AN: Well dear readers, it looks like ME1 is still in the lead and by default it win, as this week is the deadline for the previous chapter, here's the continuation. For this chapter it will focus a little more on the other universe where the games are real. And I thank those who took the time to participate in that poll which I forgot to officially set up but next time when something like this comes up again I'll definitely set up an official pill…er..ppll…damn it! Poll! There! I am grateful for the reviews. Anyways moving on...
Disclaimer: I don't own Mass Effect or Stellaris. This is getting old.
Important Notice: For all of those who have given me helpful ideas I thank you all and if I do use them it will be accredited to you in the AN below. If anyone have any other helpful comments or sees any mistakes (whatever that may be, materials from both games-I want to be accurate with some of my descriptions to make this story real-ish) please PM or review.
*Slight changes made in this chapter.
Also, for the two guests who reviewed the third chapter recently:
I thank you for that and hopefully you like this one-ish. While the third chapter is not actually mission critical in and of itself, it is a stepping stone for the plot further along the line as it will help explain why he suddenly has a niece. All will be explained further in the story as I get there but for now its a pose piece or something and should not be taken seriously...I did say I was bored, right? But seriously, its important in the long run...also the gamer guy's reaction when its revealed that his actions had caused some serious consequences is far away but its getting there. For now we'll enjoy a few confrontations between the navies of the Turians and the Tunarin Imperial Covenant.
As for JustReviewing:
I understand your concern. But as I said before...what the Masses want the Masses get and right now the Masses are confused and conflicting each other. However, I will say that if the poll I'm setting up decides for either HFY crack fic or serious tone or whatever...yeah.
Moving on!
Undisclosed Location on Citadel
"How goes Shepard's hunt?" A large, avian creature standing just above six feet, asked another creature that looked like a frog with very large black eyes and two protrusions on its head like horns. It glanced to the avian and spoke in a snappy and fast voice.
"STG has spotted her ship head-" The frog like alien was interrupted when an orange glow manifested from his left forearm and a chiming noise repeatedly rang out. "Excuse me."
"Sparatus, Valern. Good. The both of you need to come to my office at the Asari embassy immediately." the feminine face on the holographic screen that was formed from the orange glowing device spoke with urgency in her voice.
"What? Why?" Sparatus, the avian, raised a non-existent eyebrow as he asked the blue faced female.
"Tevos. Is this about the-" Valern, the snappy frog like alien was again stopped as the blue woman on his screen raised a hand.
"Not over the line." She told him but narrowed her eyes when Valern was about to say something. "I don't trust the security measures we put in place that fully. Now get over here, its important. I'll be waiting."
Both the grey skinned two horned alien and his metallic skinned avian compatriot looked at each other and sighed heavily. They were sure going to be in for another one of their fellow Councilor's lectures...or something else.
"She seems worried." Valern stated as they headed out of the room. They both passed the door and made their way to the elevators.
"Indeed." Sparatus could only nod as he mentally contemplated the urgency in the Asari's voice. The only reason for this would be the new aliens they had encountered only a week earlier. 'Has it been that long already? Why haven't they made their move yet?'
As they rode the elevator up, Valern glanced at his Turian counterpart and simply assessed that he was thinking of the latest development on the galactic rim borders of his Hierarchy's territory. The Salarian Councilor then switched his attention to the elevator, in his opinion it was a damned waste of time and money since the thing was so slow but he wasn't going to complain. He was used to it by now. But being a hyperactive race of shortlived aliens it took some restraint on his part not to curse at the elevator.
Sparatus' omni-tool pinged with an alert and the Turian manipulated the holographic keypad and screen to view the message. Valern noticed it was a message from the Primarch of Palaven.
"Repairs to the Hierarchy Shield have been completed. However, it will still have to remain in drydock for another week for diagnostics and further tests to its overheated barriers." Sparatus voiced his answer to the unasked question from the Salarian.
"Dreadnought sent to aid PG-238?"
"Yes"
"Its Captain?" A small tense feeling floated between them but the Turian shrugged it away and focused his attention on the Salarian Councilor.
"He's not in good shape...mentally." Sparatus revealed, rather hesitantly if his tone was anything Valern had to go by. The turian noticed the small nod of understanding from Valern and sighed.
"We have a small dossier on the Captain, I believe it was his first real command." The turian councilor cringed in anger but held back, sometimes he wished the damned Salarians would just mind their own business and leave well enough alone. 'Damned STG' Sparatus thought angrily as he glared at Valern who ignored the look.
"I'd appreciate it if you and your people do not spy on everyone of mine." Sparatus growled but desisted from trying to strangle the Salarian. "But yes. It was Kessor's first command."
The air was devoid of sound except for the elevator's upbeat melody, an ironic contradiction to the tense air between the two councilors. Not an air of hatred but one of frustration and annoyance since both of them knew their governments don't really like each other. The Salarians and their sneaky little niche was a pain in the neck for the militaristic turians who didn't much like it when their secrets were in danger of being uncovered.
A moment later the elevator doors opened and they reached the embassies. The floor was pristine and white with dull creamy white-grey walls adorned with screens that showed the daily news or market stocks. Sparatus and Valern marched towards the Asari embassy, double timing it and were admitted past the front desk in mere seconds.
Within Asari embassy...
Within the next minute they were inside a dark room. One they were all too familiar with after having met there frequently in the past. Tevos was already inside watching something on her omni-tool. She glanced at her two counterparts and she sat straighter in her chair.
