The Prothean archives have been on Mars forever. It’s the first alien ruin humans discovered before joining the galaxy. Now, though, as desperation kicks in, archaeologists, including Liara, give this site another look. Hidden here are plans for a Reaper-defeating weapon. The Protheans were so close to finishing it. We are to join with Liara and get this plan back to Alliance command.
However, Cerberus is after the same thing. They’re dressed as commandos, and they fight us for the Prothean information. When we lift the faceplate on one of the dead, we see he’s part-husk. At this point our old crewmate (Kaidan or Ashley) asks Shepard if she’s just a puppet, too, for Cerberus. They did rebuild Shepard, after all.
(It’s pretty annoying. The crewmate is so dogmatic, so unwilling to just look with their own mind. And, sadly, we’ve no renegade option to dopesmack them, lol. If this were just a character moment — how friends who’ve made different life choices can become close again — it wouldn’t be irritating. This, however, is a plant. The authors want the gamer to doubt Shepard and reality. I don’t like stories that think tricking someone and undermining the hero is clever.)
After much battle and some cool scenery, our team makes it to the archive. Stopping in for a chat is the virtual Illusive Man. He wants the data, and he’s in the process of uploading it out from under us. The upload is happening locally, though, and we’re able to chase and stop the Cerberus machine-woman, Dr. Eva, who’s collecting the data.
He’s changed. He was always a sketchy fellow, a villain waiting for his moment. Now he’s out with no subtlety or reason left. His soldiers are semi-husk, something he tries to justify. Working with him in the past was a temptation because his arguments had a foundation in logic. Prioritizing humanity was an understandable goal, especially when the rest of space cared little for the new guy on the block. Now he’s bonkers. He wants to use the Prothean data to co-opt the Reapers and make humans uber-powerful. His new goal is to dominate, not only the Reapers, but every other species in the galaxy, and to use tainted methods to achieve that goal.
We manage to escape with the data, but just barely, by killing Dr. Eva and capturing her corpse.