From: Francis charron (Guest)

A:Interesting idea. Maybe I'll do something like a joint operation against Gatlantis, and then SA gets one of these. But I rather stick with the original plan.

And thanks of first 100 favorites.


Chapter 5

= place: Citadel, November 8, 2179 =

"... that's why the System Alliance is forced to declare war on the Batarian Hegemony." - said the chairman, concluding the formal speech. Then they went back to the Citadel Network News studio.
"As you can see it is official now, System Alliance is going to war with the Hegemony." - said the Asari presenter - "This is extremely shocking and has already ensured a significant decline in trade with both the Arcturus Coalition and the Batarian Hegemony. The Council has yet to take the course of action as the rest of the System Alliance allies have. Admiral of the 12th Turian Hierarchy Fleet - Cacus Altius and the Matriarch Aethyta volunteers to discuss the current crisis."

"Good morning."

"Hello."

"As you have heard, the situation is very tense and many are worried about being dragged into this war. Do you have any words that can calm our viewers? " - said the presenter.

"Citizens have nothing to worry about." - Cacus said confidently - "After all, the turian fleet can't be defeated like that."

"But the Humans did it, and they even took your colony."

"It is true, but then the people outnumbered at least 2: 1, and the colony itself did not have a large garrison of ground troops, so the Macedonian primarch had no choice but to surrender. Now, this border is properly defended and our ships are much more technologically advanced than they were then." - Casus continued confidently.

"I, too, believe that citizens have nothing to worry about, but for a different reason." - said the matriarch.

"And is he?" - the presenter asked.

"The government of the Humans has made it clear that it is declaring war on Hegemon. But he didn't mention anything about the Coalition. It is clear that System Alliance leaders also do not want an escalation to a full intergalactic war, so as long as the Citadel does not intervene, there will be no threat."

"That was the second question, what should our intervention be and should we intervene at all?"

"I have said for a long time that the Batarian government is not to be trusted. Now that they've attacked people, I don't see any reason to intervene."

"I have to object." - Cacus interrupted her - "We don't know what the intentions of Humans will be and whether they will be able to win at all. This isn't Incident 314, it's a full-blown war. A war in which the Hegemony is numerically and economically superior to the Alliance, so it will be able to push them back over time. If the Hegemony wins too much, the human allies can use that as an excuse to increase the number of ships. Same on the other hand. If people start to win, they can become despotic and commit war crimes themselves. Then our peacekeepers will have to step in and stop them."

"And what form should such an intervention take?" - the presenter asked.

"Entering and driving all warring parties home. The human government will not risk attacking Council ships."

"I don't think our arrival alone will stop them." - Aethyta said.

"I have to agree with Admiral. That Humans are going to risk a war against the Citadel Council is a rather radical idea. " - said the presenter.

"At Matriarchin gatherings, I made frequent statements that were considered radical." - said Aethyta - "However, taking into account that currently, the Coalition is technologically ahead of us in the vast majority of aspects. I'm sure if I had said that today most would have agreed with me."

"Sorry to interrupt, but I just got a message that System Alliance ships have made contact with a new species, or rather species." - said the slightly excited presenter - "They say they use a completely different form of FTL than based on MassEffect!"

"Impossible!" - the admiral shouted, standing up as if something had hit him.

"Surprisingly, yes. But not impossible." - said Aethyta, remaining calm - "If you study history carefully, you can see that scientists from many races tried to invent the FTL drive before the discovery of Ezzo. However, after the discovery of the Prothean ruins, all this research was abandoned. If the words of my informants are true, only Humans are still working on an alternative FTL drive."

"So, are you suggesting that we should also start working on our own FTL drive?" - the presenter asked.

"We already have an Ezzo-based drive."- said Aethyta - "Why not just make it better? One of the radical ideas that I once suggested was to create our own mass relay. I know that a salarian scientist 400 years ago had plans to create a MassEffect drive that would travel 16 light years a day without overcharging. Unfortunately my idea was radical and the salarian died before he made the prototype of the drive. An additional problem was that he came from terminus systems, so most, if not all, scientists criticized his work without even looking at it."

