Greetings everyone. I'm surprised that I remembered about saying I was going to update on Friday, but here I am! I'm even more surprised that I stopped playing Halo 4 (which is amazing!) to post this. I am even more surprised that the people are still reviewing this story. So thank you for those who left the new 31 reviews that have been added between the posting of the last chapter and this one.

But there is one thing that I forgot... well, that I remember now at least. By my weird version of humanity, the year is 51-something-something. This is more because I wanted it to be like this. But according to the lump of jello and powdered eggs that I call a brain, this does not in anyway differentiate from the Mass Effect timeline. I even helped my bizarre train of thought and just added 3000 yeas to this story's calendar. So, the Reapers have not yet invaded and all the ME characters are still here.

If any part of that paragraph makes sense to you, then bless you. If any part of this story makes sense to you, praise you. If this entire story so far makes sense to you, then you are a better person than I.

I like this Fibonacci pattern or whatever it's called that I've had with updates so far, but because this chapter and the next are more filler than not and I don't want you all to dwell on it. So, the next chapter (if I remember and there are no technical difficulties) will be out Sunday.

"Text like this is talking normally."

"Text like this is being said through a radio or Skynet or something else like that."

::Text like this is being being read, like on paper or Skynet or something.::

Posted: 1/4/2013
Word count: 10,432
Brief Summary: The asari consider the humans and vise versa. Kinda filler-ish but I did not want to summarize it later and it ended up being this long.

Hope you enjoy.


Chapter 3

Cross the Galaxy


The First Contact War began and ended within a day. The human casualties at 476, including the science team that was shot down before the battle reached Shanxi.

Ken Williams was given the title of Sannin - something only given to great war heroes - postmortem. He was the first to receive the title since the Reaping War.

By morning the next day, twenty starships retrofitted with new and untested space weapons orbited Shanxi, with more and more moving in. They made certain to not move all of their forces to one area in case they were attacked in a completely different system.

The Systems Alliance decided to reinstate a standing military, and volunteers were of no shortage with the vid created by Hannah Shepard being wide spread. However, it would take some time before a proper chain of command, supplies, and other things needed could be formed and gathered. In the mean time, all citizens were temporarily removed from Shanxi and evacuated to the nearest colonized system.

Many were expecting the battle to continue, but it did not.

'~,_,~'

Codex Update

SCI (Ship Control Interface): As with all things made by humans, starships work with a combination of technology and Fuinjutsu. The SCI has been the method of controlling and maneuvering starships since the original lunar landing. The modern SCI is much more advanced, and has since then spread to be used in common vehicles such as cars, boats, and trains. It is an intricate and confusing web of black lines that make up the seal to control the vehicles, but how to work it is common knowledge, like riding a bike or walking up a tree. But just because you know how to work it does not mean you're good at it.

Skynet Node: Skynet does not directly connect one human to another. Rather, it connects both of them to Eve, with which they can exchange information through. If a ship is traversing Hyperspace, all humans on it cannot connect to Eve and - by extension - each other. To relieve at least some of the stress, all ships are built with a node that allows all humans on it to remain connected to each other during Hyperspace. They cannot contact those outside of the ship, nor can they access the large bank of knowledge, but it is still much preferred to the otherwise silence.

'~,_,~'

Hannah Shepard sat on the bed in the room she was given aboard the SSV Kametachi, one of many ships that were now orbiting the abandoned planet of Shanxi. A few hours after the only surviving turian ship retreated, the first of the human ships began to arrive. Hannah chose to stay with the growing fleet instead of leaving for another colony. If the turians came back, she wanted to fight them dammit!

It was not long ago that the adrenaline wore off and Hannah collapsed on her bed. Pain from slowly healing injuries and strained muscles was the least of what was worrying her.

Because now she could not forget their faces.

At the time, she was high on the blood rapidly pumping through her heart and they did not register. Now though, nothing was stopping the images she had in her head from coming forth. Images of death, blood, and fear. She had watched the vid she recorded and could not even remember half the things it showed her doing. When did she wade through that flaming wreckage? When had she passed those crying families? When had she ignored those bloodied corpses? Why did she not save that person when she could have?

People were calling her a hero, but after watching this how could they? She was supposed to protect everyone, but so many people died! She was no hero.

A knock on her door temporarily relieved her of her thoughts. "What do you want?" She called out in a hoarse voice.

"So you are alive." Well, she knew who it was now with how that voice sent her stomach into a series of backflips. "Can I come in?"

Hannah thought it over before looking to the corner desk where Rolo's avatar was being projected, the AI looking at her sadly. She nodded at her friend and the door slid open.

Naruto was dressed the same as he was when he first appeared next to her - black pants, orange shirt, and deep maroon coat. He still did not have shoes which confused her, not that she would ask.

The blonde legend took one look at her - his eyes thankfully no longer chilling her heart - and gave a sad smile that did the exact opposite. "First time on the battlefield?" She looked up at him sharply and he gave a small chuckle that made her lightheaded. "Don't look so surprised. Ignoring the fact that there hasn't been anything resembling a war since I blew up that purple lobster, I would know that look anywhere." Hannah had to stifle a laugh. She'd never heard anyone talk about the Reaper so casually before, or caller it a lobster. "Oh, but don't tell Gyuki I said that, he likes to think he was the one to put most of the power behind the blast." This time she did laugh. Naruto only nodded. "Feeling better now?"

Calming down, the Commissioner of an empty city felt as if the world had been lifted off of her shoulders. "Yeah, much better. Thank you." Naruto gave another smile that did funny things to her breathing. "Why are you talking to me so much? And how did you know my name before?" It had been bothering her for a while. Even joking with him like this, Naruto still seemed like a larger-than-life figure. Why would he care about little old Hannah... okay maybe old was a bad thing to be said in comparison to him but you get the point.

The legend shrugged. "The only reason I even heard about the attack in the first place was because Ben told me. He asked me to watch out for you as well."

Hannah blinked. "There are a lot of Bens out there." She was friends with half a dozen or so.

A thoughtful look passed over Naruto's face. "I think he's the leader of Gaia now, or did her already retire?"

