Disclaimer: I own nothing...why am I even writing this thing...isn't it a bit redundant to write this every time? You know what? I'm not gonna argue on this...oh yeah and hopefully my OCs don't mess things up too much. Don't want the Reapers to chicken out on us now, do we?
*Slight changes made to this chapter with missing words and misspellings corrected. I've also changed the relationship between Nathan, Matthew and Harald making them all brothers with Harald as the eldest. Ages are: Harald 240, Matthew 140 and Nathan 135.
Turian Dreadnought...[Dear Readers, for story interaction purposes, you get to name the Turian ship]-PM me with suggestions please (Five will do-I'll pick out the one that sounds cool-ish)-
Bridge
Kreiyik Kessor, the Captain of this Dreadnought, assigned to assist Patrol Group 238 that had found a dormant relay. A relay that the same patrol group reported was over 30 kilometers long, 20 km tall and about 12 km wide. This report set the Salarians into a gleeful dance...literally, he was there and he saw a group of Salarian scientists hop around and dance to a non-existent melody.
He could have sworn he heard that inaudible tune, or maybe the 300 ships in front of him was causing him to hallucinate. He turned to a nearby ensign and asked, "Slap me."
"What?" The ensign was startled by the Captain's sudden and very inappropriate request. "Sir..."
"Captain! We're receiving a hail from the unknowns!" The Comm Officer, a Turian by the name Latoria Generius, if Kreiyik remembered from the crew manifest when he first boarded this dreadnought. It was brand new too, fresh off the assembly line so to speak.
"Is it audio?" Kreiyik inquired of the Comm officer who looked back at his holographic monitor/screen. The Captain's mandibles twitched anxiously as he waited for the Comm Officer's reply.
"Sir, its audio!"
"Play it then."
The bridge crew all strained their ears to listen to the audio from the alien ships that loomed over 110,000km from their position above the fifth planet in the Vasir system, one of the many outer rim territories within Turian Hierarchy space. The crew comprised mostly of Turians, however, there are a number of volunteers from the Asari, Humans and Quarians in the fleet.
Among Kreiyik's own bridge are two humans, five Asari and a Quarian (well two actually but the other one is in engineering).
"Well where's the audi-"
The Captain was cut off when a loud BOOMING and all round intimidating voice that spoke in an almost low growl threatened to cause the speakers and several terminals to go haywire. When it spoke, everyone paused and paled instantly, or whatever passes for a pale complexion for the Turians, the humans were as white as the walls in the medbay, the Asari were suddenly a shade of blue or purple lighter than they were before and the quarian...well...no one actually knows what color the quarians' face look like since they never take off their suits! In perfect Turian the alien message played;
"Our God demands the extinction of your pathetic race...and We are His instruments!"
Silence reigned through the bridge as the crew looked to each other for some form of comfort or at least tell them that they didn't hear that message right. No one offered any and this caused the Captain's mandibles to open and close in rapid movement. He was unsure of what to feel...on the one hand he had a hostile alien entity declaring war on his race. On the other hand...well there wasn't much on the other hand besides the gnawing grim feeling of being outnumbered, possibly outgunned and hopelessly OUTNUMBERED! 'have I mentioned that before?' he screamed within his mind searching for anyone who might have an idea of what to do.
'Crap! I'm the Captain of this ship! I'm the one who should know what to do!' he berated himself angrily and turned to the ensign next to him. "Ensign-"
"Sir!" The female quarian volunteer, who manned the Tactical Terminal, yelled out frantically waving her arms to catch the Captain's attention. "Scans show those ships don't use eezo! But I've detected an absurd amount of energy signatures radiating off of them!"
"And how big are those ships again?" Kreiyik shuddered to think of the massive sizes of the ones farther back of the alien fleet. He was hoping his own math is wrong-
"Holy shit!" A human operator manning the Statistics terminal stared disbelievingly at his monitor. "Captain! Sir! You are not gonna believe this!"
"Stop beating around the bush, human, and spit it out!" Captain Kreiyik can never understand why these humans always had to use meaningless words...just get straight to the point is his motto...er...maybe.
"Sorry, Captain." the human crewman apologized but didn't look one bit happy to, in fact Kreiyik noticed the man was muttering something under his breath. "Well sir, the smaller ships are about the size of our cruisers...don't ask me how they can field that many cruisers but they do...then there's the obvious kicker, their dreadnoughts which outnumber the Turians own total of dreadnoughts, I think, and are on average at...dear lord...1.7km...I think...but...uh..."
"What is it?!"
"Well, Sir." The human crewman looked at his Turian superior, whom he was sure no one likes-his personal observation of fellow crew members' gossip-and gulped a sizable lump in his throat. "There are 55 super-dreadnoughts...e-e-each...each up to 3.6km..."
He didn't finish when the quarian suddenly had a fit and fainted right there on her terminal, her body hung over the side of it disrupting the electronic hologram that was her screen, which flickered on and off.
"Spirits..."
"Goddess..."
"Holy mother-of-pearl!"
"Sir! I'm picking up heat sigs from those weapon turrents mounted on the top side of those ships!" The TacOp Officer yelled out in alarm. "Shit! They're launching missiles!"
