In the unobservable strata beyond space and time, where the skeins of causality are spun and woven, the ROB the Resonant Overseer of Balance hovered before a faltering karmic lattice. This section of his domain, a multiversal bloom of interlinked universes, was fracturing.
A malignant node pulsed in defiance: the Mass Effect universe. Once under fate's sway, it had become anomalous cut off from karmic flow, unbound by dharma, spreading spiritual entropy like cancer through its multiversal neighbors.
The lotus engines, living structures that digested soul-energy and reissued it in reincarnated forms, shuddered under the weight of its interference.
Fate's immune response had no purchase in a system where fate no longer ruled. The ROB, programmatic architect of cosmic karma, knew the threat. Without intervention, the cancer would metastasize into neighboring universes unraveling the order of the entire sector.
He required a soul. Not any soul. A soul of specific resonance, an inverse frequency to the entropy wave now radiating from the Mass Effect anomaly. The karmic lotus bloomed, offering potential candidates: vibrational echoes of courage, sacrifice, moral clarity, and curiosity.
From among them, one lotus petal pulsed with unique harmonic inversion.
Sebastian Dalton.
Recently deceased, his soul retained the vibrational imprint of his actions, choices, and thoughts. His karmic frequency, though flawed and human, oscillated in a pattern that could resonate against the disharmony corrupting the Mass Effect plane. Uniquely, his death was recent; his memory and identity remained intact in the karmic lattice.
He was not born into the new universe. He was stamped, a direct override of reincarnational protocol, embedded into a ROB-generated vessel grown within the Mass Effect universe. The stamp carried his essence, memories, and life experience.
"You are not reborn, Sebastian," the ROB's voice vibrated through a space of no space. "You are embedded. An inverse harmonic inserted into a corrupted waveform."
The lotus engines reoriented, forming a singular bloom: a golden-petaled metaphysical flower trembling with stored resonance. It closed around Sebastian's essence, compacting him into a soul-vector and launching him across planes.
But to fulfill his role, he would need tools.
"Integration commencing."
The second voice was feminine. Precise. Comforting. It echoed within.
First Gift: SAS-C short for Soul-Anchored Symbiotic Companion.
An artificial intelligence bound to his soul signature. Not merely an implant. Not a VI. It was him, and not him but a mirror-mind, a guide, a strategist. It could interpret, analyze, protect, and enhance.
Second Gift: Nanite Integration.
Infinitesimal machines, directed by SAS-C, capable of restructuring his biology in secret. They would grant him the ability to:
Evolve biotic potential through Element Zero manipulation.
Reinforce musculature, ligaments, and tendons to increase speed and strength.
Harden bone mineral structures beyond human standards.
Enhance endocrine function, regulate organ efficiency, and optimize metabolism.
Rewrite his genes; correct flaws, incorporate beneficial alien traits, and adapt without changing his external appearance.
Enhance sensory capacity to superhuman levels vision, hearing, balance, pain modulation.
He would look human. But he would become more.
"Caution: Knowledge integration available. Full neural overlay restricted to avoid dissonance. Skillsets must be internalized and physically reinforced."
Muscle memory could not be bypassed. Practice was still necessary. Mastery had to be earned.
Sebastian awoke inside a universe that hummed wrong.
He gasped not for air, but for alignment. Every atom in his body screamed misplacement. His perception off-kilter as if the laws of cause and effect were strained like overstretched muscle.
He was in his body, but not. This body had never known Earth's sun, but held the muscle memory of training, survival, and pain. The third gift the ROB bestowed encoded knowledge of this universe; it surged through his mind like compressed history. Turians, Mass Relays, Reapers…
He remembered his death. He remembered Mass Effect both the games and the fictional history of this place. He remembered a life lived but not his own. The life of an 18 year old prodigy and the tragic life of loss. Two families and two homes. One to accidents and another to violence.
And he was vibrating.
