Cerberus (Mass Effect)

Cerberus is a rogue black ops agency that featured in Mass Effect.

History

Cerberus was an organization that was formed from humans within the Systems Alliance and came into being after mankind achieved interstellar travel. Following the First Contact War, an anonymous manifesto appeared on the extranet that warned of an attempt by aliens to commence the genocide of the human race with such an event being deemed inevitable. The manifesto called for the formation of an army that operated as Cerberus to guard against invasions that came from the Charon Mass Relay. This was derived as rhetoric of a survivalist that was written by an Illusive Man but the author of the manifesto remained anonymous.

In 2165, terrorists stole anti-matter from the SSV Geneva with the sole figure that was arrested claiming that his sponsors was Cerberus. Throughout 2160's and 2170's, there were alleged agents of Cerberus who were believed responsible for assassinations of politicians, sabotaging starships carrying Element Zero and also conducted nightmarish experiments on aliens as well as humans. Counterterror experts began to speculate on the nature of Cerberus where they believed that they had experienced perhaps a change in leadership after a shift in their strategy to stockpiling ships, agents and weapons.

It was known that the agency was secretly involved in encouraging the Systems Alliance into co-developing the Normandy which would allow humans to observe Turian technologies as well as their warship design practices. After the destruction of the ship, Cerberus was responsible for reconstructing the most advanced warship in the Alliance Navy by using the original schematics along with purchasing thousands of supplies over several years in order to build it in secrecy. One cell was responsible for conducting this operation who built the ship in a remote site within the Voyager Cluster.

After the Battle of the Citadel, the Illusive Man put Miranda Lawson's Lazarus Cell into operation which was involved with recovering the remains of Commander Sheppard. Using Project Lazarus, they managed to revive him from his ruined remains in order to get his aid in stopping mysterious raids on Human worlds that were abducting colonists. Through Cerberus resources, the Cell was able to construct a improved and larger version of the Normandy for this mission.

Overview

In appearance, Cerberus was a secret black ops organization that existed within the ranks of the Systems Alliance. The actions of the organization had often led it to be labelled as terrorists with many believing that it was a human supremacy group that sought to place mankind above those of other races. Though certain members of the group had a more idealistic view of Cerberus feeling that it secured humanity's interests and that it did not possess any xenophobic qualities. Many had denounced it as being human-supremacists though Cerberus itself referred to itself as human-survivalists.

The organization was divided into a number of task oriented cells with each operating in complete isolation from the others. This meant that the individuals from one cell were incapable or recognising the members of another. Such cells were given their own special name with one being known as the Lazarus Cell. The agents of each cell were led by a single person who served as the Operator and directed their actions after receiving instructions from the Illusive Man himself. Cerberus was known to not operate more than a dozen operations conducted by the various cells as this was because the Illusive Man preferred to personally oversee their actions. As such, too many projects strained the ability for him to multi-task the number of operations that he was able to keep track of at any given time.

Among the soldiers it possessed in its ranks included:

• Engineers :
• Troopers :
• Dragoons :
• Centurion : front-line tacticians that were meant to enact strategic goals though adapted to changes in circumstances with these soldiers armed with M-96 Mattock heavy rifles that were modified to launch smoke grenades in order to leave enemies vulnerable to crossfires.
• Guardian :
• Nemesis :
• Phantoms :

In terms of resources, following the Sovereign incident, Cerberus was known to possess at least three cells with a total of approximately 150 agents conducted operations for the organization. The financial capabilities of agency were not known though it was believed by the AI EDI that they possessed a reliable income of several billion credits per year. This was achieved through a number of legitimate business that served as "fronts" for support operations. As a result, the finances of the company were hidden behind shell companies with the Illusive Man killing anyone that attempted to expose him. In addition to these, there were a number of individuals within the Alliance military complex who were private wealthy contributors to Cerberus continued existence. For its own specialist hardware, the organization turned to the Cerberus Skunkworks that produced black ops wetwork equipment for its operatives. This included weapons such as advanced particle beams with excellent shield penetration, damage and accuracy along with field hardsuits that had advanced protective features along with sophisticated anti-hacking defences.

They had experimented with Reaper technology from study of the remains of the Collector Base past the Omega-4 relay. This led to experimental subjects being created that were designated as Adjutants who had the ability to infect other life forms and convert them into a new member of their race.

Members

• Illusive Man :
• Oleg Petrovsky :
• Kai Leng :
• Maya Brooks :
• Miranda Lawson :
• Jacob Taylor :
• Commander Sheppard : male agent recruited after his death where Cerberus resurrected him with cybernetics following the destruction of his ship at the hands of the Collectors and worked to stop the threat posed by these aliens.

Notes

• Cerberus was created by BioWare and featured in the setting of Mass Effect,
• It was apparently named after the three headed dog Cerberus that guarded Hell from Greek Mythology.

Appearances

• Mass Effect:
• Mass Effect 2:
• Mass Effect 3:
• Mass Effect: Andromeda:

External Links

• Mass Effect Wiki Entry

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