"Goddammit!" Captain Kreiyik's use of a human curse word was lost in the myriad of shouts, yells and swearing that erupted as soon as the aliens started firing. Kreiyik watched the tactical display show the lead dreadnought, at 2.2 km it was larger than the Destiny Ascension. 'Why in Spirits would they need so many ships...of that SIZE?!' "Send fleet wide evasive maneuvers...NOW!"
"Sir!" The Comm Officer responded with a frantic push of the holographic keypads as the order came.
'Well...there goes my math diploma out the window...' Kreiyik thought grimly as he eyed the 3D tactical display.
In the emptiness of Space...
Outside, the alien cruisers had begun opening fire, they let loose a salvo of what looked to be torpedoes, missiles-the size of a civilian corvette-what the hell!, and a shitload of smaller missiles...all of which were headed in the Turian fleet's general direction.
Not wasting time...and seeing that the missiles and torpedoes would take a while to reach their lines, the Turian fleet seized upon this drawback and began maneuvering out of the missiles line of fire. Frigates darted downwards, while the cruisers and the single dreadnought deployed to reinforce Patrol Group 238, all pushed their engines into an upward thrust maneuver.
For about 15 minutes the missiles and torpedoes traversed all of 110,000 km and finally reached their targets, or where they should have been some 15 minutes ago. However, much to the surprise and horror of the Turians, the missiles and their torpedo pals suddenly twisted in an abrupt and almost impossible turn...scratch that...the hard turning maneuvers the alien projectiles made were impossible to do. It would have simply caused the missiles or torpedoes to break apart due to the tremendous G-force.
But it seemed as if these things decided to defy the laws of known physics! Of the fifteen frigates that were deployed (which included the two from PG-238) about seven of them were hit by torpedoes with what looked like glowing blue centers and with an incredible force that literally disintegrated them or broke them apart into several thousand pieces of space debris. Although smaller, the bunched up whirling missiles proved to be effective against the frigates' GUARDIAN point defense lasers. This left only 8 of the original 15 frigates, the rest of which scrambled to evade the remaining projectiles that their GUARDIAN laser point defense strained to bring down. Much to the chagrin and annoyance of the Turian commanders, the torpedoes and the missiles chasing their tails were actively dodging any oncoming laser attacks. A majority had been destroyed but the remainder were eagerly gaining on their acquired targets.
Four of the five cruisers (including the cruiser that had initiated First Contact) had been unable to dissuade a swarm of whirling missiles, about the size of their own disruptor torpedoes. Many of the larger missiles had proven to be just as elusive which greatly defied both the laws of physics and annoyed/scared the hell out of the GUARDIAN point defense operators. When the first of these large projectiles hit their target, a cruiser, it had exploded into a great fireball of nuclear radiation and death. The cruiser was literally torn apart and melted down along with their crew complement. A lot of good men and women were killed by just one alien missile.
"These bastards are using WMDs!" The TacOp Officer onboard the Turian dreadnought screamed at the top of his voice, his mandibles flared open in anger and disgust, as well as horror. A mixture of fear and adrenaline causing his emotions to rise and fall in a cascading torrent of hate and anger...as well as apprehension and exhaustion.
True enough, three other cruisers went down...or up? in similar fashion as their GUARDIAN defenses were overwhelmed by the smaller swarming missiles and then the larger ones connected with a zealous vengeance as it tore through hull and crew and then proceeded to explode in a fiery display of orange, red and yellow. The scanners nearly broke due to the sheer amount of nuclear radiation it was picking up from the explosions. The debris were nothing more than charred and molten slags of metal with no discernible signs of their crew. Many a man or woman hung their heads in defeat at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation.
They hadn't even managed to get within effective weapons range and here were the aliens soundly beating them without even suffering any losses to themselves...except for the ordinances the Turians managed to shoot down with their point defense lasers. Captain Kreiyik gave the general order to retreat, to his remaining ships, all of which engaged their short range FTL to jump to the other side of the system, within a 100,000 km of the other (smaller) relay.
My Apartment
0610 hrs
I just can't believe it...
I mean...I'm watching my ships totally fucking up the Turian fleet and destroying more than half their ships. I...I'm speechless. Granted I had 300 ships, most of which are destroyers and cruisers, but to see the Turians not even putting up much of a fight. Man that's kind of a serious let down. To be honest I expected them to actually destroy or wound at least two or maybe five of my destroyers but seeing them being soundly beaten to the curb? That's almost as bad as when the Europeans colonized the Americas in the 1600s.
What the Fuck man?! What kinda update is this?!
...
You know what? fuck it.
I'm just gonna enjoy it while it lasts. So the Turians are...what the-holy shit! Did they just?! Yeah they did! Those cheating fucks! They actually...that actually worked...so their sublight engine FTL capabilities work just like they do in Mass Effect. Hmm...I wonder if I can replicate that...okay...seeing as how the situation log has been updated with debris recovery missions, I'm going to cross my fingers and hope I can research Element Zero technology.
Huh. The 1st Fleet is just sitting there...oh well, I looked at the computer monitor and found the submenu on the right hand side, scrolling down on it I found the card for the first fleet and selected it. I know I can just click on the fleet but I like to...take a more...uh...dramatic, yes thats it, a more dramatic (if somewhat long) route.
Hehehe...I sure taught those Turians a lesson they'll never forget.
I clicked on the set stance button and switched it from passive to aggressive. Now the Holy Pacifier will attack any unknown vessels that enter the system. Maybe I should reinforce them...how about the 4th and 12th fleets? Yep, Holy Martyr and Holy Shit are the ideal choice for reinforcing this system which is...funnily enough named, Galenix Beta. I wonder who comes up with these names?
