Ten years... it had been ten long years since the Reaper War was brought to it's end. The ancient Reapers, sentient starships forged from the organic material of entire species. Had returned to reap the harvest, as they had time after time for untold eons. But this would be there final march, as they were felled.
In the last great battle of the war, over an occupied Earth the great hero, Commander Shepherd. Stood at the apex of the Citadel, and was given four choices by the Catalyst. To take command of the Reapers themselves, as the Illusive Man sought to accomplish and failed. To destroy the Reapers for good, at the cost of all other synthetic life in the galaxy. Undoing the sentience of the geth and EDI. To merge organic and synthetic life as one through his cybernetic nature. Or have all organic civilizations destroyed outright, only leaving a handful of warnings for the next Cycle to deal with the Reapers.
Shepherd rejected all of these choices. Instead, motivated by vengeance for all the lives lost to Saren, the Collectors and the various minions of the Reapers. He pressed on, to the very heart of the Citadel... and cut it out. Disconnected from the Citadel's ancient and almost mythical power source. The Catalyst withdrew in, along with the Reapers from even the most distant reaches of the galaxy. And with them, there vast husk legions simply fell without there masters to direct them.
The war was over... but it came at a price. Without it's power source, the Citadel fell towards the surface of Earth, the ancient capital of the Citadel Council. Few survived it's fall, on or off the ancient station. Among the the survivors was Commander Shepherd himself
In the decade since, the galaxy has rebuilt. Old wounds, centuries old had begun to heal. The krogan had been healed of the Genophage, the rachni had been given a second chance at life. And the quarians and geth had reconciled, finally regaining Rannoch after centuries of exile amidst the stars. But not all was well.
Much of the fleets of the galactic civilizations were decimated, even before the final Battle of Earth. And with the Citadel effectively destroyed, the Council was dissolved. Many of the so-called 'lesser races' were decimated, with races such as the elcor teetering on the brink of extinction. The asari and salarians were disgraced. The asari for hoarding a Prothean relic and technology, and the salarians for there initial inaction in the war. The dalatrass's petty refusal to allow the genophage to be cured. And the ancient Leviathans, the creators of the Reapers still lurked in the shadows of forgotten worlds
But from the ashes, rose the Galactic Coalition. An alliance not unlike the Citadel Council. But unlike before, where while benevolent. It was often inactive, debating endlessly and effectively doing nothing until it was too late. The Coalition strode to maintain some semblance of civilization in the sundered galaxy.
However, this story isn't of how the galaxy stood tall in-spite of the trails and tribulations of the Reapers and there schemes... not now at any rate.
On Rannoch, the sun of Tikkun rose for morning. Near a cliff overlooking on of Rannoch's seas. Near where Shepherd had slain a Reaper Destroyer during the quarians attempt to retake there homeworld. Shepherd had retired from his life of saving the galaxy, with his beloved Liara beside him in bed. Then an alarm went off beside there bed. "Well... it begins." John said as he got up and hit the snooze button on the alarm clock. "Must we John?..." Liara said half-awake. "You know it babe. I just really wish it wasn't THIS early." John said in exhaustion.
"It's only seven. It isn't THAT early." Liara said. "I know... but we've got to be ready. This is a big day no matter how you go about it." John said as Liara got out of bed with her husband. They made there way to the kitchen, and made some bagged lunches. And prepared breakfast. "Ahsoka! Benezia! Elizabeth! Breakfast is ready!" John said, then in a flash three asari children ran down stairs to the table.
"First day of school... how do you think it will go John?" Liara asked as the triplets tore into breakfast like a starved varren. "Any kid of mine can survive anything. Besides, what could possibly go wrong on the very first day of school?" John said proudly as his and Liara's daughters were eating. "Don't forget to brush your teeth girls. And I do mean you Ahsoka." Liara said as they finished eating. "But my teeth are fine mommy!" Ahsoka protested. "We explained this, looking good isn't the point." John said. "Yeah Ahsoka!" Beneziah and Elizabeth. "And don't tease each other! You've got teeth to brush to you know." Liara said.
"But I like brushing my teeth!" Elizabeth said. Eventually the bus for school arrived. Ahsoka was wearing dark burgundy colored boots, finger-less gloves, shirt, and grey stockings. Beneziah wore predominantly black, and Elizabeth was wearing a blue dress. "Remember! Behave yourselves! Make friends. And don't give the teachers too hard a time." John said as the bus departed.
