Dr Shoko sat on the shuttle as it approached the Normandy. She looked out at the ship in awe, that ship could be classed as a cruiser but it wasn't. That was why it was amazing, such a ship took ages to build, but still a sight too see. The shuttle came in and docked with the Normandy and unloaded her and the fresh supplies they needed for a good few months. As she exited the craft Karin came up and hugged her old student.
"Shoko, good to see you again." she said braking the hug.
"Chackwas san, same to you. Now let's see the facilities." the Japanese doctor said.
"Sure grab your stuff and let's go."
Shoko grabbed her duffel bag and followed Karin to the lift and the two of them rode up to the 2nd floor and exited. The two then moved over to the medical bay, the bay could hold over 30 people with a door at the back. As soon as she saw this Shoko nearly geeked out with excitement, in this room was every single high tech piece of medical equipment that could be fitted on a ship before the Crucible fired.
"Ahhh sugei," Shoko said as she began to look around.
"I know it's pretty amazing, this is what the minds of the Alliance could make and afford before, well everything." Karin said as she began to stroke her forehead.
"You ok?" the new doctor asked.
"Yeah, just… just a headache.." she fell into a chair making Shoko to move over to her and checked her pulse.
"Rapid pulse, dilated eyes, high fever." she muttered making her checks. "Sweating…. Hai come on." she moved the old doctor to a bed and lay her down. "Hai let's see."
She muttered as she checked a terminal next to the doctor as she activated a scanner. A blue holo laser scanned the doctors body picking up the information on her body.
"Hai… hai… Karin chan, have you been stressed out recently?"
"Yeah, about a lot of things."
"Hai, you better get some rest, new doctors orders understand."
"Yes doctor." Chackwas said in an amused sarcastic tone.
As soon as she said that Ashley walked and was surprised to see not only Chackwas on a bed but a new doctor standing in front of her. It took her a moment before she talked.
"Oh, hi." she said. "Is this a bad time?"
"No, come on in." Chackwas said. "Dr Shoko Sugimoto, Commander Ashley Williams. Or is it Shepard now?"
"Still Williams for now, we haven't discussed a name change yet." she said as she shook the Japanese doctors hand. "Kornichi wa."
"Ahh, Anata wa nihongo o hanasu? (you speak Japanese)" she asked.
"Hai, Amaterasu ni sunde ita. (Yes used to live on Amaterasu)"
"Ahh good planet?"
"Kinda, until..." she tried off remembering how she was forced to burn the planet.
"Anyway, what can I do for you?" the doctor asked.
"Well..." Ash said as she took off her top. "…. I would like this tattoo removed." she pointed at the New Olympian tattoo.
"Ah, hai would come and lay on one of the beds please." she said as Ash began to move. "Do you want another tattoo?"
"Yeah, the solar empire emblem."
OOOOO
Joker relaxed in the pilots chair looking over the terminals as his wife came up and put her arms around him.
"Hey babe." he said kissing her soft metal lips.
"How's things?" she asked.
"Ah same old same old, how about we go to our room and have fun?" he asked before a face appeared to the left of him.
"Pervert." John said scaring the two and caused EDI to fall. "Ha sorry couldn't resist. Anyway set course for Tuchanka we need to meet up with Wrex, take off as soon as we can."
"W..will do." Joker said blushing and began to type furiously with EDI joining him.
John walked over to the galaxy map as Ashley came from the lift rubbing her arm.
"Hey Ash you ok?" he asked.
"Yeah I'm fine, just got that awful tattoo removed. Still sore however, so try not to touch it please." she said.
"Ok but aren't the ninites supposed to help with that?"
"You'd think so but no, according to Mordin the nanites help with healing reflexes and other problems however pain is a natural bodily response to damage. Since being sore is a response to being damaged without damage they're not going to do anything. Anyway me and Liara want to talk to you in her room."
"Ok." he said following her into the lift and to Liara's room.
Liara sat at a terminal looking over information on her screen stroking her chin. As soon as Ash and John she turned to them and indicated to two chairs for them to sit on. They did and she turned to face them.
"Ok let's being, John what we say is from the point of view we have seen from this new galaxy." Liara said.
"Ok shoot." he said unsure on what to make on what she was meaning.