"THIS is not important now." - the admiral said - "What counts is a brand new FTL drive that humans can get with little trade. If that happens, they will have a tremendous strategic advantage over all other races!"

"I have to disagree with the admiral." - said the presenter - "In the report they mentioned a few races that are hostile towards each other, and actually at war. In that case, can't we just start trading with another of these races?"

"We don't even know where they are or what area they control." - the Admiral said.

"Besides, we know nothing about these races." - Aethyta added - "They may act like Krogan, Turians, Salarians, Asari, Humans, maybe even different from any other known race."

"Sorry, I just got another update." - said the presenter - "A representative of one of these races will come to the Citadel soon. We do not know the arrival date yet, but we do know that they will arrive on the Alliance ship. In addition, we still have basic information about the races from these regions passed on to us by humans. They will soon be available to all our viewers. See you in the next CNN issue in the meantime."

So soon everyone started reading about these new breeds. Of course, most were surprised that these races are similar to humans and asari, or that they are humans, only taken to these planets 50,000 years ago.

= place: Rannoch, November 8, 2179 =

President Koris was sitting in his office. Various ministers and fleet commanders stood beside him. After the System Alliance declared war on the Batarian Hegemony, things became tense. Many ministers were angry that the humans hadn't consulted with them and the Geths, but what happened didn't happen. Now there was a discussion on how to deal with it.

"I know we owe humans a lot, but we have no way of joining the war. Our economy is weak and ground forces are non-existent. Plus, the huge birth rate will keep most of our possible reservists at home. " - said the Minister of Finance.

"They are not asking us for total military support, but for our merchant fleet to help transport supplies to the front lines." - Koris said.

"But that's a problem in itself." - said the Minister of Infrastructure - "Yes, we have many ships and yes, we can repair them, but we have no way to build them, because the navy is on new ships, bigger than most battleships. We are therefore far behind when it comes to building civilian ships."

"You know well we had to do." - said the Minister of Defense - "We need a symbol that the Quarians are a race to be reconded with again, and how better to do that than through a great ship. In addition, our fleet consists of 90% of frigates and destroyers, which do not carry fighters, and as people during the first contact war showed us, without fighter cover, ships will fall very quickly."

"But you didn't have to make them that big." - said the Minister of Finance - "It would be enough to make them in the style of escort aircraft carriers, or at least the size of ordinary ones, not 1.5 km long behemoths! This is the Bismark effect Humans have warned about!"

"Calm down, calm down!" - Koris interrupted them. - "We will discuss whether or not it was worth spending our resources on new ships. It is now clear that we are owed a debt to Alliance and we will probably not be able to pay it back in our lifetime. I also know you can't send all the ships like that, but I think 500 should be enough. In this way, we will limit losses and significantly strengthen the war efforts of our Allies."

"Even if I wanted to, there are currently only just over 300 merchant and cargo ships that can help people." - said the Minister of Trade.

"But we have a lot of mining ships." - said the Minister of Education. Unlike all known races, most of the Quarian's mining and trading ships were state-owned, mainly because of their history. But most importantly, these ships were active reserves during the war. It is true that they had minimal weapons, but could, as now proposed, be used to transport war material.

"Mr. President, this could cut our mining operations by 5 percent and slow down the construction of new infrastructure significantly." - said the Minister of Finance.

"It's only until more merchant ships come back." - Koris reassured him.

"Maybe we'll send the 7th fleet again as a backup." - said the Minister of Defense.

"Did you not listen to what I was saying at the beginning?" asked the annoyed Minister of Finance.

"Yes, but this is not our entire navy, just one fleet." - the defense minister countered.

"From what I got from the human government, they don't want to escalate the conflict beyond People versus Batarians." - Koris said - "Therefore we will not send the 7th fleet to the front lines, only to cover our convoys. Even when the Geths cross the border with Terminus and Travers, the pirates and the Hegemons might slip through anyway. This will give people total support of over 600 ships. Add to that the technological advantage, the Geth guarding the boundaries and training them, and in less than 2 weeks people will take over all the border systems and force the Hegemony into peace."

