Disclaimer: I do not own Mass Effect or Star Wars

Prologue

"People! People! Please, calm down. All of your questions will be answered, as long as you ask them in an orderly manner." With his statement the entire yelling crowd of reporters and camera crews proceeded to quiet down until there was a only a select few still whispering to their colleagues about what to ask.

Seeing the quiet the speaker directed his attention to a female news reporter to his immediate left and pointed his hand at her. "Yes, you there ma'am, what is your question?"

The reporter raised her microphone to her mouth and responded, "Yes, Mr. President, what can you tell us assembled here and the people watching here today at home about today's launch?"

The year is 2073, and the world is in a new golden age of progression and scientific advancement never before seen in human history. Shortly following the unification of Earth under one global government in 2029, caused by the increasing shortages of fossil fuels and the decline of the value of the dollar, the United States with several military allies embarked on the warpath, with the goal to bring the world to heel. Bringing humanity's best minds and thinkers together to solve the crucial energy crisis facing civilization, remarkably human innovation has never failed when put to the challenge. The researchers quickly put their time and effort into multiple possible fields that could supply endless amount of energy. They found success in one such field; they proceeded to use the power of nuclear fusion to achieve the end of the energy crisis.

With the energy crisis solved the scientists went back to their chosen careers, except this time with the backing of a world government, a government that would provide the funding fuel their wildest dreams. This led to a great many other technological advances; from medical science to weapon design to even robotics. With medical knowledge and understanding of the human DNA at astonishing levels the average life span increased dramatically- with some even living of up to two centuries.

Yet, with all this progress, there came problems. With the decline of disease and an increased birthrate and lifespan, the lack of war and any type of armed conflict, the world's population boomed at an even faster rate than at the beginning of the twenty first century. At first the only problem was a sudden influx of citizens to cities old and new. Seemingly overnight massive urban centers and sprawling metropolises sprang up all over the globe. Even though food production itself increased it could not match the skyrocketing birth rates.

Facing this problem, the still newly formed RoE (Republic of Earth) called upon the recently created Committee of Science- led by the greatest scientific minds that humanity had to offer- to once again find a solution to another crisis. Seeing the best possible option the Committee proposed the colonization of extraterrestrial bodies in the solar system. Agreeing the RoE commissioned the building of vast amounts of fusion powered rockets- which had been available on space probes since 2036- to lead the charge on colonization efforts. That was in 2043, and since then Humanity has reached the edges of the solar system and tamed it. Even with the population explosion tended to, the drive for more living space was still there. So in reaction the Committee researched new technologies for wide scale terraforming, eager to turn Mars and Venus into their own respective Earths. In 2053 the effort paid off with large scale terraforming possible and ready for use, within five years due to the RoE pumping large amount of resources into the project Mars atmosphere was made breathable, with Venus closely following. In 2055 true artificial gravity was discovered, allowing for the construction of space habitats, by 2059 dozens of artificial satellites were parked in the Lagrangian points of the major astral bodies of the solar system.

With the populations needs and desires sated there only remained one obstacle to human expansion, the barrier of faster than light travel. This brings us back to the year 2073; nearly every human in the solar system it seems is tuned in to their respective news agencies. The RoE had announced a month earlier that they were holding a press conference for the unveiling of the newest project of the CoS.

The recently elected President of the RoE was a man of Chinese decent; having spent his life growing up on the one of the first lunar colonies he was the RoE's first president not born on Earth, and also the youngest. His name was Kim Long and he currently stood on the display floor of the Committee of Science's San Francisco headquarters. Behind him stood various models of space exploration craft, members of the Committee also stood side by side behind him. President Long's front consisted of numerous reporters, hungry for any kind of information the President would give them.

After finally managing to quite the reporters the President cleared his throat and pointed a female reporter to his far left.

Taking the gesture as her queue, the reporter asked, "Yes, Mr. President, what can you tell everyone at home about this mysterious new project the Committee of Science has been working on?"

President Long nodded and answered. "It is in my highest honor that I inform you all that over the past decade the Committee of Science has been working on a feasible method of faster than light travel. They have succeeded in their goal." His proclamation silenced the entire audience, every single reporter and guest in the room knew the importance of such a discovery, no matter how scientifically ignorant they were.

The silence could not last forever though, and in a matter of moments nearly every reporter was screaming question after question. President Long merely quieted down the reporters again and spoke in an uplifting tone that contradicted his age. "As we all know, for over the century that mankind has been involved in space exploration we have been confined to our own solar system. With this discovery Humanity can finally expand to the stars and complete its dreams of manifest destiny, with this new invention we can colonize to our heart's content. And you can be rest assured that the Republic will be backing the efforts of developing this new technology to its fullest potential and using it to advance humanity's cause!"

The reporters and esteemed guests were caught up in the whirlwind of emotions the President's speech had caused. Applause started and quickly picked up momentum, everyone feeling a sense of patriotism and expansionism.

With his part concluded President Long stepped away from the podium and let one of the researchers behind him take the stage. As the applause concluded and the next speaker took to the podium the reporters made sure their equipment was still working fine.

