Standard disclaimer: I do not own Mass Effect, nor any other content that you recognise. Some characters and systems are original creations. I am receiving no money for my work.
Shanxi – Theta System
2112.10.31
Marcel Styles huddled down in the trench he was standing in as more soil rained down on him from a near miss, trying desperately to keep himself together even as the kinetic barriers overhead flared from the constant dinobird artillery bombardment.
His section was gone, shattered in the total rout of Hackenburg sector and the resulting frantic overland retreat to Qinghai. He knew that Master Sergeant Adams was dead, and so was over half of the rest of his section. The few soldiers of his unit that remained had attached themselves to whatever unit they had staggered into the reserve trenches with, just as he had.
An Alliance city's Reserve Lines were their last line of defence. A set of three zig zaging trench lines – usually hidden from sight of the civilian population with holograms – they were protected with kinetic barriers and formed a thin, three deep defence line between each of the 6 flak towers. With their cruiser grade barriers and armour protecting their heavy flak and artillery guns, the flak towers were the anchor points of the reserve line, giving the otherwise weak trenches the chance to appreciably slow a determined attack.
Designed to prevent the nightmare scenario of an enemy force that had somehow bypassed both the Maginot Line and the air defences, the reserve lines stopped any force that had landed on the city plains behind the Maginot Line from rushing straight passed the flak towers and into the city. That said, the reserve lines were predicted to hold an enemy advance for only a few hours, a day at the most.
The garrison commanding officer was supposed to use that time to organise an evacuation of civilians into the shelter network while counter attacking with other forces. They were definitely not supposed to rely on the city's Reserve Lines to defend the city for more than 24 hours.
The dinobirds attack on Qinghai's Reserve Lines had entered its 4th day eight hours ago.
The artillery pieces of the flak towers had fired constantly – day and night – trying to keep the dinobird forces from massing too easily and to cut their supply lines whenever they could. The flak guns themselves hadn't been idle either, shooting down wave after wave of gunships, fighters and missiles that had tried to overwhelm the tattered remnants of the Shanxi garrison.
On the ground, despite the near suicidal resistance of the Alliance forces, the dinobirds had pushed forward. Nowhere had they been stopped or forced to retreat. The dinobirds had punched multiple holes in the 1st trench line on the first day of their attack and the line collapsed in its entirety at the start of the second day.
Holes began to open in the 2nd trench line that evening but its defenders had held on longer, that line hadn't finally collapsed until late yesterday afternoon. Now, on the fourth day, only the 3rd trench line remained. The dinobirds had been pushing hard since daybreak. They hadn't tried a night attack since learning the hard way that the Alliances' sensor jamming tech was perfectly capable of rendering them electronically blind. That, coupled with the lesson that their night vision systems were just as vulnerable to having search lights trained on the troops wearing it as the human's systems were, had resulted in a bloody end to the dinobirds only attempt at a night attack.
But with the sunrise the dinobirds had smashed into the single remaining defence line with a fanatical fury that shook the morale of even the most dedicated Alliance soldier.
Marcel ducked down into the trench and tried to steady his breathing, determinedly not focusing on the large number of unmoving bodies littering the floor, blood pooling from the wounds that had killed them and attracting flies even as the battle raged.
Above, another shot rang out from the tank turret behind him. As the Alliance had been unable to miniaturise kinetic barriers enough to fit them to tanks or soldiers armour yet, the few tanks that hadn't been with General Williams when he had been trapped and forced to surrender were woefully outmatched by the dinobirds hovertanks.
Rather than waste them in a futile counter attack, General Jodl had ordered them buried. Not dug in, buried. With only its turret above ground the Alliance tank acted as a fortified anti-tank gun, giving Marcel and his infantry some much needed cover from the dinobird hovertanks and APCs. Cover that had kept them all alive far longer than they should have lasted.
