Shuttle 47, Tarkov City Outskirts, Eden Prime, 1:34 PM, 2945 PSC
Saren got out of the shuttle and looked out towards the city, one of many detected from orbit. It was beautiful, but was visibly scarred by battle.
"Alright soldiers, listen up. We have orders to link up with a Human military unit, a few kilometers away." Junius said "Orbital imaging says that there's a clear route leading to it. Hostiles are confirmed to be patrolling the area, be on the lookout for any Batarians." He disabled the safety on his weapon, and looked back to his team. "Let's get moving"
As the group of Turians made their way through the route, Saren followed at the back of the formation. His rifle was always shouldered, and one could tell from his tense mandibles that he was high on alert. He took careful glances to the sides, checking them for any hostiles and trying to take his mind off the topic of these Humans.
'What are they like?' he thought to himself. 'Are they aggressive like the Krogan, or naturally devious like the Salarians? Perhaps they act like the Asari. They do look disturbingly similar.' Saren shook his head. Now is the time to be focused. If he slips up, the whole team could be wiped out.
They pushed further through the path, the route cut through a small forest. The route was still clear, but anybody could ambush them fairly easily, so long as they could keep quiet while hiding behind the trees.
There was a rustle behind him, Saren pointed his rifle up at the tree where the sound came from. As he inspected the tree, a large, rodent jumped out of the plant and ran off, deeper into the forest.
"I'm getting too wound up"Saren said to himself. He caught up with the rest of the team, and they pushed further into the forest, until a small clearing showed up ahead of them.
"Hold up" Junius said. The entire team complied and stopped their movement. "Six Batarians, 12 meters, that way. Looks like they've set up some kind of watch-point" Pointing towards a small clearing that had makeshift fortifications on it.
"The Four-Eyes are scattered far enough for us to sneak up on them." One of the Turians, Vetran, said. "Better we take them out silently. That way we won't have half the Batarian army coming after us"
"I agree." Junius said "Arterius and Halis, take down the two near the trees. Vetran, Kalidon, sneak up on the two on the other side of the road. Kesarus and I will take the ones at the edge of their little outpost."
Saren nodded and went with Halis, moving from cover to cover, trying to hide themselves from the Batarians. As they entered close quarter combat range, Saren looked towards Junius, who in turn nodded to him. Junius then pulled out his knife and then stabs the Batarian he was targeting. Kesarus follows suit, and then they drag the body away from sight.
Finally realizing something is off, two of the Batarians, the ones that Vetran and Kalidon were tasked to deal with, went off to investigate. Halis drew two knives, and threw the two Batarians near him. The knives were too slow for the kinetic barriers to detect, and struck the Batarians in the neck. Seeing a clear shot at the two Batarians that are inspecting their missing comrades, Saren focused on them, and then shot his hand out. He put his mind into the very fabric of space and time itself, and called for it to stop. The Batarians got caught in a stasis field, unable to speak or move, leaving them unable to defend themselves as Vetran and Kalidon slit their throats.
"Nice work with the stasis, Saren." Vetran said, cleaning his knife on a Batarian's corpse.
"Thanks, I've been working on that one for a while now."
"Alright, great work. Now let's get these bodies out of the open. Don't want the enemy to notice us too soon." Junius said.
After a few minutes of them dragging the bodies away, they set out again on the trail. Once again, Saren was at the rear of the group.
"Let's speed this up soldiers, the meet-up point shouldn't be too far away now. Better not keep these Humans waiting." Junius ordered, now speeding up to a jog
-000-
"Damnit Collins, you nearly blew our cover!" a soldier reprimanded his colleague
"It's not my damn fault that stupid ass falcon-rat had its nest next to my position" Collins retorted
"Cut the chatter you two" the Boss said "They're on the move again, better we follow them a bit further now"
"I don't see much point in keeping too much distance Boss. Our cloaking tech is far better than anything the Batarians have. If Four-Eyes can't see us, I doubt they can." Carla, the team sniper, said
"These Turians mightn't have the ability to see infrared naturally like the Batarians, but they seem to have sharper vision." Boss said "If we stay too close, chances are they might see us. Better play it safe with these, uh, people."
"I agree. We're not completely invisible, they might spot the light distortions if we get too close" Anderson, the point-man said
"See that Carla? Anderson agrees with the Boss. Why do you have to stick up to the Boss every time he says something?" Collins asked
"Anderson was in the Marine Corps dipshit, they didn't train him to ask too many questions." Carla answered.
"You two are gonna be the death of me." The first soldier, Annette said
"That's enough" Boss said, silencing everyone. "We're losing track of the Turians, we better start moving now."
The entire squad agreed, and began to follow the Turians again, albeit now from a further distance. They followed quietly on foot, making little to no noise, and their tactical cloaks keeping them practically invisible. They stopped when the Turians spotted a group of Batarians.
"ArFoCom wants as many recordings of these guys operating as possible. I want everyone capturing whatever they can, the more details caught, the better."
The team acknowledged, and spread out to cover as many angles as they can. They watched as the Turians dispatched a group of Batarians quietly. One by one, the Batarians fell, killed silently by the Turian Special Forces. But the moment that really shocked everyone was when one of the Turians had shot out his arm, and a blue energy flew from him to two Batarians, freezing two Batarians in their tracks and vulnerable to attack.
