/Open Report/
R000001UO-ID*****8769-CLS/error/
EXTRATERRESTRIAL OBJECT DISCOVERED
AI-COM/MGLN
ASSETS/FORCECON/IMPERATIVE IMMEDIATE ACTION ORDER
PRIORITY: ALPHA RED
Official Vital Report (OVR) outsourced to complete Homo-Sapien Command Structure. (Secure-line)
Record: July 25th, 2479, 0049 Hours - Unknown object detected off orbit of the Charon. Scanning initiated.
Record: July 25th, 2479, 0100 Hours - Scanning Complete. Correction to previous record. Object is located within Charon, Object previously scanned was large chunk of the moon. Deep Scan initiated.
Record: July 25th, 2479, 0200 Hours - Deep Scan Complete. Presence of Unknown Object CONFIRMED~~~Artificial Status CONFIRMED. Activating NEW WORLD protocol.
Record: July 25th, 2479, 0210 Hours - Governor Tyronis of vital location NESSUS declares STATE OF ALERT. All CIVILIAN assets ordered to return to ports across Jovian Moons.
WARSAT OPERATIONAL STATUS: READY
PLANETARY DEFENSE FRAME STATUS: READY
WARMIND STATUS: AWAITING ORDERS
End Report Summary:
Object of unknown origins and composition discovered within Pluto's moon Charon. NEW WORLD protocol activated and at prime operational status. WARMIND MAGELLAN awaiting orders from HIGHCOM and RASPUTIN for operation orders.
/Report Sent/
Mars, Solar System
July 25th, 2479
0230 Hours
Mars Defense Force HQ
General Gregor MacRivvel was awoken from his sleep by his terminal's vital message line beginning to blare. The soldier in him immediately shot out of bed to his terminal. He quickly skimmed through it, as he saw that it was a message from his XO Major Skyler Bell to report to the Operations Center immediately. Giving a confirmation that he received the message, the General quickly got dressed in his uniform, and made sure to tidy up his hair before heading towards the OPS-Center. Upon arrival he saw the graveyard shift in a fervor over something, and he hoped that something would be told to him soon.
"General MacRivvel SIR!" an Exo Soldier guarding the room noticed him and called out, snapping into a salute. After the call rang out, the rest of the room turned and saluted without hesitation calling out "SIR!". Gregor quickly returned the salute, before lowering his hand and telling the room. "At easy soldiers! I need a report on what is going on ASAP!"
To his side he saw Major Bell walking up to him, holding a datapad in her hand. After typing a command into the pad, a computerized voice rang out across the room. "General MavRivvel has the Command." When Bell reached him she handed him her datapad. On the screen, an image of some sort of tuning fork structure was shown to him, the Major, seeing is quizzical look gave him the rundown before he opened it. "At approximately 0049 hours, the Warmind Magellan scanned a large object in the orbit of the moon Charon. Initiating a scan, the Warmind learned that said object, was actually a part of the moon. The scan also indicated the presence of an unidentified object residing within the moon." Bell paused to take a breath, and before she continued, the General interrupted her.
"Why are we just receiving the report now Major?" He asked, eyes narrowing.
"The short answer sir, protocol. Magellan was required to inform the Governors of the Jovian Moons colonies, as well as the heads of their militias to the scan, however no deep scan was initiated at the time, so the AI had not yet filled out the OVR." Bell answered him. The question wasn't a bad one. Had the Warmind been a major one such as Icarus, Rasputin, and Charlemagne, it would have sent the report to the officials of the nearby settlements, as well as HIGHCOM, but Magellan was a minor Warmind, who stuck to official protocols of only notify local authorities until a deep scan is complete, and an OVR deemed necessary.
Gregor nodded his head for her to continue the report, finding the answer satisfactory. Clearing her throat, she obliged the General. "When a deep scan was completed, the object was confirmed to be artificial in nature, and apparently not related to the Traveler in any way, seeing as Magellan activated the New World protocol. Twenty minutes ago the Governor of Nessus declared a state of alert in case the object's slow resurfacing draws any… unwanted attention from outside the Solar System." Bell finished stating, before quickly adding, "That picture is what the scan on the moon brought up. That is the object."
Gregor scratched at his chin while looking at it. "Could it be Vex tech?" He asked looking at Bell.
"Unlikely sir. The Warmind specifically stated it was unknown. It would have been able to tell if it was Vex." She replied.
"SIR! We just received word that another chunk of the moon detached!" A private yelled from over at his terminal.
