms, while Miranda's NumberTwo's office is on Deck 3 where the Captain's Cabin was on the SR-1. In general, you'll want to talk to your squadmates, not just because doing so will unclock {{Side Quest}}s for you, but because each of them has ideas for upgrades for the mission. Jacob, for instance, studied the fate of the SR-1, and suggests you add asari-invented Silaris armor to the SR-2.\\
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These can be done in any order you please, and there are some benefits to varying it up. For instance, if you just grab Kasumi and Zaeed up front, you have that much more flexibility in your party composition, and there's frankly no reason to not do this. That said, for simplicity, this recap will follow the numerical order above.\\

Most game guides recommend you get Mordin first, because he lives in and unlocks the ''Normandy''[='s=] Tech Lab on Deck 2, where you can purchase party-wide buffs, new weapons, upgrades for the ''Normandy'' herself, and more.\\
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Dr. Solus, according to EDI, is operating a free clinic on Omega, which is currently dealing with an outbreak of plague which affects everyone but humans and vorcha. (If you do this first, all of your party members are human, but -- spoiler alert -- the characters you get from the "Archangel" and "Warlord" missions are not, and if you bring them with you they may drop a few one-liners about feeling a bit ill. Don't worry, they get better.) While you can go straight there, you're first encouraged to visit Afterlife, a nightclub run by Omega's head crime boss and dictator-in-chief, the asari Aria T'Loak. You can also ask her about Archangel, who is also here.\\
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The slums of Omega have devolved into chaos: quarantine has been imposed, and the Blue Suns, a group of PrivateMilitaryContractors, have taken it upon themselves to just kill everyone to halt the spread of the plague; additionally, many have taken the opportunity to do some looting instead. The end result is that Shepard can find a lot of corpses in a lot of apartments. Eventually, Shepard makes it to Mordin's clinic. Mordin is a MotorMouth, but is also the first person Shepard has met who isn't particularly hostile. Mordin is happy to join Shepard's suicide squad, but first wants Shepard to help him deploy a cure for the plague, which he (Mordin) has developed. This results in Shepard fighting their way down to Environmental Controls to put the cure in the air circulation system. Once done, Mordin boards the ''Normandy''. He's an Engineer with various tech powers. His upgrade idea is not related to the ''Normandy'', but rather enhances his power damage.\\
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Mordin's arrival not only unlocks the Tech Lab, it also unlocks the [[ScrappyMechanic ill-liked]] resource scanning minigame. There are four basic raw materials needed for upgrades -- iridium, palladium, platinum and element zero -- and, to get them, Shepard has to use the ''Normandy'''s scanner on various planets and send down probes which will retrieve raw materials for later use. This is precisely as tedious as it sounds. However, a few short missions can be unlocked via scanning, not to mention [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fd_zv6DhQlI a joke or two]]. Miranda's ship upgrade is supposed to make this less tedious, but it only does so on console, as it essentially upgrades the player's mouse sensitivity -- a thing PC players can do easily anyhow.\\

Some guides recommend you actually do this mission ''last'' of the initial four, because there's just a ton of fighting against a wide variety of enemies. That said, some players choose it second or even first for sentimental reasons.\\
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Aria, back in Afterlife, mentioned that all three major groups of PrivateMilitaryContractors -- the Blue Suns, the Eclipse, and the Blood Pack -- have decided to band together and take out Archangel. Shepard signs up as one of their cannon-fodder low-level {{mook}}s, with the intention of going DoubleAgent later. The mercs' assault is going to be grim: Archangel has holed up at the end of a one-way street and has a commanding view of the approach; plus, they're known to be an expert with a SniperRifle. The mercs' plan basically boils down to "WeHaveReserves," backed up by a bunch of mechs and a FutureCopter. Shepard is given the opportunity to sabotage these things before heading in, reducing the mission's difficulty but lowering the amount of ExperiencePoints you can get from it.\\
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Shepard leads the "charge" down the street, quietly taking out other mercs along the way, and then ascends to the top floor of the safe house to meet Archangel -- who turns out to be none other than Garrus Vakarian, who's here to shoot criminals and chew bubblegum. And he's all out of bubblegum.\\
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The rest of the level is basically an EscortMission: Garrus stays up at the top shooting mercs with his sniper rifle as the Eclipse, the Blood Pack and the Blue Suns all attack one at a time. Garrus has his own health bar. Each merc group's attack includes that group's leader, resulting in a BossBattle. This culminates in Tarak, the Blue Suns' leader, flying in with his gunship, which the four of you have to shoot down. The gunship's parting shot is a rocket to Garrus's face, and Shepard calls for immediate medevac.\\
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Garrus survives, with a couple of cybernetic implants, a fairly serious facial scar, and some physical damage to his armor which he wears for the rest of the game. He takes up residence in the ''Normandy''[='s=] Main Battery at the very tip of Deck 3, directly under Joker's pilot seat on Deck 2, where he can frequently be found "[[MemeticMutation in the middle of some calibrations]]." He occupies a truly odd place in the game's class structure: while he shares the sniper rifle, and split emphasis on Tech and Combat, as an Infiltrator, he seems to have all the things an Infiltrator ''doesn't'' normally have; his "Concussive Shot" {{knockback}} ability is normally found on Soldiers, "[[ShockAndAwe Overload]]" is an Engineer or Sentinel power, and he doesn't have the InvisibilityCloak. He suggests upgrading the SR-2 with turian-invented "Thanix cannons" to give her more firepower.\\

Shepard takes a squad to the ''Purgatory'', the turian prison ship where the convict, Jack, is being held. A sudden but inevitable betrayal occurs as the warden, Kuril, decides to capture Shepard and sell ''them'' for profit as well. Shepard must fight their way out, and then override security for the whole prison -- starting a riot, but more importantly releasing Jack, the Psychotic Biotic.\\
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Jack, to everyone's surprise, is revealed to be a bald-headed, highly-tattooed woman. However, her title as "most powerful human biotic" is justified by CutscenePowerToTheMax, in which she effortlessly handles 3 YMIR mechs which would normally give her a ton of problems during gameplay.\\
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After killing Kuril, Shepard eventually corners Jack, who has arrived at the airlock where ''Normandy'' is docked. She hates Cerberus with a passion -- apparently she suffered some past violence at their hands -- but agrees to work with them as a chance to sow chaos from within. She takes up residence in the basement of Deck 4. She's a ChaoticEvil biotic, and has the Shockwave and shotgun of a Vanguard. That said, she, like Jacob, lacks the FoeTossingCharge SignatureMove of the Vanguard; in fact, only one party member in the whole franchise will ever have that, and ''she's'' currently becoming a HumanPopsicle in preparation for her role in ''Mass Effect Andromeda''. Jack's upgrade is a new biotic amp that increases her power damage.\\

Shepard lands on the planet Korlus, where Warlord Okeer has been hanging out with the Blue Suns. It becomes clear that Jedore, the local Blue Suns leader, has hired Okeer to create DesignerBaby krogan on behalf of her organization. Most of them, in his opinion, are defective, and those he has released to her control -- not that she can particularly control them; the Blue Suns and their baby krogan are fighting all over the place, and while the Suns are winning, it's a near thing. Okeer needed independent scientific assistance to do all this genetic engineering, which is why he contacted the Collectors. Jedore finally figures out that Okeer is behind the mass release of krogan and starts piping poison gas into his lab; Okeer, as the price of his allegiance, demands Shepard kill Jedore. Shepard does, but Okeer succumbs to the gas, leaving Shepard only with Okeer's perfect specimen: a single uber-krogan, full-grown but not yet awakened, in its UterineReplicator.\\
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The tank is stowed in the Port Cargo Hold on Deck 4, and Shepard is given the choice of whether to break it open and awaken the krogan within. (Technically, you never have to open it at all, and there are a few benefits to delaying, as some additional content becomes available earlier.) The krogan explains that he has the genes of several notable krogan warlords in his DNA, but Shepard encourages him to pick his own path -- and his own name. He chooses "Grunt". He is roughly analogous to the Soldier class, but with an emphasis on the StoneWall aspects of the class rather than the straightforward DPS of Zaeed. His upgrade is a massive M-300 Claymore shotgun whose recoil would break the arm of a non-krogan.\\

* Another DLC involves Shepard being asked by Alliance command to visit the "''Normandy'' Crash Site" and place a memorial there. This is a neat way to provide closure to the old girl, but has so little plot relevance that we're not even going to bother talking about what happens there: nothing does. (Or, rather, we've just finished successfully describing it, so let's move on.)\\