Now where are my science ships?
Oh wait...I think I'll send in the Eye of God, after all it wouldn't sit well with Dr. Kodiak if I give his find to some other aspiring science officer...hehehe...man, just thinking about it like this makes me wonder if the characters are even alive.
Pfff...as if.
*dundundun*
Captain Harald (POV)
"Captain?" Comm Officer's tired and sleepy voice, came over Harald's personal communicator. "We've just received new orders, sir."
"Did you just wake up?" The Captain asked his subordinate, there was a long pause on the other end of the line before the Comm officer answered...in a more sober voice.
"No, sir. I woke up two hours ago...its the migraine I'm getting that's really bothering me. Its actually making me more sleepy than I would have hoped."
"Very well. I did warn you that you'd have one hell of a hangover from those Killian Booze, that alcohol is not for the faint of heart." Harald chuckled as he remembered the young Communications Officer adamantly demanding his superior officer to bring out his stash of some of the most well aged and fine alcoholic beverages. A well-known secret...one which the Captain actively denies exists, until there's a party to be had. "All that aside, what are our new orders?"
"That's the thing, sir. Uh...well, the Grand Marshal himself called me up when I arrived at my station. He gave me a priority Alpha-X5 package."
"A what?" Captain Harald fell off of his chair at the mention of such an important delivery. Only the most sensitive and very dangerous missions are given to science ships during wartime with those last two designations. X5. "Are you certain?"
"Yes, sir. Is-is this what I t-think it is, sir?"
"I don't know. I'm on my way to the ship. Contact Dr. Kodiak and the rest of the crew and have them report to the Cargo Bay assembly area, ASAP!" Harald put on his dress blues with the signature military gold trimmings and a few medals hung from his right breast pocket, personally put there by the Grand Marshal himself during the war against the avian xenos two hundred years ago. He had retired after the war...hoping for a less exciting life. 'Get a civilian job they said, it pays well they said, it's safe they said!' yeah right!
His third year into the job and he's getting his ass shot at by frigging aliens...all over again! He is seriously considering rejoining the navy, heck, with his prior experience in commanding ships, he'll likely be made Admiral! 'You know what? I think I just might take myself up on that offer.' He smiled at this line of thought and was seriously considering it, 'Okay, if all goes well on this next mission, I'm re-enlisting with the Navy.' He made up his mind, just as he finished dressing up and exiting his apartment.
He lived in one of the many rented living spaces on board the Marlin Spaceport, which is in geosynchronous orbit with the military stronghold, Keep. The planet itself is located five stars away from the Galenix system where a heavy military presence had sprung up and one of the desert worlds there, the fourth one from the red giant sun, is in the process of being terraformed.
Immediately hailing a mono-rail cab, he was whisked away at mach 13, across the midsection of the spaceport towards the more militarized area. Here he found his way to the elevators which zoomed upwards, downwards then sideways to reach his final destination. The elevator doors opened up to reveal a disheveled Captain Harald, his slicked back hair in a tangled mess and his uniform blues all crunched up, while his face was plastered with red lipstick.
A young woman, a stunning blonde, who was similarly dressed in a Captain's uniform albeit not so messed up as her male counterpart, walked out of the elevator with a satisfied smile on her lips. Her bright red lipstick was smeared to the right side of her mouth so she carefully wiped it clean, along with the little bit of white creamy substance that stuck to her fair and smooth skin.
Harald patted himself down and quickly rearranged his appearance before leaving the elevator, which was kind enough to wait while he did this, the Captain walked out and looked around the large hangar bay for his ship. He needed no longer look than a few more meters before his eyes settled on the angular and rectangular shaped ship that bore the name Eye of God.
"Ah...ain't she a beauty!" He admired his ship for a moment, taking in the view before the same female Captain walked by from behind him. He yelped in surprise as the blonde reached down and squeezed his right butt cheek. "Damn it, Steph! Don't do that!"
"Aww...wittle kwapten can't take a wittle squeeze?" She pouted playfully as she quickly leaned in close and pecked at his cheek. "See ya later lover boy! I'm off for a new assignment."
"Wait!" Captain Harald recovered from his stunned trance, calling out to the blonde Captain, Steph, full name being Stephanie Mazdik, daughter of the famed Ace Pilot, Rosela Carabiner-Mazdik (who bagged over 1200 kills during the war 200 years ago). He envied her mother's status but such thoughts are not to be acted upon for they corrupt the Covenant. "What new assignment?"
"You didn't hear?!" Stephanie cupped her hands from about a 100 yards out and yelled back at him, "It's official! We're going to war! Whoo!"
'No way...' Captain Harald Vandersen's thin lips formed an evil grin as he thought his chances of becoming Admiral were that much closer now that hostilities had been declared...though the aliens hadn't officially done so, but that didn't matter to the Holy One. Once that big guy makes up his mind...whoever or whatever he is, he'll see it through to the end. The Covenant wouldn't have made it this far into their spacefaring history without his continued support. Of course there were periods of time when the Holy One would be absent but in that time, he/it, would leave a set of instructions to the Grand Marshal and trust him to carry out his duty to the best extents of his ability.