The General frowned. "There isn't much we can do at this moment." Gregor stayed silent as he thought of what he could do. By now a larger image of the object appeared in the holotable in the center of the room. Turning towards Bell, he told her what he had come up with. "Major, contact Clovis Bray and tell him that we found an extraterrestrial object near Pluto and we need his engineers and scientists to study it. But make sure they have a military contingent with them, incase something happens. Also put some of our own scientists on their ship, we can't just give this whole thing up to the civilians."
The Major nodded her head. "I will get right on that sir!" With a quick salute she turned and left the room.
MacRivvel saluted her back before she left and then turned to look at the object projected in the center of the room. I hope that thing isn't a threat. The General thought to himself. If the object did turn out to be a threat, Humanity would be stuck on the defensive. The only actual warships Humanity had weren't FTL capable, research was still trying to find a way to make FTL work for them. They were all also assigned to guard Earth, leaving the outer colonies with only Warsats and small militias to defend them, granted they had tens of thousands of frames, but those mechs were only meant to buy time, not win battles.
Giving his command over to the next highest ranking officer in the OPS-Center, Gregor headed towards his office to send his personal report to his fellow HIGHCOM officers back on Earth and Venus.
The Moon of Charon, Solar System
August 1st, 2479
1200 Hours
Clovis Bray Research Ship Galileo
Sydney Taylor's head felt like it was going to explode. Everything they knew about physics, even with their expanded view on science thanks to the Traveler, told them that this object function shouldn't be possible. Lowering the mass of a ship enough for it to travel in FTL was supposed to be against everything in science, though apparently, it wasn't as this object now proved.
The last few days had been hectic, with her being assigned as the military science liason to Clovis Bray for this research mission, as well as the knowledge of an alien device being found out by the public, putting this mission together without the press gaining info was the hardest part. Another thing that happened over the last few days was the disappearance of Charon. The moon had slowly been torn apart as the device heated up, the icy moon ripping apart and melting in chunks, leaving only the device behind.
A groan of frustration came from one of the Clovis scientists, his name was Alex Bleadorn, she believed. "What is the problem Alex?" Sydney asked, making her way over to him.
His fist slammed into the desk as he typed in a command. "This damn device keeps asking for an activation signal, along with data about our mass. Why can't this thing accept we don't want to go through it! We just want to study it for fucks sake!" Alex ranted, his voice getting louder, drawing attention from other crew members.
Sydney gave him a small smile. "Just keep saying no to it Alex, it isn't anything we need to worry about. What we SHOULD worry about, is why it decided now of all times to destroy Charon, and why we never discovered it before."
"Ah ha!" A voice came from behind them. Both of the scientists turned around to see the Exo Juliana-00 walking towards them. One of the few non-military Exos, Juliana was something of an oddity to Sydney. After reaching them, the human turned machine continued to speak. "I can help you with those inspired questions!" She said gleefully.
After making a motion for Juliana to continue, Sydney leaned back against the wall to listen. "For the first question to be hypothesized, I must first answer the second. I believe the reason we didn't find it until now to be because of two facts, one, we weren't looking, or expecting anything to be inside Charon, and two, the moon blocked any scans we made, the only reason we had detected it in the first place was because a chunk of Charon broke off." The living machine explained.
"Okkayyyy. And the second question?" Alex asked.
"I believe that the reason Charon has been destroyed now of all times, is because the device is activating." Juliana quickly lifted a finger to stop Alex from interrupting. "Or… it could be going into standby mode, turning on but not fully activating. Since we have refused to activate it, and the only reason it would feasibly break Charon apart was if it was turning on, that must mean that someone from the other side of where it leads it turning it on, or at the very least its' counterpart."
Silence reigned in the lab of the Galileo as the entirety of the science team had gone silent to hear the Exo speak. One of the scientists currently looking at the composition of it spoke up first. "You think that aliens are activating this thing's counterpart, because if they are, that means they have a direct open door into the Solar System. This thing is a security nightmare if that's the case. Could this device have just been on some really long timer?" The man asked, worry laced in his voice. The entire mood was somber now, the idea of first contact coming from this device made the whole team nervous.
Juliana turned to the man who asked the question and shrugged. "It is only a guess. We can't really be sure, We have had the Traveler here for four centuries now and we barely understand what it truly is. We just found this thing, only research can tell us more."
Just then, the Clovis team leader walked into the room, saw them all doing nothing besides looking at eachother and barked out, "Get to work! We have a job to do here, and sitting around doing jack shit won't help us find answers!".
A few 'sorry sir' responses came meekly from the Clovis scientists, while Sydney shook her head and went back to her own terminal. We have a lot of work to do she thought.