Her eyes bulged out. "You mean Benjamin Udina? The Kage of Gaia asked you to watch out for me?"

"So he is still the leader." Naruto seemed pleased to have that confirmed. "I ran into him when he was a kid, he kept jumping around and asking for my autograph." Hearing the word he muttered to himself, Hannah was beginning to wonder if he was BS'ing her. That strict old guy she sees in vids of big political conferences jumping around like that? That would never happen. "Anyway, he managed to contact me through this old machine I have on Seidou and told be about you and what's going on."

"So you were on Seidou." Rolo exclaimed loudly, drawing attention to his hologram in the corner of the room. It were physically possible, the AI probably would have blushed in embarrassment. As it were, he awkwardly coughed into his fist. "R-Right, well, how did you get to Shanxi so quickly?" His desperate attempt to get their attention away from himself worked.

Naruto just shrugged and looked back at Hannah. "I asked Eve to modify the seal of someone on Shanxi so that I could teleport to it. She just so happened to chose you."

Hannah gaped at him, again. She knew he could teleport, the Hiraishin Jutsu was one of the things he was most famous for. But the distance between Shanxi and Gaia was so great, there's no way he could do that... Right?

Footsteps drew the three's attention to the door as a young man stepped in. He jerked to stop when he saw Naruto, an understandable reaction. He stuttered for a few seconds before finally managing to speak in the presence of the living god. "S-S-S-Sir!" He jerkily turned to Hannah. "Ma'am! The Captain wishes for your presence on the bridge!" Having delivered his message, the young man gave one last stunned look at Naruto before leaving. Hannah just hoped she did not look that ridiculous when she first saw Naruto. Internally, she knew that she did.

'~,_,~'

Walking through the halls of the Kametachi was an interesting experience for Hannah. Everyone they passed would stop whatever they were doing to stare at Naruto as they walked passed. The blonde seemed to ignore all of it but Hannah decided she felt very uncomfortable.

When they reached the bridge and met the Captain - one David Anderson - Hannah was met with a very solid frown from the dark skinned man. "Commissioner Shepard, I would appreciate it if you stopped dismissing all messages sent to you.

Hannah blinked, then nearly slapped herself when she remembered that she set her HUD to automatically dismiss any call sent to her, as she did not want to talk with anyone while she was in a depressed funk. So that's why he sent an actual person to get me. With a thought she dropped the blockade, wincing at the headache that came with the sudden influx of messages from friends and family, along with a few from unwanted fans. "Sorry Captain, it won't happen again."

Anderson nodded, before looking at Naruto and nodding to him as well. "A pleasure to meet you, Sir."

"Likewise, Captain." Naruto nodded in turn. "What do you need us here for?"

"There's an alien ship."

Out of the corner of her eyes, Hannah saw Naruto's visage harden into what it was on the roof on Shanxi. She was pleased to note that Anderson gave a slight shiver under his gaze as well, meaning that it was not just her who was scared by it. The Captain was quick to break eye contact and look back out the large window of the bridge. Hannah could just barely make out ship against the black of space.

"It has stopped within the reach of our weapons but our AI's scans show they have none of their own." Anderson continued. Unspoken was the caution with using said weapons of the Kametachi. They were untested. Maybe they would work, maybe they would not, it was a fifty/fifty chance.

"What are they doing then?" Hannah asked, only to get a shrug from the Captain. "What are we going to do then?" He shrugged again.

"It could be a distraction, maybe a trap, I don't know."

"It's none of those things." They both turned back to Naruto, and were glad to find that his 'scary look' was gone. "A distraction would have attacked to draw our attention and a trap would have used the wreckage of our own ship or something more tantalizing." He gave a small smile. "This is a peace offering."

'~,_,~'

Matriarch Benezia would not have been able to keep the scowl off her face if she wanted to as she sent her simple message for what felt like the hundredth time. This new species that the council had ordered her to negotiate a peace with over what the turians did were not what she expected. The surviving turians from the unneeded assault said - after some rubbish about terrible monsters with magical powers - that they had no space worthy ships left in the system. Benezia had fully prepared to enter the planet's atmosphere but was instead met by a blockade of over fifty large, odd looking, blocky ships. Ships with weapons.

Still, she did not back down. She had confidence in her negotiating skills and - if worse came to worse - her pilot's skills behind the wheel.

The good news was that they were not firing at her. The bad news was that they were not returning her requests for communication.

"Can we leave now, all these ships are making me nervous." Her pilot, another asari by the name of Tela Vasir, complained as she had been doing since they got there. Though it was understandable as all the weapons she could see with her naked eye were trained on their small vessel.

"No. If we do not stop them, they could strike back at the turians. Who knows where it will go from there."

"Let them beat up the idiots!" Tela responded hotly. "They deserve it, I just don't want to get in the way."

Benezia said nothing - though she agreed that the turians were idiots for doing what they did - and was about to send her invitation again.

"Damn, they're doing something now." Tela gripped the wheel tighter, ready to swerve away if need be.

Benezia looked out the front window of the small shuttle she procured to see a hatch on the side of the largest ship there open. She also tensed, waiting for a fighter ship to fly out, or a railgun to present itself... But nothing happened. The large opening in the ship just sat there quiet, waiting... inviting.

"That room is plenty bing enough for this shuttle to fit into." Benezia hedged.

Tela instantly caught on. "No, no, no! Nonononono! NO! I am not going in there!"

Benezia put a comforting hand on the younger asari's shoulder. "I know you want to become a Specter Tela, and brokering peace with a new race is exactly what you need." Tela worried her lip, looking indecisive. "I'll even write you a recommendation myself." A Matriarch as important as herself recommending an asari was basically a guarantee that she would get into the program, and they both knew it.

"Fine!" Tela huffed in frustration and pressed the shuttle forward.

The small craft expertly maneuvered into the offered opening and set down on the metal floor. Apparently they had artificial gravity technology, which was good. Though how they managed that while supposedly not possessing a Mass Effect core, Benezia had no idea. Though they could not see it from the front window of the shuttle, it was obvious when the hanger door closed as air began to pump into the room.