"Sir." His TacOp Officer greeted him at the airlock with a swift salute. "All hands are on deck and the good doctor is inside on the bridge awaiting your arrival."
"Great..." Harald muttered gravely as he thought of the time he would spend with that idiot, a smart idiot but an idiot nonetheless. "Fine. Do we have enough supplies for the trip?"
"Yes sir."
"Good. Where's the helmsman?"
"Over here, sir!" The high-pitched yell coming from behind the Captain revealed it to be the aforementioned helmsman, who looked like he'd just gotten out of bed. He arrived and quickly did a salute, executed with the exact military precision taught in all military institutions throughout the Imperial Covenant. However, there was something odd about the way the young man glowed...
*sniff*
"Is that women's 38' Granger D-9 I smell, helmsman?" Harald scowled at his subordinate who cringed in fear and unconsciously stepping backwards.
"Y-y-yess, sir?" The nervousness in the young helmsman's voice was not lost on the Captain who simply glared at him before relaxing his facial muscles and smirked.
"No hard feelings, helmsman..."
"Fred, sir." The young fellow supplied.
"Right. Well don't take it so hard. I was just messing with ya." The Captain patted Fred on his back in a friendly...more like brotherly gesture. Then with a wink he grinned at the poor kid and said, "Seriously though, try and keep it in your pants when you're still technically on duty."
"O-of course, s-sir!" Fred saluted and nodded gratefully. The TacOp Officer watched the exchange with a questioning look on his face, he wasn't sure whether to leave first or just watch it play out so when the Captain visibly relaxed, so did he. Phew.
All three men entered via the airlock as it slid to the side and let them in to the decontamination chamber, a few seconds and the green lights turned on. Another set of bulkhead doors slid open and they entered the bridge. The ship itself was small but it was large enough for their purposes.
"Ah. Captain Vandersen." The cheery voice of the good Dr. Kodiak, reached Harald's ears and he blanched. "Good to see you again. Although I would have preferred Captain Mazdik for this op."
A glare was thrown to the science officer and he felt like he was about to die but shrugged it off, he was too important to kill….yet and cleared his throat. "Now, now. I was just joking. However, the gravity of this mission is such that we need to be very fast in getting to our destination. The Alpha-X5 is to be given the highest priority and should we fail..."
He let that hang in the air for the moment and anyone who was within earshot felt a cold shiver down their spines at the thought of being offed for failing a mission. One thing the Covenant hated more than disgusting non-humanlike aliens was failure. Over the course of their rough and very turbulent history, the Covenant had executed 8000 officers of various ranks, 900,000 thousand soldiers of various ranks, decommissioned over 4 million vehicles that were found to be at fault (i.e. malfunctioning or missing some parts or didn't want to start at all...or the well-known excuse; "we ain't got no fuel"), a few scientists (though not many were outright executed, rather they were simply retired), and in one case, which Harald found to be utterly ridiculous, the brass was unsatisfied with the performance of one their few Titanic Beasts.
Of course that last one was promptly scrapped by the Holy One who saw no reason to blame the poor beast when it had accidentally stepped on its handler...er...commanding officer.
"Let's just not dwell on that thought though...bad for health." Dr. Kodiak added and turned around to leave but stopped, "Ah, yes. You called for an assembly in the Cargo bay...I'm afraid there simply isn't enough room there so we'll have to make do with the PA system."
Harald snapped out of his thoughts and nodded absentmindedly, he walked over to his chair while the Fred and the TacOp Officer went to their respective terminals. The Captain sat down and asked whilst looking to his Comm Officer. "Prepare a ship wide broadcast, Comm Officer Rodeo."
"Aye, sir." Rodeo nodded slowly mentally kicking himself as another sharp pang of pain slammed the side of his head but he groaned quietly and soldiered on. "You're on the air, Captain."
"Alright people." Harald began, "Last time we were out there, we got shot at. Luckily for us, ol' Goddy, is a mighty great protector and its thanks to her efforts and those of our engineering crew and our pilot that we got out of that mess alive." *Crew cheers in the background* "Alright, settle down. But now we've been called upon once more to serve as the hand of the Holy One and this time its a priority mission entrusted to us to carry out efficiently and as quickly as we can. It'll be dangerous but now, at least, we have our flyboys in the Navy to look out for us. That is all, now lets get out there and bag us some alien tech! Whoo!"
The bridge crew gave out cheers and patts on the back as they applauded. They were all happy they hadn't died during their previous mission and with the ship repaired they were once more called to breach the unknown. Dr. Leon Kodiak didn't partake in the celebrations but he did listen and thought the Captain's speech was crap. Of course, he wasn't going to let the man know that. Instead he looked over from where he usually sat, the Science terminal to the Captain's left side and spoke.
"That was an inspiring speech you made, Captain Vandersen." A crooked smirk escaping before he could stop it.
"Fuck you, Kodiak." Harald gave the science officer the finger before turning his attention to the helmsman. "Fred, get us underway...easy does it, we don't want to scratch the new paint job. Otherwise, the mechanics and the engineers might tears us a new one."
"Aye, sir. Being careful of the paint job." Fred blurted out with a cheeky grin but then had to duck to avoid a slap to the head from the Chief Engineer who was on the bridge and happened to be passing by the helmsman's terminal on his way to the Engineering deck.
The ship lurched abruptly to the left causing Harald to yell out in alarm, "FRED!"
"Sorry, sir!"