The Moon of Charon, Solar System
August 10th, 2479
0536 Hours
Clovis Bray Research Ship Galileo
Running the graveyard shift for the Galileo had to be the most boring job on the ship. The job was basically sitting, staring at the 'Mass Relay' as it had been named, and waiting to see if anything happened. Alex was reading a news article to pass the last half hour of the shift before he was relieved. His feet were kicked up on his article was about a new medicine his wife's team had discovered at the Ishtar Academy on Venus. It apparently had something to do with a native plant called 'Spirit Bloom', that was created during the Traveler's terraforming.
Glancing over from the datapad he was reading the article on, he looked at the picture he had on his console of his wife and daughter. He felt like the luckiest man ever to be a part of their lives. It was a shame he couldn't see them as often as he liked. For months he had been trying to get transferred to Clovis Bray's Venus office, without success, he was needed on Mars they said.
A flashing red light got his attention just milliseconds before the klaxon started blaring. Alex shot straight up and rushed to the flashing device. The gravitational readings are off the charts! The scientist thought as he looked at the screen that showed the Relay. Is it… Activating? Alex thought in shock before opening up an intercom to the entire ship. He didn't have time to contact the boss first.
"The Relay is activating! Get to the lab immediately!" He yelled into the mic, watching as the gyroscopic center began spinning at a rapid rate, and before he knew it, he was staring at fifty ships the likes of which he has never seen before. He sat and stared for what felt like a long time.
A sound of stomping feet knocked him out of his stupor. Coming from his right, Sydney walked up and looked at him, she was still looking half asleep. "What do we have Alex?" She wasn't looking at his terminal, so she didn't see the fifty warships.
Alex gulped. "Um… Well… Fifty extraterrestrial warships just came through the Relay. What do we do?" He answered, and asked. Looking at the ships, they seemed to be orienting themselves towards the research vessel.
Sydney paled. Fifty ships? Humanity had ten all guarding Earth. Sure the warsats would help, but if they found a way to shut down the orbital defense grid a vast majority of colonies would be defenseless. "Send the First Contact package and try to hail them. I'll send a report to HIGHCOM immediately." And with that order, Sydney sprinted towards her office, the lab already filling with the scientists who woke to the alert Alex sent out.
Alex, the second Sydney ran away, pulled up the package they were given. 'Just in case.' The General had said. Glad he had the foresight Alex thought as he sent the package their way, and attempted to bring up a channel with the unknown vessels. Alex frowned when he saw that while the hail request was received, it was rejected. The man tried again, to the same result. What are they doing? The scientist thought in worry, the last of the ships had gotten into a formation, facing towards their singular vessel. A few military fighters were sent with them, but fighters wouldn't do anything against full fledged warships if worse came to worse.
Fear gripped Alex's heart as he saw a flash come from the center of the vessel, and before he could even think about it, a huge crash echoed throughout the ship, and an announcement rang out from the bridge. "Comm Systems are down! All occupants strap down for evasive maneuvers! The fighters will try to buy us some time!".
A few short seconds after the announcement was made another few flashes came from some of the now enemy ships, though most missed not expecting the quick motion of the ship to evade the fire. Holding onto his terminal, Alex felt as the systems of the Galileo went into overdrive to try and escape. Another crash rang out, and alert klaxons blared. An automated voice notified the crew of damages. "Engines one and four are down. Engineering deck has been depressurized, no survivors. Fire suppression systems are down on decks 1 and 2. Fires have ignited on decks 1 and 2. Rear Hull Integrity is at 50%. Vital Repairs required."
With the ship unable to accelerate further with the loss of half of their engines, Alex knew the situation was hopeless. An abandon ship alert went off ship-wide, but he knew they didn't have a chance. He looked at the picture of his wife and daughter and held it in his hands as he simply sat there, screams echoing through the halls as another round hit their vessel. A few seconds later explosions rang through the ship. The last thing Alex felt was the heat before everything went dark.
Unnamed Star System
August 10th, 2479
0546 Hours
Batarian Dreadnought Pillar's Strength
Admiral Devethk Gocpetor smirked as he saw the primitive ship go up in flames. He had originally planned on boarding the ship for a few extra slaves, but when he was informed that they were trying to send an emergency broadcast back to one of the planets in this new system, he decided destroying the vessel was necessary. The few fighters that had escorted that vessel were easily dispersed by the GUARDIAN point defense system.
