A/N:

Guest: I agree completely. I had originally conceived this work as multiple stories that covered Pre-Fall Krogan, The post nuclear period , the Uplift and Rebellions, and the ME1-3. It would be an ambitious project to have that become reality.

FallenMetalGod/frankieu: I hope I can measure up to your expectations. I thought starting in Pre-Fall Tuchanka would be a unique take among the large number of fics on this game.

Tylol40: I wasn't aware of this, thanks for the recommendation. And don't worry, the Dino mounts will not be forgotten, I have great plans for Krogan Monstrous cavalry scenes.


Karaa is a stunning place, when I take a moment to actually get a good look. I spend most of my time in the Depths, the mining front at the lowest levels of the under-city, and so it is not often that I find myself somewhere with a good enough view to take it all in. The twin cities are built in what I am 99 percent sure is the crater of an asteroid impact, however many millions of years ago it was, you can see it pretty clearly if you climb up the banks of the Sun City. A massive ring of earth on an otherwise flat plain, not too dissimilar to the Wolfe Creek crater out in the outback of Australia, the main differences being that this one would be somewhere around 20 Kilometers wide, and that the impact punched a hole right into a cavern so large it developed its own biosphere.

Then some thousand years ago as the Dukun tell it, a number of enterprising clans saw the potential on offer and established what would become the sun city, followed not long after by the proto-undercity. The Krogan seem to have always had a penchant for living underground.

The defensibility of the crater rim, combined with a relatively sparse population of dangerous wildlife and the abundance of resources allowed the city to endure the passing centuries as other would-be nations rose and fell.

Now it stands as a testament to what Mass Effect 3 had only hinted at, that the Krogan had once had enough brain cells to rub together, and enough chill, to build wonders of construction and art that shamed anything they would build in the millennia after the Salarian 'Uplift'. Ziggurats reached up to peer well over the crater walls, themselves lined with farms and pastures of domesticated plants and animals. Massive stone bridges spanned above the city to connect the great temples of stone upon which you can look down into the bowels of the under-city, the great stairs of Nuhl descending to the very depths. The under-city itself was no less impressive, growing even as it provided the materials for the Sun City to expand, much of it was carved out of the stone itself and shaped by generations of Krogan who rarely felt the need to move up to the surface.

Unless the war drums sounded, of course. Even four thousand years earlier than Mass Effect, the Krogan are still Krogan.

Karaa has not been the target of outright war in some centuries, but that has not stopped us from finding an outlet for that particular urge in the ongoing battles of the surrounding nations. There is always territory, resources and above all, honor to be won contributing to the horrific death toll that would probably take Citadel level technology to accurately track. Such was life on Tuchanka, builders and artists though we are, above all we are warriors and life without challenge is no life at all.

I moved off to the side of the walkway as a trio of armed and armored Krogan walked by, their eyes lazily scanning the crowds, cradling large bore weapons that could be mistaken for cannons by the standards of any other race. Their shoulder guards bore the symbol of the Frhal, the closest analogue to police that Karaa possessed. Krogan law was not nearly as expansive and refined as that in my previous life, and the law enforcement reflected that, more concerned with large scale unrest or infestations of wildlife rather than theft or assault. If you were doing something stupid enough to get their attention, you had a better chance of a large callibre facial than ending up in a prison, a system of law enforcement that seemed strangely effective here. At first it seemed strange to me, with very little standing in the way of a Frhal shooting whoever they want and walking scott free; But as my mother had explained it, doing so has always resulted in one of any dozens of children, cousins or clan members returning the favor. The Krogan proclivity for violence acting as a check on itself…Maybe after a century or two passes I'll begin to understand these people.

I suppose that's another thing I'll need to get used to. Barring any unpleasant surprises, I can expect to live for…Well nobody really knows. Even at this stage of civilization, nobody knows how long one can live. Nobody knows a single Krogan that has died of something so inconsequential as age. Hell, of the council of five Chiefs that rule Karaa, three of them are the same damn chiefs who discovered the crater and founded the city, AND fought in every war since. It's going to take a damn atom bomb to kill those suckers in the end…

Speaking of which…The proverbial sword of Damocles hanging over me and every other poor scaly fool on this rock. I'm rather partial to not dying in nuclear fire, so I've spent the last three or so years trying to figure out how to avoid that. No resounding success there unfortunately. I have spent many a night in the long houses discussing with Brol over strong Krogan beer and roast varren, trying to understand how I could even go about it. One problem is that Krogan don't simply love challenge, they need it. Their brains are hardwired to seek it, and war is fast becoming the best and only way to satisfy that craving. I don't think there is any way to stop it, what we need is the discipline to take that and channel it elsewhere, in short I think the Krogan need to become more…Turian.

