Final Meal
Tali knelt panting, her sweat and breath fogging up her mask as she struggled with a steaming hot heat sink valve. The Alarei was safe but the fleet incurred severe damage due to lucky hits from the Batarian fleet and the stress of constant maximum speed movement. In fact one of the engines of a liveship exploded yesterday under the strain. That live ship had to be towed along by two other ships on the way to the Mass Relay slowing down the fleet. Luckily all of the ships that made it to the relay were still able to perform the Mass Effect jump to the Sol Sector.
Now they were currently in their Mass Effect jump and they had a precious few hours before exiting the jump point. Tali's mind swam with worry as she thought of her final glimpse of the Heavy and Patrol fleets fighting a desperate rear guard as the rest of the fleet escaped through the Mass Relay. She wondered if Aunty Raan would survive and make it through. She knew not all of the ships would make it, a handful would have to be the last and there would be no one to cover them. She didn't know if they would attempt the jump or go out in one final blaze of glory. Privately she hoped they would take their chances and attempt the jump. You wouldn't know unless you tried afterall...
Finally Tali managed to patch the heatsink valve and the pipe stopped leaking superheated gases. Her enviro suit could keep her alive in extreme temperatures but this room was seriously pushing it. It was so hot here water vaporizes almost instantly and anything flammable instantly combusts. They had drained this room of most of the oxygen and hydrogen in the hopes that the room wouldn't explode. The risk was much lower now considering the main engines were now off and the ship was moving thanks to propulsion of the relay.
Tali stood up and was about to head to another valve when one of the engineers stopped her.
"Take a break Tali, get some food and rest." the engineer said calmly. Tali, now almost delirious from heatstroke, vaguely recognised the voice of her friend Laetor.
"I'm fine…" Tali said breathlessly as she paused, unsure of who she was speaking to.
"Trying to figure out who I am? Get some rest Tali, the repairs are almost done." Laetor replied with a chuckle.
"Right…" Tali muttered as she stepped out of the room. Immediately she felt her suit cool down as the ambient temperature plunged from that boiling hot room. Tali took in a grateful gasp of cool air and felt her head clear ever so slightly.
Tali decided that maybe it would be better if she grabbed something to eat… and some water, water would be good. As she dragged herself to one of the canteens she found herself staring at a display that read an announcement from the admiralty.
Priority Notice
In light of the current crisis situation all food has been rationed and converted into nutrient paste in order to conserve food supplies. All adult individuals are allocated 1500 calories a day in the form of two nutrient paste meals.
Water is also being rationed and each individual is allotted 800ml of water a day to be retrieved at the nearest canteen.
The admiralty apologises for any inconvenience or discomfort caused, may we stand united in the face of this great crisis.
Keelah Se'lai
Tali sighed internally as she took a tray and headed over to the nutrient paste dispenser. She watched as the machine dispensed a disgusting looking green paste onto her plate. Nutrient paste was more calorie efficient as it is more easily absorbed by the body. The problem was it tasted horrible and was barely edible. Nutrient paste was most commonly used in the wider galaxy by the more unpleasant prisons to feed their unwilling tenants. A poor choice for a potentially final meal…
The fleet often resorted to Nutrient Paste when food was low much to the grumbling of the populace. This time however she noticed the canteen was quiet except for a few mothers coaxing their unwilling children into eating the vile paste.
"Hey Tali." a familiar voice said from behind.
Tali turned to see her friend the socially awkward Veetor, he was two years younger than her and was training for his pilgrimage. Although it seems like her his pilgrimage would be put on indefinite hold.
"Hey Veetor." Tali greeted.
"Hey." Veetor replied as she sat down and just looked at her.
"So… what have you been doing?" Tali said, trying to break the awkward silence before it fully solidified.
"I've been helping in the infirmary, mostly clerical duties. I don't know much about medicine so I just do what I can." Veetor replied softly.
"Right…" Tali said, honestly Tali liked Veetor, he was a gentle soul even if talking to him sometimes felt like chewing glass. That was not to say she was a social casanova, she wasn't exactly a very social person but she was alright by the average standards.
In truth she didn't have many friends, most were intimidated by her. Not due to her personality but mostly due to her social station. She was after all Tali'Zorah, only child to Rael'Zorah, the admiral of the Support Fleet. The Support Fleet were the main engineers of the migrant fleet, they retrofitted old ships and maintained existing ones. They were also combat engineers and were trained to repair external damage to ships in the middle of fights. Needless to say that was an extremely dangerous job and it was a volunteer only vocation. Their ships like the Alarei were engineer cruisers filled with maintenance equipment like specialised shuttles and specialist engineers.
Due to her relation to such an important individual and the fact she was also a naturally gifted engineer made her quite unapproachable. It was quite common for Quarians to have some form adolescent romance but Tali was well… never approached. Thus she was close only to two individuals the first was Veetor the social outcast that had a knack for agriculture and hydroponics. The second was Kal'Reegar, an older male marine who was also born on the Raya, Tali's birth ship. He was two years older than Tali and had already completed his pilgrimage by returning with a large stockpile of weapons. Reegar was quite headstrong and generally no nonsense which made him fit poorly with the more reserved Quarian culture.