This system was detected months ago by a Hegemony patrol, while the foolish Council simply thought it was pirates, the Batarians knew better, they had an investment in nearly all pirate groups, so they knew it wouldn't be any of their agents. At the orders of the Emperor, a single frigate slowly activated the Mass Relays leading to this system while avoiding Turian Patrols. When the final relay was discovered, Devethk was sent with his fleet to grab a foothold with this system, and get as many slaves as possible before reinforcements could arrive to conquer the species that lived here.
His navigation officer turned towards him. "Admiral! Early system scans detect dozens of colonies spread throughout the system! The nearest one is located on one of the moons of this system's largest planet! Shall I set the course for it?"
Devethk looked at the officer, while many Batarian leaders would've punished the officer for speaking without being prompted, Devethk was not one of them. He gained victory in many slave runs by respecting his crew, not by controlling them with fear. "Yes." The Admiral replied before turning to the Ensign at the communications terminal. "Inform the captains of the rest of the fleet to maintain formation, and prepare to launch the ground force on my command."
"Yes Admiral!" Came the response, the man's voice heard repeating the orders through the channel that the fleet shared.
The view of the small planet in front of the fleet faded, as the fleet performed an in-system jump towards the selected location. In less time than it took to blink, the view returned this time of a small moon surrounded by satellites, hundreds of which seemed to be orienting themselves in the direction of his fleet.
An ensign's yell caught the Admiral's attention. "Admiral! Those satellites are heating up! They are orbital weapons!"
They had exited close enough to the moon that the bridge could see the red pinpoints of light building up at hundreds of locations. "Evasive maneuvers! Rotate 2 degrees starboard and prepare our Mass Accelerators!" The slaver yelled, proud that his men followed his orders without hesitation.
While the rest of his fleet began to move as well, a few of the frigates were too slow as red beams of energy shot out of some of the larger weapons. The beams punched through their barriers and gutted the vessels, whose engines overloaded, and nothing remained in their place besides balls of fire which quickly faded in the vacuum of space.
Devethk opened a fleet wide channel to the bridges of every vessel. "Retreat out of those weapon's ranges! While we retreat launch the ground assault! Those weapons won't be able to track our landing force!"
Green lights of acknowledgement appeared on his terminal as the Batarian fleet, three ships fewer, turned and retreated to a safe distance, shuttles and gunships flying out of their hangar bays, and turning towards the colony. The orbital grid didn't even seem to try to track the landing force that got closer to the moon every second, seeming to be content with keeping the ships at a distance.
Once the ships had turned back towards the moon, this time out of range of those energy beams, an ensign walked up to the Admiral. "Sir, scans we took of the moon, as well as data streams we detected indicated that the control center for the orbital grid seem to be in an underground bunker deep beneath the only major city on the moon."
Devethk glanced at his omni-tool, that had all the data the ship received newly downloaded on it. The orange glow lit up a small area of the dim bridge. "Good. Tell the landing force to focus on reaching that control center. Once those weapons are down we can move our fleet in towards the moon and send down the slave transport containers."
"Yes sir!" The ensign saluted, then headed back to send the orders.
With a grin on his face and high spirits, the Admiral began to read through the collected data scans of the star system. He gave a slight frown when he noticed the high amounts of data and communication travelling between the planets and moons. Whatever was down in the control center on this moon, was communicating with systems spread across this star system. Some aspects of this species seemed primitive, as they only had ten warship detected at on of the furthest in worlds, but yet they have hundreds to thousands of defensive energy weapons above each of their colonies. Only time would tell have advanced this species truly was.
Oh how he looked forward to crushing them beneath the might of the Hegemony.
Authors Note:
Welcome to the first chapter of From the Traveler's Light. This is a shorter chapter than I plan on for most of the chapters in this story, as I wanted to see how you all felt about it. I had this story in my mind for awhile and decided to give it a go. Let me know how you all feel about it in the comments, and tell me if it is worth continuing.
A few things I wanted to mention are as follows. One, even when this story is in an alien POV, the date and time in the headers will be in Human time, just to make it easier to compare back to the main species of this story, and give a better understanding of the timeframe of events. Two, this is gonna be an AU where the Collapse never happens, and the Guardians are never born. All of the stories I read are all of 'Guardian in ME, ME in Destiny, or Guardians defeat light, become super powerhouse, meet Council'. This story I hope will bring a new light (no joke intended) to the ME and Destiny crossovers as it shows Humanity's Golden Age, a time when they powerful, but not a curbstomping army that will destroy anything that gets in their way. This isn't a Humanity FUCK YEAH story, Humans will win some and lose some. That is all I wanted to say.
(p.s I don't own either of these properties.)