Not externally. Internally. Spiritually. His karmic resonance shaped across lifetimes was now acting as a tuning fork inside a discordant realm. He could feel the entropy. See it.
People's decisions were missing a certain spiritual coherence. Fate didn't nudge events toward meaning or balance; it was all chaos, unchecked will, recursive destruction.
He realized then: this universe had amputated itself from the karmic flow.
That was his mission. Not to defeat the Reapers alone, but to re-thread fate through the corrupted web. To do so, he would need to act, influence, correct.
"You must harmonize, not dominate," the ROB's words echoed in memory of a time he did not recall. "Restore spiritual resonance through choice, not conquest."
Then.. silence, darkness, infinite and absolute.
> Initializing SAS-C... Synchronizing with neural lattice... Confirmed: Subject is conscious. Welcome, Sebastian Dalton.
A voice though not heard, but felt.. it resonated through his being. It wasn't intrusive; more like a mental vibration, or a wordless familiarity echoing from the deepest corner of his soul.
"Who.. what are you?"
> I am SAS-C: Soul-Anchored Symbiotic Companion. First Gift of the Administrator. I reside within your soul and will accompany you across all iterations of form. You are the Executor. You are the Cure.
Sebastian now pulse racing, before a wave of calm washed over him. His cortisol levels dropped sharply, and a tingling behind his eye lids but they remained closed as if to deny the reality he found himself in. His muscles becoming denser. His breathing more efficient. His mind clearer.
> You are occupying a reconstructed body grown from an optimized template. Nanite colonies have already begun neural tagging and tissue calibration. You may now direct basic modifications.
Sebastian hesitated. Then he thought:
"Can I gain biotics?"
> Confirmed. Latent potential in human DNA allows biotic interfaces via Element Zero node implants. Nanites will construct compatible nodules. Estimated time: 72 hours.
"What about.." He paused. "Height adjustment?"
> Confirmed. Skeletal and tendon systems will be incrementally lengthened over six days to preserve integrity and avoid suspicion.
That's when a wave of realization hit. He had power. He could shape himself, correct inefficiencies, unlock capabilities the average human could only dream of. He didn't just have knowledge of the Mass Effect universe. He now had the means to bend its rules in subtle, surgical ways.
> SAS-C advisory: Maintain phenotype stability to avoid detection by Citadel Security or Alliance Intelligence. Genetic upgrades will be expressed internally.
"Understood. Blend in, not stand out. This isn't about playing hero. It's about preserving the narrative long enough to fix what's broken."
> Correct. Fate's immune response cannot engage in this sector. You are not merely an observer. You are the substitute regulator.
Then again all went silent..
Citadel-bound Civilian Shuttle – Interior Cabin – Year 2170 – 0200 Hours
Sebastian eyelids fluttered open, and light struck like a hammer. A soft blue glow diffused through low cabin panels, punctuated by occasional orange blinks. Across from him: four figures strapped into crash seats. Turian. Human. Salarian. Human again. Civilians.. probably. He was in a mid-sized passenger shuttle. Sleek interior. Clean, but impersonal. No logos. Probably Citadel-subsidized. Probably routine.
Probably.
But nothing about this felt routine.
His thoughts flailed. His hands clenched against the safety harness wrapped tight across his chest. His vision cleared slowly, but his mind lagged behind. A strange duality split his awareness: He had died. But he was alive. He had memories.. Atlanta. Franklin's World. The aptitude program. The experimental training on Arcturus. Then… the blooming. The voice. The lotus engines.
The ROB.
The shuttle lurched slightly. Inertia anchors adjusted seamlessly. A console light blinked above the viewport with scrolling text:
Approach vector: Citadel Transit Corridor 3 – ETA: 00:37
He realized then: this wasn't some afterlife. Nor a dream. He was en route. Being delivered.
> SAS-C: Your current cover identifies you as a returning civilian apprentice assigned to Systems Engineering Outreach, contracted for medical analytics work under Citadel residency.