"Wrex and Aria have been going head to head since Wrex became a Warlord. Now because their territories are so close they have had feuds over planets. However due to Aria being Master and Wrex being a minor, she sees the territory as hers and only hers while seeing Wrex as an upstart fool who needs to be taken care off. However due to the ships Wrex has, he has rapidly claimed these planets as his own before Aria could get a hold of them. As such tensions have mounted, now while Wrex has fast ships they are old and quite weak which Aria can use to her advantage and blockade the planets until they fall to her. War with the Omega and The Krogan Alliance is going to happen, but since our Empire and the Alliance are friends we are going to be brought into it regardless." Liara said with certainty.
"Now because we have boosted our forces and with the Krogan we could win but this is what we wanted to talk about John. Since Aria is planning to attack our Friends it's best if we take her alive, and turn her into your personal slave." Ash said bluntly.
"Wait, as my slave. Take Aria as my slave? Why?" he asked.
"For authority and respect." Liara said before Ashley took over.
"Look John I don't like it as well but let me try and explain it. The thing is that Aria rarely leave her station and the station is a good target to capture and so is she. If we capture her it's bet to make her a slave as a warning to all, because we are allied with Wrex and his faction it would look bad if we outright kill her or imprison her. The ultimate humiliation for a former Warlord is to become little more then a servant. Travos learned that the hard way, after the Crucible fired she tried to take over and crushed one of Aria's allies however the Omega Empire crushed her and took her as a slave. The only way to show what happens who try to attack our friends is to take the leader as a slave. However you have to declare her as a slave, after that you can do what you want with her."
John sighed as he looked at the two. "So I have no choice unless I want to be seen as weak." the two nodded at that. "Ok then, when the time comes I'll take her as a slave. Might as well live by this galaxy's code."
The two gave wry smiles, and nodded as the ship hit the relay.
OOOOO Location Classified Shadow broker Vat base.
Miranda sat at her desk looking over the gernetic codes the base had. For the most part they had mixes of Human, Asari, Turrian, Salarian, Korgan, Quarrian and Batarian. The codes also included animals like lions and wolfs from other worlds. She kinda smiled at this, this meant that they could make people with animal instincts to create fine soldiers. This combined with the mechs they now had a major advantage.
They where not the most technology advanced faction, but they where the most resourceful. Humans where always being credited as one of the more creative and resourceful races. Because of that they made do on what they could get their hands on. In fact the security they had was made up of mechs until they could make 'Strom soldiers' to protect the base. When she and John where disguising what to call the Vat soldiers they came down to Stromtroopers and Storm soldiers. However John was insistent on not calling them Stromtroopers as he didn't wanted to be seen as an evil Emperor out of one of the old sci fi vids he used to watch.
While she was hesitant she understood and they both decided that Storm soldiers was the best idea. It had a lot less historical baggage behind it. She figured that the name would grow on her. As she looked down the list she made notes on paper, on ideas on what to use. As she looked at this her mind fall back to that old failed project of hers.
"This is just like Project Replica, huh…. Well, failure tends to breed success." she muttered.
OOOOO Location unknown, Abandoned Cerberus base.
The planet was almost permanently dark due to an Ash from volcanoes. A planet like this few places would be a bad idea to set up anything. But Cerberus did, before the Crucible fired anyway now the place was left abandoned, it had been for years. A failed project that simply didn't work. Unlike another one this one was the illusive man's idea which he supported. But the project just failed to produce good results as such it was abandoned.
Inside the base however where thousands of pods, each one with a green liquid and a person inside. One of them them was labelled 'Shepard'. A greed light appeared above the pod and it opened releasing it's contents. The man groaned as she stood and looked around.
"Wha… ahh I remember huh I'm alive, my purpose.. what was it?" he asked himself as more pods began to open. "I'm not human, I'm a replicant… I must…. I must find John Shepard and kill him. That is my purpose."
OOOOO
On a planet in Omega space sat peacefully in the void of space but on the world was anything but peaceful a large area of land was dotted with concrete and wooden structures in a gridded like pattern while a large building at one end of the area was the only building out of place. It was like an old human monastery where human monks used to fight outside and pray inside. But this building wasn't used for any such religious ritual but training for biotics.