"Just...focus." Harald grumbled as he pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration, if the kid wasn't one of the best pilots in the science fleet, he'd had send his ass to the outer colonies to dig manure.
The science ship departed from the space station and as soon as it reached the edge of the system, it disappeared in a flash of white light.
Aboard the Flagship Pacifier
Bridge
Admrial Jorik was fuming with disappointment. He had hoped this new race would prove a distraction from the boring fights he conducted against the usual space borne beasts, most notably the Crystalline and void entities, pirates and rebellious colonies. But he was sorely disappointed by this race's lack of adequate response to his first volley of missiles and torpedoes. 'Okay, so maybe we outnumbered them...and outgunned them...and basically outsized them. But still! To fail that utterly? We must be dealing with a rather primitive race here, then again, all of their ships had spinal mounts..most of them with a moderate number of turrets but they're mostly for anti-fighter and anti-missile platforms with a small number dedicated as mainstream gun batteries...'
He was so deep in contemplation that he did not see the holographic form of another wizened and aged man in dress blues that had more decorations than one could count. The hologram waited patiently but was visibly becoming irritated with the lack of attention he was getting from the Admiral.
Communications Officer Liam Terrence, just over 100 years old and one of the youngest to have made Comm Officer, looked over to the Admiral then to the hologram and then back at the Admiral. He wasn't sure whether or not to tell the Admiral that he had a priority holo-conference with the Grand Marshal but Admiral Jorik had given him strict orders not to disturb him under any circumstances so...
"JOHANN GET YOUR HEAD OUT OF YOUR ASS!" The Grand Marshall shouted out at his fellow senil-senior, which caused the good Admiral to go rigid and then turn around slowly.
"Er...who are you again?"
"Don't even try the 'I'm old and senile' card! It won't work!" The hologram growled and glared at Jorik who seemed to get the memo and stopped pretending. A serious look crept up and took hold of his expression.
"Sorry, sir. Won't happen again." Admiral Jorik saluted and stood at ease, feet apart and relaxed his shoulders. "What do I owe this visit?"
"The Holy One has left instructions for you to position your ships near that smaller Relay. You are to shoot anything that comes out of that station." The Grand Marshal informed the Admiral who looked thoughtful, if instructions are left then the Holy One must be busy but he is sure he can handle any problem that comes at him. Then he thought of something else.
"Sir, if I may ask..."
"Go ahead."
"You called the Station a Relay?"
"I don't know how I know it but I do...right, we can't keep calling those damned things stations so I'm making it official. We'll use relays from now on, understood?"
"Crystal, sir." Jorik nodded but then thought of something, "Sir...if I may be bold as to say that...it would be better to inform of the Science Department of the new name for these massive stations."
...
"Sir?"
"Don't you have a job to do?"
Jorik nodded and saluted as the hologram disappeared. He glared over at Terrence and stomped to the man's terminal. "Why didn't you inform me that the Grand Marshal was trying to communicate with me?"
"Sir, you gave me strict orders not to disturb you. I told the Grand Marshal as such and he assured me that I leave you alone." Terrence explained, silently praying to the Holy One that the Admiral doesn't throw him out the airlock.
"What did he say exactly?" Still glaring, Jorik waited for the trembling communications officer's reply who was starting to sweat waterfalls.
"I-I-I-he-h-h-he t-t-told m-me that it was f-fine and that he wanted to see the l-l-look on your f-f-face when you t-t-turned around...s-s-sir." Terrence was stammering profusely and his knees were shaking so bad he had to grab onto the sides of his terminal to prevent himself from collapsing.
The entire crew on the bridge were expecting a verbal storm of shouts and curses but instead they visibly relaxed when the old man they all knew as the Vault Breaker, for his mission against the giant space vault and its fearsome defenses (which took out four fleets and took about ten fleets to break through-with the 1st Fleet suffering heavy casualties except for Jorik's ship which dealt the final and decisive blow), started laughing in his usual baritone voice which reached its peak and he settled down.
"Ha! That old codger still has some pranks left in him...but he lost it now!" Jorik continued laughing as he returned to his chair and sat down on it causing it to bounce slightly. He saw his crew looking at him like he was crazy and with a smirk he simply said in an exaggerated and dramatic voice, "What?!"
Nobody dared say anything and quietly averted their eyes from their somewhat eccentric admiral. Most of them knew what he was like at times, but others were shocked and mentally scarred by this. They hoped a few weeks of therapy will erase their memory of that event, poor Terrence might have to go through five months worth of therapy to get over this.
Outside in space...
The 300 ships, cruisers, destroyers and battleships, that made up the 1st Fleet/Holy Pacifier, slowly lumbered through the void and headed towards the smaller fork shaped station on the other end of the system. A new name for the stations was radioed in from HQ and the new term to refer to these stations was Relay.
Moments later they reached their destination and set up just 50,000 km from the relay. Reports flooded in that a science ship, the same one that had been attacked in this very system, had arrived through the other more larger relay and was requesting an escort.
A destroyer was ordered to break off from the main formation and it headed back to the other end of the system to rendezvous with the Eye of God. It took a few hours to reach there in cruising speed but there weren't any nearby threats so that was a plus.
The captain of the science ship thanked the destroyer's CO and both ships proceeded to where the alien debris were located, near the fifth planet. The Gelanix Beta system had six planets, with the first one being a molten planet of magma and lava but the second and third planets were nothing more than toxic and barren wastelands while the fourth and sixth planets were gas giants. The fifth planet was surprisingly a pristine Gaia world.