Somewhere in the future, our descendants are rolling in their graves.

Stopping the development of atomic weapons doesn't seem viable, I don't know when or where they'll be made, nor do I have any intention of becoming a roving doomsday prophet. The latter would probably end with me getting eaten by a thresher maw.

The scent of iron broke me from my thoughts. I spend far too much time thinking, enough that I'm considered an oddball by most. I'd arrived in the depths, despite remembering little of the journey. Down here the sun's light is faint, instead we live by the light given off by the numerous crystals mined and positioned around the under-city, their warm blue light has not faded in the centuries since they were placed.

They're warm to the touch, so they're almost certainly radioactive.

"There you are." Came a voice from my right, soft by Krogan standards.

"Yhorm." I greeted warmly. He was the foreman around these parts of the mine, and had taken me under his wing since the collapse that took my family. "Nothing explode while I was away I trust?"

"Not a whole lot of that since you started tinkering." He grunted. It was as close to a laugh as his emotionally constipated ass count could get. "Still need your help with the new drill though, stupid prototype shit."

I hummed in agreement, there was a cultural distaste for new tech. The Krogan liked things to last, and the cutting edge did not have a good track record.

"Idiots placed the air vents too far forward, they get stones inside right away." I muttered. "Would be better to cover them and put a hose out back, won't have to worry so much about dust either."

Yhorm stared at me. "Should be you up there making them, boy." It wasn't the first time he'd made the observation.

"Ah, but what would you do without me? You'd find a way to dig into a river." It actually wasn't impossible, there were already two underground rivers that cut through the under-city.

His responding nudge would have broken something were I still human. "Careful whelp."

The drill in question came into view as we rounded the corner, he had obviously had a few of his boys drag the thing up out of its hole. It was as large and imposing as you would imagine a Krogan made drill to be. Thick metal plating covering proportionally oversized gears and other innards, the drill head itself was a painstakingly forged piece of work that i had to admit was ahead of its time in comparison, i don't know how Yhorm got ahold of this but it would dramatically improve things…if i can get the damn thing to stop jamming as the slightest provocation.

"Do you have the wrenches I asked for?"

"There." he replied as we approached, gesturing his head towards a small pile of tools deposited at the base.

"Alright then, give me a hand to get that casing off."

It had taken me years to get over the strangeness of having only three digits, let alone the claws that impeded tactile sense, but I have to admit that it has become the new normal, they have a surprising range of motion and of course, steel bending strength. A fact I was grateful for as I lifted the 10kg wrench with a flick and got to work on the bolts.

"I don't get why they can't use normal sizes." Yhorm grunted as he got to work alongside me. "It was a pain in the quad to find wrenches for them."

"I imagine the smart ones are designing the machinery, whoever is left designs the rest." I chuckled back.

Together we made short work of it, heaving the heavy plate unceremoniously to the ground. The insides of the drill were nothing surprising to me, as advanced as it was by Krogan standards, being the first powered tool I had yet seen, it was nothing compared to the electrical transformers I began my career working on in a previous life.

"Looks like it will take your hand off if you poke around too much in there." Yhorm said as he eyed the drill's internal mechanisms.

I shot him a lopsided grin. "You're not wrong. Don't touch the lever there."

"The child thinks he's funny." The older Krogan muttered as he joined me in picking out the larger chunks of stone, the clacking echoing around us as he discarded them on the ground.

"One day they'll make these so stupidly compact, you wont be able to even reach into it." I said with a grunt, dislodging a particularly stubborn rock.

"And on that day, I'll grab a damn pick and do it the way Vulk intended." He replied, invoking the god of the forge.

"If you really believed that, you'd have never had this thing dragged-" I trailed off. There had been nothing out of the ordinary, just the sound of stone hitting the ground, but if I still had hairs on the back of my neck, they'd be standing right now.

"Boy?" Yhorm questioned before catching the look on my face. He gave the air a single sniff before huffing and leaning down to pick up one of the wrenches.

"Stupid things." he muttered under his breath.

I didn't have time to shout a warning before a shadow detached itself and leapt at Yhorm's back. He didn't need one. The wrench swung around with shocking speed and caved in the side of the varren's skull in an explosion of gore. Yhorm sniffed in contempt and gave the corpse a kick.