"Holy crap, they've got wizards!" Collins said, the surprise obvious in his voice. "That shit ain't supposed to be possible"
"For once, I agree." Annette replied
"Good thing we were recording this, the eggheads back at home are going to go nuts over this" Anderson said.
They watched again as the Turians picked up the corpses and dragged them to a place where it's less likely to be seen. The Turian that they assumed to be the leader ordered his, at least they thought it was a he, soldiers to keep moving.
"They're getting close to the location Boss. We better get there fast." Carla said.
The Boss agreed, and they headed out, going through a shortcut that they knew of, but the Turians didn't. It took them a few minutes, and while their arrival was a bit too close for comfort, they did reach the meet-up point before the Turians did.
"Hey Boss, heads up." Collins said.
They looked over to where the Turians had finally showed up. The Boss nodded and got rid of his cigarette.
"Try to look somewhat surprised." He said. The Boss walked over to the Turian leading the group. "Hello, welcome to Eden Prime." He then began to point at his team members. "Our call signs are Redeemer (Annette), Dagger (Carla), Wisecrack (Collins) and Raider (Anderson)." He then pointed to himself "My call sign is Boss."
The Turian looked at each member, then held his hand out, presumably to shake hands with the Boss, who simply took the hand and shook it.
"I'm Force Commander Junius, these are my soldiers: Arterius, Vetran, Hallis, Kesarus, and Kalidon."
"Alright. I'm assuming that we're to be working together." Boss said.
"We are, Lieutenant Commander Trevanian has given us autonomy to work with you as required." The Turian answered
"Excellent." The Boss nodded to Annette. She stepped forward and placed a holographic projector on the ground. She then took out her nCom, and activated the projector. "The Batarians have built up a Forward Operating Base on top of Kusarigama Hill. They have refueling and restock station deployed. We are going to go in there, destroy the station, and get out."
Junius examined the map that had materialized from the projector.
"It looks like they've set up with a large forest by their south." He said. "We can probably sneak in from there."
Hallis pointed at a tower on the map. "Those sentry towers are going to be a problem. They have direct line of sight over the refueling station."
"What if the sentries are looking at something else?" Collins said.
"A distraction?" Kesarus said.
"Yeah, if a group would somehow get 'discovered' by the sentries on the other direction, they'd be too busy dealing with them to pay attention to the station."
"It could work. Who would be going though?" Junius said as he contemplated.
"Our group is larger, sir. We would have better chances by numbers. Besides, the Batarians won't be expecting a Turian Blackwatch squad in the middle of this place." Kalidon said.
"It could work. While the Turians distract the enemies, we will sneak behind them, plant the charges, detonate it, then in the middle of all the chaos, both teams can pull out." Anderson said.
"Anybody got a problem with this?" The Boss said and looked around. When he saw that no one had disagreed, he nodded to Annette. She deactivated the projector and packed it up. "Alright then people, let's get rolling."
-000-
CODEX Entry:
Systems Alliance Equipment: The Systems Alliance, unlike their Batarian foes, have not fully implemented mass effect technology for military use. Their ships still use a nuclear generator to power the ship, but does have a Mass Effect drive for ftl uses and such. Magnetic accelerator rails are still utilized to launch their slugs, and their rifles still use conventional balistics as opposed to grain projectiles used by the Batarians. Both vehicular and infantry based ammo has modified variants available for use. D-rounds, short for Distruptor Rounds, is heavily utilized by the Systems Alliance military as it contains an EMP charge that helps it weaken, or bypass, shields altogether. Other ammo mods include AP rounds (armor piercing), Incindiary rounds, and HX Rounds (High Explosive)
The Council/Hierarchy First Contact: When the Council first discovered the Turians, they had already been expanding for over two hundred years. As the planets they were inhabiting were incompatible with the Council races, they are generally ignored, allowing for the Turians to be undiscovered for so long. A Salarian mining company had sents ships to mine the asteroid fields, which were believed to be rich in metallic elements and eezo. while both is true, the Turians had already began operations there, building a colony and mining outposts in the system. When the Council ambassador team had met with them, the Turians had been offered membership, but the Primarch of Palaven at the time had politely refused, claiming that joining the Council will not be in the Hierarchy's best interests. Trade and communications would later develop between them, the Volus in particular being big fans.
The Krogan Federation: During the Rachni wars, the Salarian STG agent who was in charge of uplifting the Krogan people had noted that the subjects bred rapidly and was very aggressive when in packs. When reported to the STG HQ, he recieved the order to utilize the already constructed Shroud machine to modify the Krogans just enough to lessen their aggressiveness and breeding rates. After the Rachni wars itself was done, the Asari Councilor at the time sent a team to help educate the Krogan populace. This proved very successful, as both species revered their Matriarchs. The Krogan clans, while still holding internal autonomy are a part of a larger federation, complete with a functioning parliament system. The Krogans then gained a seat as a councilor for their outstanding service to the galaxy, followed shortly by the Volus a few decades later.
A/N
Sorry that this chapter came out really late, midterms came about and i had to study for it. Anyways, thanks for being patient.
So some users might be confused on some things, and then again, i haven't fleshed out this AU further either, so from this chapter on, i will be adding a few CODEX entries to try and build up the universe a bit, so that things aren't as confusing.
Anyways, thanks for reading, leave your thoughts on reviews or PM me, and have a good day.