TheHeist takes place at Donovan Hock's villa. Kasumi remains under cloak, acting as Shepard's VoiceWithAnInternetConnection, while Shepard strolls in the front door, posing as the leader of a group of {{Private Military Contractor}}s. Kasumi helps Shepard peel away security and get into Hock's vault, where their weapons and armor was stashed beforehand. The two break into Hock's vault and find a number of priceless treasures, like a Prothean statue from Ilos and the head of the Statue of Liberty, as well as the M-12 Locust -- arguably the best [=SMG=] in the game due to its sniper-rifle-level accuracy, and therefore a boon to anyone playing Adept, Sentinel or Engineer (squadmates don't suffer from accuracy issues and are therefore better served by the M-9 Tempest you'll pick up later in the game) -- and Keiji's graybox. However, this is where Hock catches them. After fighting their way through his {{mook}}s, Shepard and Kasumi take on Hock while he flies a gunship.\\
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As Kasumi peruses the memories stored in Keiji's graybox, it becomes clear that their relationship was far more than professional. Shepard may encourage her to either keep the greybox or destroy it; either way, Kasumi becomes Loyal. Remember how every character has a third active ability that needs to be unlocked? This is how you unlock it. Kasumi's is "[[BlindedByTheLight Flashbang Grenade]]," which is a powerful area-of-effect stun.\\

* If Shepard decides to save the workers instead, they succeed, but Vido gets away in a helicopter. Then an explosion traps Zaeed under a piece of debris. If Shepard has enough Paragon points, they can convince Zaeed to abandon -- or at least delay -- his RoaringRampageOfRevenge, at which point Zaeed becomes loyal. However, Shepard can (or, if lacking enough Paragon points, be forced to) simply free Zaeed and call it a day, at which point he remains unfocused and ''does not'' become loyal. Finally, there is also the option, if you delayed this mission until after TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon, to decide Zaeed isn't worth the trouble and leave him to die.\\

Shepard and a squad land on the planet Aite, where a Dr. Gavin Archer explains that various [=VI=]s are trying to upload themselves into the extranet and off the facility. There are also geth everywhere, which the [=VI=]s have seized control of. In the end, Shepard needs to get to a satellite dish, with which the VI will beam itself offworld, and destroy three of its four structural supports to end the virtual prison-break attempt.\\
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After completing the four recruitment missions that are actually missions (IE Grunt, Jack, Garrus and Mordin), Shepard will get paged to the ''Normandy''[='s=] conference room at the back of the CIC. TIM informs Shepard that the human colony of Horizon is in the process of going dark, and Shepard is to head there immediately. Anything you didn't complete will still be available for later consumption, but no matter what, '''Do not answer TIM's call unless you're satisfied with the current state of affairs''': once you answer, it's a PointOfNoReturn and the game sends you straight to Horizon [[ButThouMust without asking permission]]. TIM warns you to expect the Collectors... and the Virmire Survivor, who is part of an Alliance outreach to the Terminus Systems, an independent area which rejects the Council's authority.\\
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The mission also introduces the BigBad of the game: Harbinger, an intelligence or commanding presence that can inflict a VillainOverride DemonicPossession on any Collector {{mook}} it chooses, giving them an immediate boost to durability and DPS. This is almost inevitably accompanied by the CatchPhrase "[[MemeticMutation ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL]]," which players hear very, very frequently.\\
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Shepard and their squad are beset by not only Collectors but husks, the cyborg zombies that Sovereign turned its victims into. This is the first direct link between the Collectors and the Reapers, confirming that TIM's belief in their cooperation was right. Shepard also starts finding some of the colonists of Horizon: they are frozen in place by the Seeker Swarms and are now stuck where they were, allowing the Collectors to, uh, collect them at their leisure. Shepard, of course, is having none of it. They activate some of the AntiAir defenses that the Alliance recently put in place, and this drives off the Collector mothership, the massive cylinder of doom that killed the SR-1. The person who comes to congratulate them for saving the colony... is none other than the Virmire Survivor, who praises them for their work... and then almost instantly starts complaining that Shepard is working with Cerberus. (To repeat: NebulousEvilOrganization made of {{Right Wing Militia Fanatic}}s.) Aside from an e-mail later in the game, where they apologize for their emotional reaction at seeing Shepard BackFromTheDead, this is the last time we see the Virmire Survivor until the third and final game.\\

# '''The Assassin:''' A very lethal drell by the name of Thane Krios has agreed to work with Shepard and/or for TIM. Shepard needs to go acquire him.\\

* Technically, Samara, Tali and Thane all have their loyalty missions open up as well, but simply for organizational reasons we're going to leave them until later in the document. You can't do everything anyway; the next plot-mandated intermission kicks in after you do five more missions.\\

Thane and Samara are both hanging out on Illium, which serves as one of several general hubs for missions (alongside Omega and Tuchanka, which we will get access to via Grunt and/or Mordin). Your first stop is a KnowledgeBroker who has set up shop in the two years between games: the daughter of a famed asari matriarch and renowned Prothean expert, Liara T'Soni. She knows where both Thane and Samara can be found, though she declines to join Shepard's team; she's been busy for the last two years making her own way in the world, and besides she's ''this close'' to hunting down the Shadow Broker for good and all. Her friend, Feron, is currently the Shadow Broker's prisoner, having pulled a "YouShallNotPass" to protect her, and she's preparing for a RoaringRampageOfRescue.\\
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Near Liara's office is the Eternity bar. This is notable for being the home of Matriarch Aethyta, an asari bartender who was laughed off Thessia for daring to suggest the asari should start looking into questions like how to make their own mass relays. (She mentions how her father, a krogan, fought in the Rebellions, and her mother against them, and that the two lived happily for hundreds of years before finding out, having it out... and ending up TogetherInDeath.) She also mentions having fathered a purebred daughter at one point. [[ChekhovsGun This will be important later.]] Shepard additionally runs into Conrad Vernor here, wearing cosplay N7 armor and claiming to be engaging in derring-do throughout the galaxy. Thanks to a GoodBadBug, Conrad will always claim that Shepard threatened him with a gun barrel to the face, regardless of whether Shepard did so. Shepard, exasperation notwithstanding, can help Conrad perform a sting on an illegal drug dealer... or just shoot him in the foot to make him leave.\\
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In any case, Shepard sets out after the Justicar, Samara, who is investigating the murder of a volus businessman. Shepard is granted access by a local police officer, Anaya, who mentions that she's been ordered to detain Samara -- she's the asari equivalent of a Spectre, but with ''no'' oversight beyond the HonorBeforeReason innate in anyone who follows the Justicar's Code. As such, Anaya would very much like to avoid having to act on those orders: Samara ''will'' resist arrest, Samara ''will'' succeed at doing so, and Anaya ''will'' go home in a box.\\
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Shepard finds Samara interrogating an Eclipse lieutenant about the murderer: apparently, this is someone Samara has been trying to find for some time. As such, Samara refuses to join Shepard unless they help her track that murderer down. The Eclipse granted the murderer passage offworld, and Shepard assaults an Eclipse base to find out the ship's name and destination. Shepard learns, from a NewMeat Eclipse mercenary who has grown disillusioned with the life, that the refugee is an "Ardat-Yakshi," which she thought was just an asari story -- but no, the Ardat-Yakshi got offworld via the AML ''Demeter''. This information in hand, Samara agrees to join the ''Normandy'' crew. She lives in the Starboard Observation Bay on Deck 3, and is mostly an Adept, though with the addition of an assault rifle. Her upgrade increases the size of ''Normandy''[='s=] fuel tanks.\\

Tali is in charge of a scientific expedition to the planet Haestrom, which used to be a quarian colony. This means there are geth around, which is why Tali has quarian Marines with her. Additionally, something odd is going on with Haestrom's star: it's burned through the planet's magnetosphere, and if Shepard stands in direct sunlight for too long, their shields fail.\\
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The major NPC encounter is with the leader of those Marines, Kal'Reegar, by now the only living quarian on the planet besides Tali herself. He is facing down a Geth Colossus and a bunch of other foes single-handedly. Shepard can order him to take cover, or to make a ruckus with his rocket launcher, at which point he dies during the fighting.\\
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Tali acknowledges that her responsibilities to the Migrant Fleet are over. She explains that Haestrom's star is aging a lot faster than it's supposed to be, speculated to be due to infusions of dark matter. (This RedHerring was LeftHanging, but is believed to have been intended as a ChekhovsGun towards the original ending of ''Mass Effect 3''.) She joins the ''Normandy'' crew, though she is skeptical of working with known xenophobes -- and, despite wearing a mask which obscures everything but her glowing eyes, manages to fasten Jacob with a ''tremendous'' DeathGlare when he encourages her to introduce herself to EDI. Tali takes on the post of chief engineer and can be found on Deck 4; she is a fairly straightforward Engineer class, despite the addition of her favorite shotgun. Her upgrade augments the ''Normandy'' with improved "cyclonic barrier technology" DeflectorShields.\\
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Garrus and Tali are the only party members from ''[=ME1=]'' who can be permanently recruited during ''[=ME2=]'', due to PopularityPower. They are also PromotedToLoveInterest in this game.\\