"It will still slow down many projects, but you are right." - said the Minister of Finance - "The ships should be ready for departure in 3 rotations of the planet."

"Then I can consider this meeting complete." - Koris said.

= place: Rannoch, Geth Consensus, November 8, 2179 =

Information: The Alliance has declared war on the Hegemons.

Question: What do we do about this?

Opinion: We should help Humans in the war.

The Argument Against: People declared war on their own without consulting us, so they shouldn't expect help.

The Argument For: We signed the Aid Treaty. If we break it, we will lose our credibility and increase the AI opponent camp.

Compromise: We should send more ships to defend the Coalition's borders against invasions by pirates and mercenaries from Terminus who are sponsored by the Hegemony. In this way, we will free many System Alliance resources from the duty of guarding the border and allow them to be transferred to the Hegemony front.

Vote: 82.2% for this plan, 6.5% against, 11.3% abstentions.

Question: What to do with your first contact situation with Yoruba Union?

Information: The representative is asking for military support for his faction against the enemy faction.

Information: We have confirmation that the enemy faction has repeatedly broken the laws of war and enslaved several other races.

Question: Will they try to do the same with us?

Answer: The behavior of one of their officers and the information obtained seem to confirm this.

Information: We have found information that they are using a certain insectoid race as slaves. Attempting to compare with our databanks led us to believe that these are Rachnii.

Information: According to the information given to us by Boluwatife-Gul, the faction of which the SUS Empire is a member has an ancient station and plans to use it to attack one of the homeworlds of the opposing faction.

Question: Should you undertake military intervention?

The Argument Against: We have never intervened to aid organic species in their conflicts. Consensus agreed to the Alliance with Humans, as they were an exception to the rule that organics always trust in organics, started enormous technological advancement and ensuring peace with creators, which led to a significant increase of our chances of survival and allowed for a peaceful existence with organic beings. Apart from this exception, I don't know any reason to support any of the factions. This can lead to hatred in the faction we are going to fight against.

The Argument For: If the Citadel manages to influence envoys from their factions, it could lead to an increase in the anti-AI camp. Additionally, according to the information provided, we are technologically more advanced than they are, at least in terms of automation, defense systems and kinetic weapons. If we help this faction, we will gain the sympathy of more races, and if we free the races conquered by the SUS Empire and the Boral Federation, we will gain more allies, strengthening our position and the galaxy as a whole. In addition, the imperialist aspirations of the SUS and the Borals may become a problem for us in the future, and this may lead to conflicts in which we might lose. But now they are weakened and we can defeat them relatively easily. In the worst-case scenario, we will lose resources, and in the best case, we will convince a much larger number of organic beings in that region that it is worth coexisting with synthetics.

Inquiry: If we agree to send support, how much and what?

Answer: 4 fleets and a 10 million combat platforms with transports and full armored and air support, which will be exactly 644 ships. In the worst case, i.e. losing all our resources, we will be able to replenish them easily. Additionally, it will allow us to maintain significantly increased defenses at the borders and our key locations without slowing down any of our operations.

Vote: 72.9% for intervening, 22.3% against, 4.8% abstained.

= place: Gamma 357 system, November 9, 2179 =

A small fleet of System Alliance ships of the Third Category has arrived in the uninhabited system. They were part of the 8th Fleet, which was now rushing to the Batarian front, in addition to the first battle, the first skirmishes also took place. Mostly small groups of Alliance Navy and SDF ships against the Hegemony groups, but the numbers are fairly even so far, so almost all have been won by the humans. But that was only until the Batarians had activated all of their Mothball Fleet ships and gained a significant advantage in numbers at the front. That is why this meeting was very important. This rebellion may have had one thing that the System Alliance lacked the most - information.

Kichirou Shinkawa watched stepped on the bridge of the Capetown 3-class heavy cruiser Nuuk, escorted by 2 light cruisers and 4 frigates.

