The proving grounds were never quiet. Whether it be the muted whacks of hand to hand combat, the sharp pops of gunfire from the firing range, the roar of plasma torches as vehicles were repaired, or the hums of the engines of their skycars and the armored van that served as their flagship, no true gunship, but quite formidable on its own.

It was the constant commotion that made Narn appreciate the grounds so much, located in the former main plaza of the Batarian district, they had occupied the most immediate structures, evicting or otherwise displacing their original occupants and converting them to ad-hoc barracks, garages and armories. And it was here that Narn could be closer to his people.

Standing before a hastily constructed firing range created from the leftover detritus of the Krogan takeover were a trio of Krogan, standing behind their line of sandbag cover and taking shots at a scrapped skycar, towed into the center of the field to serve as a target, It was there he found Sarr as well, the older Krogan standing by the end of the firing line, barking orders to the three.

The predominant tactic the Krogan employed when shooting was to tuck the stock of their weapon into their shoulder, lean into the recoil and hold down the trigger until the thermal clip was spent, or just about. Narn had recalled how it irritated Sarr, who would invariably launch into a speech about training the men better.

In the end, Narn felt it was easier to just concede Sarr's point and leave him in charge of training.

"How many times do I have to say it! Short! Controlled! Bursts! You pyjaks are more likely to shoot each other than the enemy at this rate!"

One of the soldiers, a large, burly krogan with a pair of red facial markings running down either side of his face, whipped around to their drill instructor and snarled. "Tell that to the Batarians, old timer."

"Are you really going to brag about taking out soft-skinned gangsters." Sarr starts, only to shake his head as he reconsiders. "You know what, suit yourself. I can at least count on the others to claim glory once we face a real foe, you yourself would make a fine meat shield, at least."

The slight made against the Krogan's skill in battle immediately made him snap up, throwing his rifle down to the ground with a clatter, the other two watched, bemused as he stormed up to Sarr, their chestpieces clattering.

"Watch your tongue before I rip it out of your head, Fossil! The blood of Shiagur flows through my veins. I am more Krogan than you and those two whelps put together!" the red-streaked krogan sticks a stubby thumb over his shoulder, and the pair of krogan that were so bemused with the show suddenly moved to take a more active part, not keen on letting the insult go unchallenged.

What happened forced a legitimate chuckle from Narn, watching as Sarr put up a hand to halt the pair of Krogan before striking the insolent soldier before him with a backhand so fierce it produced a crack loud enough to be heard from several feet away. The soldier fell to his hands and knees, swaying a bit with the force of the strike, quite literally struck dumb.

"You don't look anything like the Blood of Shiagur, you look like a sniveling whelp who's not fit to lick my boots. Now, are you going to follow my instruction and learn to wage war like a true Krogan, or will I have to hit you again?"

The Krogan on the ground rose to his feet without a word, staring at Sarr with lethal intent. Meanwhile, the older Krogan looked completely nonchalant as he crossed his arms over his armored chest. Soon enough, the soldier spun on his heels and stomped over to pick up his rifle, taking aim and firing off a burst of rounds that shredded the door off the target skycar

"Good, there might be some hope for you yet." Sarr huffs, turning away just in time to spot Narn approaching him, in truth the throbbing ache in his head from the Warlord's headbutt had certainly tried his temper, and it felt good to smack that runt down, but that fleeting feeling of power had vanished as he stood at attention before Narn.

"Walk with me, Sarr." The warlord ordered, the trio of Krogan turned to get a glimpse of him before Sarr snapped back. "Did I say you could stop!?" Just as quickly, they had turned about face to fire at their target, led by the red-streaked soldier. Content, Sarr followed Narn down the Grounds.

"I saw that show with the red one. Good to know you haven't gone limp in your old age."

Sarr scoffed. "I'm not even 300. But compared to the rest of them that might as well be ancient. It's sad."

Narn offered a noncommittal mhm of acknowledgement before changing topics, he didn't want to get another wistful tangent out of Sarr at a time like this. "Are the men ready?"

"I still think you should reconsid-"

"Are. The. Men. Ready?" Narn cut him off, his voice blunt and gravelly as he glared at Sarr. And just like that he knew that the small moment of goodwill they had shared was gone.