Shepard learns that Thane has been hired to kill off Nassana Dantius; Shepard recalls that they (Shepard) inadvertently helped her murder her sister in the first game. Nassana has become overly paranoid, expecting attack from any angle, and accordingly surrounds herself with heavy Eclipse protection; she's also become something of a BadBoss, as evidenced when Shepard lands at Dantius Towers and sees her using her mercs and security mechs to indiscriminately slaughter the construction workers there. (One of the workers, if rescued, quips, "[T]ell [Thane] to aim for her head... ...cause she doesn't have a heart!") She also very clearly subscribes to the "WeHaveReserves" school of thought, and Shepard fights through over 100 {{mook}}s to reach the penthouse at the top of the tower. Dantius offers money and bribes to save her life... but it's too late, especially since Shepard isn't actually who came here to kill her. Thane, the drell, drops out of an air vent and puts an end to the deceitful asari, [[CradlingYourKill cradling her as she dies]] and then praying afterwards -- [[ReligiousBruiser for himself]].\\
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Thane accepts the suicide mission, as he's already dying. After making his home in the Life Support room on Deck 3, he explains that his reptilian species evolved on a SingleBiomePlanet that was all desert. Unfortunately, Rakhana's biosphere was too unstable to handle industrialization, and the planet became uninhabitable. The drell were saved by the hanar -- the floating pink jellyfish aliens we've been seeing since the first game -- who helped them with a HomeworldEvacuation and relocated them to their own home planet of Kahje. Unfortunately, as you'd imagine for jellyfish, Kahje is ''also'' a Single-Biome Planet, this one of ocean. "Kepral's Syndrome" is now the leading cause of death amongst drell, as their lungs struggle -- and eventually fail -- to cope with the humid, moisture-laden air of their new home. But it's not communicable, even to other drell, and it won't impact Thane's performance. In the meanwhile, he has the better part of a year, and he sees the Suicide Mission as a chance to make the galaxy a little brighter before he passes. Thane is closest to an Adept, but comes with a sniper rifle. His upgrade helps the ''Normandy'' stock more resource probes, which is [[ViolationOfCommonSense something assassins think about frequently]].\\

Shepard and Garrus arrive at the Citadel, where Sidonis was last seen with Fade, a criminal who specializes in helping people drop off the grid. They learn that Fade is actually Harkin, a former C-Sec officer who had a brief appearance at Chora's Den back when Shepard was trying to find evidence to incriminate Saren. Harkin, realizing he's being followed, throws a bunch of Blue Suns mercs at Shepard. It's not enough, and the two corner Harkin and have him arrange a meeting with Sidonis.\\
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Garrus sets up with his sniper rifle and uses Shepard to lure Sidonis out. You can use Paragon interrupts to convince Garrus to spare him -- especially after Sidonis admits his guilt and shame over what he did, and Garrus realizes that, in some ways, they are both the same: haunted by SurvivorsGuilt and the ghosts of their past mistakes. If Sidonis is spared, Harkin will be arrested, and Sidonis will surrender himself to C-Sec for the murder of 10 people on Omega (though Bailey has no idea what to do to him: Omega has no government to extradite Sidonis to). If not, C-Sec will report that they have no leads on Sidonis' murderer (leading Garrus to reply, "[[DeadpanSnarker What a shame]]"). Either way, Garrus becomes loyal and unlocks "Armor-Piercing Ammo," increasing his weapon damage against both armored and unarmored targets. While this might not sound too exciting, especially compared to things like "Singularity" and "AI Hacking," it should be pointed out that any ammo powers can be talented to apply to ''the entire squad'', enhancing DPS across the board.\\

Shepard and Grunt land on Tuchanka. Grunt is not impressed -- the krogan have bombed themselves back to the Stone Age more than once, and the place is essentially a dusty wasteland. However, this is the fourth main hub of the game (aside from the Citadel, Omega and Illium), and also the hiding place of the final ''[=ME1=]'' recruitable character: Urdnot Wrex, should he have lived through the first game, has ascended to leadership of Clan Urdnot, giving him a platform for his bleeding-heart, far-left views (which, to re-iterate, include the absurdly liberal idea that krogan should focus on things ''besides'' shooting each other). Of course, if Wrex did not live through the first game -- and he has the first PlotlineDeath flag in the franchise, so it's totally possible he didn't -- then his brother, the much more traditional Urdnot Wreav, has the rulership instead. (The same thing happens if you didn't recruit Wrex; he simply disappears into the galaxy and is never heard from again.) Whichever of the Brothers Urdnot is in charge, they help identify that Grunt has essentially hit krogan puberty, and will need to prove himself in battle. Shepard offers to serve as Grunt's krannt -- basically, someone who will show Grunt UndyingLoyalty -- and the squad goes off to pass the test.\\
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The test involves fighting a "thresher maw" SandWorm. [[DavidVersusGoliath On foot]]. Because, you know, [[ScreamingWarrior krogan]].\\
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If you kill the thresher maw -- or just survive a five-minute TimedMission -- you win, but immediately Gatatog Uvenk arrives. A more traditional krogan, he initially showed resistance to letting Grunt take the test at all, since he is an artificial krogan. He now shows interest in accepting Grunt into Clan Gatatog, but no matter what you say or how, it ends up the way a lot of krogan disagreements end up: with guns. Upon defeating them, Shepard and Grunt return to the Clan Urdnot hideout, where the clan's shaman officially inducts him into Clan Urdnot. If you succeeded at slaying the thresher maw, Grunt also gets some serious respect points: no one's done that since Wrex took ''his'' manhood rite, the better part of a millennium ago. Grunt's Loyalty power, "Fortification," gives him a massive DamageReduction bonus.\\

Shepard and Jack journey to the remains of the Teltin facility on the planet Pragia. Though Jack expected it to be abandoned, EDI detects multiple lifesigns.\\
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As Jack leads Shepard into the facility, they find computers, logs, bloodstains and other artifacts, and Jack slowly tells the story of her childhood. The facility was actually a rogue Cerberus element that had broken off from TIM, designed to create biotic gods; Jack was put in an arena setting and trained to kill other kids, and pumped full of endorphins if she won and shocked if she hesitated. Jack also finds evidence that ([[CaptainObvious surprise surprise]]) the other kids were abused as well in support of her training, but is [[ItsAllAboutMe a little too preoccupied with her own (admittedly massive) trauma]] to think about that. There are also some Blood Pack mercenaries hanging out to enliven the gloom.\\
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At the heart of the facility -- Jack's former quarters -- you find one of the other kids, Aresh. He wants to rebuild the Teltin facility and repeat the mistakes of the past. Shepard can use appropriate conversation options to convince Jack to let the guy go or kill him. Jack can also be given a few moments to inspect her old room and the memories that live there. Whatever the case, she plants the bomb, and the shuttle rockets back off to the ''Normandy'' as Teltin is consumed in a massive blast. Jack's Loyalty power is "Warp Ammo," which acts as a damage buff against health, armor and biotic barriers (but not technology-based kinetic DeflectorShields, which are distinct from biotic barriers).\\

Jacob's father hasn't been heard of in 10 years, when the ship he served on, the ''Hugo Gernsback,'' disappeared without a trace. Of course, as Jacob explained, the distress beacon suddenly went off on the planet Aeia. It's weird, is the point, and Jacob, despite being ''by far'' the most psychologically steady person on the ship, would like some closure.\\
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Aboard the crashed ''Gernsback'', Shepard and Jacob find the VI running the distress call. Apparently, the captain died in the crash, leaving Ronald Taylor the ranking officer. Logs from the crew about many of the crew losing cognitive functions. Further research logs show that the local plant life, which has served as the crew's main source of food, is what hampers the crew's thinking; it also becomes clear that the ranking officers, led by Jacob's father, have ''taken advantage of that'' to create a sort of paradise for themselves, run by indentured servitude and sexual slavery.\\
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When Shepard and Jacob reach Ronald Taylor's compound, they find him living like a king, having offed the other officers to save all the food (and spoils) for himself. He starts by lying that he was the victim of a mutiny; he also clearly doesn't recognize Jacob. Once he finds out, he starts backpedaling; but the mistakes have already been made: Jacob has been in a froth of righteous indignation ever since he learned what was done, and he has already disowned the man who sired him. ("I guess he was a good-enough father that even ''he'' couldn't screw up what he taught me.") Shepard and Jacob can decide to remand Taylor to Alliance custody, leave him here to be the victim of his freed slaves, or LeaveBehindAPistol. This leaves only the question of how the distress signal got forwarded to Jacob in the first place; Jacob accuses TIM, but it's ''Miranda'' who steps forward, claiming she's keeping an old promise. Jacob unlocks his Loyalty power, "Barrier," another emergency shielding spell.\\

Miranda, with Shepard in tow, lands on Illium and heads to Eternity, where she learns that a man named Niket, her only friend from her childhood with her father, will be helping Oriana and her adoptive family, where Miranda placed her when Oriana was but a babe, get to safety. Shepard asks Miranda -- frequently and constantly, as if we weren't being {{anvilicious}} enough about it -- whether Miranda can trust Niket, meaning that she's the only one who's surprised by his [[DoubleAgent sudden but inevitable betrayal]]. He's sold Oriana out to Eclipse, who seem excited at the idea (or perhaps the cash reward) of returning a MadScientistsBeautifulDaughter to him. Niket believes that Oriana will be happier with her biological father -- she will certainly be better provided for, as it's implied that her adoptive family are having trouble with financial matters -- but he's doing this as a surprise; he hasn't told Mr. Lawson yet. This leaves him as the only loose end. If Miranda doesn't shoot him, the Eclipse Captain does, and a BossBattle begins. Afterwards, Miranda observes Oriana with her adoptive family, where she herself placed Oriana when the latter was a baby, as the three prepare to emigrate to a more secure location and better-paying jobs. Miranda prepares to walk away, but Shepard can convince her to introduce herself.\\
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-->PS: Don't tell her I sent you this. It would just make her angry.\\