"Looks like its breathable." A still tense Tela said after a few seconds, looking at the read out on the consoles. "But they could still vent the room at any moment."

"I don't think they'll do that." Benezia gave a small smile as she saw doors open around the hanger and bipedal creatures stared moving in. It did not appear that any were wearing pressurized suits to survive a sudden venting. "Looks like this is my chance." Not wanting to hear the rebuke Tela would not doubt give, Benezia pressed the button on the wall to open the shuttle door. Stepping out she got her first unobscured view of this new race, and there were a lot of them to look at.

She counted maybe fifty of them in the room, all of them on a catwalk the bordered the top of the room. In any other similar situation, Benezia would not have been too worried as she saw no guns on them and had faith in her biotic abilities, but if these were the species that utterly destroyed the turians...

Just as she was about to try communicating, two of the aliens started to make their way down a stairway. By the time Tela was out of the shuttle and standing behind her, the two creatures were standing side-by-side at a reasonable speaking distance.

"What do we do now Mistress?" A nervous Tela asked behind her, causing the darker skinned alien to shift its gaze to her while the lighter skinned, shorter one kept up the staring contest with Benezia. "We cannot speak their language." Benezia had no answer, every other time they had encountered a new species they had linked to their computers to understand their language and upload it to the translators built into Omni-tools. The only exception to date were the krogan, who had no technology to speak of. But these aliens were not like the krogan, they had managed both space travel and artificial gravity on their own, so they must have at least moderately advanced computers somewhere. The problem was to getting to them without being able to communicate.

Instead of answering, Benezia decided to observe these strange new creatures as they no doubt were doing to her.

The two standing in front of her were so different from one another that she almost assumed they were two completely different species. But upon looking around the room, she saw various combinations of their qualities and hypothesized that their species just had an astoundingly large amount of diversity.

They were both slightly taller than the average turian but below that of a krogan. They were bipedal with forward-facing knees and five fingers on each hand. The one on the left had an incredibly similar body shape to an asari while the one on the right did not. If they were anything like the quarians, that meant the taller one was male and the shorter one female. They also shared a single pair of eyes, tribal markings over their exposed skin like turians and asari do, and had hair. Obviously they were mammals, as well as the first intelligent species in the known galaxy that grew hair. Some rumored that the quarians had hair beneath their suits (which Benezia knew was false) and others said the same about the volus (and even she did not know if that was true).

The one on the left - the male - had a dark tone skin. His hair was cut very short, almost making it look like he had none to begin with. The black lines of his tribal tattoo stood out on his skin, only seen on his neck, head, and hands as the rest was covered by clothing. As far as Benezia could tell, their eyes followed a pattern of white on the outside, followed by another color, then a black pupil - another similarity to the asari. The middle ring of the tall male's eyes were a muddy brown.

The one on the right - the female - was a little more than an inch shorter than her companion, but still taller than almost everyone Benezia had ever met, sans any krogan. She had bright red hair growing out of the top her head that stopped just above her chin and bright green eyes. She showed more skin than the male in that the sleeves of her top stopped halfway to her elbow. With the move milk-like skin exposed, Benezia could see her black markings swirling around her arms in many intricate patterns. Benezia blinked though when she noticed a significant difference between to two aliens - the female of the two had a tail. Maybe it was a difference between between the sexes?

Unknown to the two asari - with one analyzing the new race and the other fidgeting nervously under all the silent gazes - Rolo had accessed their shuttle's computer. It was not very difficult for the AI to do so, as the shuttle had a communication receiver so that it could connect with other ships and such - though it was an unheard of concept for humans. In the time it took for Benezia to assess the two humans, Rolo had easily wirelessly hacked into the shuttle from Hannah, accessed its small computer bank it possessed, and downloaded everything it could to Hannah's Beta Nerves.

Among the information Rolo gathered was a basic understanding of some language, and upon hearing the scared looking, younger blue alien speak he knew it was the language they spoke. It was only a basic understanding though, and had many holes in the translation. But with Rolo connected to Skynet and by extension ADAM - the AI who was able to work out communicating with freaking thresher maws - they were able to fill in the blanks within the minute.

Matriarch Benezia and Tela actually jumped when the female of the two suddenly spoke up.

"You are not turian."

It was a simple statement, one that the younger asari actually felt insulted by the idea that they would ever confuse her with one of those damn birds. But neither of the two blue biotics could answer right away over the fact that she had spoken in asari. Granted the accent was so bad it was almost unintelligible and she stressed the wrong syllables, but the words themselves were perfect. For a brief second, Benezia entertained the idea that their natural language was nearly identical to her own, but brushed it aside as foolish.

"No." Benezia was actually very pleased that she did not stutter. "We are asari." Though that added another question to the growing list, how did they even know the turians were called turians? They could have tortured it out of a captive possibly, but how would they have understood what it said? And wouldn't the captive have mentioned asari or other races at some point? "What may I call you?" She asked politely.

"As a species we are called humans." The 'human' female said. It was an easy enough name to remember. "Personally, I am Commissioner Hannah Shepard." Little bit more challenging, but still memorized by the Matriarch easily enough. "This is Captain David Anderson." She tilted her head to the dark skinned human next to her, who was looking at Benezia with an expression that - if humans were similar to asari in that was as well - was thoughtful. "We are on his ship, SSV Kametachi." She gave the asari a small nod. "What are your names."

"I am Matriarch Benezia and this is Tela Vasir." She introduced the two as Tela still looked nervously around the room and did not seem like she wanted to talk.

"And what do you want with us, Matriach?" The dark-skinned Captain suddenly spoke up. Benezia hid her surprise well. How did he know her native tongue as well? While the man looked and sounded intimidating, his tone - even in a language not his own - was strict as any captain's should be.

"I wish to apologize on behalf of the Turian Hierarchy." Most of the humans around the room tensed, causing Tela to shift a hand to her gun. Only Benezia and Anderson remained calm.

"They are you allies then?" The Captain asked, and Benezia noted that his accent and stresses were getting better. Weird.