"Don't just stand there gawking, whelp; you know there's never just one."

Shaking myself from my stupor, I hop off the side of the drill, narrowly avoiding another varren in mid air as it sailed past and into the side of the drill with a yelp.

"They're a bit far from the river." I said loudly, gripping my attacker by the back of the neck and ramming its head into the drill once more. A dry snap told me it wouldn't be leaping around again.

I risked a glance over to see the remaining three varren attempting to corner Yhorm, the old bastard looked bored as he jabbed his wrench out anytime one looked to chance a shot at him.

With a slight huff I threw the dead varren, slamming it into the rearmost of Yhorm's attackers. It was all the opening he needed, swinging his makeshift weapon in a tight arc and catching one underneath the jaw, the remaining varren took the opening provided but only ended up catching a short kick in the face for its trouble. I barely paused to stomp its head into the ground as I walked over to look at the remaining stunned animal.

It twitched unhealthily, probably dying of head trauma from the blow Yhorm dealt it, its bulbous black eye struggling to focus on my face. Varren were a common sight on Tuchanka, especially underground. Usually they were smart enough to avoid Krogan dwellings, but occasionally they are forced closer than either of us care for by competition from other wildlife.

"Occasionally a pack gets a smart alpha." Yhorm said as he joined me. "Probably came here trying to avoid the crowds around the rivers."

I looked around at the bodies, none of them were particularly large. "Did you see the alpha?"

"No. And these are on the skinny side, either the pack has fallen on hard times, or these are the runts."

"Either way, we've gotta root them out." I sighed, this was not going to be fun.

The old man gave me a mocking grin. "You don't sound excited, boy."

"I'm not, I hate night hunts." It was true, I'd much rather sit here and tinker away at the drill.

"Oh don't be like that, you've been on dozens."

I gave him an unimpressed look. "And every time, I'm the bait."

"It builds character."

I blinked. Of all the phrases to cross cultural boundaries…

"Bah, you're getting too big to be bait anyway. You'll just scare them away." He waved before throwing a carcass over either shoulder. "Come, we'll pick back up tomorrow, let's get these to the Longhouse. With any luck, our drinks will be free tonight."

I looked down at myself. I'm not sure how big I'm supposed to get, I was already half a head taller than Yhorm and my small hump still marked me as an adolescent. With a mental shrug I gathered the last three varren, he was probably right, with all this meat we'll be quite popular tonight.

"Getting slow there?" I teased, nodding at shallow scratches on his torso. They would likely scab over before dinner.

He shot me an unamused glare. "Watch yourself boy, I've led and defended against Kakliosaur cavalry charges. This city will pass to sand before I let a varren get the better of me."

I grinned and moved to begin the trek up to the longhouse before he spoke again.

"Boy." He said, an unrecognizable note in his voice. "I've said it more than a few times, and you've laughed it off just as many…"

I turned to look at him, but his gaze was up, towards the night sky only barely visible from our position.

"You belong up there." He continued. "You think, you take apart everything you can and put it back together. Always have."

I remained silent as his eye flicked to meet mine.

"There's too many that burn, boy, and not enough that build. We're looking at a dark future if those who can do so hide away down here."

I opened my mouth, but had nothing to say in reply.

"My hearth is always open to you, but think on this…Properly this time." And with that he hustled on past me, leaving me staring at his retreating back.

A very human sigh left me, he was right. I don't know what the right course of action was, but I'm not going to find it down here. It was time to get out there and make waves…And pray that the galaxy will be better for it.


Small Glossary:

Dukun: Krogan who fill a role similar to that of the future shaman. Krogan attitudes towards medicine is skewed by their own powerful immune systems, regenerative ability and the sheer scale of death that is unavoidable in the harsh lands of Tuchanka. As a result, any medicine has become the realm of Dukun, individuals who also serve as councilors, historians and often priests of the various faiths. Cultural deference to the Dukun of your Clan is expected, and their livelihoods are largely supported by their clan members.

The Depths: The lowest levels of the under-city, predominantly mining land, the area considered to be 'The Depths' shifts outwards as more mining takes place.

Frhal: The peacekeeping force of Karaa. Krogan law tends towards the minimal, and thus this force is concerned predominantly with affairs outside of the concern of most citizens.

A/N:

Another small update since I had plenty of time today. I think breaking the world building down into smaller, more digestible chapters is the better way to get it done at this stage.

I am planning to release a chapter per week. I wont lie, my track record in this is somewhat...lacking...But it has been some time since I have enjoyed this much free time and desire to do anything creative.