Shepard and Mordin land on Tuchanka, where a Clan Urdnot official confirms that Maelon has been kidnapped by the Blood Pack and taken to an abandoned hospital. He asks that Shepard keep an eye out for a krogan scout which he sent to investigate the area and who has yet to return. As they spelunk deeper, they find the corpses of female krogan, and it becomes clear that Mordin is still wrestling with guilt over his involvement with the genophage project; while he protests that he worked hard to revise the genophage seamlessly, so that population levels would stop increasing ''and'' not decrease to unsustainable levels, some part of him knows that his actions were both [[ToBeLawfulOrGood logically correct and ethically wrong]]. Sometimes, he admits, he wishes he hadn't been on the mission at all, but also knows that there was no other choice: "Had to be me. Someone else could have gotten it wrong."\\
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Maelon, it turns out, feels exactly the same; it's not just that he's trying and cure the genophage outright, it's that -- as he admits, upon being found -- he is doing so under the auspices and with full cooperation of the krogan Clan Weyrloc.\\
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In addition to stopping (or not stopping) Mordin from murdering Maelon in cold blood, Shepard can decide what to do with the data and research Maelon has acquired, which is the closest thing to a genophage cure there has ever been. [[ChekhovsGun This decision will be important later.]] Mordin unlocks his Loyalty power of Neural Shock, completing his FireIceLightning trifecta and allowing him to stun targets for a very long time.\\

Once Shepard does five of the missions remaining to them, the next Intermission pops up: TIM has learned that a turian cruiser fought and crippled a Collector ship, and [[ButThouMust Shepard must go investigate]].[[note]]It's really "The next time Shepard accesses the Galaxy Map after doing five missions." This allows for some Loophole Abuse, if you visit Tuchanka or The Citadel for your fifth mission: after completing, say, Grunt's, you'll still be on the surface of the planet, and can sneak in Mordin's before TIM summons you.[[/note]] Fortunately, we'll have another sandbox segment before the game ends.\\
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Different strategy guides have different advice on whether to rush to this mission. To a very real extent, it depends on your class: one of the big upgrades in this level is the ability to give your Shepard access to one (1) new weapon type out of Assault Rifles, Shotguns and Sniper Rifles, which can help Engineers, Adepts and Sentinels achieve some much-needed firepower. (If Shepard is one of the other classes, then you instead get to unlock one new gun from ''within'' the weapon type, which is very powerful and cannot be accessed in any other way: for instance, if you choose the Shotgun upgrade, Shepard gets to wield the Claymore that formerly only Grunt could handle.)\\
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TIM has received word of a Collector ship which was damaged in battle with a turian force; all the turians died, but they crippled the ship in the meanwhile. Shepard and a squad board the Collector ship, and EDI is able to run some genetic scans on dead Collectors, finding out something astonishing: They are Protheans, or at least all that is left of them, having been enslaved and then genetically modified by the Reapers. Shepard gets to a central command console and links the ship with ''Normandy'' so that EDI can pilfer their data files; EDI determines that the turian distress call actually originated from the Collector ship itself, and that TIM knew it was a fake. Also, it's a trap: Shepard is forced to HoldTheLine while EDI finishes copying their backend data, and then fight their way out as the Collector ship powers up and prepares to do to the SR-2 what it did to the SR-1. Apparently, though, the Collectors aren't much without the element of surprise; Joker's piloting is sufficient to get the ship away this time.\\
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Samara gives the name of the criminal on the AML ''Demeter''. "Morinth" is indeed an "Ardat-Yakshi" -- an asari with a rare genetic disorder that causes the reproductive MindMeld to turn into a MindRape, turning the victim into an EmptyShell... and is wildly addictive for the asari in question, resulting in a DepravedBisexual SerialKiller. Samara, a Justicar, has devoted her life to hunting them down; to her knowledge, there are only three, and the other two have chosen to live a life of seclusion and celibacy. Morinth has not. She is also Samara's daughter. When asked how many children she has, Samara answers, "Three. And three Ardat-Yakshi are in existence today. [[BrokenBird It is as it sounds]]." (Samara's adherence to a strict CodeOfHonor suddenly [[TheAtoner leaps into perspective]].)\\
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Morinth has been found on Omega, and is up to her old tricks. By investigating the apartment of Morinth's latest victim, Shepard picks up enough clues that they can pose as a random NPC and act as bait for Morinth. Samara prepares to spring the trap; this is the closest she's gotten to catching her daughter in 50 years.\\
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It should be pointed out that these remaining Loyalty missions, as well as Zaeed's which was already covered, introduce something new: a fail state. In all the Loyalty missions affecting squad members whose names start a letter in the first half of the alphabet, no matter what Shepard does or what decisions they encourage the squadmate to make, they ''always'' get closure no matter what happens. If they're in the second half, though, the mission can be "completed" without success, if Shepard botches some part of the mission. In this case, Shepard can play their cards wrong and not succeed at piquing Morinth's interest; if so, Morinth gets bored and leaves, and the mission ends without unlocking Samara's loyalty or loyalty power.\\
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Assuming Shepard doesn't do this, Morinth invites Shepard back to her apartment. There, she attempts to seduce Shepard, requiring a ''massive'' amount of KarmaMeter points to resist: Shepard either needs an OldSaveBonus from the first game, which starts them with some points, or to have {{munchkin}}'d the hell out of the Karma Meter system, focusing all your points exclusively on one side.\\
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Whether or not Shepard succeeds, Samara bursts in, and mother and daughter fight, evenly matched. If Shepard failed to resist the seduction, they automatically aid Samara, killing Morinth and securing Samara's loyalty power [[LifeDrain Reave]]... But if Shepard ''succeeded'', they can ''choose to side with Morinth'' as opposed to helping Samara. If so, Morinth disguises herself as Samara (mostly by means of borrowing the latter's strawberry costume) so that no one on the crew is the wiser. Morinth comes with the [[MindControl Dominate]] loyalty power. Shepard can also visit Morinth to have sex. ...[[NonStandardGameOver Once]].\\

The ''Normandy'' arrives at the Migrant Fleet and Tali is immediately brought before the Admiralty Board, the five Admirals of the Fleet who counterbalance the civilian Conclave (the fleet ''is'' still technically under martial law). She meets with Adm. Shala'Raan vas ''Tonbay'', her HonoraryAunt, and is taken before the three members of the Conclave: both Raan and Tali's own father, Adm. Rael'Zorah, are recused from the hearing. The remainder -- MadScientist Daro'Xen vas ''Moreh'', diplomat Zaal'Koris vas ''Quib-Quib'' and BloodKnight Han'Gerrel vas ''Neema'' -- charge Tali with treason: the ''Alarei'', a lab ship at which Rael'Zorah has been doing research, has been overrun by geth, and Tali is believed to have endangered the fleet by sending him geth parts and components. Tali also learns that she has been forcibly renamed: Tali'Zorah nar ''Rayya'', who grew up on the ship ''Rayya'', went out on her pilgrimage; Tali'Zorah vas ''Neema'', who was accepted as an adult on the ''Neema'', went to Haestrom; now Tali'Zorah vas ''Normandy'' has been stripped of her ship name, which is about one step away from exile. However, a quarian's captain always stands for them in legal matters... And Tali has Shepard vas ''Normandy'' with her.\\
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Shepard and Tali volunteer to board the ''Alarei'' and clear it of geth, as this should prove Tali's loyalty, help her find if her father is still alive, ''and'' allow her to find proof that the whole thing is just one big accident.\\
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Shepard is able to speak to the four remaining admirals before they head to the ''Alarei'', and it becomes clear that Tali herself is something of a pawn in larger political maneuverings. Han'Gerrel has been agitating for a return to Rannoch and war with the geth; Rael, supporting him, has been running weapons tests on them (hence his need for Tali's pilfered geth bits). Xen is essentially on their side -- she sees the geth as servants to be mastered -- but couldn't care less for a trial, since Rael and Tali are either TooDumbToLive or just terribly unlucky, neither of which requires judicial correction. Zaal'Koris is less sanguine on the idea of a renewed RobotWar, seeing the geth as children the quarians have wronged, and Raan, TeamMom, agrees. Shepard and Tali let her have it for ambushing her publicly with the news that her father is in danger, possibly dead, on the ''Alarei''; Raan protests that Tali's unfiltered emotional reaction will be important in proving her innocence. All of them ''like'' Tali, but all of them are willing to use her in their machinations: it's NothingPersonal.\\
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The ''Alarei'' is filled with a lot of living geth and a lot of dead quarians; the Admirals had feared that the geth were rebuilding themselves (it's not like they don't have the parts to do it), and that fear proved correct, giving Shepard a lot of enemies to fight through. Just outside the central control room, Tali finds the corpse of her father and breaks down weeping; there is a Paragon interrupt that allows Shepard to give her a CooldownHug. Rael left a message about how the central room has the main server with which the geth are networking; it also shows the whole story: the geth activating on the ''Alarei'' wasn't an accident as the Admiralty Board suspected, it was ''on purpose'', to further Rael's research. Rael was ''deliberately'' reviving them so he could perform tests on them. You know, ForScience Tali now has proof that she is innocent... because her father is "the worst war criminal in the history of our race." She begs Shepard to not use it.\\
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Back aboard the ''Neema'', the Admirals are trying Tali ''in absentia'', as it's suspected she chose an honorable death in combat over exile. Shepard and Tali barge in. Shepard can withhold the evidence and get Tali exiled; Shepard can hand over the evidence, exonerating her but dishonoring her father's memory, which results in her ''not'' becoming Loyal... or can TakeAThirdOption and call bullshit on the whole KangarooCourt, which is really about how the Admiralty Board want to handle the geth. In this outcome, Shepard refuses to hand over the evidence entirely, pointing out that Tali's history of service -- the campaign against Saren, her hard-earned expertise with the geth, the recent fight to clear out the ''Alarei'' -- should speak for itself. Unusually, Shepard can do this without invoking a KarmaMeter option: if both Veetor and Kal'Reeger are present, which requires that the former was not turned over to Cerberus and the latter was saved on Haestrom, they will speak up in Tali's defense. Whatever the case, Tali'Zorah vas ''Normandy'' heads back out with her captain, possibly in possession of "Energy Drain," which is a LifeDrain for shields.\\