Benezia nodded. "We are." The humans around the room began to shift low into crouches and the one called Shepard in particular slowly pull on a pair of fingerless gloves, followed by grabbing the hilts of two knives on her belt. They still use knives even after they achieve space travel? Very weird indeed. It was while Shepard was shifting that Benezia noted the ring of dark red fur around her collar that she had assumed was part of her clothes was not. She actually had hair - or fur rather - growing out the base of her neck. She supposed she should have seen that coming as it matched the color of her tail fur exactly. A quick glance around the room revealed that some of the humans had tails and others patches of fur, but not all of them were female like she suspected they would be. Very, very weird.

Deciding it would be best to defuse the situation as soon as possible, Benezia pushed her confused thoughts away and continued to speak. "Both the asari and turians are part of the council of species that has ruled this galaxy for over two and a half millennia." She saw the surprise blossom on their faces. "Currently there are ten species that are ruled by the council, though three of them have been separated for some time now." No one was really certain if the batarians, quarians, or krogans would ever be allowed back and only time would tell. "One of the laws that has been in place by the council for almost two thousand years states that no new Mass Relays can be activated. This is because the opening of one Relay long ago led to a three hundred year long bloody war that billions perished in." From the resigned scowl on the Captain's face, she knew he understood. "The turians probably acted out of fear at seeing you attempting to activate the Relay and opened fire. Whatever reason the Admiral of the fleet had for attacking the planet, I cannot say as his ship did not survive the battle." Shepard had an odd reaction and gave what looked like an amused yet sad smile.

"I see." Anderson said, giving a thoughtful frown.

Benezia let that sink in, relieved to note that Shepard had released her knives - though she knew she could easily fight her off had she drawn them. "I am also here to offer you to join. The Council that is." Seeing their surprised looks, she explained. "It is customary to offer the chance to any new species, even if they had a... rough start with one of the Council species."

"And what do the turians say about this?" Anderson asked, his face giving nothing away to whether he wanted peace or the chance to kill all of the avian species.

"They came to an understanding that it was they who instigated the attack... eventually." Behind her, Tela snorted.

"A little advice." The younger asari spoke up, apparently no longer as nervous as she was before. "The turians are the main military branch. They're still unhappy that you guys beat them back and they'll stay that way for a while." Benezia scowled at her tone. It was no secret that Tela held no love for turians.

A snort very similar to Tela's came from Shepard. "And we'll hate them for murdering a bunch of civilians for as long as we remember. And unfortunately for them, humans have long memories."

Both Benezia and Anderson ignored their accomplices who were now smirking at one another in mutual amusement. "If you could show us the location of where to meet this Council, we can move out." Anderson said, causing Benezia to give a small frown for two reasons. The first was that she was hoping to take her shuttle to the Citadel. If humans did not posses Mass Effect technology it would take forever to get to the nearest active Relay.

"Don't you need to contact your superiors first?" And that was the second reason. The Council would need to speak with the main government, not a random Captain and his crew. For them to want to leave immediately confused Benezia.

Anderson just gave a small smile at the question while Shepard smirked. Unknowingly, Benezia had just confirmed the suspicions of all the members of the Systems Alliance who were watching through the Captain's eyes that these aliens did not posses anything quite like Skynet. "They're already informed and have agreed to listen to the Council." Was Hannah's mysterious reply. No use in telling possible enemies about what humans could do if it could be avoided. Once they could be trusted more, they could know. But until then, she would keep her knives and sword on her person at all times.

Benezia's frown deepened. Fine, if they wanted to play like then so be it. Besides, as soon as they found where the Citadel was they would probably admit it was too far away for them and agree to board her shuttle. "Very well, do you have a navigation room?" Anderson nodded and walked away, followed by Shepard. Benezia gave a nod to Tela as the younger asari closed the shuttle door and they both followed the humans.

Walking through the alien ship was an interesting experience. Despite having no expertise with designing starships, Benezia could easily tell that no, they did not posses Mass Effect technology. She had originally thought that they might if they found some renovating way to deal with the heat exhaust on such a large ship. But walking through said ship she found it lacked many things every other ship she had ever been on had. The hallways were too big and awkwardly supported that they would collapse if forced through FTL travel. The circuits of electricity were distributed so incredibly wrong that they could not all lead to one source of power. Most meaningful though, was that there was no telltale hum of an Element Zero core.

After walking up four sets of stairs and down a long corridor, they reached what was definitely the navigation room, if the large hologram of the galaxy was anything to go by. Benezia let out a relieved sigh. They had holograms, at least they were not too technologically backwards.

At a gesture from the Captain, she moved up to the hologram and jabbed at the exact area of the Citadel, pleased that the projection sensed her action and lit up the area with a dot. Anderson came up beside and gave the dot a thoughtful look. "The Serpent Nebula." He said to himself. Just when Benezia was certain he was going to ask for a ride in her shuttle that did have a Mass Effect core, albeit a small one, he surprised her by nodding. "Very well, it will be done."

The room that was a moment ago was empty save for the two humans and two asari burst into action. Almost before Benezia knew what was going on, she was surrounded by dozens of humans moving to sit in the chairs around the edge of the room she now realized was actually the bridge.

Anderson and Shepard moved away from the hologram towards the far side of the room. It took Benezia a few seconds to regain from her surprise and follow. It took Tela even longer. Catching up the the Captain and Commissioner, she was about to go into a rant - no, not a rant. Matriarchs don't rant. She was going to debate - to try and convince them to just take her shuttle because it would take far to long for this ship to make the journey when she was stopped by the sight of the next room. It was obviously the cockpit, and the human in the only chair was obviously the pilot. What surprised her was the controls the pilot was using.

The whole dashboard was a metal plate that made a U around the pilot's chair had. It had no levers, no buttons, not even a wheel! There was a small circle off to the side built into the 'control panel' that looked to be a hologram projector but it was currently out of use. The rest of the metal was covered in a web of intricate black lines that looked like they were painted on. Even more surprising was that the pilot's hands were dancing over the markings, jabbing, swiping, and circling them in seemingly random patterns.