"Councilor Sparatus, Valern." She greeted in a courteous tone and nodded to each of them. "Thank you for coming over despite the short notice."
"Please, Councilor Tevos." Sparatus returned the courtesy, but the underlying sarcastic tone in his voice was not lost on the asari. Being a diplomat, she picked up a few things on mannerisms. "Enough with the pleasantries, what is the reason for this...meeting?"
"Yes. I would like to know, STG has indicated no new movement from the new contacts, why are you so worried?" Valern put in his own two cents and the asari watched them both with a calm and composed expression before she let out a breath, more of a sigh really. The salarian saw that she was frustrated, but why?
"What I am about to say cannot leave this room, until such a time when we can truly corroborate the information I have." She informed them and both Sparatus and Valern had apprehensive looks but nodded nonetheless. Whatever information she has must be important to make her worry so much.
For the next ten minutes Tevos was in animated conversation with the Salarian and the Turian councilors about the information she had on her. Her arms and hands flew around in wild and sometimes inappropriate gestures to emphasize her points whilst Sparatus or Valern's expressions would change from apprehension to astonishment as she spoke more and more on the info.
When she was done both councilors looked even more serious but Sparatus was shaking his head from side to side. His eyes narrowed and his talons on his chin, a single talon softly scratching his mandible, which twitched ever so slightly. He looked annoyed if the constant huff he let out was anything to indicate it.
Valern just stared at Tevos with eyes nearly bulging out and his mouth forming an 'O' then closed. His head bobbed a little up and down but he remained silent. He didn't know whether or not to believe the information. Not that he couldn't dismiss it but it sounded so outlandish and...well it was simply out of this world. He didn't know if the asari councilor had lost her mind but some parts of her information was correct. His analysis of the alien's ships and weaponry from the data collected from the satellites and from the information acquired by the Turian fleet that was attacked proved some of her story.
Yet he just can't help but feel that the whole thing was...weird, to use a human term. He glanced over to Sparatus who looked like he was about to scold Tevos but was held back by the more believable parts of her story. The asari on the other hand only sat back with a calm expression, like a good little diplomat she is, and understandably didn't say a word. She knew that her fellow councilors would dismiss her claim and even she would but the Matriarchs were adamant.
They had been the ones sitting on this information and had contacted her to give it to her...even if she personally thought it was a farce, the matriarchs had spoken and their word was law among the asari. The information was thousands of years old and that alone would have made it redundant but when a thousand year old blue lady with enough biotic power to crush every bone in your body tells you that she is right then you listen. Tevos sighed but it was a silent, mental sigh, one that she had learned to do whenever she was faced with some hard choices or frustrating diplomatic situations.
She did this when the humans were first made contact with and also did it again when they had come head to head with the Batarians in the SKyllian Verge. 'I really need a vacation.' she groaned in her mind as she watched the salarian and the turian eye her with a mixed look of disbelief and annoyance, well that last one was Sparatus and she could understand.
"Well?" She broke the silence and the others looked at each other, unsure of what to say exactly. "Look, like I said, the information can be withheld for now. Until we can find some form of confirmation for-"
The sudden pinging noises coming from their omni-tools filled the room and they all answered simultaneously. Their eyes flew open in shock and fear when they read the message.
"Impossible!" Sparatus yelled as his eyes registered the words on his screen. "How can-there were...there were over a thousand ships in that system!"
"Sparatus calm down." Tevosordered, her voice shaky but firm.
"STG confirms it." Valern spoke up, his usual snappy tone now more resigned and a hint of fear in it. "A force of 300 ships, all matching the description of the new contacts' ships poured into the Xaxrix system and wiped out a large portion of the turian fleet positioned there."
"Spirits...that's thousands of souls...gone."
For a moment the room was silent but Sparatus roared out in anger and his talons balled into a fist as he slammed it against the table, a slight dent can be seen on the surface.
"Fleet survivors...report having destroyed a sizable number of the enemy fleet. Of the 300 that arrived, most of which were frigates, over a 100 enemy frigates either destroyed or disabled. Several of their cruisers were also damaged and three of which suffered heavy catastrophic loss. While their dreadnoughts sustained minor hull breaches and the single super-dreadnought they fielded sustained no damages." Valern quietly read off the report he received from his operatives. He narrowed his eyes and managed a glance at his counterparts. Tevos was seemingly calm but within her well kept facade she was raging though not quite in the way he and Sparatus imagined. The turian however was clearly distressed but angry.
"This proves that they can be hurt." Valern spoke, mostly to reaffirm to the two other councilors that all was not lost.
"How are the ships coming along?" Tevos inquired in a quiet voice as she looked to her turian counterpart. He stared at the dent he had made on the desk for a moment before breathing in to calm his nerves and replied.
"We're maxing the capacity out and thanks to the Salarians and their upgrades can begin fielding a large number of ships, mostly frigates and cruisers, within the next few months."
"We might not have a few months." Tevos pointed out and both Valern and Sparatus agreed with her. "Why not inform the humans and the other races of this situation?"
"The humans, maybe."Sparatus spat out the word humans but unlike his fellow turians he can at least respect them for some of their contributions to the galactic community. He didn't hate them personally, just the way they seemed to flaunt their politics around that irritated him. Then he had a thought, "On the other hand, I wouldn't want the Batarians to find out lest they try and acquire the alien's tech for their own."