Thane and Shepard arrive on the Citadel to stop Kolyat. From one of Thane's contacts, they learn that Elias Kelham, a small-time crook who made it big after Sovereign attacked the Citadel, hired Kolyat. The head of C-Sec for Zakera Ward, Armando-Owen Bailey, balks a bit when asked to arrest Kelham, as the two have an under-the-table arrangement (Bailey swings much more Renegade than Paragon), but ultimately is swayed, giving Shepard a chance to interrogate the crime boss. A successful interrogation reveals that Kolyat has been assigned to assassinate Joram Talid, a turian politician running largely on an [[FantasticRacism anti-human]] platform.\\
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Talid will be at a fundraiser, and Shepard spends the entire time shadowing the politician from the catwalks above. Shepard can actually lose track of Talid, at which point you flunk out of the mission and Thane doesn't go Loyal. If you keep up, Talid eventually returns to his apartment, where Kolyat is waiting. When Thane shows up, he complains about his DisappearedDad who only ''now'' cares to show up. (Thane can have confessed to Shepard that, when his wife died, he shipped the kid to relatives; Kolyat was 10 years old.) Thane confesses his culpability: [[ILetGwenStacyDie his enemies killed Irikah to get to him]], and Thane simply could not handle the shame of living with the son he deprived of a mother. The two retreat to have a conversation and start to catch up, while Bailey contemplates what to do about Kolyat, who can (and should) rightly be arrested for attempted murder. Shepard can Paragon him into giving Kolyat community service, Renegade him into employing Kolyat privately, or just let him go to jail. Meanwhile, Thane pops his Loyalty power, "Shredder Ammo," which increases his damage against unshielded targets. (This is ironic, given that Thane's quest involves ''no'' combat whatsoever, a distinction only shared with Samara's above.\\

Cerberus has found enough information that Liara can definitely hunt down the Shadow Broker; they are happy to provide it to her because the Shadow Broker has aligned themselves with the Collectors, creating an EnemyMine situation. Shepard is called to Liara's apartment, which is being searched by the asari Spectre Tela Vasir; Vasir explained that someone tried to assassinate Liara, and she (Vasir) has been called in to investigate. Shepard finds a message inviting Liara to the offices of the company Baria Frontiers, where one of her contacts will give her the exact location of the Shadow Broker.\\
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As Shepard and Vasir arrive, a bomb goes off, wiping out the top three floors of the building. Liara has just been the target of two assassination attempts in half an hour. Someone ''really'' wants her dead.\\
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Vasir goes to seal the building from the top while Shepard & Co work their way up from the bottom. As they head in, they are attacked by Shadow Broker {{mook}}s. The two Spectres arrive at Liara's location at the same time... only for Liara to pull a pistol and claim that Vasir set her up. Vasir is a DoubleAgent working for the Shadow Broker. If this is false, Vasir does a really bad job of denying it, instead shooting at Shepard and then running for it. Shepard, Liara and one other character of your choice get in an aircar and chase the rogue Spectre, trading banter all the way. Vasir crashes atop the Azure hotel, and Shepard jumps out, '''with Liara as GuestStarPartyMember'''. Make sure you choose a third squadmate who either synergizes with her strengths or counterbalances her weaknesses: as a straight-up Adept, she has limited weapon damage, but she is the only character in the game besides Shepard themselves with access to the "Singularity" spell, and ''the'' only character in the game with Stasis -- no one else has it, and Shepard themselves can only learn it via the "Advanced Training" perk which lets them buy and equip one Loyalty Power (such as Stasis).\\
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Liara notes from the blood spatter that Vasir was wounded in the crash, and she and Shepard track the Spectre down. As befitting an [[EliteAgentsAboveTheLaw Elite Agent Above The Law]], Vasir has ''tons'' of HitPoints, and is also the first boss in the game to have the Vanguard's Charge spell. After defeating her, there is a short conversation where she justifies getting help from the Shadow Broker to defend the galaxy against threats; isn't that precisely what Shepard is doing while working for Cerberus? Whatever the case, Liara has the data, which pinpoints the exact location of the Shadow Broker's ship.\\
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Shepard, Liara and a squadmate land on the exterior of the ship and fight their way in. It's a long, tedious battle that doesn't need covering. The Shadow Broker itself is a pre-FTL species, a "yahg," that isn't seen around the galaxy due to the AlienNonInterferenceClause; this one was kept as the Former Shadow Broker's pet, before assassinating them and taking their place. When Liara points out the "pet" part, the yahg gets touchy: it throws its desk at your third party member, and the TapOnTheHead takes them out for the duration of the BossBattle. Whatever the case, Shepard and Liara prevail. Liara, having achieved her KlingonPromotion, now becomes the new Shadow Broker.\\
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Shepard turns their attention to the Reaper IFF. They'll be getting it by visiting the corpse of a Reaper in the Thorne system. Many of the Cerberus staff sent to study the Reaper are dead, more are indoctrinated, and the Reaper activates its DeflectorShields, forcing Shepard and their party to blow up its drive core before they can escape. But the weirdest part is a geth, which calls out to "Shepard-Commander" and appears to be wearing some N7 armor. It helps Shepard fend off the opposition, but is damaged in the fight.\\
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After the mission, Shepard can decide what to do with the geth they rescued. You can forward it to Cerberus for money... or you can awaken it, at which point it joins the party as your last squadmate. "Legion," as it calls itself (after EDI makes a Biblical allusion), is 1183 geth runtimes occupying a single platform. It has the AI Hacking and Combat Drone spells of an Engineer, but also excels with a sniper rifle. It takes up residence in the AI Core room, where EDI also has its primary hardware, at the back of the Med Bay. His upgrade is a powerful anti-materiel rifle, which only a geth platform (or a Shepard who picked the Sniper Rifle upgrade during the Collector Ship mission) can use effectively.\\
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Shepard bides their time running around the galaxy waiting for EDI to finish integrating the Reaper IFF into the ''Normandy'''s systems. If you took advantage of the third sandbox section, the only one that isn't timed, to wrap everything up, there's actually only one thing left to do:\\

Legion will speak of a group of geth heretics that are causing problems. It turns out that the geth are in no way united; there are geth traditionalists who remain on the quarian homeworld of Rannoch and more-or-less want to be undisturbed, but also geth heretics that want to continue the RobotWar. These heretics allied with Saren and Sovereign, and are now writing a computer virus that will allow them to turn ''all'' geth into heretics. Legion wants to stop them.\\
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You know who's a really good squadmate to take on this mission? Tali. Legion has 40% more HitPoints and a SniperRifle where Tali has a shotgun, but their two basic skills -- "Hack An AI to Fight For You" and "Spawn A Combat Drone" -- are identical. Their passive abilities are also nearly identical, the only difference being that Tali's provides a boost to Spell Duration where Legion's focuses on Reduced Cooldown. [[{{Foil}} Really makes you think, huh.]]\\
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Legion leads Shepard to and through Heretic Station, where these geth have their home. Legion provides a lot of {{infodump}}s on the geth as you proceed. Continually, Legion shows ParalysisByAnalysis, able to see both sides of an argument and being unable to decide between them; to them, Shepard's decisiveness is a massive boon. Thus, unsurprisingly, when the virus is deleted and Shepard asks what to do with the station, Legion leaves it up to Shepard-Commander: you can brainwash them back into loyalist geth, or just blow the place up. Legion comes home with their "Geth Shield Boost" ability, which ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin.\\