"Captain Hans, are the representatives of the rebellion already in place?" - Shinkawa asked.

"Probably." - the captain replied.

"How is it 'probably'?"

"Our scanners detected 4 unknown corvettes and some heavily modified Volus transporter." - Hans replied - "But they hasn't sent the code yet, so we can't make sure it's these rebel representatives."

"Captain, the ships hailing us." - the communications officer said - "They sent the codes, they are representatives of the Rebellion. They are about to send a ferry with a fighter escort and then start patrolling the area."

"Also send one squadron as an escort, then have them summoned on a standard patrol." - said the captain.

At almost the same moment, Nuuk and the modified Volus freighter, which was apparently the flagship of the rebel fleet, dispatched fighters. Nuuk sent 12 trident fighters and the rebels 4 batarian fighters, and the Kodiak ferry, which had become so popular in the last few years that they could be found almost anywhere. The transport went smoothly and the ferry quickly docked in the hangar. The Marines onboard stood in formation awaiting the departure of the Rebel representative.

When the door opened, everyone was surprised to find Batarian soldiers surrounding Asari. Until they said - "I am the official representative of the rebellion - Linyxmia Lilyt."

All the Marines kept calm outside but were internally surprised. After all, they were expecting a Batarian.

"This way, please." - the officer said after a second, and Linyxmia, escorted by 2 batarians, followed. After 2 minutes they were there. Of course, the soldiers had to stay outside the room. Shinkawa and two officers were in the room.

"Nice to meet you, Mrs. Linyxmia Lilyt, I am Kichirou Shinkawa and I will represent the System Alliance." - said the ambassador.

"It is a real honor to meet the person who negotiated peace between the Geth and Quarians." - said Lilyt - "It shows how seriously the Alliance takes this negotiation."

"By the way, I was expecting a Batarian." - Shinkawa said.

"It's a natural assumption, after all, the vast majority of Rebels are batarians. But there are many others as well, like salarians, turians, asari, and even a few humans. " she said calmly - "But our ethnic makeup is a debate on a different subject."

"You're right." - Shinkawa admitted her - "You wrote that you want to negotiate an alliance with us, but the government is undecided."

"It's natural, you don't know anything about us after all." - she said, then added with a smirk - "Even I don't know how many ships and people we have in total. Only our leader has this knowledge. But he decided to show you a few of our possibilities. I'm sure you've already noticed at least some of them."

Right, the scans showed that the 4 corvettes that served as escorts were nowhere in the database, and the freighter itself was highly modified. This meant that the rebels had at least partial production and engineering capacity. This already exceeded previous expectations that they would only use old military ships and converted civilian ships. Additionally, sending Asari as negotiator meant that the Rebels did not want to simply replace one regime with another. Shinkawa's views about the rebellion grew rapidly.

"But can you testify to us of your intelligence capabilities?" - asked the ambassador as he was constantly trying to get the best deal for his government.

"Here is our proof." - Lilyt said. She turned on her omni-tool and displayed a list - "This is a list of attacks on the colonies in Traverse, Council Space and Coalition that the Hegemony has commissioned over the past century. You cannot afford the Council's intervention, why not make it easier for yourself."

"And what do you expect in return?" - Shinkawa asked.

"Many, but we all know that certain things in life cannot be obtained." - said Lilyt - "For now, the alliance against the Hegemony, the exchange of information and your participation in the operation 'power up' will suffice."

"That is?" - Shinkawa asked.

"I cannot reveal the details until you agree, but they will allow it to deal a huge blow to the Hegemony Navy." - Lilyt began - "As you probably know, they have many more ships than you, especially if you count the Mothball Fleet and all the pirates, mercenaries and many smaller nations in the terminus. Add to that the defense of the more important worlds and the need to leave at least a minimum of garrisons in your space, they will be outnumbered 6 to 1 when it comes to ships."

"But the current situation is 1:1." - Shinkawa interrupted her. - "Additionally, many of the ships that are to support them from Terminus will be blocked by the Geth ships, which are already increasing their presence at the borders."