"Speaking of hard times... isn't there a meeting of the Coalition Council today?" Liara asked. "Yes, yes there is. But it's in a couple of hours." John said. "But isn't it supposed to be REALLY important? Something about extra-galactic signals?" Liara asked. "And it can wait until the meeting actually happens. Till then, we got the morning off... kids are out of the house." John said.
"You haven't prepared for the meeting at all have you?" Liara asked. "I think making sure our girls get to school took priority over a meeting." John said.
Several hours latter, John arrived at the meeting in question. It was in a room with a large round table. At each sat a representative of each of the Milky Way Galaxy's space ferrying species. Even the raloi, the newest species encountered before the Reaper War sat at this conference. "So, shall we discuss new business?" John asked. "With cautious optimism: The Phoenix Program has bolstered elcor populations. The cloning technology is creating new elcor to help bolster our population." The elcor representative said. The Phoenix Program was a Coalition program that was created to help reestablish and bolster populations decimated by the Reapers.
"Representative Eyanor: While the continuation of the elcor species is worth celebrating. We have greater issues that require our attention." A geth said. "Oh no... please tell me it isn't a Reaper that survived the war." The raloi representative said. "It isn't. In fact it doesn't concern our galaxy in a direct manner. How many of you are familiar with the Andromeda Initiative?" The geth asked, for a few moments the representatives murmured among themselves. "Anyone? Anyone at all?" The geth asked.
"I do! A few of my relatives got off betraying there gang by signing up with the AI. Some kind of extra galactic colonization operation." Bray, the batarian representative said. "Affirmative. The Nexus and the Arks departed to the Andromeda galaxy a few months before the Reapers began there opening assault." The geth said. "That seems convenient. But do we know anything else Representative N'tuuka?" John asked of the geth representative. "Yes, earlier last week. We received a message... from Andromeda." N'tuuka said.
"Impossible! There's no way we should be able to receive messages from another galaxy! At any rate, it would probably take centuries to get there in the first place!" The volus representative said. "I know of the technical impossibilities. But that does not change that we received a message from the Andromeda galaxy." N'tuuka said. "This one does not understand. Why is this of a matter of concern? Surely even if our galaxy were not in upheaval. We do not have the means to reach Andromeda?" The hanar representative asked. "We don't. But the Consensus is working on the blueprints for a Mass Relay capable of inter-galactic travel. We do not know when it will be completed. But-"
"But we need to focus on rebuilding our galaxy! The Reapers trashed just about everything, and a decade latter we're just now getting back on our feet! I don't know about the rest of you. But if the colonists stumbled into some kind of trouble, then they'll have to fend for themselves." The krogan representative said. "N'tuuka, can you play the message?" John asked.
"Yes. Be advised, the file is corrupted, and we have only cleaned up the audio." N'tuuka said as the video began.
"This is Pathfinder Scott Ryder. I don't know if there's anyone in the Milky Way to answer this but... well this galaxy is a bigger mess then we thought. The Arks and the Nexus were damaged by the Scourge. Some kind of... I still don't know what it is. It's... it's basically a kind of 'space coral' that damages ships. In the chaos Director Jien Garson was killed. Not by the Scourge! But murdered on-board the Nexus, and was presumed killed by the Scourge. The Arks damaged. Asari and salarian Arks boarded by hostile alien natives. Turian reached it's designated world, but it was severely damaged. Both it and it's target Habitat. Ark Keelah Si'yah... well it's intact but. I'd rather not get into WHAT I had to rescue them from! Ark Hyperion was the only one to make it relatively in tact... but my father, the last Pathfinder of Ark Hyperion died. But that's the past... the Nexus has been fully upgraded. We have functioning colonies, and we've even gained the resources to terraform the Hyperion golden world, we have an ally in the Heleus Cluster in the angara. To clarify there not the aliens that boarded the Leusinia and the Paarchero. That's a whole other alien race... kett. To put it simply the kett are monsters. They occupied this cluster nearly a century ago, and the angara have been fighting an inter-planetary guerrilla war ever since. What's even worse... the kett reproduce by completely overwriting the genetic material of aliens, turning them into kett! Mainly angara around here. But they've even figured out how to turn krogan into barely sentient abominations! There should be more detailed files on what's been going on here. But point is. We've driven off the kett. But they'll be back. It was... frankly because of sheer dumb luck then we drove them off, and killed there Archon. But they'll be back with even greater numbers, and ships... I don't know if there's anyone on the other end of this thing. Or even if your friendlies. But please... if you can help us. Send whatever you can. Pathfinder Ryder. Over and out."