Already there were plans being put into play to send in a colony ship to begin construction of a shipyard and a military colony on the planet, it will be turned into a military stronghold and act as a forward operating base to launch a new crusade into this galaxy.
Now that was something that was hard to swallow. Most of the crew of the fleet had nearly went insane when their scanners kept on scanning and scanning and scanning and...you get the point...their surroundings trying to determine where they were in the galaxy. It was around this time when they discovered that they were in a whole new galaxy and it was infinitely way bigger than their own.
If what the sensors were picking up is true then this galaxy had hundreds of thousands of stars...however, the scientists back home were in a state of controlled panic when the data came in that the scanners were still picking up new star systems within the new galaxy.
By the third day they had arrived in Gelanix Beta, over 2 million stars had been detected, and by the fifth day, just a little over 10 million was picked up and the sensors were still counting. It's become a common sight to see scientists faint after reading the new data, most had become used to it while others just couldn't help but feel weak at the knees. Why! Just yesterday the scanning had reached a 50 million and still sprinting forward like it was a marathon!
Two weeks in and the colony ship had arrived with its contingent of skilled engineers, miners, scholars, scientists, geologists, environmentalists...a whole lot of other -ists. The shipyard had begun construction as well and the system had received two additional fleets for security, the 4th and 12th fleets (known respectively as Holy Martyr and Holy Shit), with 900 ships in the system the new colony/FOB was as secure as one could get.
My Apartment...
0700 hrs
Crap! I have work tomo-oh wait, its the weekend. Sheesh...man I thought I was a goner!
But seriously, I've been sitting here for nearly 3 hours, I had to go to the little men's room for a bit, but so far nothing has happened. However, I do have to say that I'm starting to notice some strange things occurring while playing.
For one, when I ordered the 1st Fleet to attack the Turians, my Battleships hadn't tried to engage first, instead the cruisers, specifically my Javelin and Torpedo classes, moved forward and began loosing salvo after salvo of missiles and torpedoes. The destroyers didn't move an inch and just sat there as if waiting for something.
My battleships hadn't even so much as fired their long range Giga Cannons! I watched them sit there on their asses without ever firing off a single shot and instead waited while the missiles reached their targets. I tried clicking on the fleet and then right clicking on the Turians but the fleet didn't respond, only so far just letting my cruisers engage with their missiles and torpedoes and I'm glaring at my screen as if the thing had broken.
After a while I just let them be. However, if I didn't know any better then I would say the damn admiral had gained a mind of his own...pffft, yeah right!
I look at the time and see that its nearing half past seven so I decide to call it a day and saved the game. I watched as the thing finished saving then I opened the menu and selected exit game. The screen blinked and the game vanished to be replaced by my desktop save screen, a black knight standing in front of a ruined castle with his back to me and his head pointing upwards to the sky. He was on his knees with an arrow to his back. Poor sod. Then again...it looks cool the way he seemed to just stand there as if thinking of all the things he had done up to that point in his life...crap...I'm sliding off topic.
*sigh*
I turned off my computer and yawned. I really need to sleep but I guess I can continue playing later...you know...when I wake up.
Few minutes later...in bed...
After coming out of the bathroom and feeling slightly refreshed from that bath, I change into my pajamas...what?...and slopped down on my very comfortable queen size bed. It is very comfy and I doubt there is anyone else who has anything like it.
Er...not that I'm bragging or anything.
*sigh*
You know what I'm going to bed...
Closing my eyes I began dreaming...well that was quick...I was in a bedroom...go figure...I was just waking up...weird...oh well might as well as enjoy it.
Inside somebody's bedroom
A man stirred on the queen sized bed that he had told friends was the most comfortable bed in the whole galaxy, he bragged how it would get him to sleep almost instantly every time he got on it. He even bragged that its gotten him laid on more than one occasion, this little bit of information was met with skeptical stares and sniggering. He proved them wrong of course when he provided home videos, which he assured them was done with the consent of the women he slept with, and showed them to his skeptical friends. That shut them up fast.
A groan and a hand grabbed his head, the man slowly sat up in his bed and made to get out only to be stopped when a hand grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back to bed.
"Don't go just yet..." a feminine voice begged flirtatiously as a woman revealed herself from underneath the blankets and snuggled up the man's bare back. Her breasts firmly grounding themselves against him as he stiffened and turned his head back. His eyes widened when he saw who was in bed with.
For her part, the woman opened her eyes, long eye lashes fluttering, but suddenly her own eyes widened as it dawned on her who it was that she was cuddling. "NATHAN! WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING IN MY ROOM!" She screamed in his ears causing him to cover them.
"Your room?!" He yelled back rubbing both ears. "In case you haven't noticed! This is MY room!"
She looked around and realized he was right but then glared at him and kicked him forcibly off of the bed and covered her chest with the blankets. "Oh! You are so dead! When I tell daddy about this, you're going to pay!"
"The fuck!" Nathan exclaimed as he stood up from the cold floor and shot a glare at the woman. 'Who was she to kick me off of my own bed?! Oh right...she's Admiral Johann Jorik's granddaughter...oh man did I mess up!'