"Even with that, if the Hegemony manages to activate most of its ships and bring them to the frontiers, you may not be able to hold on." - continued Lilyt - "There is simply too much space to defend. Especially if you want to capture territories, which will extend your supply lines even more. Additionally, your economy and the number of ships you can produce is still smaller than that of the Hegemony. You will not be able to win the war of exhaustion. On the other hand, the 'power up' operation consists in taking over or destroying ships from the Mothball Fleet in their largest base for this type of task. With your help, it can be much more effective than if we did it ourselves. Especially with your Warp Drive."

"I do not know what are you talking about." - Shinkaw said with a straight face.

"We know you have had an alternative FTL drive for a long time, but you are not using it openly because you want to consolidate your position first." - said Lytit - "Currently you can make 1 jump every 24 hours, and each such jump will allow you to travel 600 light-years. Of course, you can also make smaller jumps and the drive will load much faster, but on travel with thousands of light-years, this is your fastest option. So play open cards."

"All right." - Shinkawa said - "There is no question of a full Alliance. For now, we still hope this war will be short. We will destroy their forces at the borders and demand peace. If, after all, they are not willing to make peace, then we will agree to an alliance with you. No sooner, no later."

"I see." - said Lilyt - "After all, I will give you a list with some attacks and evidence for them, but only a few."

She then got up and went to leave, but before leaving, she turned to Shinkawa and said - "I'll give you some more advice. Watch out for the 26th Hegemony fleet."

Not knowing what that meant, Shinkawa and the officers just shook their heads and watched the rebellion ambassador walk by.

As System Alliance and Rebel forces flew their way, Lylit reported to the leader via messenger - "It's just as you predicted. They do not want to join the full war against the Hegemony just yet, but if the fighting continues and there is no chance for peace, they will ally themselves with ass."

"Do is not 'if' but 'when'." - the leader replied - "The elites on Khar'shan will not agree to any peace that is unfavorable to them. On the other hand, humans have been attacked and they will not make peace either unless they have no choice, or is unfavorable to them. In other words, we will soon be able to start the second phase of our fight against the Hegemony. However, you will still be needed. It's time to call on our friends."

"I am already on it, leader." - said Lilyt - "But what are we to do with these new races?"

"For now, they are at war with another group and are unlikely to interfere in our affairs." - the leader said - "I admit, this unawareness of who they are and what their goals are is a little disturbing, but we can't help it."

"I see." - Lilyt said and hung up. The group of ships set off at once for the next destination.

= place: Citadel, November 10, 2179 =

Meanwhile, the Council tried to reconcile the Humans and the Batarians.

"We cannot be intimidated by these humans." - Ambassador of the Hegemony began - "Hegemony demands immediate military intervention by the Citadel against this unjustified aggression."

"Unjustified?!" - almost offended Ambassador Goyle - "These were YOUR warships that invaded OUR space. I really don't know what the Hegemony government was thinking about sending these ships to OUR planet, destroying OUR ships and attacking OUR people."

"I am asking for peace." - Tevos said - "We can certainly solve this problem peacefully."

"We can." - Goyle replied, -"If only Hegemony agrees to our demands."

System Alliance government orders sent to the Batarian Hegemony government are:

1. Give back all people who are slaves in the Hegemony.
2. Allow SA to build monitoring bases in the Hegemony space.
3. Allow anti-piracy actions in the Hegemony space by SA ships.
4. Give up all officers and politicians responsible for the attack for punishment.
5. The hegemony is to send an official apology to all SA citizens.
6. The Hegemony is to pay 3 times all damages and compensation to families and people directly wronged by the attack on Elysium.

Of course, the reaction of the Hegemony ambassador and his government was almost the same - "You must be crazy if you think we will ever agree to such terms!"

"This is very bad for you." - said Goyle - "Because if you disagree with them at a predetermined time, the next ones will be even more severe, and we will start the actual offensive actions on your territory. And you have less than 10 standard hours left."

"You can't attack whoever you want, like that." - Sparatus said.