"That is a problem but we cannot let our own bickering get the better of us," Tevos reasoned with the turian who looked like he was about to argue but he kept quiet, his mind still on the lost souls of many turians who served with the fleets in the Xaxrix system.
"Understandable." Valern stated, he worked a little with his omni-tool and then continued, "Humans and Batarian industrial capabilities may lessen the workload but the logistical and supply of eezo may endanger the economy and what eezo resources we have left."
"Then we lift the ban on dormant relays and begin activating more of them." Sparatus suggested which prompted Tevos to glare at him. "What? We have limited worlds rich with eezo, unless you want Thessia to offer some of theirs?"
"We're going to go around in circles if we continue this." Tevos sighed. "Lets meet again tomorrow."
"Agreed."
With that they all left, except for Tevos, who simply laid back in her chair which leaned to comply with her movement. A sigh escaped her lips as she brought her hand to her temple and rubbed the throbbing ache that was developing. She silently hoped that whatever trouble Shepard had predicted from that fanciful vision the new Spectre had witnessed from the faulty beacon on the human colony...the one that was attacked by Saren, another Spectre that has recently been disavowed. 'What was the name of that colony again?' Tevos thoughtfully tapped her chin then she remembered, it was Eden Prime, 'humans and their naming conventions.' She silently prayed to the goddess that the Citadel races won't be facing two potentially devastating events...one of which hangs in the hands of a human and her wild claims and the other a more material thing. She kept going over and over it in her head, that message they first received from the new contacts during the second contact with their fleet.
"Our God demands the extinction of your pathetic race...and WE are HIS instruments!"
She remembered how it sent chills up her spine and wondered what would set these aliens down this path...a path to exterminate a sentient life...just because their god demanded it? Why? What gives them the right? And no she didn't believe for one second that these aliens wholly believed in such a demand from their so called god. However, such thoughts gave her headache more fuel and she groaned standing from her chair and headed out of the room.
Within the darkness as she turned off the lights...a shadow swirled into a black mist that seem to echo with a maniacal laughter fading into obscurity.
Oh what precious fun we're going to have...
Xaxrix system
2 hours earlier...
51st Fleet/HolyBreach
Aboard the Flagship Breach
Bridge
Harald almost couldn't believe his luck. Out of the most promising candidates eligible to command not only their own ship but a whole fleet, he'd been chosen by the Grand Marshal himself, and by extension, the Holy One. Now he stood on the small balcony on the bridge overlooking the trenches that lined the bridge each divided by three aisles. His keen eyes eyed his new crew, all of them fresh out of the Naval Academy, but all of whom had passed with flying colours and were handpicked by the Committee to serve on the most advanced piece of machinery the Covenant could roll out of the assembly line.
This ship had it all, new and improved sublight engines, the Mk.2 fusion powered Impulse thrusters, with state of the art tachyon sensors which most objects in the known galaxy could not escape, brand new and battle tested computer systems dealing mostly in the offensive capabilities of his ship and finally the FTL drive, probably the most powerful one the Covenant had built to date. This drive was similar to the Jump Drive but is powered by the hundreds of minds of some of their most gifted psionics, most of these were volunteers hoping to power this innovative piece of technology with their gifts. Though it has drawbacks that needed twin Mk.3 Warp drives just in case the ship needed to high tail it out of a bad situation.
Captain…no…Admiral Harald Vandersen was proud of this, the culmination of his military career, he had resigned from the military to take care of his aging parents and younger brothers but then outbreak...his eyes darkened with that thought, his mind forcing itself not to remember….to remember….no….he will not remember. He cannot, that memory was repressed for a reason. Instead he turned his attention back to the bridge crew below him, the conning tower was where they had set up the bridge, one would think that it was a bad idea to put the most important command centre on such a vulnerable target but the shipwrights and designers of the Covenant had never had that thought cross their minds before. In fact not one person in the Covenant had thought it was a horrible and dangerous idea to place their commanders in the line of fire.
Each combat situation a Covenant fleet enters into, would be a nightmare of worry for the vulnerable bridge and its crew complement and the commanding officer, however, the Tunarin had always been warriors from birth till death and never had they considered their position a vulnerability. Sure it could get them killed if some pilot or missile or some other weapon get lucky and hit the bridge on the conning tower, but the motto of the Tunarin and its Covenant had always been, "Face your foes head on, Face their weapons head on, Face your death and welcome it with open arms….no matter how and in what form."
Of course, this mentality is not without its downside, every now and then a few Tunarin would get overwhelmed with the loss of their friends, loved ones and those who they feel they need to protect or could have and failed. This feeling can compromise the thought process and military rigidity of their mentality which may result in suicides, spontaneous murders, unprovoked attacks and in some cases, mass riots and full on rebellions. For the past four and half centuries the Tunarin Covenant had somehow managed to put out two solutions to this problem. Harald had been one of the recipients of the second form. The first being outright execution whilst the second is a costly and often times faulty process, involving the deliberate suppression of the painful memories and the subject of those memories.
Thus Harald had avoided a mental breakdown by initializing one of the many defense mechanisms against such a case. Chemicals within his body, artificial glands attached to his heart (among many others) produce these chemicals, which then begin getting pumped to his brain to where his long term and short term cerebral strands are located which target specific parts of it and begin dispersing to suppress the memory forcibly making him forget momentarily of his loss. Admiral Vandersen, newly assigned to Holy Breach and commander of the Flagship Breach, was snapped out of his thoughts when he noticed his second in command, First Officer Jacob Merallus. Said Officer was quite tall, taller than himself by a foot and a half. The man wore the dress blues with the double Red Crescent moons over a black background, placed on an oval patch attached to his left shoulder.