Tela gasped when she entered the room. "By the Goddess!"

The pilot said something in a bizarre language that Benezia's translator could not make heads or tails of. She realized with a start that he was speaking in his native tongue. Anderson said something in response - just as indiscernible - and nodded. The pilot put his hand to one particular array of lines, each of his five fingers touching an individual circle. With careful slowness, he moved his hand forward, dragging his fingers along five parallel lines that originated in a circles. Benezia had to grab onto the doorway she was still standing in as the ship gave a sudden lurch. By the time Benezia managed to look up again, she could only gape as all the shining dots of stars outside the large front window seemed to be pulled and stretched like taffy before the ship shot forward as if fired from a giant slingshot. Unlike what it would feel like if that simile actually happened, there was no great influx of inertia. Benezia stayed rooted in one spot as she viewed the ship shooting forward like she had only seen done by a Mass Relay, and there definitely was not one of those nearby - well at least not a working one.

"Were have entered Hyperspace. It will take about four and a half hours to get to the Serpent Nebula." Anderson said next to her. He actually looked nervous for Benezia, despite being of different species and knowing each other for less than an hour. "Are you okay?"

"Y-Yeah, I'll be fine." She managed to say as she stood up straight, and quickly looking away from the streaks of light out side the window as they were making her dizzy. "What was that term you used?"

"Hyperspace?" She nodded and the Captain scowled. "From what we could gleam from the computers of your shuttle, you don't have a similar word in your language. And based on your reaction I'm going to guess this not is how you planned to travel to the Council?"

"No." She shook her head. "I have only used Mass Effect technologies for long distance travel."

"You mean all your ships are powered by Element Zero?" The pilot asked, surprisingly articulate with the asari language. He sounded both disbelieving and a little afraid. "Don't they ever, you know, explode." The asari was unsure if she should be worried that he was not looking at what he was doing as he swiveled in his chair to stare at her.

"Well, sometimes, yes." Benezia confirmed, failing to hide her confusion. They knew about Mass Effect technology and Element Zero?

"Do you not use Element Zero to power your ships?" Tela asked, ripping her eyes away from the hypnotizing view outside the window.

The pilot shook his head. "Nope, we use good old Chakra and Fuinjutsu." To prove whatever it was he just said, he slapped the painted on lines that obviously controlled the ship. For a second Benezia was afraid that he just sent the starship into a deadly tailspin or something similar, but when nothing happened she calmed down.

"Humans had a pretty nasty experience with a Mass Effect core long ago." Shepard explained, trying to ease the asari's confusion. "When we stumbled upon the plans on how to make our own, no one wanted to build it, much less ride it. So we forgot about it and worked out our own way of flying faster than the speed of light."

"I... see." And she did. Kind of. But now Benezia wondered how they could have a problem with a Mass Effect core before they knew how to build them.

"Seeing as we have time to spare, why don't you give our guests a tour Commissioner." Anderson asked Shepard, who in return gave him a 'why should I?' look. The older human just gave an annoyed look that she managed to survive for three second.

"Fine." Shepard sighed before moving to walk out the room. "Follow me ladies... you are ladies right?" She gave a cautious look at Benezia and Tela, obviously concerned she had just unknowingly insulted them.

Tela just shrugged. "Sure, might as well be." At seeing the humans' collective confused look, Benezia spoke up instead.

"All asari are of mono gender, but we can give birth to children like the females of other species. Our physiques also hold similarities to the females of another race called the quarians so it is generally accepted that we are female even if is not biologically true."

Shepard blinked and visibly restrained herself from asking how sex was supposed to work for them, much to the amusement of the asari present. While Shepard was struggling with herself, the Matriarch remembered something else important. "Captain, I need to ask something of you." Anderson nodded for her to continue. With a flick of her wrist, orange flared around her left forearm and Benezia was once again surrounded by tense, crouching humans. "This is a tool used by almost every citizen of the council species." She tried to defuse the situation.

"Is that an Omni-tool?" Benezia nodded, assuming they got the word from her shuttles databanks but did not know what it meant. Shepard gave it a curious look. "I've always wondered what those would look like."

Ignoring the odd comment, Benezia brought up the program that had not been used since the krogans had been uplifted. "This is used to program our translators that let us talk with so many species easily. It will take awhile but as the images come up you have to say what they are in your language and then type them in. Though we'll save that for later since we have to know your alphabet first, unless you use a individual character for each word." She held her 'tool for the Captain to see. The first picture was that of a star, easy enough.

Captain scowled, apparently he did not like the idea of going through all of this but knew he had to do it. I mean, it wasn't like every human knew how to speak asari already right?

Instead of speaking however, the Captain raised his own hand. There was a flash from his fingertips and a ball of light shot from them and into the offered Omni-tool so fast Benezia would have missed it had she not been looking directly at it. Over the next few seconds, the images flashed over Benezia's 'tool far to fast to comprehend. When the screen showing that the program had ended appeared, it was quickly followed by the one showing it being downloaded to her translator. When that finished, the orb of light shot back out of her arm computer and into Anderson's waiting fingers.

"Will that suffice, Matriarch?" The Captain said in what - to her - sounded like perfect asari, but with his lips moving much differently it showed that he was still speaking his native language. A playful smirk was at his lips, probably from the face she was making. "He also took the liberty of downloading your translations for the other Council species, I hope you don't mind. Don't worry, he stayed away from anything personal."

Benezia stared at her now idle Omni-tool. That process was infamous for taking upwards of six hours. Granted her original plan was to do something similar in linking their computers, but with the way it was just done she needed some time to think. "Yes, that's fine." She did not even fully register that Anderson said 'he' like it was a different person who completed the program.

She barely paid attention as Shepard took her and Tela away from the bridge to show them around the ship. These humans were very, very, very weird.

'~,_,~'

David Anderson watched as the Commissioner and two aliens left. The orb of light flew from his hand again, this time hitting the hologram projector next to the pilot on the SCI. It immediately lit up to show an AI avatar that looked like an aged old man. "Are you sure that was a smart move, David?" The super computer asked. "The asari language was posted on Skynet before we went into Hyperspace. We could have easily used their language when we want to be understood and our own when we did not."