In all cases, Shepard has the option of making one of them back down; however, if Shepard does this, '''the squadmate is un-loyalty'd'''. (If you're romancing them, they also dump you, no questions asked.) Fortunately, if Shepard speaks to the "losing" party afterwards, they may get a Persuade option to soothe egos and get Loyalty back. Ideally, though, Shepard has enough KarmaMeter points to convince them ''both'' to back down. In Tali and Legion's case, this involves Legion agreeing to hold onto the classified data, and Tali volunteering something less classified that they can send home instead.\\
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Cut content indicates an argument between Grunt and Mordin was planned, but never implemented. If disagreements were intended between the remaining characters, no data has seen the light of day, but the seeds are there: Jacob, the ConsummateProfessional, expresses some disdain for the OnlyInItForTheMoney ProfessionalKiller Thane when the latter is recruited; Zaeed and Kasumi are both guns for hire, but differ in their perception of a CrapsackWorld versus AWorldHalfFull; and it's quite obvious why Samara, with her LawfulStupid adherence to her CodeOfHonor, would object to a CowboyCop vigilante like Garrus.\\

If Shepard romanced anyone during ''Mass Effect 1'', their picture will be on the desk in the commander's quarters. Of course, none of those three actually bunk on the ''Normandy'', and Shepard has the option of moving on to someone a bit closer by. (If so, Shepard will turn that picture face-down.)\\
\\

-->'''Garrus''': I remember this one mission, me and this recon scout had been at each other's throats, nerves mostly. She suggested we settle it in the ring.\\
'''Shepard''': I take it you went easy on her?\\
'''Garrus''': Actually, she and I were the two best hand-to-hand combatants on the ship. I had reach, she had flexibility. It was brutal. After 9 rounds, the judges declared it a draw. A lot of unhappy bettors in the other room. We, uh, ended up having a tiebreaker in her quarters. I had reach, [[FlexibilityEqualsSexAbility she had flexibility]]. More than one way to work off stress, I guess...\\
(later conversation)\\

* Thane can be romanced by a female Shepard. Drell have extremely vivid memories, and Thane is still haunted by a lot of things -- particularly the death of his wife. However, Shepard encourages him to make new memories with her, and Thane begins to call her "''siha''", after one of the valkyries in his people's mythology. For their tryst, Thane admits that he has stopped being ready to die -- because he's got something to lose again. Shepard simply replies, "Be alive with me tonight."\\

* Quarians ''also'' have Mirror Chemistry in addition to their not-precisely-existing immune systems. Mordin suggests Shepard self-sterilize, thoroughly, and avoid oral contact.\\

At some point, EDI will finish the Reaper IFF integration. When she does, she will tell you that the full shakedown requires the ''Normandy'' to sit dead in space and twiddle its thumbs. As such, on your next visit to the Galaxy Map, Shepard will go on a mission and take the ''entire PlayerParty'' -- as many as 12 other people -- with them on the shuttle. ''Normandy'' is now conspicuously empty of people who specialize in shooting guns.\\
\\

-->'''Joker''': Argh! You want me to go crawling through the ducts again.\\
'''EDI''': I enjoy the sight of humans on their knees.\\
({{beat}}. Joker's expression includes a QuizzicalTilt, a FascinatingEyebrow and a FlatWhat.)\\
'''EDI''': [[DontExplainTheJoke That is a joke]].\\

At this point, it will hopefully become clear why most guides advise, and why this recap assumes, that Shepard does all the side quests and things ''before'' recruiting Legion: when you get the Reaper IFF, this event shows up. Even worse, TakeYourTime is ''averted'': If you go through the Omega-4 Relay now, you can save the entire crew, but if you stop to do up to 3 missions -- missions being defined as, "Leaving the ship for a combat situation" -- half of them get eaten by the Collectors. If you do 4 or more, ''all'' of them do, with Dr. Chakwas as the SoleSurvivor. But if some of your squadmates aren't loyal yet, the entire endgame gets harder. No, better to get everything squared away during the unstructured Sandbox III phase. Meanwhile, you can still run around, do shopping, harvest resources for upgrades, and even go talk to EDI. Because Jeff officially unshackled her, she can now provide full disclosure on things she was formerly programmed to hide: she can now tell you that Cerberus consists of about 150 agents organized into three cells (the ''Normandy'' herself being one of them), and was able to obtain top-secret cutting-edge schematics for the ''Normandy'', which was co-developed with the turians, because Cerberus was one of the lobbyist groups pushing for its design and creation in the first place. Jeff and EDI also (do not) acknowledge that they have moved to a FirstNameBasis with each other, or in Jeff's case referring to EDI with "she/her" pronouns instead of "[[ItIsDehumanizing it]]".\\

The explosion from the Collector Cruiser's destruction overloads ''Normandy'''s systems, and the ship makes a crash landing on the Collector Base. Fortunately, this is exactly where Shepard wanted to be anyway: StormingTheCastle on foot. The crew regroups in the conference room to discuss their options.\\

Shepard's commando team decides to split into three forces. They need to get to the station's main control center. Shepard will lead a typical three-person fireteam while a Tech Specialist, preferably someone who's good at engineering, uses an AirVentPassageway to open the way, and a SupportingLeader takes the remaining 6-to-9 party members for a [[WeNeedADistraction diversionary attack]]. Shepard must choose who will fill each role. (Miranda will give advice on who to choose. [[RedHerring Only some of it is accurate.]]) Shepard then leads the EscortMission of the tech specialist, blowing away Collectors in between opening valves so that the tech can keep crawling through the air vents; wait too long, and the Tech Specialist dies, resulting in a NonStandardGameOver. Even if you get through, the Tech Specialist has to hack doors so that Shepard's team can get in, the ''other'' team can get in, and the door closes behind them. Choose your roles poorly, and the Tech Specialist is slain in the morass.\\

The team arrives at the central control center, where -- as predicted -- the Collectors are holding the humans they have abducted. Shepard orders them freed; as mentioned above, some or all of your crew may have already been liquefied for whatever purposes the Collectors are attempting: Chakwas has observed the humans being ground up into some sort of genetic slurry, and that slurry being piped deeper into the station. Shepard resolves to follow those pipes and find out what's going on, but the way is infested by seeker swarms -- too many of them for Mordin's countermeasures to work.\\
\\
The team splits again. Shepard nominates a Leader to head up another diversion, and then chooses a Biotic who will guard Shepard's fireteam using a biotic bubble while the four of them head down the main path. Lastly, Chakwas and whatever crew survivors remain need someone to EscortMission them back to the ''Normandy''. The Escort character will ''stay'' at the ''Normandy'' throughout the rest of the mission, so Shepard can also tell the crew that they need all hands on deck and that the {{Red Shirt}}s will have to risk it. (If so, you get an Escort Mission with no bodyguards and the escortees die.) This is when completed Loyalty Missions start really coming into play: if your Biotic isn't loyal, you lose one of the two squadmates you took with you; if the Escort (exists and) isn't loyal, they perform a HeroicSacrifice to get Chakwas ''et al'' back to the ship; and if the Leader isn't chosen correctly, they also die as the diversionary team rejoins Shepard.\\

Shepard, accompanied by as few as three party members, confronts their final challenge. They have found where the human DNA is going: the Reapers are building an embryonic Human Reaper. (It's still like a gajillion feet tall.) Shepard selects two characters for their fireteam; the rest stay behind for a "YouShallNotPass". At this point, the game performs a behind-the-scenes calculation to determine the outcome: every character has a "Defense" value, and if the team's average is high enough, the EverybodyLives; if not, up to three of them die. This can be tilted in the player's favor by completing Loyalty missions (which gives a character +1 defense), taking GlassCannon characters with them to fight the Human Reaper while leaving StoneWall characters to HoldTheLine, and detailing a Glass Cannon to be the Escort during the previous segment. However, once again, Loyalty missions come into play: if Shepard takes non-loyal squadmates with them to handle the Human Reaper, they die -- period. (The Human Reaper is just a bog-standard DamageSpongeBoss who doesn't really need dwelling on.)\\