"LIEUTEN…"
The body of one of his soldiers slammed down into the trench next to him, missing their head from a dinobird sniper round. Marcel screamed as he franticly tried to wipe the blood from his helmets visor, self-loathing burning through him as the warm, wet feeling spreading down his legs let him know that he had pissed himself in fear. His breath came in shuddering gasps as he sobbed and desperately tried to get himself back under control. The terrified 2nd lieutenant slowly – shakily – stood and peeked over the parapet of the trench. Looking for the danger that his now dead comrade had tried to warn him of.
He took several deep breaths and reactivated his outgoing coms. "The dinobirds are making another push. On your feet everyone! Keep them back!"
Focusing on one target at a time Marcel kept up a stream of fire, inwardly marvelling that neither his pants wetting fear, nor his tears had leaked into his voice as he called his unit to the parapet. Dinobirds died under his fire, but too slowly. Far too slowly. The kinetic barriers in their armour were keeping them alive under fire that would have wiped out an entire Alliance squad.
"Keep it up!" Marcel yelled into his comms as the fire from his area of the trench began to tail off. He hoped that it was just because his soldiers were taking cover from the withering fire from the advancing dinobird troops, if it wasn't it meant that most of his new command was dead already.
He aimed for the centre mass of the closest enemy and held the trigger down, quickly burning through his thermal clip, but also – mercifully – the enemy's kinetic barrier. There was a loud crack as the armour gave way, then a cry of pain before the dinobird collapsed in a spray of blue blood as Marcel's rounds finally found a clear path to their flesh.
"BREACH! BREACH! BR…"
Marcel watched in horror as a few dozen meters south a dinobird leaped down into the trench, followed by a second, and a third. There was no answering fire from that area any more.
Marcel abandoned his post and ran, blood thundering in his hears, terror giving him a burst of strength and speed he didn't think he had left. There was no point holding his position now. Tearing through the zig zaging trench line he burst around the corner to his objective, the group of dinobird troops that had just leaped down into the trench.
Nine dinobirds were clustered there now, crowded into the trench and about to sweep out in both directions. They fired as soon as they saw him, and Marcel felt his left side light up in agony as their rounds punched through his armour while he franticly tried to stop his forward momentum and throw himself back the way he had come.
It was too late for the dinobird troops, the belt of four grenades that Marcel had thrown as soon as he had burst around the corner landed at their feet and exploded. Shrapnel overloaded their kinetic barriers and punched through their armour as the napalm from the two incendiary grenades clung to them, burning intensely and melting their damaged armour into their flesh.
"Breach….contained…" Marcel whispered fiercely into his comms as he grinned at the screams of the dying dinobird troops, the sickly smell of burning meat filled the trench along with smoke from their burning bodies. The fear soon returned as he saw the stream of napalm flowing across the trench, away from the now silent enemy troops and towards him. He tried to crawl away, but he could only scream as his left arm collapsed under his body weight. The agony sent 2nd Lieutenant Styles screaming into oblivion as the stream of napalm continued to expand across the trench.
Pax System – Horse Head Nebula
2112.10.31
Admiral Katrine Drescher stood at the plot table in the centre of the multi-tiered pit that was the flag CIC of the SSV Cotopaxi. Before her, the fleet was arranged in the highly unconventional – and completely untested – formation which she had ordered in an attempt to make her assault on the Theta system as successful as possible.
Her Flag Lieutenant, Stephen Hackett, looked at the display with a great deal of scepticism. Keeping his voice low, so as not to be heard by the other officers and crew he attempted to respectfully question his Admiral again.
"Admiral, this has never been attempted before. Most people would consider it to be borderline lunacy, I just don't understand why you think it's necessary?"
Admiral Drescher smirked as she watched Flag Lieutenant Hackett attempt to tell her that he thought her fleet formation was batshit insane in a respectful manner. It was encouraging to her. Respectfully questioning superiors – in appropriate settings – kept those superiors on their toes, and made it more likely that the fleet command structure would spot vulnerabilities in themselves before the enemy did.
