Hey, thanks for trying out my fanfic. Starting with writing was something I had in my mind for quite some time, and now that I have started with it I like to think the first chapter is passable at least. Just for the record: I do not own Mass Effect. (Must have been a big surprise for you, I know.)
On with the story.
Sentinel 29
The Senate of Life has come to know the fate that awaits the Mass Effect universe. Should these events come to pass they would be in violation of the senate's directive. They need a guardian, a Sentinel, for what they know as "Galaxy 29"
Chapter 1
While I was walking down the road which led to my home; A small row house in a small, normally not so noticeable town called Heartsprings. I, "jack-of-all-trades master of none" John Burton, aged 22, was thinking about the previous 2 months of my life. Looking back at it now, I suppose you can call that day my self-reflection day. The reason I was rethinking my past at the time was mostly due to my normally strange life throwing even stranger things at me then was usually the norm.
One of these strange things was in that specific case, a person. My sister Karla to be precise, who moved to the closest big city she could find, talking about "being free". I will be honest; I did worry about her even if she was (Well, maybe still is. I have no way to check anymore) as egocentric as can be. She was still not knowledgeable about the dangers life in a city can bring to a young 20-something lady. Maybe she stumbled upon this fact by herself by now. I hope this happened gently, but I fear she needed a shock to bring her back to reality instead of the fairyland her mind seemed to project on it.
My crazy uncle appeared in my thoughts as well, he was also known locally as The Fireworks Man. He liked fireworks a bit too much and blew himself up while playing with gunpowder and fire in his garden shed. Gunpowder and fire are a bad combination for sure, but he didn't get the nickname for working in a 100 percent safe way after all. The doctors made it pretty clear that he "would not be using his index finger anymore". To show everybody he was indeed still crazy he even said "I'll try to lose the finger of my other hand next time." My aunt almost fell unconscious because of that joke. The story made it through the gossiping channels of the local community very quickly and I'm pretty sure the doctors and other medical staff will remember him for quite a few years.
Anyway, as I was lost in thought like that, that evening. I was not expecting to cross paths with anyone. This route had been walked by me a few times already now round this hour. I had not even once found another person during my strolls. This led to me not really noticing my surroundings and made it so that I would fail to notice a blue orb floating in front of me before it was too late.
Then again one does not expect floating blue orbs at any time in one's life. Tonight however, a blue floating orb was present, right above the spot of gray pavement I would soon be placing one of my feet on. If anyone were listening at that moment they would hear the sound of a man falling and a man cursing everything till kingdom come shortly after the said fall. After I was done cussing out God, Satan and the followers of both, I began looking at the object that had made me stumble. On the ground was what appeared to be a sphere of some kind, slightly blue in color and about a foot in diameter.
Slowly, I walked towards the sphere, picking it up as soon as I had reached it. It felt strangely light, almost like part of its weight was.. Not there. Picking it up seemed to be the worst thing I could have done at that very moment to me however. It began glowing blue and displaying strange markings. Later I would learn that this was the boot up sequence, but right now I was scared shitless, too shocked to move. Suddenly a few of the markings displayed on what seemed to be a screen transformed into English characters. Recognizing these at least, I read them: "Translation in progress – New language interface setting: English" and "Initiating audio translation procedure Alpha-15". Right after I had read it, the sphere shot out of my hand and simply hovered 2 feet in front of me. Although soft, a low frequency sound emanated from it. Almost like a muted engine running. I also heard lots of clicking and squeaky noises coming from the sphere. That to me, made it sound like it was broken. Slowly the clicking and squeaky noises changed and I began recognizing some of these sounds as words, mostly "hello" and "machine". After 20 seconds I heard a ping from the blue sphere, it sounded a lot like the ping from a computer error message. This made me reaffirm my thought the sphere was indeed broken. The sphere however, did not agree.
Slowly, it started to form a sentence; "Identity confirmed: John Burton, 22 years old, college dropout". I tried to respond with "no need to mention the college dropout part", as it was touchy subject for me. The sphere did not heed me and said "Welcome John, your biological data has been stored and confirmed. Can I have a moment of your time?". This moment in time the sphere was referring to however, I was busy being marveled by and freaking out over the fact a strange blue sphere began glowing, hovering and talking at the same time. This was besides the sphere was storing my "biological data", which I figured to be my DNA, without my permission. Me freaking out led to me stumbling and falling though. This fall then led to a complete blackout of my mind when my head hit a hard object while falling. This hard object being the pavement.
When I woke up the first thing I noticed was a throbbing at the back of my head. I had apparently made quite the fall before passed out. The second thing I noticed (while rubbing the sore spot) was that the freaky sphere was still there and that it was not, as I had deducted before opening my eyes, a result of my brain going haywire because of the fall.
The sphere spoke to me after what was about 15 seconds of intense staring from my side. "John Berton, are you capable of rational thought yet?". I started to move away from the sphere, as it was a bit too close for comfort. "What do you mean whether I am capable of rational thought!" I said "I am always cape- Wait, you are asking whether I am alright?" The sphere's blue glow seemed to become slightly brighter before answering. Almost as if my question had made it sigh. "Yes, that would seem to be the current figure of speech on your planet". "My planet?" I thought. "You can't be serious, this thing seems to imply that it's from an extra-terrestrial origin, only one way to find out." I figured asking would be the best way to get more information "Please introduce yourself before we continue, this might make it a little easier for me." The sphere seemed to be willing to humor me, as the previously bright glow dimmed a little. "I am Sentinel Assistant Bot Three-hundred fifteen, also known as SAB315. I was manufactured on Garé." Personally, I had never even heard of the place which was mentioned by the floating orb of light. It did sound very French though. Something that did strike to me as odd was that it said "on", not "in" though. Almost like it wasn't a city on Earth. "What and where is this 'Garé'?" I said "I'm not familiar with it."
The glowing and hovering blue light bulb, the description of which had already been shortened to "Blib" in my mind for ease of reference, said (or at least vocalized) the following: "Garé is a planet in the Fanra cluster located in galaxy one. It is home to the "Somaref" Senatorial Manufacture and Research Facilities." This definitely gave me some material for thought. Possibly, the sphere was from an extra-terrestrial origin. Possibly, it was from extra-dimensional origin. Something that was also possible was that this was a dream or I was simply going bat-shit crazy. Knowing whether it was a dream or not was easy, clocks often did not work inside a dream. A quick check using my watch confirmed my suspicion that it was most likely not an image of my subconscious mind. As for me going bat-shit crazy, that would have to be tested another time as Blib began talking about "Existence and variety of life in galaxies protected by the Senate" and "Galaxy Sentinels".
At that moment I decided to play along for now, who could have known that it might lead me to where it did?
Well, I suppose the senate did.
...
Some of it anyway.
First chapter done. Slow start, but one needs a slow start to properly begin a story in my opinion. Updates will unfortunately also be slow due to real life requiring attention (and time), but will come eventually.