A/N: How'd this end up so long? I wasn't even going to write about the Vorcha.
Chom looked down at his home. He knew that he would never see it again. He couldn't say he was sad to see it begin to receded away from him, but neither did he look forward reaching his destination.
The world where Chom was born was small, hot and overcrowded. When your species lives only twenty years there is precious little time for childhood- less still when you're unceremoniously thrown from the hovel you call home at six. But that was the way of the world. The new baby made Chom simply one mouth too many to feed. He wasn't heartbroken.
He learned the ropes of the street quickly- how to pick a pocket without catching anyone's attention, how to find the best crevices in which to sleep at night, how to kill another Vorcha with a bit of broken glass before he could kill you. Chom was not happy but neither was he unhappy. He lived as well as anyone he knew and had neither the time nor the inclination to give his existence any further thought. He might have lived out the rest of his allotted days like this, dying of old age in a gutter in ten or twelve years, perhaps earlier in a bar fight or a scuffle over food, had his hand not slipped.
His gang had dared him to sneak a pistol off a Blood Pack recruiter in the bar. It wasn't the sort of thing you could say no to- not without losing face- so he did. Or he tried to. Standing behind the Krogan at the bar Chom nearly had the pistol out of the holster when his finger slipped and the gun to fall heavily back into the holster, alerting the Krogan to his presence. Chom jolted but not fast enough. The Krogan grabbed him by the collar and threw him onto the bar, holding him down by his throat. The certainty Chom felt in his own approaching death as he looked into the beady eyes of the Krogan left no room for any other thought or emotion, not even fear.
"You've got a quad on you to come up and try to steal my pistol when I've got my whole team here in this bar," growled the Krogan
Chom was silent, unable to locate in his mind even the words of a plea for his life. The Krogan burst out in laughter.
"And you won't even beg for your life like the rest of these rats. I like that kid. You're Blood Pack material."
And so Chom came to find himself taking a last look down at the planet through the dirty window of a merc transport. He held two fingers a centimeter apart in font of his eye. Everything he had ever known could fit between them now.
"You first time offworld?" hissed a grizzled veteran sitting near him. Chom stared at him a moment and then nodded.
"If you get through training it not so bad," he said with a laugh that turned into a hacking cough.
"Blood Pack pay good- food, females, place to sleep. All you got to worry about are shepards," He said, his face turning serious. Chom bit.
"Shepards?" He asked.
"Shepards," Hissed the veteran disdainfully, "No good meddlers. Go sticking noses into not-their-business. Vorcha try to make honest living- merc, smuggler, red sand- not doing no harm to no one- not doing no harm to shepards but they no can leave alone. Alliance, C-Sec, hu-mans, turians, asari- all shepards," he spat.
Chom looked back out the window. The planet had disappeared from view completely. He'd rarely seen any stars through the city lights and smog but now dozens flitted by his window every moment. It made him feel dizzy so he turned back to the veteran. He looked old. Maybe even 16 or 17. Chom though of what he had had said about shepards and fiddled nervously with the gun in his lap. He had assured the Krogan he knew how to use it, though in reality working guns had always been rather about his pay grade as an urchin.
"Vorcha beat them, right?" Chom asked finally,
"Ehh?" The veteran cocked his head
"Shepards- Vorcha kill them, take guns?"
The veteran shook his head.
"Shepard come, Vorcha leave if you want to live. I hear story, before first shepard Vorcha live all over, control Omega, then shepard human come, kill Vorcha, make them leave."
He shook his head again.
"Have to be careful, careful now. Vorcha home world," he spat on the floor in disgust again, "No can live on, not enough food. Omega, space station, shepard cities, they no want us- they say 'We no want merc, we no want red sand.' but Vorca no can be scientist, no can work at store." he said with a derisive laugh, "No, Blood Pack only place for Vorcha. It good you join. You watch your back, you no bother shepard and it a good life."
Chom pressed his nose to the window. When he looked out he could no longer see stars, only streaks of light. Once he's been sent by the gang to another settlement. That was far away, two days there and two days back on foot. The Krogan had said they would be in the ship for at least twice that long and if each of these specks they passed were as big as his planet...
He looked away from the window again. The thought made his head hurt. There had to be a way for things to make sense again. His mind turned over the veteran's words.
"You say there was first shepard?" He asked,
"Yes, human leader. Now its pack even bigger than Blood Pack."
"I kill shepards, I take their guns, I make new pack."
Chom wasn't sure where the words had come from but once he had said them he liked the sound of them. The veteran laughed his raspy laugh,
"Good luck kid, I like to see it."
The more the Chom turned the idea over in his head the more he liked it, if one human could start a pack- why couldn't he? He'd never seen a real human but he'd seen them in vids and they didn't look so tough- all soft fleshy skin and funny looking stumpy legs. True, the universe seemed huge and terrifying now but so had the city when he'd first left the house. The though comforted him. He had a plan now a goal. With new-found boldness he turned back to the veteran.
"Old man you teach me, how you use gun?"