"Because Lieutenant, as you are aware both from your own experiences with them and the telemetry from Commodore Hansa's battles, the enemy commander is disturbingly competent. I have no doubt that if I attempt to force the relay in a traditional manner, I will lead this fleet straight into a trap.
A trap that we might not be able to fight our way our of, despite our superior numbers. This formation will neutralise the positioning that I would have ordered the enemy forces to take up were I defending the relay against this fleet, and had the same information available to me as we believe the enemy commander does."
The Admiral concealed her concern from her subordinate well. It was true that this method of relay assault would neutralise most of the defensive formations that she would have chosen had she been in the enemy commander's shoes, but it also left her acutely vulnerable if they had done something that she wasn't expecting. She sighed, looking at the display again.
War was a series of gambles, all you could do was make your best guess as to what the enemy was doing and react accordingly. Well, unless you had a Lord of the Rings style palantir. But as much as the intelligence services tried, they could never be as accurate as a fictional magical seeing stone, which meant that military commanders were always working on incomplete information. Information that had also been filtered through a dozen people's assumptions and unconscious bias's.
On reflection perhaps calling war a series of gambles was implying far more certainty in the decision-making process than was deserved. A series of random stabs in semi darkness was probably more appropriate, unless you had the stunning breakthrough such as that managed by Alan Turing at Bletchley Park available to you. Namely, breaking the enemy codes and being able to read all of their transmissions as they sent them.
Now that was the real version of a palantir, and an advantage Admiral Drescher would happily kill for right now.
"Where is my enemy? What are their numbers? What are they doing?" She muttered to Lieutenant Hackett. "These are the questions that you are going to be asking throughout your career. How well you are able to answer them will be the biggest factor in determining whether your forces will be led to victory or defeat."
Stephen swallowed and nodded in recognition as he stared at the fleet display. Worry gripped his belly, this whole plan rested on the fleets mass attractor beams. Known as 'tractor beams' for short, these were dense mass effect fields created by the drive core in the mass attractor beam emitter arrays.
The emitter arrays then projected the intense gravity well that resulted in a specific direction, pulling everything in that direction towards the centre of the gravity beam, and thus towards the ship. The fleet's tractor beams had never been used in the way Admiral Drescher was using them now, if they failed at any point then the fleet could be left scattered, easily overwhelmed and destroyed.
"Dispatch the fireships."
Flag Lieutenant Hackett was brought back to the present with a jerk as on the Admiral's order the 4 specialist relay assault ships began to move towards the relay. Across the Grand Fleet crews were called to action stations, damage control teams got into their armour and the medbays prepared for casualties. 31 days after it fell to the dinobirds, the Alliance attempt to liberate the Theta system had begun.
Theta System – Centauri Veil
2112.10.31
Admiral Macen Arterius was sleeping fitfully on the camp bed installed in his office just off the banner bridge of HWS Enforcer. The escape of the human ship nine days ago had been a revelation for him.
Undoubtedly it had been carrying technical data on his ships, their capabilities, his fleet numbers, positioning and as much data on the turians themselves and the ground battles as the engineers had. That had not been the revelation for him. Rather the revelation had been that Commodore Hansa had sacrificed her entire fleet to give that ship a chance to escape.
There was only one reason he could deduce for that sacrifice to be worthwhile, the aliens homeworld was not in this cluster. Rather it was through the relay, and stationed at their homeworld was a fleet that the Commodore believed was capable of defeating him in battle.
It seemed more and more likely that Commodore Hansa had been commanding the engineer's version of his own patrol fleet. A turian battle fleet contained 400 more warships than a patrol fleet, so he had taken that as a low estimate and assumed that there were one or two additional engineer patrol fleets that could join with their home fleet.
This meant that he could expect anything from 300 – 800 warships to be sailing to engage him in battle. With Third Patrol Fleet's combat losses, the upper ends of that estimate would leave him outnumbered 2:1, a ratio that would seriously start to eat into his technological advantage.