"YOU USELESS SACK OF SHIT!" a woman yelled as she kicked a Asari in a red tank top and red camo trousers across the floor.
The Asari groaned as she looked up to see a crowd of Biotic users, they where from the ages of 16 to 18 years of age. The Asari looked to the woman who kicked her. This one wore a very short red tank top and camo trousers. She also had armour from her shin to her knee that was in a simple red colour. Her body was covered in rectangular and round tattoos, she also had a stripe of hair in the middle of her head that ended up in a pony tail.
She had a pissed off look on her face as she walked out of her house.
"Come on then you blue whore, out with it! Let your friends know what you said." the tattooed woman said.
"All I said was that you could be easer on us teacher." she said back jumping to her feet but was blown into a building behind her by a shockwave attack.
"Go easier on you? Do you think the enemy will be easier on you?!" the woman yelled. "Don't make me laugh. If you cannot handle the pressure then you should go back home whore, as a matter of fact get out! I don't teach weaklings." she said turning around.
The Asari on the other hand got up and charged up a warp in her hand.
"I WILL DO MY PART TO SERVE QUEEN ARIA!" she ran up to the woman who jumped and kicked her in the gut sending her back into the building again.
This time the Asari was knocked out cold as soldiers came to take her away. One of them went into a building and took out the girls stuff before she was taken away. With that the woman walked back into her home while the others broke up and walked around but talking about this.
"What was she thinking? She knows that master Jack only does this for our benefit." one said.
"Yeah, going easy on us that's dumb. The krogans never go easy on us ha, how are we supposed to fight if the master takes it easy on us?" another one asked.
Inside the monastery the woman they called Master Jack looked out at her students as they began to practice. She leaned back in her chair looking at a holopad and typed in the Asari's profile, 'Unfit for combat' before placing it on her desk. Just then Asari's head appeared in a hologram on her desk.
"Jack dear, how have you been?" she asked.
"Do you need to ask?" Jack asked fore shooting a look at her. "I had to label at least 20 unfit for the army. Like I had a choice, you just send me weaklings."
"Well I have no control over that. After all I have no control if the people who want to join the Army of Omega are weak. But that's why your here to weed out the weak. Anyway that's not while I'm contacting you. We may have a problem with our plans."
"What problem?" Jack asked venomously.
"A new Warlord has entered the area, a minor but it appears he has quite the history. His name is John Shepard, well commander. He was a former Spectre and N7 solider, he's also known as the lion of Elysium."
"I heard of him during the war, but didn't he die?"
"That's what I heard as well, however it seems that Cerberus had different idea's."
"Cerberus…." Jack muttered with anger.
"I appeared they recovered his body and rebuild it for him to fight for them but Arrival happened. As such their plans fell apart and from what intel could tell, they sent him into cryo. Now he's back for what ever reason. However aside from this, because he took out Zeno and seized all of that little empire's resources we may have a problem. You see he's with earth, and Earth and Wrex had a friendship pact, because of this if we declare war it'll be a war on more then one front. I need these troops Jack."
"No promises, training takes a long time. I need a month to get the majority of them battle ready."
"So be it, I'll declare war in a month." Aria said before closing communications.
"But that doesn't mean that war will happen in a month." Jack muttered. "After all, declaring war can be done by one of the parties. Ha this will be interesting."
OOOOO
Tali and her team moved deeper into one of the old planets labs. The light's where on by automatics due to the solar panels on the roof. Weapons up they entered one of the armour labs, inside one of the tubes was grey armour in the shape of a human male. One of the computers was active and she hacked onto it before finding the right file.
"Humm project, Boost?" she muttered.
"Let's see." said one of the Salarians in her team as he walked up to the console. "Huh interesting."
"I know right? Using micro jets in the armour, to give the wearer a boost in the air and ground to allow them to get to cover. Not to mention the materials, it has the same strength as heavy armour but the lightness of light armour. No way we can pass this up, but..."
"But?" the Salarian asked.
"The materials, used and the technology. If I'm right about this we cannot produce any more, until we can find more planet's with the materials required. Which means.. what to do with this armour."
"Simple, give it to Shepard he's our leader as such he'll need the very best of the equipment."
"Agreed, let's find more."