"Don't point that thing at me!" She shrieked as she covered her eyes when Nathan's manhood was swinging around with every movement he made. His face went red and he grabbed a pillow to cover himself with. "Aarrgghh! Get out and let me change!"
"Hey! You get out and let me change!" He retorted angrily but a glare from her and he bolted out the bedroom. The door slid shut and locked behind him. "Great! Just fucking great!"
"Hey bro." Nathan glanced over to his left and down the hall he saw his brother, Matthew, looking at him with a jackass grin. "See you and Matilda still can't hold your liquor."
"Oh Holy One. Please don't tell me it happened again." Nathan moaned as he thought back to that party he attended. It quickly spiraled out of control and pretty soon everything was black...next thing he knows he's in his bed with Matilda Jorik of all women! 'Why me?!' he stared up at the ceiling in a melodramatic pose with both arms held up. His pillow fell and Matthew looked away yelling at him.
"Damn it, Bro! Get some pants on...you're fucking disgusting!"
"Says the guy who ran around the city naked!" Nathan quipped snarkily at his brother who cringed and glared daggers at him.
"That was ONE time!"
"Whatever-" the door to his room slid open and the slender body of Matilda barreled out crashing into Nathan and both of them falling on the floor with Nathan landing on his back while she fell on top of him, her chest cushioning his handle and the tip coming up to her lips.
"Awkwaard." Matthew stated and turned away from them heading towards the kitchen downstairs. Nathan and Matilda both got up quickly with Matilda landing two quick punches in the man's abdomen.
He doubled over and coughed. "The hell was that for?"
"That was for fucking me without my permission...again!" She screamed at him and kicked him in the groin. Causing him to squeal an unmanly scream as he dropped to the ground and moaned as the pain traveled through his lower body.
She stopped at the stairs and angrily declared, "You're DEAD, Nathan Vandersen! You hear me?! DEAD! D.E.D! DEAD!"
When the woman was well and truly gone, Nathan not sensing her unique thought patterns, he let out a low grumble as the words escaped his lips, "You spelled dead, wrong, you illiterate bitch...arrgghh...damn that fucking hurts!"
"You okay there bro?" Matthew's voice called from downstairs. "Bro, you still alive?!"
"Fuck you, Matty!" Nathan spat out as he picked himself off the ground and groggily and painfully entered his room and went to the bathroom. There he opened the dispenser and got out an ice pack for his aching and bruised balls. "I am so not drinking around her again."
Few minutes later...
"Hey bro." Matthew greeted his younger brother as Nathan stepped into the kitchen. "You heard about the new war right?"
Nathan nodded.
"Did you also hear that Harald's ship was nearly blown to Holy One's kingdom come?"
Nathan paused as he was reaching into the fridge to grab the carton of Melok milk, he turned to look at Matthew with an expression that says Don't bullshit me dude but Matthew just stared at him with a grim look.
"You serious?" Matthew nodded, "And when did you hear about this?"
"When the war was officially announced. He called me up and told me about what had happened." Matthew explained as he gobbled up two Vatalan fried eggs and a Leton (sort of like bacon).
"Why didn't the government inform us about that?"
"You know those bureaucrats won't lift a finger until a superior tells them what to do...they're fucking clueless!" The older brother pointed out as he waved his hands around to emphasize his point.
"Point taken." Nathan grabbed his carton of milk and poured himself a glass. The milk was a thick creamy green substance that is native to the animal of their planet, the creature was a hulking 10m tall and has enough milk and meat to sustain a single town for a month. He downed the glass in one go and exhaled, "So while I was off getting my ass drunk and somehow ending up bedding Matilda for the sixth time, ol' Harry was being shot at?"
Matthew looked thoughtful for a moment and then nodded, but he decided to voice a question that's been bothering him for a while now. "You've been in bed with that crazy detano (their native tongue equivalent of bitch)for six times now?"
"Yeah...oh no! We are NOT talking about that! Next subject!"
"Okay..." Matthew wasn't expecting that response but seeing as how his brother was acting and pouting like a child he decided to switch topics. "Have the results for your application to Psionics division come out yet?"
"Now that you mention it..." Nathan pulled up his neural link interface (referred to as NeLI) and mentally thought of the page he wanted before it showed up. Matthew cannot see what his brother was viewing, not without accessing his own NeLI, so he waited patiently before Nathan smiled from ear to ear and began talking in an excited tone. "Dude! I'm in! I'm officially in!"
"No way!"
"Yes way!" Nathan began jumping up and down as he did a little victory dance (AN: think of the victory dance from that movie Evan Almighty).
"Bro! Cut that out!" Matthew protested when his brother was doing that weird dance he does when he gets overly excited. "Seriously, bro, cut it out! Its fucking creepy!"
"I'm going to ignore that." Nathan sneered at his older brother but was too excited to actually be hurt by that comment. "You are now looking at the newest mid-tier officer of the 5th Psionic Commandos under the direct command of Jalen Mazdik himself."
"So you get to be bossed around by your idol, big deal." Matthew scoffed playfully but Nathan ignored his quip and proceeded to wolf down his own two eggs and Leton. "When do you think you'll deploy...we're going to war now so the 5th Psionic Commandos will be attached to whatever army that will be formed as part of the Expeditionary force."
"I don't know...we'll see when it happens." Nathan shrugged and drank another glass of Melok green milk. "I've got my orders to show up at the Psionic barracks for further assessments before I'm assigned to the 5th PCs. What about you?"
