To be clear: This story is based on the Bad End omake in Psi Effect, where the humans never made first contact with the Citadel because the Reaper Invasion began too early (It's on the Space Battles version). This forced them to retreat and leave the Citadel to be annihilated.

Consequently, this story has nothing to do with the main Psi-Effect storyline.

The very first human I had met was Shepard. John Shepard. I met him on a battlefield with my dead sisters littered around me. That was a thousand years ago, when the Reapers had still been ravaging what's left of the galactic civilization.

When John saved me and my sisters from the Reapers, it was as if a new kind of hope blossomed in my soul. The humans will save us. The humans will save us.

That was a delusion, a delusion born out of desperation and belief. The Citadel Civilization believed that the galaxy could be made into a peaceful, ordered place where all sapients could respect one another and unite ourselves through common principles.

The Reapers proved us wrong. We live in a pitiless universe, where destruction are death exist in the empty corners of infinity, far beyond our hopes and dreams…

(Sound of drinking)

In this galaxy, the ideals of the Citadel cannot exist. Only self-interests exist. Only survival. And the humans have survived.

Their entire civilization is based around the idea that the universe was hostile, and that they must see it as a threat. Most Asari would have regarded such an outlook as depressingly pessimistic. Most Asari are now dead, and those who lived have done so at the mercy of the humans.

(Sound of drinking)

Ah, the humans… They are a cold, analytic race, easily upset but strong, very intelligent and deadly. When the Asari first encountered them, we found it strange that we shared so many common features. I know several Asari who were hopelessly enamored with a cold, stone-faced human (I'm one of them), and through this attraction, we have convinced ourselves that they are like us.

But that, too, is a lie. Their psionics make them closer to the Ethereals than to us. Oh, there are the Ilena Thanoptises who would argue with me, arguing that there is warmth hidden deep within the human soul, and there is truth in that. Humans are capable of compassion, unlike the Ethereals, and that compassion can be as sweet as Terran Chocolate.

But I wish to present you with another truth, a truth based on numbers, as the humans say. Out of the hundreds of human Temple Ships, less than a dozen had accepted refugees from the Citadel species, and only because they plan to use us in their fight with the Reapers. Are those the actions of a compassionate species.

And that is the source of my anger, of all anger among the Citadel survivors. They could have saved more. To that, the humans would answer that they have no duty to save, that survival dictates a harsh mind and an iron heart. They're right, and I hate them for it.

I once saw the humans as many Asari see them still - beautiful, a source of hope. Now, I see them as something becoming like the Ethereals that once tried to conquer their homeworld, alien and terrifying. This is true even for my Shepard.

Forgive me. I'm rambling. Where was I?

Yes, the humans. It is important that the remnants of our people should not pin our hopes on the humans, tempting though it may be. They consider us expendable, and a pitiless part of me agrees with them.

This is not merely conjecture on my part. Very few of the Citadel survivors and their descendants know about the infamous Duterte Incident, but those who do, have very few delusions with regard to human mercy. Don't get me wrong. Mind you, the humans are not even trying to hide what happened with the Duterte, but if you don't ask, they won't tell.

(Sound of drinking)

So let me tell you about this little piece of long buried, long ignored piece of history.

The Duterte Incident took place late in the Reaper Invasion, when the humans had shifted from rescuing Citadel refugees to attacking isolated Reaper battle groups. The Temple Ship, Duterte, had taken in a few thousand refugees over the span of a decade.

However, the largest batch of refugees came from a battered fleet of survivors, near the edge of the Serpent Nebula. Information is sketchy, but from what I've heard, the humans of the Duterte only accepted a certain number of refugees, leaving the rest of that fleet to die.

Heartless?

Yes, but we must understand that Temple Ships do not have infinite resources, despite human technological supremacy. Only a certain amount of food, energy and logistic supplies can be allocated per sapient in any given Temple Ship, and the Duterte is among the poorer ones.

So from that ramshackle fleet of refugees, the humans only saved a portion of them, leaving the rest to die. That turned out to be a bad decision. Once inside the Temple Ship, the Serpent Nebula refugees began instigating some of the other Citadel refugees, and soon a small riot had erupted, injuring several servitors and damaging several equipment.

The rioters demanded that the humans save their families and friends. They demanded that they respect their sapient rights. The humans responded by leaving all of the refugees on a third tier garden world, including those who did not riot.

The Psionic Avatar of the Duterte was said have left them with this message: "We saved you and you responded with demands. So be it. You can demand your so-called species rights from the Reapers."

In a matter of days, the Reapers found the refugees and exterminated them.

The humans have saved a lot of people, but they saved them for their own designs. When you don't want to comply with those, it's right out the airlock for you. I'm drink and I rambl… rambling, but I don't care.

Shepard is better than most. He's saved numerous Citadel refugees, and helped them to find new purpose in their life, including myself. But beneath that warmth, lies something alien and dangerous. This is true for all humans, even the relatively xenophilic Titans. Beneath their Asari-like features is a species closer to the monstrous Ethereals.

And they terrify me. Shepard, for all his nobility, terrifies some secret part of me…. I've run out of gin, and I must get more.

End Recording.