Fortunately, the Admiral had two other advantages. First, the engineer fleet had to come through the relay, so he knew its emergence location. Second, thanks to Commodore Hansa's chosen method of attack and his own scientist's investigation of the wrecks, he knew the most vulnerable aspect of the engineer's ships. Behind and below.
Within a day of the escape of the human ship Admiral Arterius had completely redeployed the fleet. Third Patrol Fleet was now almost entirely massed at the relay, and it was split into three sections.
Half of the fleet was centred around HWS Enforcer and positioned 180 degrees lateral and 45 degrees ventral to the relay, behind and below. Exactly the same position as Commodore Hansa had taken. The Admiral knew that his new opponent would suspect this of him, were he in their position he would counter this by transiting the relay upside down to prevent turian warships from attacking the weaker ventral aspect of his force.
To prevent this countermeasure from succeeding he had positioned a quarter of the fleet under the command of Superior Captain Kandros at 45 degrees lateral and 45 degrees dorsal to the relay. Above, ahead and to the right. The remaining quarter was placed under the command of Superior Captain Nyx at 115 degrees lateral and 45 degrees dorsal to the relay. Above, ahead and to the left.
When the engineer fleet arrived, it would find itself under heavy fire from three directions. All of which were completely free of turian ships, allowing each of the three groups to fire without worrying about hitting their comrades in the crossfire. With fire coming from behind, below, above, ahead right and ahead left, the weakest stern and ventral aspects of the engineer's ships would be taking heavy fire whether the enemy commander decided to come through the relay upside down or not.
They would also be unable to concentrate their guardian arrays on any single attack vector, nor turn to engage the forces behind them without exposing their vulnerable sterns to the forces ahead of them.
All of the turian banner officers were agreed. The trap was set, and it would be a total massacre for the engineer's forces. His battle simulators told him that, his banner officers told him that, his history and tactical training told him that. Yet Macen Arterius still couldn't shake the fear that somehow the engineers would surprise him again, which was why his sleep was so fitful as he waited for the hammer to fall on Third Patrol Fleet.
"Battle Stations!" The alert siren had him leaping out of bed and through the doors into the banner bridge.
"Report!" Admiral Arterius barked as he took his position at the command podium in the centre of the banner bridge, elevated above the tactical holotank and in full view of his crew. None of them commented on the state of his uniform, rather they seem reassured to see him. The confidence boost due to his presence warmed his heart a litte.
"Four ships have emerged Admiral, they're performing such high gravity manoeuvres that its highly likely that they're automated."
"Targeting systems are having difficulty locking on, enemy ships are still moving at speeds outside survivable organic limits and it's throwing off our calculations."
Several turian ships fired anyway, but their shots went well wide of the human vessels. The targeting computers weren't calibrated for ships to be able to move that fast because usually they couldn't. Not if they didn't want their organic crews turned into jam on the bulkheads. The guardian array's targeting computers were, but those ships were well out of range of the point defence lasers and could probably have shrugged off any damage that they could have inflicted anyway.
"Recalibrating, firing solutions in 10 seconds."
"Enemy vessels are slowing and….Huge explosions present at former locations of enemy vessels Admiral."
"Thank you, crewman." Arterius looked down at the tactical display. The four drone ships had detonated at points equidistant from the relay before detonating so that they could engulph the entire area around it in a huge blast of hard radiation and heat. Had his ships been positioned closer to the relay, they would have most likely been badly damaged and they would certainly have been blinded, leaving them unable to target any force following the drones through.
The explosions also had the benefit of clearing away any minefield he might have laid. Mining the relay was against Citadel law, but the engineers didn't know that, and emerging from the relay straight into a minefield was a scenario to give any halfway competent fleet commander nightmares.
"Well, it seems that they have the equivalent of nova bombs and that the competence of Commodore Hansa was the rule and not the exception for their commanding officers. Prepare to engage enemy forces, they will be emerging any moment now." Admiral Arterius watched as the reminder that the engineers had just used a turian relay assault tactic and that Third Patrol Fleet had soundly defeated the last engineer officer to engage them soothed any doubts among his banner crew.