After the FinalBoss, Shepard is contacted by TIM. Shepard wants to just blow the whole base up -- ItsTheOnlyWayToBeSure -- but TIM suggests a DepopulationBomb, allowing Cerberus to take control of the base and study the Reapers. Either way, Shepard sets themselves up a bomb and makes a mad dash to the ''Normandy'', grabbing any survivors ''en route'', eventually having to make a running leap for the ship's door while ''Joker''(!) grabs a rifle to provide covering fire.\\
\\
Done the math? If Shepard had only three squadmembers left, then exactly ''one'' person is left to Hold The Line. Unless they are Garrus, Grunt or Zaeed, who [[GuideDangIt each have a high-enough Defense value to do this solo]], the one person isn't enough, and the character dies. And if Shepard took two non-loyal squadmates to the fight, they died too. It's totally possible to get to the point where one of those three is still around -- and, in fact, they can hold the line ''even if they aren't loyal'' -- but it's also possible that Shepard is now the SoleSurvivor of the Suicide Squad.\\
\\
And Joker may be an AcePilot, but he's also a HandicappedBadass with brittle bone disease.\\
\\
If Shepard has any remaining squadmates, they pull the commander to safety. If not, Joker can't do it, and Shepard suffers a DisneyVillainDeath; Joker flies the empty ship away. In this event, this is a GameOver: Shepard is KilledOffForReal, beyond Cerberus's power to revive or repair, and this save file cannot be imported into ''Mass Effect 3''.\\
\\
Of course, it's also possible -- particularly if you did everything this Recap suggested, in roughly the order we suggested it -- to get the GoldenEnding where EverybodyLives, and Shepard takes the ''Normandy'' and all 12 party members back out through the Omega-4 relay, ready to handle any missions that haven't been completed and confront the Reapers during ''Mass Effect 3''.\\
\\
...But they're ''not'' taking any squadmates on the last DLC mission:\\

The final DLC mission is actually available during Sandbox II, but we have left it until last for pacing reasons.\\
\\
Adm. Steven Hackett of the Alliance pages Shepard. A friend of his, Dr. Amanda Kenson, claims to have proof of imminent Reaper invasion, but has since been captured by the batarians. Shepard is asked to perform a ''solo'' infiltration mission and find out what she's learned about the pending Reaper "Arrival".\\
\\
Shepard lands on Aratoht and breaks into the prison to exfiltrate Dr. Kenson. Aboard the escape shuttle, she confesses that the charges are true: she ''was'' planning to destroy the mass relay in the Bahak system by smashing it with an asteroid. When Shepard points out that this will annihilate a nearby batarian colony of some 300,000 souls, Kenson reports that TheNeedsOfTheMany must prevail: this is the mass effect relay the Reapers are planning to use to begin their invasion, and they're planning to begin it in about three seconds. She knows this because she has a Prothean Artifact back at base whence she has been receiving visions, similar to Shepard and their Beacon on Eden Prime. Shepard asks to see this Artifact, mindful of indoctrination, and Kenson agrees.\\
\\
If this sounds like Shepard being overly cautious, it's actually ProperlyParanoid: Kenson and her team ''have'' been indoctrinated, and immediately open fire on Shepard to sabotage their own project. Shepard must fight their way through the science team (which suddenly has ''tons'' of guns, armor and hit points) to the base's control center: fortunately, it is on the asteroid that will be used to smash the mass relay. Unfortunately, communications are down, and Shepard needs to 1. Start the ColonyDrop process, 2. Get to a Comm Relay to call for help, 3. Get picked up by the ''Normandy''. InThatOrder. While at the Comm Relay, Harbinger drops by via hologram, and Shepard reaffirms their insistence on fighting back the Reaper threat. Harbinger points out that destroying the Alpha Relay will only delay the Reapers' arrival, not stop it entirely... but it ''will'' delay their arrival, and for Shepard that's enough. Joker swings by for pickup and gets the ''Normandy'' through the Alpha Relay with only seconds to spare.\\
\\

The Illusive Man wishes Shepard luck: nobody knows what's on the other side of the Omega-4 Relay. All that is known is that Shepard's choices throughout gameplay are going to have an effect on the endgame. See [[Analysis/MassEffect2 our Analysis page]] for granular, almost [=GameFAQs=]-level, detail, including how the game calculates random deaths.

* After Shepard finishes blowing up the Oculus, ''Normandy'' is confronted by the stalactite-shaped Collector Cruiser that made such a dramatic entrance during the opening CutScene. Without Garrus's Thanix cannons, Joker has to use the ship's original, vastly inferior Cerberus {{Photoprotoneutron Torpedo}}es to do the thing in, and return fire kills a randomly-selected squadmate.\\
\\

Shepard's commando team decides to split into three forces. They need to get to the station's main control center. Shepard will lead a typical three-person fireteam while a Tech Specialist, preferably someone who's good at engineering, uses an AirVentPassageway to open the way, and a Leader, preferably someone who's good at leadership, takes the remaining 6-to-9 party members for a [[WeNeedADistraction diversionary attack]]. Shepard must choose who will fill each role. (Miranda will give advice on who to choose. [[RedHerring Only some of it is accurate.]]) Shepard then leads the EscortMission of the tech specialist, blowing away Collectors in between opening valves so that the tech can keep crawling through the air vents; wait too long, and the Tech Specialist dies (Tali, reminiscing on the situation during the next game, will protest, "I got ''set on fire''!"), resulting in a NonStandardGameOver. Even if you get through, the Tech Specialist has to hack doors so that Shepard's team can get in, the ''other'' team can get in, and the door closes behind them. Choose your designated specialists poorly, and the Tech Specialist is killed in the morass.\\

The team splits again. Shepard nominates a Leader to head up another diversion, and then chooses a Biotic who will guard Shepard's fireteam using a biotic bubble while the four of them head down the main path. Lastly, Chakwas and whatever crew survivors remain need someone to EscortMission them back to the ''Normandy''. The Escort character will ''stay'' at the ''Normandy'' throughout the rest of the mission, so Shepard can also tell the crew that they need all hands on deck and that the {{Red Shirt}}s will have to risk it. (If so, you get an Escort Mission with no bodyguards and the escortees die.) This is when completed Loyalty Missions start really coming into play: if your Biotic isn't loyal, you lose one of the two squadmates you took with you; if the Escort (exists and) isn't loyal, they perform a HeroicSacrifice to get Chakwas ''et al'' back to the ship; and if the Leader isn't chosen correctly[[note]]Not to spoiler, but it ''has'' to be either a loyal Jacob, a loyal Garrus, or Miranda, who for whatever reason has PlotArmor for this phase[[/note]], they also die as the diversionary team rejoins Shepard.\\

Shepard, accompanied by as few as three party members, confronts their final challenge. They have found where the human DNA is going: the Reapers are building an embryonic Human Reaper. (It's still like a gajillion feet tall.) Shepard selects two characters for their fireteam; the rest stay behind for a "YouShallNotPass". At this point, the game performs a behind-the-scenes calculation to determine the outcome: every character has a "Defense" value, and if the sum total is high enough, the entire defensive team survives; if not, the game calculates which one(s) of them perishes. This can be tilted in the player's favor by completing Loyalty missions (which increases defensive value), taking GlassCannon characters with them to fight the Human Reaper while leaving StoneWall characters to HoldTheLine, and detailing a Glass Cannon to be the Escort during the previous segment. However, once again, Loyalty missions come into play: if Shepard takes non-loyal squadmates with them to handle the Human Reaper, they die -- period. (The Human Reaper is just a bog-standard DamageSpongeBoss who doesn't really need dwelling on.)\\

After the FinalBoss, Shepard is contacted by TIM. Shepard wants to just blow the whole base up -- ItsTheOnlyWayToBeSure -- but TIM suggests a DepopulationBomb, allowing Cerberus to take control of the base and study the Reapers. Either way, Shepard sets themselves up a bomb and makes a mad dash to the ''Normandy'', grabbing any survivors ''en route'', eventually having to make a running leap for the ship's door while ''Joker''(!) grabs a rifle and shoots at the oncoming Collectors.\\

Done the math? If Shepard had only three squadmembers left, then exactly ''one'' person is left to fight the delaying action. This isn't enough, and that character dies. And if Shepard took two non-loyal squadmates to the fight, they died too. Shepard might be the only one left.\\

Shepard investigates the abandoned colony with Jacob and Miranda Lawson as their squadmates. (Miranda is roughly a Sentinel.) They find no colonists, just more security mechs that have been programmed to shoot anything that moves... and the last thing anyone might expect: Tali'Zorah vas ''Neema'', here to find a lost quarian named Veetor who came here on their Pilgrimage. Veetor, it is revealed, is who hijacked the security mechs and has programmed them to KillEmAll -- as proved by a BossBattle against a [[GiantMook YMIR Mech]] that slaughters Tali's squad when they LeeroyJenkins in over her objections. Veetor, who has been in hiding, has security-cam footage of what happened to the colonists: they were subdued by insects which Veetor calls "seeker swarms" and then carted away by obscure aliens called "the Collectors." Miranda explains that the Collectors live on the other side of the Omega-4 relay and are very rarely seen. If they're working with the Reapers, it only bodes ill.\\

The ''Alarei'' is filled with a lot of living geth and a lot of dead quarians; the Admirals had feared that the geth were rebuilding themselves (it's not like they don't have the parts to do it), and that fear proved correct, giving Shepard a lot of enemies to fight through. Just outside the central control room, Tali finds the corpse of her father and breaks down weeping; there is a Paragon interrupt that allows Shepard to give her a CooldownHug (and if you do not do it, you are a CompleteMonster). Rael left a message about how the central room has the main server with which the geth are networking; it also shows the whole story: the geth activating on the ''Alarei'' wasn't an accident as the Admiralty Board suspected, it was ''on purpose'', to further Rael's research. Rael was ''deliberately'' reviving them so he could perform tests on them. You know, ForScience Tali now has proof that she is innocent... because her father is "the worst war criminal in the history of our race." She begs Shepard to not use it.\\