"Well... that complicates things." The krogon representative said. "I vote that I don't get directly involved with this mess. All in favor say I, I, motion caries!" John said hastily. "So... N-N'tuuka. How is that inter-galactic Mass Relay coming along again?" The raloi representative asked. "The Consensus estimates that it will be about fifty years before the technical details are refined and perfected... at least. We are attempting to create a gateway to interstellar travel that. Up until the war was used almost exclusively for traveling between star systems Representative Tavar." N'tuuka said. "Oh... then in the meantime. Can we discuss the matter regarding raloi colonization? There a number of suitable planets close to Turvess. And we have little in experience in interstellar colonization... and there are clans of vorcha on some of them. So that'll also be a bit of an issue." Tavar continued.
"Wait... did it seem like he knew that something would be wrong? He doubted anyone would get his message." John said. "He's at least six-hundred years in the future. Even without the war, anything could happen to our galaxy in that time." The quarian representative said. "But does he know about the Reapers? I mean, could anyone in the Andromeda Initiative know?... did Garson put this whole thing together just to get away from the Reapers?" John asked. "It could be possible. But we're just speculating at this point. And you heard N'tuuka. It will take fifty years to reach them... but is there a way to contact them? Send messages to them?" The salarian representative said.
"Yes, but it's not a two way communication, and even then. We don't know if they can decipher and clean up our messages. For now. I believe it be best that we focus on rebuilding galactic infrastructure. I might also suggest launching an investigation into any backers of the Andromeda Initiative." N'tuuka said. "Agreed, such a large operation would require an enormous amount of resources. There has to be a trail to follow." The asari representative said. "That maybe. But we have to see to the rebuilding of OUR galaxy. As it stands... we don't have the capability of helping the AI." The turian representative said.
"That's true... but we should still let them know that home is still standing. Give them hope, even if it's a distant one." John said. The representatives murmured for a moment. "Your logic is sound Representative Shepherd Commander. Attempts will be made to reach the colonists in the Andromeda galaxy. Perhaps even establish a stable line of communications." N'tuuka said. "And speaking of which. Raloi colony's?" Tavar said.
The meeting went on like this. With it now about deciding how to help the raloi colonize nearby systems.
Eventually Shepherd returned home, his daughters and wife waiting. "So... how was school?" John asked. "It was fine. The teachers were nice. We made a couple of friends." Elizabeth said. "And Ahsoka didn't get into trouble?" John asked sardonically. "Daddy! That was an accident!" Ahsoka said. "No one's saying you meant to hurt Yaar'vik." Liara said. "No, Ahsoka didn't get into trouble. She almost started a food fight, but nothing came of it." Benezieh said. "And don't you girls have homework?... seriously, do you?" John asked. "We already finished dad... and with that in mind can we-"
"Yes Elizabeth, you can go play video games. But when we call for dinner, we better not have to ask twice." John said. "Fair enough." Ahsoka said as she and her sisters left there parents alone. "So what happened today?" Liara asked. "Well short answer. The raloi want help colonizing some planets near there home system. The turians want to use geth labor to rebuild the fleets. And we got word that the colonists in Andromeda have survived. So any ideas on what to have for dinner?" John said.
"Wait. Andromeda?... I met with the human Pathfinder Alec Ryder." Liara said. "What? You know someone from the AI?" John asked. "Yes, he contacted me for help on researching fallen civilizations." Liara said. "And why didn't you mention the Andromeda Initiative before?" John asked. "We've had bigger issues John. And besides, nobody would expect to hear from them any time soon, if at all." Liara said. "I see, but we need to know everything that we can about the AI. Literally no one but the geth and batarian representatives knew about it." John said.
"My only real contact with the Andromeda Initiative was with Alec. And I never bothered to ask about the initiative's objectives beyond the colonization of the Andromeda galaxy. He suspected that there could be ancient technology in the Heleus cluster." Liara said. "At any rate. N'tuuka said that we can't get there in less then fifty years. Because the geth are working on a giant mass relay that can get us to Andromeda... and presumably back as well. I really should have asked about that." John said. "Oh... so we can't help the Andromeda colonists?" Liara asked.
"Not directly, I think we can only get communications from them. Maybe data." John said. "Then we have plenty of time. For now, lets just enjoy our lives... we barely survived the Reaper War. Let's not go seeking wars we can't even fight in the first place." Liara said. "Agreed... now about dinner. What have we got?" John said
