Disclaimer: I do not own or have any rights to representation of Bioware, EA Games and any other mass media trademarks within this fiction. Characters belong to Bioware. All is represented within the context of private entertainment.

Notes: A question on my mind inspired this story: What if the First Contact War had lasted for years and the other species decided to ignore humanity?

You will see no cannon characters from the games in this story. I have read many wonderful stories set in similar AU featuring Shepard or someone we know, but they don't work for me if Reapers are not involved, and they won't be here.

I couldn't find any expert on turian language, so I decided to invent a few words myself. I hope they sound as turian to you as they do to me! :P

Expect updates, but not often. Don't worry though, I will not abandon this story, or any of the other stories I'm writing. As always, reviews are greatly appreciated!

Chapter 1: Stuff of nightmares

"Somethings wrong, shut the light

heavy thoughts tonight

And they aren't of snow white

dreams of war, dreams of liars

dreams of dragon's fire

and of things that will bite"

Enter Sandman

Metallica

Lieutenant Marianne Brice knew it was over. She couldn't complain though. She had done almost everything she wanted to, and it had been one hell of a ride. She was young, but overall she had no regrets. How many people were lucky enough to say that at the end of their lives?

She had been fighting for days on that alien outpost, and she was exhausted. One by one, the members of her team had died, and she had been forced to take their supplies to stay alive just a minute longer. No ceremonies to honor their memories, no time for burials or cremation. For hours she had had no one to talk to, except for the orders she barked to herself in her head. Enter the soldier, leave the woman out. It was the only way she could have another breath, and each was the potential last one.

The infiltration mission had gone wrong from almost the very beginning, but it was too late for placing the blame on her C.O. His corpse lied on the floor, starting to rot. Just like the rest of the humans on that little toxic planet forsaken by God. She could see the alien's shadows surrounding her, closing on her position, and she knew that in seconds she would also face her Creator.

"It's stuff of nightmares!" said Aidan Carter in a grim tone.

He was watching the news next to Marianne Brice, both sat on a couch on her living room. They were both seventeen years old. She had this big, enormous, impossibly colossal crush on him, which he was unaware of. He treated Marianne like a sister, no matter how many things she tried to draw his attention to her. However, what they were seeing on the screen was terrifying, so much that Marianne wasn't thinking of how his lips would feel over hers. She was thinking if humanity had a chance of survival.

She had never seen the aliens so close. Sure, they were in full armor and had their helmets on, but they were still intimidating. She tried not to think about that, about the fact that she was in front of the solid response the galaxy gave the humans to their question "are we alone?". Her mind filled in: "Well, fuck you, talking monkeys, you're not alone and your company bites." Marianne was glad she didn't have to see their horrible faces at her final hour. She had seen pictures and diagrams, and that had been about all of how much she wanted to see of them.

Lt. Brice readied her assault rifle. At least if she was about to be killed by space monsters, she would take a few with her.

She had been a child when she first heard of the exciting discovery of alien ruins on Mars, but she remembered it clearly. Not only did Marianne remember her parents talking about it, but the discussions about it in school, in other people's homes, at the news. Many were afraid of the discovery, of the possible threats of space travel. The fear grew when scientists discovered that Charon was not a moon in the outer solar system, but a strange device that allowed to explore distant stars.

Little Marianne had not been afraid at all. She had been excited. That afternoon, however, young Marianne felt her childhood had been brutally vandalized, when the news displayed how humanity's biggest fear was justified. Aliens were real, and they were not friendly. They had attacked human ships that were exploring the galaxy, with no provocation. Nobody knew what the aliens would do next. Would they come to Earth? Exterminate every single human in the galaxy?

Aidan was livid, watching the screen, absorbing every word the journalists would say, every interview with Alliance's officers. He seemed to be scared to death. Marianne, on the other hand, knew exactly what to do. Her birthday was near. She would enlist in the Alliance Military that very same day.

She was a good shot. Two aliens went down before the rest surrounded her, before she felt a sharp pain in her right arm and the left knee at the same time. She had been shot. Lt. Brice growled softly, and fell to the floor. Her weapon fell before her. She still had her side pistol, but before she could reach it, they shot again. In her hand this time. She felt pain, but mostly she just stared at the red fluid pouring out her wounds, almost in disbelief.

"Narrag sethie muur!" one of the aliens said with reverberating voice. Of course, she didn't catch the meaning. It sounded like an order though. Perhaps the thing was telling the others to finish her off? It didn't matter. She had fought to the end. She was proud of herself. Marianne took a deep breath, knowing she had done everything in her power to try to stop them. It wasn't a bad death at all.

Two of the creatures lifted her from the floor. With its three fingered hand one of them took all of her weapons and anything she could use to hurt them, while the other shackled her. A large alien carried her in its arms.

Marianne understood that very second that she was being taken prisoner. Her first feeling was confusion, because she had never heard of the aliens doing that, despite the fact that the war had lasted for years now. However, most of the combat had happened in space, with ships attacking and taking down each other. Some colonies had been bombarded from orbit. Face to face combat was a very rare occurrence, and it normally ended with no survivors. When facing each other, both sides were fierce, ruthless. Nevertheless, for all their aggressiveness, the aliens didn't attempt to invade Earth, or even the largely populated colonies. The attacks weren't even that frequent as one would expect in a war, which helped the Alliance to reorganize and plan their strategies carefully. If they meant to destroy all humanity, they were sure taking their time to do so.