So it was with these two odd balls that Tali spent most of her adolescence, she had other female friends of course but they were more playmates than actual friends. As they got older they drifted apart and now she only had Reegar and Veetor. An unlikely trio for sure and always quite the sight to see. The loud and headstrong Reegar was often the only one able to sustain a conversation with Veetor and then there was Tali as always being the voice of reason within the group.
"It's really scary, Tali…" Veetor said shakily.
"Why what did you see?" Tali asked, furrowing her brows.
"From my window I saw one of the Alarei's shuttles, it took a direct hit from one of the Batarians kinetic shells. They just vaporised, all that was left was molten metal…" Veetor replied shakily.
"We'll get through this right? We'll lose the Batarians?" Veetor asked with a clear tremor in his voice.
"The admirals have a plan right? We aren't just jumping blindly through the Mass Relays?" Veetor said shakily.
"No we aren't." Tali heard a weary voice say as she turned to see Reegar standing behind her with a tray of nutrient paste.
"Reegar, how are you?" Tali asked.
"Fine Tali, my shuttle took a near miss but I'm fine." Reegar said as he sat down heavily.
"I heard from my CO, he told me the craziest thing." Reegar said as he scooped up some of that disgusting sludge.
"And that is?" Veetor asked as he turned away from his disgusting meal.
"He told us we are jumping to Sol…" Reegar replied.
"Sol?" Veetor said as he dropped his spoon.
"Quiet… I shouldn't even be telling you this." Reegar hissed as Veetor calmed down.
"But why Sol…" Veetor asked, now speaking more softly.
"Because no one else would take us, at least at Sol the Batarians won't follow us. If they do follow and the humans decide to blast us into the next life the Batarians will follow us. At least that way I can spit in a Batarian ghost's face…" Reegar replied darkly.
"It was my idea…" Tali muttered.
"Really? Huh, I did hear something being muttered about a crazy girl by my CO when I left the room." Reegar replied as he turned to face her.
"Yeah… they wanted an idea, I gave them the best one I had…" Tali said as she lowered her head trying her best not to think of the consequences of her idea going round.
The humans were suspected to be the most advanced sentient species in the known galaxy. Asari archaeological evidence revealed that the Sol region of space was probably the heart of the Prothean Empire. When the Turians went through the relay with the intention of subjugating the humans they ended up losing the whole fleet. No information made it through, it was like something was jamming the comms…
The humans had in the past sent tentative exploratory missions beyond Sol space. The meetings with the other races were brief and the ships they used seemed rather plain. They were, however, suspiciously too normal. The ships conformed almost perfectly with the average ship technology at the time. Then came the news from the Asari that they discovered the heart of the Prothean Empire probably lay in Sol space.
The Council thus naturally demanded entry to do investigations. These demands were met with swift denial. Relations quickly soured with the secretive humans who remained to content hide in Sol space. With more and more evidence pointing to Sol as a treasure trove of Prothean technology tensions began to mount.
Finally an intervention was proposed by the Turians and it received the support of the Asari and Salarians. The Turians would provide the muscle, the Asari would provide the funding and the Salarians would provide the scientific skills for analysis after the fact. It was a good plan on paper until the entire Third Fleet of the Turian Hierarchy vanished past the Sol Relay, wiping out a third of Turian's fleet.
There were no demands, no communications, just deafening silence and the realisation that 100 000 Turians were just sent to their deaths. The galaxy had no choice but to accept that the Third Fleet was lost with all hands and the fact that Humans were far more dangerous than the rest of the Galaxy believed.
"Well hopefully the humans will take pity on us for creating that power vacuum all those years ago." Reegar muttered in response.
The loss of the Turian fleet sent shockwaves across the galaxy. Naval restrictions were relaxed to safeguard against the humans. The Batarians took this chance to rebuild their fleet since the Turians had lost too much to stop them and the other races were struggling to rearm themselves. Thus was born the rise of the Batarian Hegemony. When things went sour with the council, the Batarians decided to use the Quarians as a sandbag to prove to the Council that they were a race to be feared.
The decided to use genocide to use get a bloody point across…
"When have any of the races stuck their necks out for us? We're suit rats, remember?" Tali replied bitterly.
"Maybe humans are different?" Veetor said hopefully.
"It's your idea Tali, you aren't exactly inspiring confidence." Reegar said.
"I know, I know… I don't know why I came up with that… It's crazy. If the humans decide to destroy us all we can do is stand there and get shot… I may have just killed our race…" Tali said as she brought her hands to her facemask.
"What's done is done Tali, we just have to see it through." Reegar said.
"Yeah, you may have saved us too, you know. This might be the best thing to happen to us." Veetor added helpfully.
"I hope so Veetor…" Tali muttered as she let out a sigh.