"Admiral Vandersen, Sir." First Officer Merallus saluted and took a relaxed yet still rigid stance with his hands clasped behind him. "All ships reporting in green and ready to take on their first challenge."
"Good." Harald nodded, keeping his eyes on the tactical holographic display floating above the bridge crew below him. Ships were shown in 3D rendering and his fleet was marked in green, all of which were displaying individual stats regarding their hull integrity, shield charge and strength, etc. His fleet was shown lazily floating in the void just a couple of thousand kilometres from the large fork structure High Command had designated a Relay.
With a thought, Harald accessed his NeLI, he saw the bridge crew similarly accessing their NeLI in order to maximise their efficiency of using their terminals. Shipboard AI had access to the NeLI but was constantly monitored…he thought it was ironic how they're still using the damned thing when its kind had nearly destroyed the galaxy some hundred odd years before the war with the avian race. He found what he was looking for in the network and again with a single thought he connected to Comm Officer Raymond Uriel.
"Communications Officer Uriel." He spoke mentally and said crewman looked up from his terminal, three steps from the Tactical Officer's own terminal which stood right below the balcony.
"Sir?" Uriel inquired with a thought.
"Connect me to the fleet." Harald commanded and the Comm Officer nodded then tapped away at his terminal.
"NeLI connection has been amplified to ship and fleet wide communications." The new Admiral thanked his subordinate and then cleared his throat which caught the attention of his whole bridge, his ship crew and the rest of the fleet/ships under his command. Everyone knew this speech was coming, it happened every time before a major engagement…not the one where you get married but a hostile engagement with both sides trying to blow each other away with weapons of mass destruction.
*"Akeiang!." Harald began, a smile forming on his lips. He always wanted to say that bit, watching too many vids had influenced him to a point. "Sons, and daughters of the Holy One! Our foes today are another bird like species, although we have just met them, they have proved to be just as hostile as the ones from a hundred years ago. I know many of you are veterans of that forsaken war and while we as a species crave war, it is one where we aren't always prepared to lose those closest to us. These xenos have angered the might of our god and His wrath will flood this galaxy in a tidal wave of conquest! I see before me not a thousand enemy warships. Nay, what I see before me are a thousand fools throwing themselves against the might of our shields!"
When those words left his mouth the xenos began their bombardment of his fleet. Across the distance between them, golden streaks of light barrelled in a straight line at impossible speeds closing the vast distance between them. In just under fifty seconds the enemy weapons made contact with their shields. Sky blue hexagonal shaped hypershields snapped into existence with every strike.
"I was there on that lowly science ship barely a quarter the size of our corvettes and I witnessed the might of their so called spinal cannons!" Harald yelled as his corvettes, positioned at the front of the fleet, had their shields impacted by several hundred mass accelerator rounds. The tactical officer who monitored the vital signs of the entire fleet flinched with every hit but sighed with relief when he saw that single shots barely made a dent in the shields charge and the capacitors were quickly recharging every minute. However, he frowned when he registered several shots hitting a single corvette forcing the shield to plummet a good forty percent while the capacitors struggled to compensate with recharging the lost energy. Meanwhile, the admiral continued with his speech, all the man was missing is a nice dramatic music to accompany said speech.
"I trembled at the fate which I had been dealt with." Admiral Vandersen's voice took on a near identical tone with that of every other charismatic leader within the command structure of the military. Dramatic voice, the over-dramatic hand gestures and that prideful glint in his eyes, all of which are indicative of a man used to giving speeches yet had not the opportunity for his voice to be heard by no one other than those closest to him. "But I wasn't going to let my crew die on my watch. Not when I had the chance to save their lives, but now I have the chance to payback these xenos for their attempt on my and the lives of those who served with me on that ship. With this fleet under my command and orders directly from the Holy One, we will smash their pitiful fleet and when we have secured this system, the 15th/Holy Sword and 42nd/Holy Hammer fleets will arrive to begin their incursion!"
Along the second trench, where most of the logistics and supply masters were situated in their terminals, two young officers, a 2nd Lieutenant and a 1st Lieutenant, both in their early 100s, glanced at one another and one whispered, "...did he say pitiful?"
"I think he did." The 1st Lieutenant replied in a similar fashion as he leaned just a little to his left. He caught a glare from the young female Lieutenant of similar rank to his fellow whisperer's left but ignored it.
"Nothing pitiful about that." the 2nd Lieutenant inclined his head towards the tactical display where it showed their fleet near the Relay and the alien fleet opposite their position shooting at their corvettes. There was over a thousand of them and it looked like the shields of their screen line were beginning to show signs of strain. "How long do you think his speech will go on?"
"I don't know but I hope he finishes soon...it looks like the Killer, Lover's Quarrel, Hypothesis, Marrow and High Price are about to lose their shields." the 1st Lt. replied worryingly. His eyes darting from the admiral above them and the tactical display.