"Consider it a sign of trust." Anderson replied, looking out the window as the stars stretched by.

"You just didn't want to go through that translation program, did you?"

The human smirked. "Maybe."

'~,_,~'

These humans had found a way to create Mass Effect technology, but did not use it. Obviously they had something else that worked, and that was what worried Benezia. Even after twenty-five hundred years after achieving it, the asari could not think of anything to work even remotely as good as Mass Relays. Even after the salarians - who were widely seen as the best scientists - joined the Council, they could not design of anything better. Even after the quarians - indisputably the best engineers - joined, something better could not be created. Granted, they never had a reason to try and find something better, but still.

What other great differences did these humans have?

"And this is the mess hall." Shepard continued talking, even though only the younger asari was paying attention. "And over there-"

"Wait." Tela's interruption was sudden enough that it drew Benezia out of her thoughts. Shepard scowled at being stopped, but let the asari speak anyway. "What's that sound?"

The two others blinked and tried to focus on the sound. "It sounds like... cheering?" Benezia admitted.

"Oh, that." Shepard gave a wide smile that frightened the two aliens a little. "That was going to be the last thing on our tour, but since you asked..." The hanyo walked to a nearby door. With a practiced ease, she lifted her hand and swiped her three middle fingers down the three black lines that looked like they were painted on the wall next to it. Obediently, the door slid open and the dull sound of cheering that Tela heard up instantly picked up to a giant roar that momentarily deafened the asari. Shepard on the other hand, raised her arms above her head and gave a cheer of her own to the ceiling. "Come on!" She shouted over the roar of a crowd, waving to the visitors. Before they could retort, she grabbed an arm of each and physically dragged them into the door - and she was strong!

The three were immediately lost in a crowd of yelling people. As all the humans were at least a head taller than the asari, they could not see what everyone was cheering at. Shepard had to push the two aliens forward until they broke through the crowd and hit a railing. It turned out it was a room almost identical to the hanger their shuttle was currently in. The catwalk that was suspended around the border of the metal room was packed with humans of all shapes and sizes. In the center of the room on the ground below the catwalk, two bloodied and sweaty humans were battling it out to the cheering of the crowd.

It did not take Benezia very long to figure out what this room was used for, and when she did she wanted to curse. Humans were not just a weird race with frightening new technology, they were a weird race with frightening new technology and a love for brutal fighting! And she had hoped that the krogan were the only ones like that.

To her utter embarrassment, it did not take long for Tela to figure it out as well and begin cheering right along with their distracted tour guide.

The fight ended within a few minutes as one of the humans curbed stomped the other into the metal floor with enough force that Benezia worried they were trying to kill each other like barbarians. Thankfully, the downed man just got back up with a smile, rubbing his chin and forfeiting. The crowd roared one last time before things quieted down to a low talking level. The victor of the match took a seat on the floor down in the arena while the loser walked away.

"What are they waiting for?" Tela asked, her voice hoarse from the shouting.

"For someone else to accept a fight with that guy." Shepard jerked her head to the victor. "Come on, that's all I wanted to show you, let's go."

Benezia let out a relieved sigh as Shepard began to turn away. She would be happy to never see an arena like this ever again. "What do you have to do to accept the fight?" Tela asked, not moving as she looked at the human in the arena with a thoughtful expression.

"Tela..." Benezia said in a warning tone.

Shepard, however, gave a wide smile. "Just jump down there and hope he accepts the challenge."

Tela nodded. "Is there anything one should know before jumping in?"

By now, the Commissioner had moved back and clasped a hand on the younger of the two asari's shoulder. "It starts as a fist-fighting match but as soon as anything is used by one person, the other is allowed to use their equivalent. You pull out a weapon - he's allowed to use a similar weapon and vise versa. Understand?" Tela nodded. "Then good luck."

"Tela-" Benezia was stopped from trying to dissuade her again when the younger asari put a foot on the catwalk's railing and jumped over, landing in the crouch on the arena floor with the grace asari were known for. "Goddess save me." Benezia said as she pinched the bridge of her nose.

::FIGHT ON!:: Hannah sent the text around to everyone in the room. Instantly, all attention was drawn back to the arena and the winner of the last fight looked up.

There was a pause as the two contestants stared at each other and the crowd was silent. The human looked at the volunteer with a guarded expression as she began to fidget under the many silent gazes. It was obvious to every human in the room that the man was a bit scared at the idea of fighting an unknown - even if just in a spar. No human liked fighting something they did not understand.

After what seemed like forever for the asari, the human stood up and nodded with a wide smile. As if on command, the crowd gave a roar of approval loud enough to cause Tela and Benezia to jump. The human slid into a crouched position - what seems to be the stance of choice for humans - and Tela stood tall.

Faster than Tela thought possible for someone of the man's size, he was rushing for her with his arm held out to clothesline her neck. The asari managed to roll to the side to avoid it along with the kick that followed up. Just as she came out of the roll, a hand clasped around her arm and violently threw her away, nearly dislocating her shoulder in the process.

The asari hit the ground some distance away, disorienting. Humans apparently had more natural strength than she thought they would. As soon as she managed to regain her bearings, she saw the human was now above her about to execute a curb stomp like the one that ended his previous match. Tela did not think, just acted.

Blue flames licked her hands as she caught the man above her in a dark aura. With a swing of her arm, she sent the man sailing across the room, his momentum only stopping when he hit the metal wall.

Time froze for Tela as she stared wide-eyed at Benezia's similar expression from across the room. Revealing biotics while surrounded by dozens of adrenaline high, mostly unknown aliens was not the ideal situation. If they thought it was witchcraft or something else that would cause bad reactions, and it could get messy. She needed to-

"WHHOOOOOOO!" The roar of the crowd came back, shortly followed by the human fighter getting up while rubbing the back of his head.

"I've gone five rounds already." The man shouted to her while shaking his head. "I don't have it in me to fight a biotic. You win." The crowd cheered as the man went to the stairs and up to the catwalk.