What they were doing with her was a change of strategy, because they decided not to kill her even after all the alien lives she took. They wanted something from her, and she decided she wouldn't give it to them. She made a promise to herself to stay strong. The Alliance had trained her for resisting interrogation, and she planned on putting that training to good use.

The Alliance had regulations against their soldiers 'fraternization'. That was the reason why Private Marianne Brice was not pleased when Aidan Carter decided to enlist, only two months after she had. Gone was any chance she could possibly had with him. Not that she had many to begin with.

That very night, Private Brice went to a bar, and got completely wasted for the first time in her life. She woke up in a place she didn't recognize. Soon she realized she was in someone else's bed, a naked man sleeping by her side. She sighed and checked on him. He was definitely older than the last boy she had been with. For a start, he was not a boy. He was cute. Marianne was glad that even drunken she had a good taste, and went back to sleep cuddling next to the stranger's body.

The aliens carried her away from the small building they had been fighting in. The wind outside carried death, as she could feel in all her open wounds, through her armor. She felt a burning pain in her open flesh, that was getting worse every passing second. She repressed the urge to scream.

There was a small vehicle, a shuttle probably, less than a hundred meters away. Fighting the wind, they all rushed in that direction, with the human prisoner still being carried by the large alien. When they reached the shuttle, it tossed Marianne inside. She was glad that at least she hit the metal floor on her back, and not with her shattered knee.

The door closed as soon as the last alien made its way inside. It took off, and meanwhile the creatures cleaned their armors. The planet was toxic for them also, she reasoned. She wondered why would they keep an outpost in such a hostile location.

After a while, they took off their helmets. They spoke in their strange language, but she couldn't make any of it. They were really ugly, just like in the pictures. Stuff of nightmares indeed. Fear clawed at the back of her head.

Marianne was tired, hungry and in a lot of pain. She realized how desperate her situation was. She was in enemy hands and she had no idea of what they planned to do with her, but she knew that if she gave in to despair, they would probably get what they wanted. She couldn't let them win. The young human focused on her curiosity instead, something to keep her mind off the pain and the fear.

She observed the aliens. They had two arms, two legs with spurs, and some strange hump on their backs. Their waist were so thin that it seemed almost impossible that it would support their large torso, but they moved with agility. Some of them had some sort of spikes on the crown of their heads, pointing backwards. Other lacked the spikes and where a little shorter. There seemed to be about the same quantity of the two types, for which Marianne reasoned some type was probably male and the other female. If logic for life on Earth was any indicator, the larger specimens were probably the male. She didn't know if evolution had taken the same logic on alien species though. She didn't even know if there were only male and female genders, but it seemed reasonable, for both diversity and practicality. All of them had mandibles instead of mouths, fierce eyes with bright, feral colors, and a flat nose. At least, it seemed like a nose, or it was in the same place on the face that a human nose would be. The faces looked to be of some rigid material. Definitely not skin. They had facial marks painted in different patterns and colors. Some sort of tribal markings?

One of the creatures approached her. She recognized it from the armor: it was the same creature that have given the 'narrag sethie muur' order a minute ago. It had spikes on its head. The alien crouched next to Marianne, and touched its arm. Something glowed orange on it. She looked. The creature growled something, and then it moved its hand as if it was typing something. A few seconds later the pain of her wounds was practically gone. The creature helped her up, cuffed as she was, and made her sit on a bench in the shuttle. It removed the prisoner's helmet.

"Sik Vriat Malek Nikus," the alien said looking at her, again with his voice reverberating. The mandibles moved in a strange way as it spoke.

The human stared at it, not sure of what it wanted.

"Nikus," repeated the creature, pointing at itself with one finger. "Vriat Nikus. Vriat Malek Nikus."

"Oh!" she exclaimed, understanding. It was introducing itself, but she still wasn't sure if it was male or female. It seemed polite, even nice. There was only the minor, little problem that it was her captor, though.

She took both cuffed hands to her chest, pointing at herself. She said, using the order that she understood from its words: "Brice. Lieutenant Brice. Lieutenant Marianne Brice."

"Brice," repeated the creature. "Lan tekre sanail, Marianne Brice." Nikus used a tone that would be considered reassuring if used by a human. The prisoner didn't know if the tones of voices for these aliens had the same meaning, but even if it did, there was little any of them could do to reassure her.

It didn't matter, though. She had no intention of replying. Her name and rank was the only information they were going to obtain from her, and she had only given that in case they needed it for an eventual exchange of prisoners. There was nothing else they needed to know. She decided not to speak any further, no matter what they did to her. She had no need to communicate with them, they had taken her and now they decided her fate, but she would keep as much control on her situation as she could. More importantly, Marianne didn't want to give the aliens any insight on her language or culture. She would give them no advantage over her people, even if she had to die to preserve them. That was what she had sworn to do when she enlisted to protect Earth from their threat.