"Enemy forces exiting relay." Sensors called out calmly, confident in the positioning and skill of the turian fleet.
"Opening fire, all forward guns." Tactical grinned at the rest of the crew as the unmistakable sound of Enforcer's main gun firing rang through the banner bridge. There were more than a few subdued hisses of pleasure from those crewmembers that had friends among General Sparatus's legion.
"Enemy forces are inverted, just as you expected Admiral, they are upside down relative to us." Sensors reported again, a sense of smugness permeated the banner bridge like a creeping mist. Their Admiral had outplayed the engineer commander and the engineer's fleet was going to pay the price.
Space near the relay lit up with electric blue lightning as the first shots from the turian fleet slammed into the kinetic barriers of the emerging engineer ships. Soon they began returning the favour and it was the forward groups of the turian fleet's turn to have their barriers lit up by incoming fire. Fire that got heavier by the minute as engineer ships continued to emerge from the relay and join the battle.
"Forward groups are taking fire." Comms reported calmly, it was what everyone expected. They might have outplayed the engineers, but none of them expected the stubborn species to go down without a fight.
HWS Enforcer suddenly rocked violently. There was silence across the banner bridge. The shot hadn't even dented the kinetic barriers, the sound reverberating through the ship told them that. But the engineers were firing on the forward groups of the fleet, they shouldn't be able to fire at them. Enforcer rocked again and again the shock reverberated around the room more than the sound of the impact did.
"We are taking fire Admiral!" Damage control finally managed to find their wits and reported what they had all realised as they monitored the barrier readouts on their console.
"How? Enemy forces are already engaging the forward fleet groups, they haven't had time to turn!" Helm called out with absolute certainty and utter confusion. They, better than anyone else on the banner bridge, knew exactly how fast a turian ship could turn. There was no way a turian ship could have turned to fire on Enforcer this quickly, and if they couldn't manage it, how on Palaven had the engineers?
"ENEMY FORCES HAVE DRAGGED A THIRD OF THEIR FLEET BACKWARDS THROUGH THE RELAY! A FULL THIRD OF THE ENEMY FLEET IS FACING US!" Sensors screamed in panic. The total and utter shock of seeing something they had believed totally impossible unfolding before their eyes overcoming their training.
The banner bridge froze. Officers simply stared at sensors in shock, Enforcer took three more hits before most of them managed to recover themselves and start to do their duties again. But this time their movements were quicker and sharper, there was more than a little fear motivating them.
The horrified scream of the sensor operator was like a cold claw grabbing Macen Arterius's heart. He pulled up the display to show the fleet in more detail and realised that his sensor operator wasn't hallucinating, every two ships coming through the relay normally were using their tractor beams to drag a third ship between them, pulling it through the relay backwards.
Far from being trapped and unable to turn to face his main force without exposing their sterns to his two forward forces, the engineer fleet was able to engage all three groups of his forces simultaneously. No turning under fire or exposing of vulnerable sterns required.
Engineer ships continued to pour through the relay in groups of three. Emerging, disengaging their tractor beams and then throwing themselves into battle. Firing up their engines and accelerating to join one of the formations that were engaging the turians and covering their emergence.
"STAY FOCUSED!" Macen's voice barked out loud and clear across the banner bridge as he saw his crew's actions becoming more frantic. They paused and then continued their duties in a more controlled and resolute manner restoring order. "The enemy commander may be clinically insane; the engineers may have avoided our trap by transiting the relay in such a way as to neutralise our positioning and we may be taking more damage than we had hoped.
A coolant pipe chose that moment to burst as another round slammed into Enforcer. Hissing pouring thick white gas to pour into the banner bridge as if to give lie to the Admiral's words. He gritted his teeth and continued as the white gas began to collect around his crew's ankles. "We may well be taking more damage than we had hoped. But we are still turian. Or warships are the best, are crews are the best. Stand tall and return fire."
A form of calm fell over the banner bridge as the Admiral managed to quell his crews concerns once again.
