Avengers of Mass Effect

Shanxi arc chapter 2

Disclaimer: I do not own either Mass Effect or the marvel cinematic universe, if I did this would instead be the script of either a large scale DLC for all the games and I would be sitting next to Stan Lee during his cameo's.

Edit 6-4-2019: I started editing this chapter today, rest in peace to Stan Lee who died not long ago.

''Talk'' This signifies regular oral communication between people, including oral communication happening through things like a radio.

Talk Text underlined like this indicates mental communication in the form of telepathy between two willing parties.

''Talk'' Text written in cursive like this indicates that the person that you are viewing hears something not in their natural language that they also do not have a translator for in their omnitool or similar devices, if they understand it or not can be seen by in what language it is written.
If written in English cursive it means that the person does still understand it, if it is written in the actual language in cursive then the person who's POV you're reading from doesn't understand it. Exception to this of course is if the language the other group doesn't understand is English, however chances of that happening will be rare enough that you can almost instantaneously notice it when this is happening.

'Talk' Text written in bold like this signifies forced mental communication and mental possessions.

''Talk'' A being with a very high level of supernatural power is talking while letting it out, for instance Loki doing spells with the infinity stones powering him, Captain Rogers declaring his oath from becoming a God and drawing power upon it to defend those who cannot defend themselves, etc.

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Planet: Shanxi, Location: Military headquarters inside the capital, Time: moments after we left off in the last chapter, POV: 3rd person

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Everyone in the room was silent for a moment before General Williams decided upon a course of action and started giving out orders. ''I want an evacuation of the civilian population to start right now, get them into the shielded bunker complex, first priority given to civilians in the direction the enemy is coming from, all APC's and half of the IFV's we have are to be put to use to accomplish this.

Warn all other cities and their garrisons to follow plan Seven B and head towards the bunkers hidden in the forests around them, in case this is followed up by an enemy attack the capital will hopefully draw their attention away from those areas long enough for re-enforcements to arrive. The remaining two battalions of Chinese Regulars, the Chinese military reservists in those areas and the towns local militias will have to guard them in those bunkers.

Next up I want all aircraft that we have to ready themselves for battle, even if the group that won that fight near the portal is peaceful it is almost certain the enemy on the other side of the relay won their fight against the Chinese exploration flotilla and as such they might very well attack while we're still evacuating the civilians.

While this is happening I want our infantry to start digging defensive trenches and other defences around the City to connect the already there static defences to each-other, with 75% of the infantry regulars and half of the militia regulars spread out evenly over the Eastern, Southern and Western sides. Meanwhile the Northern side will not only have the remaining 25% of the infantry regulars but they will be supported by all mechanised and armoured units we have available that aren't involved in the evacuation effort.

The remaining half of the militia will be split into taking defensive positions in important strategic locations inside the city such as the bunker complex, communications towers and the vehicle yard, and forming a mobile reserve force to fill the gap anywhere in the front line where our troops are having severe difficulties. Lastly we'll get law enforcement to fill up the position of last lines of defence for the civilians inside the bunkers. Are these orders understood?''

All soldiers in the room saluted before a chorus of ''Sir, yes sir!'' could be heard from them. ''See to it that these orders are followed, dismissed.'' At this he once again got a number of salutes while the junior officers went to brief their units on the situation and get them into their assigned positions.

He then turned towards the nearest communications officer ''Contact the airfield, see what aircraft we can get up and how fast.'' After this he turned towards another nearby ''Get in contact with the law enforcement headquarters, and get them to arm up their officers as a last line of defence.''

Then he turned towards the young officer that had run into the room to show him and the other officers what was happening. ''You go call up Lieutenant Thomas Armstrong that he needs to report for duty at the vehicle depot immediately together with two squads of his platoon to go out and meet with these new people.

Also get into contact with whatever linguists and cultural experts you can find and have them assemble in meeting room five.'' After saying this he turned towards a camera in the corner of the room and said ''Sergei contact the planetary governor, he'll probably need to be there too. As soon as you've briefed him on the situation, start checking in on all stationary posts and troop patrols around the planet to see if they have seen or found anything suspicious.''

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General Williams POV

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Damnit, just why the hell did seven of the nine battalions of Chinese Regulars that were supposed to be stationed on the planet have to be away from it at this point in time, four of them going with the flotilla and another three of them being transferred to another newer colony, their replacements would according to schedule arrive next week however by that point in time we would probably either be under siege or possibly even already defeated.