The new speaker was wearing the uniform of the Committee except with the insignia of head researcher on his sleeve. As he prepared himself he took a few cautionary coughs to clear his throat, he then addressed the crowd, "Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Carter Simons, I am the head researcher for the Committee and the project that led to the creation of the invention we like to call the hyperdrive. Using immense amounts of energy we can punch a hole through space and enter a parallel dimension we call hyperspace. This drastically reduces travel time and allows travel many times faster than light. Over the past decade that we have worked on achieving this dream we have put many hours of effort in what I can tell you today."

Taking a breath the man continued, "We have successfully tested the device on probes and are now confident in a manned expedition to our closest neighbor, the Centauri system. Construction of the ship is already well under way and we expect to be able to launch this journey in a matter of weeks at the latest."

Pure bewilderment and sheer astonishment would be the perfect description of nearly every human's mind in the solar system. It all sounded too good to be real, what was once considered a physicist's wet dream was about- no, was already true. And so Humanity looked forward, ready to take the future head on.

As Carter finished his speech, he walked away from the podium to the sound of applause once more filling the air. He walked back to his previous position and waited for the question and answering part of the press conference to be over with. It was decided earlier that President Long would open up the announcement and handle all the press's questions while Carter would tell them of the actual discovery.

Many question were asked over the course of the next two hours, ranging from how would it affect everything from the mundane to the important, how it worked, and a variety of other topics. Finally the darn thing was over with and Carter could finally get back to tuning the finer points of the project.

As Carter made his way to his office on a higher level of the building he was stopped by the yell of one of his colleagues. Turning around he was faced with a young assistant by the name of Zachary Autumns, a newly appointed researcher who had just graduated from his university of choice three years prior.

Approaching Carter the young man said, "Mr. Simons! President Long wanted to talk with you before he left."

Nodding Carter gave a nod to Autumns and headed back down to the display floor. He met the President near the elevator and nodded his head. "Mr. President. I was told you wanted to meet with me?"

Long nodded as well before asking, "How goes the construction of the ship Simons?"

Carter replied, "On schedule Mr. President. Might I suggest we make our way to my office so we can take a seat instead of standing?"

The President gave his approval and a few minutes later and after passing several security checkpoints they found themselves seated at a conference table in a large windowed room.

"Well sir, everything is going as planned and we believe we should be able to make the deadline, although there are a few snags that could potentially set us back."

The young world leader drummed his fingers on the table, clearly thinking. "I have been briefed on the potential delays but my knowledge on what is causing them is rusty, thus here I am asking you."

The head researcher pressed a button under the table and a hologram appeared in the center, as well as a pair of holographic keyboards popped up in front of both Long and Simons. Carter typed a few commands and the hologram shifted to show an image of the solar system. Leaning back in his chair the elderly man ran a hand through his graying hair and began.

"You already know the basics of the hyperdrive; it digs a tunnel into hyperspace using vast amounts of energy and then travels numerous times faster than the speed of light. In hyperspace we must deploy shielding to prevent the loss of the craft through collisions with dust and dark matter. This is not a problem."

As he was speaking the hologram zoomed in to show a close up of a probe. When he was done with his lecture the probe proceeded to be torn apart.

"The real problem is only a hindrance to the impatient, before a ship can make a jump through hyperspace when clear of a celestial body's gravity well. If not and you attempt to make a jump, your ship will be torn apart due to the counter acting forces. Normally, this would not be a problem, our fusion rockets can get us out of the planet's gravity pull in fairly quick time, yet it still takes several hours, therefore we put some of our manpower in finding a better sublight engine."

The hologram then displayed two intact probes next to the Earth; the probes proceeded to use their respective sublight engines to pull away from the Earth's orbit, one probe was vastly superior in escaping the gravity well, doing it in a matter of minutes.

"We found this improved form of travel in an old form that we've had for over half a century: ion engines. We improved upon the base idea, using fusion powered engines to shoot the particles out, resulting in a much faster ion drive. We found the solution to the problem, the only thing that remains is outfitting the ship with the new ion drives, meaning we will lose several months of already completed work. This breakthrough was only discovered two weeks ago, hence why we may not make the deadline."

President Long, who had been patiently listening throughout the entire explanation, moved his hand to his keyboard and moved the image of the hologram to focus on the asteroid belt. The image focused in on one particular point to show what could only be described as a ship yard. Drones brought metal rich meteors to processors, processors that would mine the resources to fuel the construction of humanity's ambitions. In the midst of it all lay the topic of the two's conversation. A one hundred meter long starship nearly completed.

"On this vessel lies the future of humanity. Good luck Carter and see that it is completed."

With the conversation concluded President Long departed from the office leaving Carter to finish preparations for the project.

XXX

There you have the prologue for my first crossover. After reading a lot, and I mean a lot of alternate first contact stories and stories of how Humanity developed on a different path, I decided to try out my own idea. I will be using some species from Star Wars and a lot of the technology.

Next Chapter: Democracy Meets Monarchy