"Say it to the Hegemony." - Goyle replied - "According to information that we recently obtained, they are behind at least 8 different attacks on our territory and 3 on the territory of the Citadel."

Everyone was shocked.

"Evidence, Mrs. Ambassador." - Valern said.

"All of them will soon be handed over to C-Sec and other law enforcement agencies in the Citadel space. Additionally, they will be published and shown in the media, so everyone will be able to see them. Do you have something against, Hegemony Ambassador." - Anita finished her statement with an audible venom at the end of the sentence.

"This is all fake evidence!" - shouted the Hegemony Ambassador - "You are simply trying to convince the Council not to intervene in your imperialism."

"Councilors, ambassadors, forgive me for interrupting, but this is of the utmost importance." - Udina said.

"Shut up human, do you even know what we're talking about here." - the batarian ambassador interrupted him.

"Mrs. Goyle has just announced that she will present further evidence of your attacks on our territories." - Udina said unemotionally - "But now I have important information from the Geth Consensus."

As the Geth were AI, they were not allowed to enter the Citadel, and all information passed through the human consulate. It wasn't called an embassy, because only the associated races and members of the Council could have had one.

"What is this information?" - Tevos asked.

"The Geths have just voted to intervene in this war of the newly met races." - Udina said.

"What!?" - shouted Sparatu -, "They cannot intervene like this."

"Tell them this, or wait, we need to send it to them first, because you didn't agree to be their consulate here!" - Udina said pointing out the Council's mistake - "And by the time our message reaches them, they will be out of reach of the communication buoys. The geths have gone to intervene and nothing will change that now."

"What about the *gasp* representative of those races." - asked the Volus ambassador.

"He will be in 3 standard days." - Goyle replied.

"There is one more thing." - Udina said.

"Don't keep it going, human." - Ambassador Batarian said.

"The geths managed to identify one of those races as... the Rachni." Udina said.

Most of the audience was shocked. Even after 2,000 years, the fear of Rachni was still alive.

"Explain it, quick!" - Even Tevos lost her normally calm temper for a moment.

"It looks like some SUS, using Rachni as a biological weapon or slave infantry, but nothing else." - Udina said.

"That doesn't mean there is no danger." - Sparatus shouted - "Do you know what happened when the Rachnii last appeared in the galaxy!"

"It seems they don't have any ships and they are controlled, so I don't know the danger." - Udina said - "Besides, the side that benefits from them is the losing side, so Rachnii won't be a threat. Additionally, the Geth strike forces are against them."

"It looks like we're going to have to think it over and in the meantime, I'm postponing this." - Tevos said.

Shortly after, the Council decided that they would not take any action until more facts were known, and would hold back the decision to intervene until the situation became better known. They did the same with the Geths who moved against Rachni. The only thing that was agreed was to increase the already large number of warships and fleets in readiness. However, on a huge scale, this affected 2 races.

The first was the Raloi race from the planet Turvess, which was under the observation of Asari and was still at a technological level similar to the human 20s of the 21st century. They discovered the Asari ship because the crew was so concerned about the return of Rachni that they forgot to check the course and were accidentally discovered by their race. Consequently, the Raloi began an extremely accelerated unification process to face the rest of the galaxy as the Turvess Confederation. Due to their location on the galaxy map, most, if not all politicians, speculate that they will join the Citadel in the future.

The second race affected in particular was the Krogan. Urdnot Wrex, used the re-discovery of Rachni as the impulse for the reunification of Tuchanka, citing the return of Rachni. Before that, he was supported by only 50% of the clans on Tuchanca and practically no clans from outside the planet, and the clans themselves that joined him were mostly smaller clans, which meant that he actually controlled about 30% of the planet. This impulse gave him enough support to draw most of the clans to his cause and take almost an entire planet. Now it was only necessary to hold them together. At the same time, the Citadel was too busy to do anything against it and citing the need to contain Rachni, there was little they could do politically. Currently, the future of Wrex Urdnot's rule is too uncertain, but it is considered the first real chance for Krogan to united under one government since the Krogan Rebellions.