"...now my brave brethren, unleash hell upon this blasted foe and let loose the Covenant's wrath!" Harald finished his speech with a dramatic inhalation of breath, his eyes red and shot, his face sweating like a rainstorm and his body shaking in pride and...was he laughing? Indeed the new admiral had begun laughing, it was not a loud laugh but it was still noticeable to some of the crew, especially the First Officer, Marellus, who eyed the man with a raised brow and look of incredulity, but decided not to say anything. When Harald had pulled himself back together, he turned to FO Marellus and asked, his facial expression normal and his tone receding in volume. "What did you think of that speech? A little over the top or just right?"
"I wouldn't know, Sir." Merallus answered honestly. "I think it was adequate considering the circumstances. I believe the order is yours to give."
"Then you have my permission, First Officer." Harald straightened up and took on a more princely pose as he tucked his hands behind his back, puffed his chest forward a little and reclined his head at an odd 5 degrees upward. His eyes glued to the Tac display. "Order corvettes to begin H-45 maneuver, Annoyance to harass the enemy corvette line and destroyers, Interceptors to maintain our flanks and deter any flanking maneuvers from their fighters, while have our Gunboats target their cruisers. All ordinances are cleared for use."
"Aye, Admiral." FO Merallus saluted before relaying the order to the Comm and Tactical Officers, one who relayed it to the corvettes while the other who monitored the situation from his terminal. "Orders relayed, sir."
"Now we watch."
In space...
Holy Breach consisted of a single Support battleship (the newest one in the navy and the most advanced), 8 Torpedo, 7 Javelin and 7 Hunter cruisers the first two classes assigned as heavy duty missile platforms whilst the last class was tasked to coordinate the corvettes' assault, 25 Corsair, Streamer and Privateer destroyers each grouped in a Strike-Pack to help with strategic attacks in any gaps opened within the alien fleet's formations or to mop-up, and finally the corvettes themselves are listed as 80 Annoyance, 50 Gunboats and 70 Interceptors with the first class tasked with harassing the alien corvette (ME-Frigates) screen and their destroyers (ME-Cruisers), the second class set on disrupting their cruisers (ME-Dreadnoughts) lines and the last corvette class on intercept and flank overwatch.
A typical corvette was assigned with 3 smaller sized turrets but with the gunboat design, it has only a single turret to support its torpedo bay, as its only comprised with a core. Its utility or secondary complement is divided into sections with 3 small, 2 medium and a single auxiliary section, which luckily doesn't draw too much power from the generators.
With the Annoyance corvettes, the designers wanted to get the most out of its maneuverability and speed. It has the standard interceptor core and armed with a single Gamma Laser mounted at the front turret, and two Stormfireautocannons attached in the middle and rear turrets. It has the added protection of three enigmatic shield generators powered by two enigmatic power generators slotted in medium whilst a single auxiliary shield capacitor helps hasten shield regeneration.
A gunboat however, has a torpedo bay at the front turret with its complementary Stormfireautocannon in the rear turret. It was designed with quick deployment of its torpedoes to deal a huge amount of damage in rapid succession from mid to knife fighting range. While still remaining at enough range from the blast, its stormfire is there to keep any brave fighter pilots from engaging it although that has not often worked. With a similar setup with their utility sections as the other two corvette classes.
So when these two classes moved forward whilst maneuvering out of the line of fire of the alien ships, they immediately used their Impulse thrusters to shorten the hundreds of thousands of kilometers between them. Each corvette, piloted by the best of what the Covenant had to offer, zigged and zagged around the incoming projectiles but even then they still got hit by several rounds. Their shields flared bright blue when struck and a few even lost theirs entirely.
A single corvette (among the dozens) that had lost its shields was now down to its bare armor, even after all these years the corvette had only underwent slight changes to its armor, it did have a slightly stronger hull with the applied living metal but even that precious resource was rare and thus applied to it as little as possible to be saved for more important structures...like a dyson sphere or ring world. The ship was captained by a competent veteran of the previous war, under his direction the ship moved gracefully in the void pulling off maneuvers that were considered impossible for such a stiff vessel. Unlike their alien counterparts, whose ships seemed to fly and weave through their attack formations with unhindered ease.
Dissimilar to what the combat vids that showed where the 5th Fleet/Holy Pacifier had decimated the near entirety of the alien forces in their first real engagement, the situation right now was becoming stressful for the corvettes and a number of Captains had become annoyed by the constant shift in the alien corvette lines. At least he took solace in that the alien's spinal mounts proved to be a handicap in this engagement, seeing as how they had to turn and face the front of their ships and fire directly where they faced. Meanwhile, the other corvettes had begun their harassment of the enemy but were wholly surprised when their auto cannons were met with some form of shielding system that didn't register within the tactical system of the fleet's NeLI network. From what the vids showed, the aliens had no viable shielding against their neturon and marauder missiles during the first fight but it would seem that assumption is wrong. A silver lining appeared when the Gamma Lasers punctured the relatively weak armor of the enemy corvettes, their shield system didn't even snap into existence to protect the ship.
The order went out. All ships within the 51st fleet were alerted to this apparent weakness within the enemy shield array and utilization of laser/energy based weaponry was authorized to the max, with autocannons to provide cover from the swarm of enemy fighters that outnumbered the Breach's fighter escorts.