Tela could only blink stupidly. So they knew about biotics already? That was good. But what really annoyed her was that the fight had been so short and one-sided that it was almost pathetic. Just as the crowd began to fall back into a wave of dull chatter, it lapsed into silence as someone else jumped into the arena.

The asari did a double take when she saw Hannah standing there with a smile. "The last time I fought a biotic, it was far to serious for my taste. What do you say?" There was a dense silence and Tela realized they were waiting for her response. She jerked her head in a nod as blue fire rose from her skin.

The crowd cheered.

Benezia facepalmed.

Trying to get the preemptive strike this time, Tela shot her hand out. Hannah stepped to the side just as a wave of blue shot past her. Hannah grinned as the black lines that covered her skin - which both asari thought were simple tribal markings - began to glow white and the crowd cheered louder. Before either asari could try and figure out what was happening, Hannah crouched and launched herself at Tela.

The previous fighter was fast, yes, but still within Tela's abilities to fight. Hannah, with whatever those marks were doing to her, was moving so fast she could barely be seen!

Tela managed to get up a rushed biotic barrier, but the human's punch met it before it could fully form and shattered it. The asari could barely lean back in time as the following uppercut tore past where her chin was moments before. She could see the air ripple around the arm as it blurred past!

In a desperate move, she shot another biotic blast at the human. It missed horribly, but Hannah had jumped away and broke off her assault to avoid it. Getting a little reprieve, Tela quickly cupped her hands and formed a ball of dark energy with the only purpose of collapsing in onto itself. She threw it at the human with a flick of her wrist. The spinning, pseudo-black hole known as a singularity sailed at its target in a way that Hannah would not be able to dodge like she had the previous biotic attacks. At least, that's what Tela thought.

The human jumped high into the air and Tela was the with its angle and velocity - a really high velocity - she would fall back down well within the range of the miniature black hole. Instead, once Hannah reached the ceiling of the room she stopped... Just, stopped.

Tela gaped as the human female stayed in a crouched position, upside down, and attached to the ceiling by her hands and feet. Hannah smirked at the reaction, and that combined with her tail waving slowly, she looked very much like a cat that ate the canary to the humans cheering around the arena.

Pushing her surprise and small amount of fear to the back of her mind where it could studied later, Tela raised both hands. A series of biotic pulses shot at Hannah. In response, the human began flipping around the ceiling. She would lift her hands and bend away, then plant them and move her feet. She moved around and dodged the dark energy like some kind of demented slinky.

Finally, Hannah jumped from the ceiling with the speed Tela was beginning to associate with the glow of her skin marks. The asari barely managed to roll away as the glowing mass of flesh and fur blew past her. As they both landed on their feet, Tela reached out with a hand wreathing in blue. Hannah dodged again and the asari jerked her other arm forward while her target was midair. But Hannah's tail proved to be more than just for show as it swung to the side and managed to move the rest of her body out of the way of the biotic pulse. She was unable to dodge the third attack though.

Instead of pushing her away again, Tela yanked her hand back to drag the human towards her, hoping it would be disorienting enough to get a hit in. Halfway through being pulled to the asari, Hannah got her feet under her and slammed them down on the metal, her momentum abruptly stopping.

The aura of biotics continued to flare around Hannah as she stuck to the ground like a statue, unable to be moved in the game of tug of war. With a grunt, Tela brought her other hand up to double the force, but it still did no good. The metal beneath Hannah gave a groan as it began to bend under the strain. The human suddenly smiled again and Tela got a sinking feeling in her stomach.

Hannah released the Chakra grip that her feet held.

As if fired like a bullet, Hannah shot at the asari who seemed to realize what would happen a second before Hannah did it and rolled to the side. Just as the human flew by, her foot shot out and struck the asari in her abdomen.

Both women went flying in different directions, slamming into metal walls to the sound of the cheering crowd.

'~,_,~'

Tela regained consciousness to the stern frown of Matriarch Benezia.

Not the most pleasant way she's ever woken up, that's for certain. I feel sorry for any child she ever has.

Tela was lying on a bench in what looked to be a locker room. A few other humans moved around but they did not seem to take notice of the asari.

"I hope that's the last time you embarrass the asari race." The woman said. You could practically hear the scowl in her voice.

"Embarrass?" Tela looked over to see Hannah sitting nearby. Even after flying into a metal wall at who-knows-how-many-times-faster than what knocked the asari out, the redhead looked perfectly fine. "I'll have you know her little stunt probably got her a lot of respect for your people."

"What?" Benezia asked, greatly befuddled.

"Power is respected." All occupants of the room shivered at the voice and most stared at its owner for some time before eventually getting back to what they were doing, the rest just continued to stare. The owner of the voice was a male human with bright yellow hair. But he looked different from the rest of the humans Tela had seen so far. Besides lack of tribal markings - that somehow glowed, she really needed to figure that one out - his features were slightly different. Not enough for him to be a different species, but like he had come from a group of humans that had grown up on a separate land from the rest of them. He probably had a different ethnicity. "Even before I was born, humans have always loved to fight." And what the heck is up with his voice? "The only condolence is that we stopped going into pointless wars long ago. And you!" He suddenly turned to Hannah with an annoyed look. "I take my eyes off of you for five minutes and what do you do? You go and break your collar bone!"

Hannah had the decency to look sheepish. "Sorry."

"I broke your collar bone?" Tela yelped, only to wince as she tried to sit up to quickly. Her stomach area was definitely bruised, and badly so.

"Don't worry it already healed." Hannah waved her concern off, but frowned at the asari. "But you've been out for an hour and your stomach still hasn't healed. Maybe I kicked you too hard."

Tela gave her a confused look. "Why? It's normal that it would take that long." The bruise probably would not fade for another day or so.

"Oh." Hannah and the male human shared a look. "Well then, you heal much slower than humans do." The redhead got a far away look in her eye, which Benezia noted was matched by every other human in the room sans the yellow-haired man with the odd looks and voice. No sooner had the distant expressions come then they disappeared. Instantly Hannah was on her feet as most of the other humans stopped what they were doing and left the room in a hurry. "Looks like we're coming out of Hyperspace in a few minutes. The Captain wants us on the bridge." Not waiting for the asari, she left as well, leaving the two aliens and the man alone.