The proving ground's right side opened up into a mix of barracks and mess hall. And taking a glance Sarr could see their forces, Krogan and Vorcha eating, sleeping, repairing armor and retooling weapons. Narn's calls for independence and his own established territory had been taken up by a varied group of Krogan from across the station. They defected from gangs, quit their former positions as bouncers and hired muscle, and more than a few followed Narn out of the Blood Pack. Even Sarr himself had given up a cushy, if demeaning, gig as a strip club bouncer. Their gear reflected that, where some had only come with a shotgun or basic rifle, others had been fully equipped in combat gear, the old gang insignias and colors freshly sanded off. All come to place their faith in the promises Narn made.

Carving out their own little nation from the flesh of Omega was tantalizing, but Sarr found himself wondering more than he cared to admit how many truly believed. He supposed it didn't matter as long as they thought Narn was strong enough to lead.

"The men are as ready as they'll ever be, I'd be more confident in our ability if we had a bit more time to rearm and repair the vessels, but all things considered we're in fine enough shape to challenge the humans. Now, about your plan."

Narn beat his fist against his own chestplate as he took a second to return the salute a pair of passing krogan had given him "What about it?" he grunted.

"It's a risk. We could afford to fight the Batarians because we knew that once we broke their leadership the rest would scatter like rats, but even that took longer than we thought. And you don't know the leader of the Humans in this block, what if we get dragged into another war of attrition?" As they walked Sarr realized they were approaching a shoddily crafted podium, a platform of scrap metal and concrete that had been grinded smooth. He's going to give another one of his speeches. He realized.

"I know you think that because you watched the old vids about the Rebellions that you're some sort of tactical genius, but I watched those vids too and I have two words for you: shock and awe. What good's a leader if there's nobody left alive to follow you? We have the advantage by starting the fight, and with the shuttle, the vorcha, and our guns, we'll obliterate whatever canon fodder they send to stop us."

For a moment the confidence in Narn's voice was so strong that for a few seconds Sarr was inclined to believe him, leaving him a few seconds late to think of a response, he never had a chance as Narn stopped besides the stairs leading up to the podium. "Call the men." He ordered.

Before long, About 500 Krogan, and three times as many Vorcha, gathered before Narn, the Krogan crowded at the front while the Vorcha flocked around the sides and rear like carrion birds, noisy and undisciplined, they clamored over each other and over the broad shoulders of the krogan, with a few being greeted with a shove or even a fist to send them flying back into their peers.

As Narn took the stage he looked out to his following, clad in his imposing combat armor.

"When the galaxy looks at the Krogan, it sees a race of pawns, believing that with a handful of credits and a few grunted orders they can use us as tools, as nothing more than living weapons! The Salarians used us like that, and when we saved them from the monsters and claimed our just rewards, we were denied!"

Sarr rolled his eyes. When you were close to 250 years old you started to notice certain things, there were beliefs and tactics that were an inextricable, subconscious part of each of the species in the galaxy. It disheartened him seeing Narn dredge up the same ancestral grudges that had been invoked to justify every would-be warlord and conqueror since the antebellum years of the Rebellions.

"And yet, history continues to repeat itself! Even now the few billion of us that remain in the galaxy have sold out our future to serve under those that are responsible for our downfall as a species. The Salarians that used us as soldiers in their war, or the turians who sterilized us, or the Asari that flaunt their civilized society while turning a blind eye to us being doomed to extinction. Even the Humans! For less than a century they've been spacefaring, and the Council is already eating out of their hand!"

Well it was the Humans that saved the Council a few years ago. Sarr thought cynically. But even he couldn't deny the anger building up in him. He may have thought that the justifications were overdone to the point of being cliche, but he couldn't deny the truth to it. It was only here, on Omega, where a Krogan could truly amass power and notoriety. There were scarce gains to be made on their irradiated homeworld, futility trying to keep their birth rate at replacement level.

This was one of the moments that made up for all others, it was how Sarr could stomach the Warlord's brutish nature and the constant dismissal of his advice, it was what made him forget the throbbing in his head from where he had been headbutted. If Narn could follow through on his promises, if he could carve out a place where Krogan could be in control of their own destiny. And if he could do it on Omega, who's to say he couldn't do it elsewhere?

"Today, we go on to prove that we'll no longer be subservient to others. Today we'll claim what's ours by right, and Gods help whoever stands in our way!"

The crowd erupted into cheers and skyward gunfire, chanting. NARN! NARN! NARN! NARN!