Even with that edge, the corvettes were sorely outnumbered by the hundreds of enemy corvette analogues. Tactical onboard the flagship received reports of several Annoyance and Gunboat corvettes losing shields with a few even reporting issues with their capacitors shorting out with onboard computers trying to compensate but the systems were rapidly being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of enemy mass rounds and some type of missile/torpedo that had managed to rip through shields rendering the corvettes defenseless, shield wise. Said missiles also disrupted the Impulse thrusters to a degree where the ship is without maneuverability for about thirty seconds giving time enough for the aliens to line up spinal shots.
Aboard the Lover's Quarrel...
Bridge
Captain Esther D. Legolas, one of many female captains within the Covenant military, growled as her ship was pestered by several tons of force with speed equal or surpassing that of light speed. Her face contorted with pain, her left side was bruised when she had been thrown out of her chair when the first of the projectiles impacted against the starboard side of her ship, that was when their shields had collapsed after being hit by one of those strange alien torpedoes. She barked out at her bridge crew.
"Status!"
"Ma'am, shields are gone! So are the capacitors and we have a leak on the third engine room...the enigmatic core was affected by whatever was inside that torpedo." the Tac Officer reported grimly as she listed out the damage. "Engineers report our FTL drive is offline as well as a possible collapse of the structural beams in engine room 2. We're dead in the water ma'am...they took out our sublight engines."
Silence reared its ugly head into the bridge as it took hold of the crew. They each looked to one another with clear sign of fear yet their innate warrior spirit forbidded them from voicing out that fear. Mostly it was worry that gripped their hearts, worry that they may (in this case will definitely) not see their loved ones anymore, but they took comfort in knowing that their death would be avenged.
The Comm Officer perked up when he picked up a transmission, it was an intercepted transmission from somewhere within the enemy communications array. His eyes seemed to sink back into his head as he heard the translated version of the communique, from his expression alone the crew immediately within his terminal area knew death was upon them.
The captain saw this but nevertheless encouraged the crew of her ship to press on...they would take down as many of the alien ships with them as possible.
Outside...
(Turian fleet POV)
Five turian frigates wolfed in on the silent drifting hull of the Lover's Quarrel and positioned themselves above and below it so that they were not within range of the swerving turrets. They had long since figured out that their opponents' turret mounted weapons had a 360 degree rotary view of the field of battle yet had somehow neglected to include an arching degree to their design, this the turians used to full effect and launched attacks by flying directly below the relatively slow frigates or above them. The blindsides were compensated for by high maneuverability but the turian frigates toyed around with the corvettes in this regard and probably saved a few of their frigates but still suffered heavy losses to the directed energy weapons.
Not unlike their GUARDIAN point defense pulse lasers, their foe utilized larger versions on their forward turrets whilst the last two were more like rapid fire mass accelerators that were pitiful when compared with the mass effect spinal guns of the frigates. However, these weapons proved just as effective when they cut through a frigate unlucky enough to cross between two of the enemy frigate-analogues and was caught in the resulting cross fire of rapid firing slugs which, although barred by the kinetic barriers, were able to force the barrier to dissipate and then proceeded to carve right through the ablative armor of the turian frigate. Added with their laser weapons which pass right through the barriers, the frigate had no chance and was cut into pieces along with all hands.
However, this time the turians get to exact vengeance for their downed comrades, with fury, and with a well coordinated strike their mass accelerators opened up and poured into the corvette. Its shields down and effectively dead in the water, the ship had no chance but by some sort of miracle, the enemy ship rotated on its axis with its turrets facing towards the turian frigates and opened fire.
This maneuver exposed its already weakened sides but a few rounds from the turian frigates passed harmlessly by and rapidly shot towards their own ships on either side. Two frigates blocked the rounds with their kinetic barriers but both lost that layer of protection and a third was completely destroyed as the projectile pierced through the weak front armor and plowed through walls to only end up smashing into the ship's core. The resulting implosion caught another frigate alongside it and that caused it to exploded on its starboard side and listed heavily to the left having lost power to life support, weapons and other essential systems, including engines.
The Turians within this wolf pack could only watch in horror, frustration and unfettered anger as their friends and possibly mates or those they knew, died in a fiery ball of white hot flame. Their ships fought with renewed vigor but were matched in that regard by the alien ship whose laser weapon turrets struggled to maintain a fire rate sufficient enough to keep up with the turian main weapon which fired around two second intervals. Their rapid fire, almost machine gun-like, mass accelerator turrets targeted a frigate each, and with only three turian frigates left they managed to inflict high amounts of damage before a lucky shot from one of the frigates tore through the stern of the ship and possibly hit something critical.
There, a few thousand kilometers (below/above) in front of them, the alien ship in all its ugly rectangular design, exploded in a great fireball of exotic matter and debris. The remaining frigates of the wolf pack scattered and limped back through the protective lines of their cruisers, one heavily damaged with two of its engines out of commission, the second losing most of its prow due to the intense heat of the laser turret-reports indicated massive loss of life aboard-while the third frigate had extreme damage across its hull where several holes were visible to the naked eye, the three ships were not the only ones to have been dealt a heavy blow as several sister frigates returned scarred by heavy mass rounds or burned by lasers.
The first round of the battle had finished and already the frigate lines were being decimated by the aliens. Their use of DEWs was a surprise after the first encounter as the turians expected mass salvos of missile projectiles, which disgustingly used WMDs (specifically, nuclear in nature), and the revelation of laser mounted turrets that dealt an excessive amount of damage against their armor was concerning, most of all since the weapon completely disregards kinetic barriers.