"Come on." The yellow-haired man said as he put an arm around Tela's shoulder's and lifted her to her feet. Though because of the height difference, she ended up with him just holding her by the arm in a firm grip. "Let's get you ladies upstairs."

After silently considering the man for a minute, she decided it would be a good idea to introduce herself. "I'm Tela Vasir." The younger asari said to the human leading her through the metal maze of halls of the ship, Benezia silently trailing behind.

"Nice to you." His voice still made her body do odd things. When he did not continue, she got annoyed.

"And you are..." She hedged. He looked at her sharply, surprised, before giving a light laugh.

"Just my luck." He laughed lightly, causing her injured stomach to squirm. "The first time someone asked my name in years and I don't have enough time to do my introduction dance. I'm Naruto Uzumaki."

"What do you mean no one has asked your name in years?" Tela asked. She carefully ignored the mention of an 'introduction dance'.

The now identified Naruto smiled at her. "Everyone knows who I am." Tela snorted in disbelief. "I'm serious." He said with a smile. "Parents have told their children stories about me for thousands of generations."

"Right, and I'm the mother of Athame." Tela retorted.

"Who?"

"Never mind." She did not want to lecture someone on religion. She noticed a bunch humans scurrying around. "Everyone seems to be in a hurry." She noted, not expecting much of a response other than agreement.

"It's difficult for humans to be in Hyperspace. You should see them after they've stayed in it for days or weeks. People look so run down it's like they're dead on their feet. That's one of the reasons they were throwing those fights you stumbled upon - people are stressed out and need a way to get rid of it."

Tela thought back to the humans she had met and talked to, Hannah in particular. They did seem a little tense after they had entered Hyperspace. "Why is it hard for them?"

Naruto hummed. "I wonder if I should tell you?" He asked aloud to himself. "It wouldn't be a problem if you become allies, but if you're enemies..." He trailed off and Tela got a lump in her throat. "Actually there aren't many things you could do against us just from knowing about Skynet, and if you ever find a way to join without us wanting you to ADAM and Eve would just kick you out, rather painfully probably."

"Skynet? ADAM? Eve? What are you talking about?" Tela was getting more questions than answers.

Naruto thought for a few more seconds - ignoring the asari in the process - before nodding to himself. "Might as well tell you." He looked over his shoulder at Benezia who had remained silent since they left for the bridge. "You're an important person to this Council we're going to see, right?" At her hesitant nod, he continued. "Then can you spread what I'm going to tell you around? I don't want to have to say it twice."

The Matriarch hesitated at the odd request, but agreed soon enough.

Naruto hummed again as he turned back to look forward. "Well you see, humans are born with this seal on them - called an Izanami Seal. As they grow, it will spread over their body. When it is complete, usually somewhere in the teenage years, it works with a bunch of other stuff in their bodies and they gain access to Skynet. Skynet is... Well people joke that its like a hive mind, but that's actually pretty accurate." The two asari tensed, stories of the rachni and their hive mind were still popular. "With it a person can instantly contact any other human and access a massive bank of information in ADAM with a thought, no matter the distance between them."

No matter the distance? The asari shared a wide-eyed look.

"As you first talked with Hannah and the Captain, every other human that wanted to was able to watch the conversation though their eyes. David actually went over everything you said with all the leaders of humanity before responding to anything. At the same time, everything they learned from your language was uploaded to Skynet and given to ADAM. I think David and Hannah ordered everyone on the ship to learn the language so they could communicate - didn't do much good since you did that translator thing of yours, though. Probably right after David got the program, he sent it out to every human on the ship so that they could understand the language of any other species of this Council we run into."

By now, Tela had lost the ability to use her legs and Naruto was literally dragging her through the hallways, not that he seemed to notice. Benezia had somehow managed to keep walking, but her jaw was left far behind. Come to think of it, just minutes ago all the humans in the locker room had gained faraway looks before suddenly rushing to work. That was probably this Skynet in action.

"And that leads to why humans have it hard in Hyperspace." Naruto finally got around to answering the original question. "Everyone on this ship had been able to access Skynet for the large majority of their lives. The problem is that, while in Hyperspace they can't connect to anyone sans the people on the same ship. To suddenly be cut off is torture to them."

The timing was almost perfect as they came to the bridge as soon as he finished and Naruto set the now silent asari in a spare chair.

"Exiting Hyperspace in five!" The pilot called from his chair, placing his fingers back over the five parallel lines - the Hyperspace control seal. He started to drag his fingers down the black lines until the streaks of light outside the window returned to being normal stars. I the distance, Benezia could see the Citadel. In perfect unison, every human except for Naruto gave a relieved sigh as they were reconnected to Skynet.

"Tela, I've come to two conclusions." Benezia said in a whisper as humans began to move around again.

"What are they?" It seemed she was still in shock, though it had lessened greatly already.

"I know how the turians lost and I will do anything to get the humans to be part of the Council."

"What? Why?"

"Imagine it." Benezia told the younger asari. "In a battle between three turian ships and an army of people like Hannah working together perfectly through this 'Skynet' and utilizing unknown technology that can do who-knows-what. Who do you think will win?" Tela thought about it, and it did not take long to do so before she shivered.

"A-And the second conclusion? Why do you want them to join the Council so much?"

Benezia gave her a meaningful look. "Take everything I just said and imagine them as your enemy."


End!

And the chapter that I cannot help but consider filler is over... for now.

Explanation time!

The ship controls: I figured that being able to control machines and vehicles was too far, so they actually have to use manual controls for them. Very strange and unrealistic controls, yes, but controls nonetheless.

Hannah's comment about Omni-Tools: "I always wondered what those would look like." Humans know all about Prothean technology, including Omni-Tools. They just don't use any of it besides Medigel.

Random fight scene: Because I said so.

Until next time,
- - Sorcerer of the East