For a moment, Matthew was shocked, he had totally forgotten that he was also in the military. Navy to be exact and was in command of a Cruiser, the Wild Beast. At age 140, he was the youngest in military history to have command of a Cruiser, beating Admral Johann Jorik's own record of 151 years. He looked back at his brother who was pouring another glass of milk before a single thought opened his connection with NeLI.
He accessed the Navy's Classified Database and entered his LOGIN and PASSWORD. After a pause the neural screen dematerialized and another one materialized in its place. It listed Matthew's ship information and beneath the ship's name was a red flag, marking it as an urgent message. He opened it and his eyes went wide.
"What is it?" Nathan asked curiously.
"Shit!" Matthew cursed and quickly got up from his chair. He rushed up the stairs in record time and a few minutes later he came back down dressed in his blues. "Sorry bro! Gotta go, orders came in, I have to get to my ship! My fleet departs in 30 minutes!"
Nathan watched as his brother disappeared through their front door and it closed. He went back to the kitchen and returned their plates and cups to the sink rinsing them before setting them aside for when the maid would come on shift and begin clearing the house. He sighed and opened his NeLI and saw that his own set of urgent messages had come in. The first one told him that he no longer needed to go for assessment. While the last one was an order to pack his stuff up and report for immediate departure to the 5th PCs HQ on Pelak, a planet two hundred systems away from his home planet, Yesif.
"Great...just great..." He muttered to himself as he began packing up his essentials and leaving a message for the maid to take care of the house while they were gone. This brought back painful memories of his mother...'No don't think about that!'
He growled and left his house. It looked like all the others in the suburban neighborhood. Three stories high and cream white colored. A front lawn and a backyard with a pool. Very generic but then that's just fine with him...and everyone else.
Setting off into the sunset he smiled and wondered what kind of adventures will he be faced with during this new war.
Somewhere in the Milky Way Galaxy
(-Its around 7pm in Real world for our gamer guy-)
In a dimly lit room on a large space station...
"Are you sure they haven't found it yet?" A female voice filled with concern, dread and frustration, asked to one of the dark figures in the room, sitting across from her at the table.
"Yes. Preliminary scans and tests indicate this species does not invest much in spying or stealth technology for that matter." The voice that replied was distinctly male but it was higher pitched and talked very fast. "Indicates that they don't need such devices if they're flaunting around that many warships in one system. Will be their downfall."
"Why haven't we send in an attack fleet yet?" Another more angrier voice joined the other two. It sounded metallic but firm and strong. It was also male. "These new aliens attacked and destroyed nearly half of Patrol Group 238 and the ships sent to reinforce them. Why do we have to sit here and do nothing?"
"Calm yourself." The female voice spoke with a calmness that belied her frustration, "Acting without first acquiring the necessary information may result in more unnecessary deaths."
A quiet pause gripped the atmosphere as the three dark figures momentarily took a breath. Then continued.
"What else have your spy satellites have picked up?" The woman asked.
"We cannot send it any further into the system, too risky, but we've picked up signs of a colony that has sprung up on the fifth planet...a garden world."
"One that we had plans for colonization." The metallic voice growled in an angry tone as the person it belonged to watched the orange holographic screen play out the scene of several large ships patrolling above said garden world.
"Our initial scans and readings from the First Contact survivors show these aliens don't use element zero on any of their ships." the snappy voice pointed out. This elicited a gasp from the other two.
"Not possible!" the metallic voice declared. "Everything in the galaxy is based on element zero! These aliens must be very primitive if they're not using it on their ships!"
"I must agree with...er...what was that?" the female voice faltered as she caught sight of something in the video.
"Ah. You noticed it?" the high pitched voice sounded gleeful when the woman had been able to pick up what his operatives pointed out to him earlier.
"Goddess..."
"What are you-Spirits! How-how is that even possible?!"
"I have no idea!" the snappy high pitched voice said as they all watched the skeleton of the shipyard suddenly become whole and then began adding several other parts in quick and rapid succession. Finally, it stopped and from it starships began pouring out at an impossible rate.
Whoever...or whatever these aliens were...they were a force to be reckoned with.
"All in favor of removing restrictions on the number of ships we can field?" The metallic voice offered. His spirits lifted when the other two affirmed to his proposal. "Very well then...I'll talk to the Primarch about this."
Hey guys! Danen5 here with the end of this, a second part, for all of you. Thank you all so much for taking the time to tell me to write a second chapter for this story and let me thank again for the reviews, favs and follows...its been hectic for me since I recently sat for the 2nd round of Police Examinations...have I mentioned that already?
Nevermind. What I really wanted to say was:
How was this chapter? Was it satisfactory? Is it too much? Or less? I seriously cannot tell since I wrote this while dru-er-somber? Ah! Crap!
Seriously though, give me your thoughts on this and if you have any suggestions then feel free to PM or review. If you see anything that can be improved then tell me about it and also I want to ask you dear readers a question that is important for the continuation of this story if you so demand it.
Question is:
I have not yet decided which part of the ME trilogy to set it in. So now I humbly ask for your valued opinions dear readers.
Which Mass Effect (whether 1,2 or 3) should I set this story in?
There I have broached the question. Now it is up to you guys to decide on which one. Please review or PM me with your suggestions...although reviewing is preferred since I can track the number from there.
-Danen5 Out!