They had to come up with counter measures against them but the time that would take frustrated the Hierarchy when the reports reached them after the first round of engagement. The admiral in charge of overall command wished to deploy his dreadnoughts but the sight of the enemy's 22 dreadnoughts along with the super-dreadnought deterred him from this line of action...perhaps now was a good time to move his heavy hitters in?
All they knew was that the enemy was outnumbered yet they clearly had better shielding, although the disruptors did prove most effective against them, the number of torpedoes was finite and should be used against strategically viable targets, like the dreadnoughts and cruisers for example. The turians were thus surprised when the enemy frigates rushed froward once more, this time ignoring the frigate screen and began pulling off maneuvers that made even the most self-conscious pilot roar out in anger or jealousy, such movement was not possible for ships not using eezo to affect the mass of their ship...without it they would be torn apart by the immense gravitational force. Yet these aliens surprised the turians all the same and began loosing salvos of torpedoes...among the same projectiles used during the first engagement.
Pulse lasers of the GUARDIAN point defense variety, came to life as VI strained and gunners strained to fight off the wave of incoming torpedoes. They exclaimed in anger and confusion as the PD lasers missed when the torpedoes suddenly and most surprisingly shot out of the way of incoming laser bolts, the projectiles merely weaved through the heavy clout of laser fire while a few did get blown out, the projectiles also had the added benefit of being smaller than their missile counterparts. This bonus allowed for a lot of them to pass through the screen and made impact against the kinetic barriers, the explosions blinded every sensor within the blast radius.
Scanners sounded radiation alarms across the turian fleet as the warheads within the torpedoes showed high amounts of thermonuclear radiation a hundred times more powerful than even their current nuclear arsenal.
For the next two hours several of the turians' cruisers suffered heavy losses alongside their frigate escorts. The enemy's ships used in this underhanded attack were largely unharmed but even then had lost a handful of their ships to heavy concentrated barrage of mass rounds launched at lightspeed, even with their commendable maneuverability and shields they were no match for the turians' own and met with heavy resistance with further probes into their defense lines. The enemy cruisers suffered heavy damage across fifteen of them when they moved in to relieve a few of their stranded frigates but their firepower was vastly proven to be much more devastating when in mid to close range as proven when a single enemy cruiser took down four turian cruisers on its own and its shields were not even close to breaking. Only with the combined effort of atleast fourteen frigates and another eight cruisers was the shield broken and the cruiser received damage to three of its forward turrets and its port hull.
Both fleets pulled back to their lines to lick their wounds but the damage was done. With several losses within the turian fleet, where a thousand ships had once graced the Xaxrix system with their presence now numbered a little over 890 vessels. Communications was also cut off by the enemy using some sort of jamming signal that the VIs and dedicated hackers and specialists were working to untangle. But it would seem like the enemy fleet, even with their small numbers, was outfitted with weapons dedicated to fighting larger ships. As is evidenced by their heavy use of nuclear ordinance.
Aboard the Turian Dreadnought Great Myrmidon.
Bridge
It wasn't a surprise to the Turiam fleet when the aliens arrived in the system. Hell, the admiral wasn't surprised by this, what he was surprised at was the number of ships that came through the relay, he had expected a fleet twice or maybe three times the size of the first one they had encountered in the system they lost but not the same amount of ships encountered during the first fight, granted most of them were frigates. Admiral LayekKorianus, a politician by trade but forced into the military by his overbearing father, but even if he refused, it was mandatory for every turian who came of age to enlist in the military and serve a minimum few years of service. So it was with great pleasure and mirth that he found himself promoted to Admiral after a few decades of his career. He had been just a mid ranking flight officer serving on the bridge when he, along with several others, was deployed with a suppression fleet to pacify a certain race some twenty something years ago. That was a first contact scenario gone to shit and now he was reliving it all over again.
Tensing visibly whenever a new report would come in with details of a frigate lost to enemy fire or in one case, friendly fire, he hung his head low and deeply sighed, he was exhausted and his chest was aching from the wound he got during the short war with the humans all those years ago. He absentmindedly rubbed the spot where the wound was and closed his eyes, mandibles twitching every few seconds, a tick of frustration and irritation he developed a few months back. He groaned when his onmi-tool pinged with a new alert.
The message was nothing new but he saw that instead of losing his frigates left and right he did a human equivalent of a grin and his eyes seem to lit up. He'd been given the order by the Primarch to begin deploying his dreadnoughts and no doubt they will be an asset to his fleet. But the losses his fleet had sustained was taking its toll on morale and the limited resources they had at their disposal, not everything could be replaced and lives is top on that list. In fact, he had steeled his nerves and discarded his emotion to engulf himself within it later on, when he heard of the death of his best friend, a Captain of the Frigate named Orsinus. Captain TranouFeryak, a turian fighter pilot with a knack for field command, was promoted to a full frigate captain just a year ago but now he was gone….he had been a commander of a proud ship with a long history behind it and had not even two years in his new command and now he was gone.
It seemed almost selfish for the admiral to just file away that part of his psyche but he had to, he had a whole fleet of turians who all depend on him and his orders to get through this mess. He had to keep his nerves from forcing a meltdown on him, he was supposed to be the epitome of Turian military discipline and pride but he will mourn for his friend and the dead later. Now he had to focus his attention on getting his dreadnoughts in position to begin their long range attack against the enemy's cruisers.