Dr. Archer now arrives in person and explains the purpose of Project Overlord: to learn to control the geth by combining a VI with an actual human mind. The VI has now holed up at Atlas Station, and Shepard will need to visit Prometheus and Vulcan stations (flying the game's replacement for the M35 Mako, the M-44 Hammerhead hover tank) to issue an override, which Dr. Archer will replicate from Hermes Station. Having achieved these goals (it's a lot of gameplay and not a lot of plot), Shepard unplugs the VI's internet connection, trapping it on the planet, but in revenge the VI infects Shepard's hardsuit and omnitool with a virus, causing the commander to stumble around in AugmentedReality. Shepard makes their way to the station's core, where he finds David Archer -- the teenage brother of Dr. Gavin Archer who has been hooked up as the project's WetwareCPU, and is trying to escape because ''[[AndIMustScream he wants to escape]]''. After defeating David's remaining geth reinforcements and pulling him out of the computer entirely, Shepard squares off with Gavin, who wants to ''continue'' the experiment because of its massive success; it may be the edge humanity needs in handling the geth. Shepard gets to decide whether to call Child Protective Services, getting David sent to a BoardingSchool called Grissom Academy, or leave David there to serve TheNeedsOfTheMany.

Back aboard the ''Neema'', the Admirals are trying Tali ''in absentia'', as it's suspected she chose an honorable death in combat over exile. Shepard and Tali barge in. Shepard can withhold the evidence and get Tali exiled; Shepard can hand over the evidence, exonerating her but dishonoring her father's memory, which results in her ''not'' becoming Loyal... or can TakeAThirdOption and call bullshit on the whole KangarooCourt, which is really about how the Admiralty Board want to handle the geth. In this outcome, Shepard refuses to hand over the evidence entirely, pointing out that Tali's history of service -- the campaign against Saren, her hard-earned expertise with the geth, the recent fight to retrieve the ''Alarei'' -- should speak for itself. There are actually three conversation options for this: two of them are KarmaMeter choices, and the third only works if both Veetor and Kal'Reeger are present, which requires that the former was not turned over to Cerberus and the latter was made to survive Tali's recruitment mission. Whatever the case, Tali'Zorah vas ''Normandy'' heads back out with her captain, possibly in possession of "Energy Drain," which is a LifeDrain for shields.\\

Shepard and Mordin land on Tuchanka, where a Clan Urdnot official confirms that Maelon has been kidnapped by the Blood Pack and taken to an abandoned hospital. He asks that Shepard keep an eye out for a krogan scout which he sent to investigate the area and who has yet to return. As they spelunk deeper, they find the corpses of female krogan, and it becomes clear that Mordin is still wrestling with guilt over his involvement with the genophage project; while he protests that he worked hard to revise the genophage seamlessly, so that population levels would stop increasing ''and'' not decrease to unsustainable levels, some part of him knows that his actions were both [[TheSpock logically correct]] and [[TheMcCoy ethnically wrong]]. Sometimes, he admits, he wishes he hadn't been on the mission at all, but also knows that there was no other choice: "Had to be me. Someone else could have gotten it wrong.\\

Maelon, it turns out, feels exactly the same; it's not just that he's trying and cure the genophage outright, it's that -- as he admits, upon being found -- he is doing so under the auspices of and with full cooperation of the krogan Clan Weyrloc.\\

With this crew, Shepard is now free to wander the galaxy and assemble a PlayerParty for what will likely be a SuicideMission.

Shepard eventually corners Jack, who has arrived at the airlock where ''Normandy'' is docked. She hates Cerberus with a passion -- apparently she suffered some past violence at their hands -- but agrees to work with them as a chance to sow chaos from within. She takes up residence in the basement of Deck 4. She's a ChaoticEvil biotic, and has the Shockwave and shotgun of a Vanguard. That said, she, like Jacob, lacks the FoeTossingCharge SignatureMove of the Vanguard; in fact, only one party member in the whole franchise will ever have that, and ''she's'' currently becoming a HumanPopsicle in preparation for her role in ''Mass Effect Andromeda''. Jack's upgrade is a new biotic amp that increases her power damage.\\

The tank is stowed in the Port Cargo Hold on Deck 4, and Shepard is given the choice of whether to break it open and awaken the krogan within. (Technically, you never have to open it at all, and there are a few benefits to delaying, as some additional content becomes available earlier.) The krogan explains that he has the genes of several notable krogan warlords in his DNA, but Shepard encourages him to pick his own path -- and his own name. He chooses "Grunt". He is roughly analogous to the Soldier class, but with an emphasis on the StoneWall aspects of the class rather than the straightforward DPS of Zaeed. His upgrade is a massive M-300 Claymore shotgun whose recoil would breaj the arm of a non-krogan.\\

While investigating, the ''Normandy'' becomes the victim of a surprise attack from an unknown cruiser with powerful weapons; just one shot cripples the ship. Navigator Pressly is slain immediately (via a case of the old ExplosiveInstrumentation), and more casualties follow. One of the previous game's party members -- either the Virmire Survivor (either Kaidan or Ashley, the MutuallyExclusivePartyMembers who cannot both live through the first game) or, if you didn't import a ''Mass Effect 1'' campaign, [[GreenSkinnedSpaceBabe Blue-Skinned Space Babe]] Liara T'Soni -- runs to Shepard belowdecks; the commander is activating a distress beacon, and declares the AbandonShip, charging their lieutenant with getting everyone else off. Shepard, meanwhile, heads up to the bridge, where Joker is still trying to keep the crippled ship moving. Shepard tosses him into an EscapePod and hits the button, just as the cruiser fires one last shot that destroys the ''Normandy'' for good.\\

The team splits again. Shepard nominates a Leader to head up another diversion, and then chooses a Biotic who will guard Shepard's fireteam using a biotic bubble while the four of them head down the main path. Lastly, Chakwas and whatever crew survivors remain need someone to EscortMission them back to the ''Normandy''. The Escort character will ''stay'' at the ''Normandy'' throughout the rest of the mission, so Shepard can also tell the crew that they need all hands on deck and that the {{Red Shirt}}s will have to risk it. (If so, you get an Escort Mission with no bodyguards and the escortees die.) This is when completed Loyalty Missions start really coming into play: if your Biotic isn't loyal, you lose one of the two squadmates you took with you; if the Escort (exists and) isn't loyal, they perform a HeroicSacrifice to get Chakwas ''et al'' back to the ship; and if the Leader isn't loyal, they also die as the diversionary team rejoins Shepard. (The one GuideDangIt exception is Miranda: she has PlotArmor if assigned as Leader or Biotic, and cannot be assigned as Escort. Use this LoopholeAbuse as you see fit.)\\

Shepard, accompanied by as few as three party members, confronts their final challenge. They have found where the human DNA is going: the Reapers are building an embryonic Human Reaper. (It's still like a gajillion feet tall.) Shepard selects two characters for their fireteam; the rest stay behind for a "YouShallNotPass". At this point, the game performs a behind-the-scenes calculation to determine the outcome: every character has a "Defense" value, and if the sum total is high enough, the entire defensive team survives; if not, the game calculates which one(s) of them perishes. This can be tilted in the player's favor by completing Loyalty missions (which increases defensive value), taking GlassCannon characters with them to fight the Human Reaper while leaving StoneWall characters to HoldTheLine, and detailing a Glass Cannon to be the Escort during the previous segment. However, once again, Loyalty missions come into play: if Shepard takes non-loyal squadmates with them to the FinalBoss fight against the Human Reaper, they die -- period.\\

After the AttackOfTheFiftyFootWhatever, Shepard is contacted by TIM. Shepard wants to just blow the whole base up -- ItsTheOnlyWayToBeSure -- but TIM suggests a DepopulationBomb, allowing Cerberus to take control of the base and study the Reapers. Either way, Shepard sets themselves up a bomb and makes a mad dash to the ''Normandy'', grabbing any survivors ''en route'', eventually having to make a running leap for the ship's door while ''Joker''(!) grabs a rifle and shoots at the oncoming Collectors.\\

Assuming Shepard doesn't do this, Morinth invites Shepard back to her apartment. There, she attempts to seduce Shepard, requiring a ''massive'' amount of KarmaMeter points to resist.\\

Whether or not Shepard succeeds, Samara bursts in, and mother and daughter fight, evenly matched. If Shepard failed to resist the seduction, they automatically aid Samara, killing Morinth and securing Samara's loyalty power [[LifeDrain Reave]]... But if Shepard ''succeeded'', they can ''choose to side with Morinth'' as opposed to helping Samara. If so, Morinth disguises herself as Samara (mostly by means of borrowing the latter's strawberry costume) so that no one on the crew is the wiser. Morinth comes with the [[MindControl Dominate]] loyalty power. Shepard can also visit Morinth to have sex... [[NonStandardGameOver Once]].\\