"And someone shut that coolant leak off!"
Well, he'd quelled some of their concerns.
"Enemy fleet count is 3-7-9 ships and rising." Tactical reported looking to the Admiral for conformation.
Macen nodded and comms sent out the order to launch across the fleet. The majority of the engineer fleet must be here now, it was time to strike.
"Fighters are deploying, orders are to intercept the enemy's oversized ship to ship torpedoes rather than attack." Comms reported the conformation of the order.
"Prioritising enemy pocket dreadnoughts for return fire." Tactical called out, getting a grip on the situation as the engineer fleet began to divide into three distinct parts as it picked up speed, one facing each of the turian formations.
"Enemy frigates are breaking off for an attack run on our fleet." Sensors called out, noticing what Tactical had missed while focusing on the engineer's big guns.
"Order our own frigates to intercept." Admiral Arterius snapped quickly. "Remember these aliens use their frigates to deliver torpedoes, not just to screen their cruisers."
Across the turian fleet frigates broke their escort formation and abandoned their cruisers, sailing at full speed towards the spear of engineer frigates that had broken away from the main body of their fleet and were approaching them at high speed.
"Interception force dispatched. They should catch the enemy frigates outside of their torpedo range." Comms called out in relief.
"Confirmed, enemy torpedo strike will be intercepted before it can threaten the battle line." Tactical grinned. The engineers relied on their frigate delivered torpedoes to give their underpowered and inferior fleets some extra punch. With them intercepted well outside of launch range, the engineer fleet just lost one of its biggest cards. They would have to learn that they were facing the most professional military force in the galaxy and that their cute little tricks wouldn't work twice. This fleet wasn't manned by batarians after all.
"Looks like we're out of luck, enemy force count is 8-9-1 ships and rising. It seems the fleet will be larger than the worst-case scenario predictions." Sensors reported with an undertone of worry. They had recovered from their original panic, but the situation continued to deteriorate, no matter what Tactical kept saying whenever another engineer ship winked off the display. They were being replaced faster than they were being destroyed. A lot faster.
Macen Arterius winced as the ratio of enemy ships to his own exceeded 2:1 and kept rising, his only consolation was the number of enemy ships that were already shattered wrecks. The larger guns and better technology of the turian ships proving their worth against the more primitive engineer designs as Tactical rightly kept pointing out, boosting morale. But beneath his confident exterior fear was beginning to grow. Sensors was right as well; the engineer ships were being replaced faster than they were being destroyed and their fleet continued to grow rapidly.
"Admiral, somethings wrong. The warbook is reclassifying the enemy ships. Enemy dreadnoughts are being reclassified as something called a heavy cruiser." Tactical called out in confusion, staring at a readout on their console that they'd never seen before, not even at the academy.
"What?" The icy claw gripped Macen's heart again as he snapped out the query.
"Sensors have confirmed the presence of 126 pocket dreadnoughts and rising. The warbook is stating that the fleet ratios are all wrong for them to actually be dreadnoughts sir, it's reclassifying them as some sort of super cruiser that was only ever built by the suit rats. I mean the Quarian Federation sir." Tactical reported with derision. It was no wonder than they'd never seen this readout before. If the last race to deploy heavy cruisers had been the suit rats, then they wouldn't have been found anywhere outside their pirate fleet in the last 250 years.
"Admiral, Superior Captain Nyx is requesting support. The fire the engineers are pouring on the forward left section of the fleet is intense, her ships are taking heavy damage." Comms reported, their voice still professional but the undercurrents were showing that they were having a hard time maintain that professionalism.
"Captain Kandros is reporting the same, every ship they destroy is replaced by a new arrival. Captain Kandros is having difficulty holding them." Tactical's voice had changed as well. The derision of only moments before gone as the state of the two smaller turian forces captured their attention.
"Enemy fleet count is 1-1-6-2 ships and rising." Sensors reported, gripping their console so hard that their hands turned light blue.