"Send fleet orders to move dreadnoughts to max range and pick targets." Admiral Korianuscommanded, his voice emotionless and his stoic expression did nothing but affirm to his crew that he was determined to see this through, today they had shown that this new and hostile alien race was not invincible. They will show them the meaning of fear and why angering the turians was not a good idea. They outnumber them by a significant margin but they will destroy this new enemy with concise and well thought out plans that will make the most of the turians' strengths and the enemy's weaknesses.
"Orders received and acknowledged by dreadnought captains, sir." The communications officers reported with a salute and went back to working on monitoring their comm lines.
"Good. I just hope the spirits are with us this day…" Layek prayed as he watched the tactical display show his fleet moving its formation to provide room for the dreadnoughts to get in position. Cruisers responded with moving to the sides of the bigger ships to provide cover fire and possible shield overlaps. The frigates moved in between to provide better coverage of their GUARDIAN PD systems. The remainder, the damaged ships totalling over fifty, remained in the rear of the formation. Without even reading the full report, Admiral Korianus knew they were too badly damaged to be salvageable and will have to be scuttled but one or two may yet be saved….except for the lives lost, those can never be replaced.
He just wished this doesn't escalate into a full blown war, the mistake was on their part when the captain of the patrol group in the system where that massive relay was found fired on the lone civilian corvette analogue. There was a brief moment in the original log of the captain's ship where the aliens had tried to communicate and had indeed managed to get a message across, albeit garbled and not understandable. Its still taking time for the linguists back home to find a viable way to translate the damned alien language but it was so bogged up with static and unknown or unintelligible words the scholars, Salarians and Asari alike, couldn't figure it out and the fact that they didn't seem to be using eezo was disconcerting and therefore begs the questions; did these aliens not know who the Protheans were and how is it that they are able to have such advanced technology without developing Mass Effect technology?
To be brutally honest, Leyak couldn't care less about that bullshit. He just wanted the aliens to either give him and his men a break, he beat the living crap out of them or he gets ordered to retreat and save the rest of his men and ships before things get really out of control.
"Sir, the enemy are deploying the rest of their cruisers." Tactical alerted him and his eyes darted to the display. Indeed there was movement on the alien's part, their cruisers were rapidly moving towards his fleet, impressive speed but was still not as fast as their own sublight engines.
"Have our cruisers and frigates form a defensive perimeter around the dreadnoughts, but far enough for us to break formation should they launch their nuclear payload." Admiral Korianus' innate tactical mind played out several scenarios that may end in his favour but he couldn't see it….not yet anyways.
"Sir, dreadnoughts are in position. Cruiser targets have been marked and all ships ready to fire on your mark."
There was a long and tense silence in the moment the Admiral contemplated on one more scenario then his eyes flickered open and he barked, "FIRE!"
*"Attention!" (Pronounced: A-key-young)
Okay that's it for now….I've run out of time and money since I still haven't found a new replacement for my laptop. I'm uploading or have uploaded this from an Internet Café where the owner is a stuck up whiny little bitch….okay that explanation doesn't do this woman justice but I'm generally a nice guy so I won't comment more on that.
Moving on…
I would like to thank AlucardBellsing, for the names of the ships he provided me. I also would like to say to someone other than whom I mentioned here that I am saving the name you suggested for another dreadnought, not the ones I put in this chapter but in another one further along the way.
Also, as some people have pointed out, this story is a crack fic with a HFY attached to it and while a lot of you are okay with it like that, me included, I have also gotten some concerns from other readers that this is not a good direction for me to lead this story and frankly I am at a loss. From the other ME fanfics that I've read, a lot of which I have seen their authors' responses to this kind of dilemma, I am inclined to try and balance things out. However, to combat this, I have decided to only balance out the effects of weapons from either side, I don't know if my description of Mass Effect Distruptor torpedoes is correct or not but I expect some form of feed back on it.
Seeing as how many of you guys are conflicted with each other on which direction this story should go, some want this to remain as it is, while others want a more thought out serious outlook on it. I will let a poll (an official one) decide the fate of this story. The result will affect the future of this story or be left as it is (a HFY crack fic). Thank you all for the reviews and I await your reply.
Although I'll still keep the first two chapters as they are seeing as that's what got people to look at this thing in the first place but the third one….well I'll just leave that there.
Now a question or questions to all of you:
1. Should I include romance in this? Though it will be limited and won't go into too much detail like the blacked out s*x scenes in the game or intimate/deeply personal scenes between two subjects. It will only indicate who gets to hook up with whom and minor details. (This doesn't cover the occasional awkward situations like the one from the second chapter-which I may or may not write in as a sort of….what was the term? I think it was Omake? Yeah…whatever that means.)
2. How much of ground warfare should I show? The Stellaris game doesn't get into much detail in this field except to show you stats of how the battle is going so its pretty much going to be up to my imagination and that's what I'm good at! Fair warning: I may go over the top with the armoured vehicles of the Covenant but I'd like to hear your suggestions on tanks and APCs.
3. Be honest, did I or did I not buggered this chapter?
I've decided on a new slogan for my presidential campaign: "What the Masses want….the Masses get!"
In other news…
*British reporter in London talking in a high pitched gravelly voice*
"A man exploded today….when he was hit by a double-decker bus!"
*Pauses to catch breath*
"We have video footage!"
Points to those who can tell me if they know who said this joke…I might not know the one you're talking about but if I do I'll let ya know when I post the next chapter.
-Danen5….logging out.