"At least we're all still alive."

"And how long do you think that will last."

"As long as they see a value in not killing us, and given that there's nothing to gain in killing us, I'd say we're safe."

Vendrix's eyes opened, once again scanning the confines of the small cell the three turians had been packed inside since Hammond and his goons had taken them.

The room was small and lacked furnishings apart from a bench installed into the wall and a single toilet. The whole cell screamed that it was meant for human captives, from the ergonomics of the bench to the bizarre L shape of the toilet. What was more was that they initially had no dextro food to feed them, that problem was fixed soon enough after Hammond had a militiaman purchase something for them to eat and drink. He had lazily thrown the sack of groceries, if you could call them that, onto the dirty floor of their cell, and inside the parcel it only contained bottled water and several tins of salted meat, packed with enough preservatives to last for at least the next half century.

Sitting on the other end of the bench, Anyo leaned up against the wall, sticking his hand into one of their tins of meat and pulling it out, the oil and congealed fats smearing on his palm as he shoveled the unappetizing mess into his mouth.

They didn't even give us utensils, they're treating us like animals. Vendrix thought, the hint of a scowl appearing on his face.

"There's nothing to lose from killing us, either. Maybe Vendrix would be safe, since he knows more about the Krogan than us, but even then." Anyo's twin, Antus, said. For the last few hours he had been pacing their tight confines of their cell, the soft scuffling of his boots against the concrete flooring had been a constant companion as they languished.

"...You know I'm trying to be optimistic, right?" Anyo replies, flecks of the pinkish meat flying from his mouth as he spoke.

"Oh…" Antus murmured, falling silent for a moment before he spoke up again. "Don't talk with your mouth full, by the way. It's unhygienic."

Anyo rolled his eyes. "Out of all the things to be concerned about, my table manners are what you pick?"

Antus stopped in his tracks and pivoted to face his twin. "I'm concerned about a LOT of things, right now. I don't need you adding to them!" He snapped.

Anyo pulled his head back as he grimaced at Antus, who relented as quickly as he had lashed out. "Sorry." He mumbled, running his hand down his fringe. "I'm just stressed."

"We're in this cell too, bro." Anyo said in a sympathetic voice, throwing his arm around Antus' neck and offering his half finished tin of meat.

Antus looks down at the tin, then to his brother, then sighs as he scoops his hand in and takes a bite out of the chunk in his hand, Anyo smiles and Vendrix can't help but watch, the scowl on his face having faded away.

The moment is interrupted by three heavy bangs against the thick metal door of their cell. The twins pivot and Vendrix rises up abruptly only to nearly fall over after forgetting to compensate for the brace still clamped down on his leg. With his hands braced against the bench they all stare at the door as it swings open to reveal a helmeted member of Hammond's Neighborhood Watch. His lips curl up into a dominating sneer as he turns his head to look over the three turians before settling on Vendrix and pointing at him with the muzzle of his rifle.

"You, get up, we're going." His muzzle swings to the twins. "You two stay in the corner until he's out. You move before then, I shoot you dead, got it?"

The militiaman was outnumbered 3 to 1, but Vendrix was hobbled and the twins didn't have enough room to maneuver, one sweep of his rifle and the guard could easily gun them all down. Sighing, Vendrix stands himself up and walks in his clumsy gait up to the guard, the twins acquiescing as they press themselves into the corner opposite of the toilet.

Before he's abruptly pulled out of the cell and forced down the Hallway Vendrix manages one last glance at the twins. "I'll be okay." he says, not knowing if it was loud enough to hear over the slam of the cell door.

Vendrix was marched down the fortress' hallways as he was led to what he hoped was a meeting with Hammond, his guard making no conversation apart from the gruff instruction for him to turn right, left, or take an elevator to a certain floor, the muzzle that was perpetually pressed against his back a clear warning of what the punishment for disobedience was.

It wasn't long before he was marched up to another door, this one a more modern sliding design, with a single press Vendrix opened up a room full of what appeared to be the more senior leadership of the Neighborhood watch.

They gathered around a table with a projected map blooming from the surface, casting illumination onto several men and a few women outfitted in combat hardsuits, their weapons lay propped up against the table with a few laying atop it.

"-My lookouts can confirm the gunfire is celebratory." Murmurs a tall, slender, rat-faced woman with short gray hair.