HWS Enforcer suddenly groaned and pitched hard to her port side as one of her escorting cruisers lost containment and detonated in a huge fireball, her fusion reactors had lost containment and hadn't been ejected in time. They'd consumed the ship. The crew of the banner bridge staggered back to their stations, franticly trying to bring things under control.
"Admiral we are beginning to take damage, Enforcers barriers are down to 67%, multiple ships destroyed, dozens are reporting heavy damage." Damage control called out before running to replace a circuit breaker that blew while they were talking. Showering a corner of the banner bridge in sparks and adding smoke to the white gas already up to their knees.
"Captain Nyx's forces are breaking, too many of his ships are damaged or destroyed. Holes are opening in his formation." Comms reported. Any sense of normality gone as what had seemed like an easy victory turned into a disaster in front of their eyes despite everything they did to try and stop it.
"Enemy frigates are making a torpedo attack on Captain Nyx! The left formation is collapsing!" Tactical called out in horror, as if they couldn't believe what they were seeing.
A spear of frigates accelerated away from the forward port Alliance formation, this time there was no interception force to stop them. They raced forwards towards the distracted ships of Captain Nyx's command before deploying into an arrowhead formation, as they passed firing range torpedo trails blossomed from them as they peeled away and fled back to the safety of their formation.
The torpedoes continued on their way, diving down on the distracted turian ships. Guardian arrays fired but they were being controlled by individual ships, formation wide coordination had broken down. Dozens of torpedoes died, blasted out of space by the turian lasers. But many more got through, far too many. Explosions blossomed all over the turian formation as the torpedoes hit home, plunging through barriers and tearing apart armour. Ripping open the hulls of ships that were already fighting for their lives and dozens lost that fight, detonating in fireballs or disintegrating into clouds of debris as they were finally overwhelmed.
"HWS Spirits Wings has been destroyed Admiral. Captain Nyx is dead. The left formation has shattered, the survivors are no longer combat capable. They're fighting as individual ships." Comms reported the devastating news. The panic had drained away, now there was only depression and failure in their voice. Damage Control actually dropped the fire extinguisher they were holding from the shock, they had expected things to get bad when the engineers kept pulling surprises out of their butts. But none of them had expected this.
"DREADNOUGHTS! Three enemy dreadnoughts just exited the relay Admiral, length 8-8-8-m main guns are predicted to be the equivalent of Enforcer's." Sensors reported, they had gone beyond shock and now spoke in a toneless drawl. As if they were already dead.
A round from the new arrivals that suddenly didn't seem so primitive anymore slammed into the bannership and the lights noticeably dimmed before coming back to full brightness as the shockwaves damaged the power distribution systems.
"Correction, enemy dreadnoughts main gun confirmed to be equivalent to Enforcer's." Tactical called out in disbelief, shaking their head as if that would make the catastrophe unfolding in front of them disappear.
"Enemy fleet count has levelled off 1-2-9-8 not counting destroyed ships." Sensors reported lifelessly.
The Admiral opened his mouth to bark that this battle was still winnable, that they were turians – the spear of the Citadel – and that they would not be defeated in open battle. But the words wouldn't come. All he could see were the flattened fringe's of his crew and the destruction of ship after ship on the tactical map.
Far too many of those destroyed ships were turian, his ships had been taking fire since the start of the battle and it was showing but they had nowhere to go, whereas the fresher engineer ships were moving in front of their damaged first arrivals, protecting them from turian fire that could have easily finished them off.
"The enemy left formation is ignoring the remnants of Captain Nyx's command. They're moving to support their right formation and pincer Captain Kandros Admiral." Comms reported pleadingly. Looking at their Admiral do to something – anything – to turn this battle around.
There was no desperate plea for assistance from Superior Captain Kandros. She was turian, and she would follow her orders to engage the enemy fleet no matter the chances of success, or survival. She had already reported that she couldn't hold even before the total collapse of Captain Nyx's force. Now, faced with double the enemy ships, caught in a pincer, and with two dreadnoughts firing on her, her very rapid defeat was assured.