Sebastian's breath steadied, but cold sweat clung to the small of his back.
"How long was I out?" he murmured under his breath, barely moving his lips.
> Three hours real time. Integration latency required to stabilize biological systems.
He lifted his hand. Studied the knuckles, the palm, the light tracing of veins. It was his hand. But not the same one he had died with.
Different bones. Different blood. Same soul.
Across the aisle, the salarian noticed him stir and gave a brief nod. "You were pale before. Now you look like you might throw up. Progress."
Sebastian gave a weak smile. "Appreciate the update."
He leaned back, letting his head rest against the bulkhead. Outside the tiny port, stars blurred past in neat lanes. The FTL corridor curved toward the massive, ringed silhouette of the Citadel, now slowly filling the view like a crescent moon made of chrome and dreams. It was still distant, but growing. Like fate approaching at relativistic speed.
He didn't know what door he would step through when the shuttle docked. But it wasn't home. Not yet.
He closed his eyes, just for a moment, letting the rhythmic thrum of the shuttle's drive lull his body but not his mind. That was already racing ahead.
> First objective: secure equipment, credits, and survival logistics. Secondary: establish resonance scan for karmic fragmentation.
Sebastian opened his eyes again, jaw clenched.
strength surging through enhanced muscle fibers. He could feel the future unwinding before him like a tangled web. Shepard's death. The Reapers. The Crucible. The geth-quarian conflict. The genophage. So many paths to ruin, each laced with entropy.
His job wasn't to replace Shepard—but to act as a stabilizer, a fulcrum. A quiet pivot point around which fate could reassert itself. If fate was a closed loop, he was the foreign key reintroducing order into a runaway script.
> Second Gift fully integrated. Nanite command access enabled. Awaiting your intent, Executor.
He took a slow breath, then whispered to himself, "Time to get to work."
As Sebastian moved his eye taught a reflective surface of the chromed panel of the shuttle. The face was familiar. The eyes were not. Somewhere behind them, a golden stamp pulsed, his soul sigil, invisible to others but searing with cosmic heat.
The lotus had bloomed. Now, he would bloom within it.
Codex entry: The life I never lived, Sebastian Dalton.
Date of Birth: 2152
Place of Birth: Atlanta, Earth
Early Life:
Sebastian was born on Earth, in Atlanta. His biological parents died during his early childhood — his father in a mining accident offworld, and his mother from radiation poisoning sustained during humanitarian relief work.
Adoption and Upbringing:
In 2159, at age 7, Sebastian was adopted by the Dalton family and relocated to Franklin's World, a lawful frontier colony known for its tight-knit settler communities and high self-governance. There, he thrived in a structured environment that valued resilience, practical intelligence, and civic duty.
Alliance Experimental Program:
At age 15, he was selected through a colonial outreach initiative for an Alliance-run experimental aptitude nursery, a highly selective program designed to foster advanced interdisciplinary talent in youth. He spent three years under the program, training at the Arcturus station nexus in systems engineering, medical xenobiology, mathematics, and cybernetics.
Graduation and Return:
By age 18 (2170), Sebastian had graduated with full honors and multiple commendations. Upon graduation, he returned home to Franklin's World, both as a personal responsibility and due to Alliance protocol recognizing colonial ties. His records at the nursery show this return clearly.
The Raid:
Shortly after his return, Batarian slavers raided Franklin's World. While Sebastian had been on an extended off-grid solo hiking trip to the Center Ridge west of Newstone Town, the slavers struck. He witnessed from a distance the attack on the populated districts, unable to intervene. The colony's infrastructure was razed, and most of its residents — including his adoptive family — were either killed or taken.
Aftermath:
The raid created a disruption in local data networks and biometric registries. Though some Alliance backups remain, the destruction of local systems resulted in Sebastian being unofficially off-grid, though not erased. He escaped the planet aboard an emergency outbound cargo runner flagged for Citadel-bound humanitarian relief.