"They're Krogan, Fall. We could've figured that out ourselves." Another man remarks, slicking back his platinum blonde hair. "What we need to know is when they plan to move. I've got my guns patrolling the length of our borders and I'm hearing about Vorcha prodding us."

"We have the turrets set up, at chokepoints and along a few routes they could flank us." Vendrix recognized Kleinfeld, the mean looking human with the zig-zag scar, standing directly behind Hammond himself, who leaned forward with his hands laying on the table, his eyes intently studying the layout of the district. A king looking over his kingdom. Vendrix mused.

As if he sensed the thought, Hammond's eyes flicked from the map to lock onto Vendrix. "You." He announced in a low voice, and the dull whine of the leadership's conversations died out for a moment as they looked over to him.

"This is the guy that got us wrapped up in all this shit?" The man with the platinum blonde hair asked, resting back against the table as he got an eyeful of the turian in a leg brace. "Hope you're proud of yourself, buddy."

Vendrix stood up straight and looked him in the eye. "Rest assured, I cannot express enough how little I desired for this outcome." He drawled, his words dripping with mock sincerity. Before the human can respond Hammond clears his throat.

"I didn't bring you up here to lock horns with my Lieutenants, Vendrix. Just tell my people what they should expect from this warlord and his little band and if there's any potential weaknesses we can capitalize on." Hammond said, his voice cool and diplomatic, not unlike when he first spoke to Vendrix, seeming to ignore that he had gone from dragging Vendrix around Omega while he was still healing to holding him and his friends hostage, and now he expected him to help just like that. He had seen where that had gotten him so far.

"Well...it seems to me that they should succumb if subjected to high velocity projectiles. Have you tried shooting them?" Vendrix quips, laughing despite himself. He manages a hearty chuckle before the entire left side of his head explodes in a blinding flash of pain, he lets out a choked gasp as he falls to his knees, clutching his head as he groans.

"Don't!" Hammond shouted as Vendrix turned his head up to the guard, recognizing the correlation between the grip of a pistol and the throbbing pain in his head.

The diplomatic voice that was there only moments before was lost as the man exploded at the guard. "Goddamnit did I fucking tell you to hit him!? get the fuck out of here!" Hammond barks at the guard. Waiting for him to close the door before he jabs a finger at the kneeling Vendrix. "Pick him up and put him in a chair. Jesus-fucking-Christ that moron better have not fucked him up bad."

Vendrix didn't fight as he felt the arms lock around his arms and get him into a seated position, the rat faced woman named Fall had even brought him a bag of ice, which he accepted with a mumbled thanks.

In another few minutes Vendrix was seated in his chair, holding the ice to his throbbing head as Hammond let out a long exhale. "Listen-" he begins. "-I'm trying to do what's best for my people here. That's all I've ever done since I got in charge. Taking you and your friends against your will was...a bad idea. But you just help me here, you all go free. My people are safe, you go back to yours. We all win. You get me? Nod so I know you understand."

Vendrix's head lolled up as he let out a growl from the back of his throat. "I'm concussed, not invalid. I understand."

"Good. Now, please, tell us everything you know."

When Vendrix looked into Hammond's eyes, he searched for another lie, another deception. But he only saw the tired, weary eyes of someone with too much of a burden on their shoulders. Despite appearances, he suspected that this was the first time where Hammond had to prove that his militia truly could protect their home.

As so, Vendrix told Hammond. Everything from the story of the first deal gone bad, the one Anyo had been injured in, to their ill-fated deal with Lady Pughnoh, and even what he had been told by Mrs. Quinnus herself when she had called him to brief him on the situation with the Krogan. As he spoke Hammond gestured for his lieutenants to take notes and revise their strategy. By the time he finished, Hammond still looked weary, but there was a determination behind his eyes. He rested a hand on Vendrix's shoulder, the Human meeting the Turian's gaze.

"Thank you, Vendrix." He turned to look towards one of the other militiamen that had moved back into the room.

"Kill him."

The blood froze in Vendrix's veins, for the second time it seemed as if the world had slowed, he was in the burning skycar all over again, covered in blood, barely alive. He could see the guard raising his rifle up to level with the side of his head, he could hear the Fall woman's scoff and the sudden ping of her Omnitool, seeing her read the message sent and seeing her eyes widen. Turning to face the window as a thin, red shape dives down towards their building before vanishing and being engulfed by a blooming fireball.