Then those engineer forces would turn to support the third of their formations, the one currently engaging his own command. HWS Enforcer would find herself facing down three dreadnoughts, and her fleet would be outnumbered by more than 5:1.
Admiral Macen Arterius frantically sought some solution, some great military trick that would let him snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, just like in the stories of the Krogan Rebellions. But there was nothing. Third Patrol Fleet had been outnumbered, outgunned and outmanoeuvred from the beginning, and now it had been outfought.
"Tactical: Fleetwide order. Cease fire." The oppressive cloud of failure fell like an anvil across the banner bridge as the last sliver of hope that maybe – just maybe – their Admiral would still be able bring them victory was finally crushed. Admiral Arterius gripped the railings of his command podium hard enough to leave impressions in the metal as he gathered the courage to issue his final order.
"Comms: Broadcast in the clear at the enemy ships, use the engi….. use the human language. Signal our surrender."
First the turian and then the human guns fell silent across the battling fleets. As Admiral Arterius's surrender was accepted, marine boarding craft left the human ships and headed towards their turian counterparts. With their arrival the Third Patrol Fleet became the first turian fleet to surrender since the end of the Krogan Rebellions 1,300 years before.
Codex Entry: Human Technological Inferiority in the Relay 314 Incident (First Contact War)
(Citadel Codex, First Human SPECTRE Collector's Edition, 2183)
When the Relay 314 Incident (First Contact War) began in 2112, humans had only known about the mass effect for 28 years. That they were able to produce warships capable of standing up to Citadel designs at all is a testament to the human mastery of engineering. But even that skill couldn't hide the fact that a race that had known of the mass effect for less than three decades was battling a race that had known about the mass effect for over a thousand years.
Though the human mass effect guns had the same length to firepower ratio as all other citadel races guns, human ships were smaller than their turian equivalents. Which resulted in the human ships being outgunned when going up against turian formations unless they had superior numbers.
The sole exception to this was the human dreadnoughts which were the equivalent of a turian 2nd line dreadnought. (A human Everest class dreadnought was 888m long with an 850m long main gun, the same length as that of a turian 2nd line dreadnought, despite the latter being 892m long.)
Human ships were also held back by weaker and thinner armour, weaker kinetic barriers and larger and more inefficient engines, meaning more of their volume had to be dedicated to propulsion to achieve the same speeds as turian ships.
All of this resulted in a navy that was made up of ships that could have been produced at any civilian shipyard in Citadel Space and were no match for any Council or Associate race's warships one on one. Indeed, of the 3,000 Systems Alliance warships barely 300 – the heavy cruisers and the three dreadnoughts – could even BE classified as warships by Citadel standards. The 1,900 cruisers would only be classified as orbital guard cutters by a generous inspector and the 800 frigates would be classified as police or modified civilian ships. Little more than target practice in a fleet battle.
It was the human's tactical ability, home ground advantage, and the ability to bring almost the entirety of their fleet to bear on only small sections of the Citadel Fleet that enabled the humans to end the Relay 314 Incident (First Contact War) in a position of strength. Had the humans faced an opposing fleet of equal size in battle, the outcome would have been far less favourable for them, a lesson that the humans would not forget over the coming decades.
On the ground the inability to manufacture kinetic barrier generators small enough to be fitted to tanks and other vehicles, let alone infantry armour, cost the Alliance army dearly. Academic analysis of the ground battles of Shanxi and Zapala predict that anything from 40% - 60% of Alliance casualties in those battles could have been avoided if their infantry had had kinetic barrier generators installed in their armour.
This is a figure of great concern to the turian army, given the damage that the Alliance managed to inflict on General Sparatus's Legion despite these disadvantages.
Timeline Changes So Far
First colony on mars: 27 years earlier than cannon
Discovery of Prothean ruins: 64 years earlier than cannon
Founding of the Systems Alliance (council of nations version): 63 years earlier than cannon
First Contact War: 45 years earlier than cannon