Now I'm going to have to hold against an unknown number of enemies that might very well have millions of ground troops to throw at me while I've got less then eight thousand troops in total, with both the militia and law enforcement being included in that number. Oh why did these bastards have to show up at one of humanities newest colonised systems and not for example the Hydra system?

There they would have found a defence force that united has the numbers to fill six fleets and is made up out of forces of four different nation states waiting on them, and I don't think they would have fared anywhere near as well against 400 dedicated capital class warships and some 200 police sloops as they did against 20 ships with half of them being scouting and exploration vessels. And even if they did break through that fleet they would still be fighting close to two-hundred thousand professional soldiers alone with nearly thrice that number in law enforcement and militia members added in on two different planets.

Sigh I cannot change the situation simply by hoping it would change. I'll have to get back to work. ''There are fifteen fighters that can be ready to be in the air in around five minutes, however if they have slightly more than ten minutes we'll also have ten Chinese army attack helicopters, three police helicopters, five gunships and four armed shuttles ready.''

Hmm a decent amount, though nowhere near enough should the enemy come by with a full invasion force its more then enough to make any initial attack wave bleed badly. ''Also the flight lieutenant left in command of the in atmosphere air-forces after his immediate superior fell ill is asking if he can look into starting to bring some aircraft from the Indian War era and newer back online that are currently in the museum of military history located near the airfield?''

While those things won't be the best aircraft due to lacking shields and such, they might be of use after all, not only that but this also gives me an idea. ''Tell him he has twelve minutes to prepare our current aircraft. Inform the logistics staff of the air-force that they are from now on allowed to procure any aircraft that might actually still work in a fight and that the Systems Alliance will foot the bill if it comes down to it.

Also have a few of mechanics we have in service look around the museum to see if any of the old tanks and IFV's are still in a useful condition, some of those tanks will be more then armoured and powerful enough to serve as mobile unshielded bunkers and anti-tank guns, while the IFV's should work in a pinch as well armed if slow APC's since it's armour should easily be able to compare to the combination of a barrier and armour of the modern APC's.''

Oh this is situation is turning better with the minute, while nowhere near good yet and we are still in severe trouble with us having less then two thirds of our usual numbers, with the added armour we should be able to hold out against any force less than five times our size for at least a week even if they have severe orbital superiority as long as the shield will hold.

At this I turn to captain Smith who has been following the happenings with great attention. ''Captain, do you have any time-table on when re-enforcements will arrive? The third fleet should be here in slightly more than a week right? With hundreds of ships?'' At this the captain shakes his head sadly.

''While we should be getting some naval re-enforcements in five days, it won't be the Systems Alliance third fleet. They are currently being held back for repairs since most of their carriers have been damaged, at this point I'm unsure if it was in a training exercise or a deliberate attack from anyone, and after the repairs are done they still need to first head to the assembly point where the patrol flotilla's scheduled to join them will arrive.

This together with the low FTL speed of their troop freighters means they'll only arrive in 12 days. I'm unsure of their total number, though it will be nearly three-hundred ships, 200 of those the third fleets original ships, roughly 100 from patrol flotilla's joining it'' Wait if not the third fleet than what group is going to arrive to support us before that? ''The fleet coming to assist us in five days is the UTC fifth fleet, that was doing an exercise near the Dutch-Belgian colony some eight lightyears away from here.

It is composed of Dutch, Belgian and British ships, 72 in total supported by one Systems Alliance light dreadnought. The other ships in the fleet are one light dreadnought, three carriers, ten heavy cruisers, eighteen light cruisers and forty frigates. The number of frigates would be lower with more heavier ships however they had to leave a large number of those behind since they needed to leave a decent amount of firepower behind to defend the colony there and with most of the other heavy ships being pre-element zero ships they would have slowed the fleet down.''

While it's a shame that they couldn't bring more of those with them, I do understand it. We know very little about the enemies strength in the area and if we lose here that colony is almost certainly going to be the next target. Also the simple fact that its UTC ships makes up a lot for those numbers, while nowhere near as cost efficient to create as full Element Zero ships are, they have more then enough armour and firepower to defeat enemy fleets of significantly larger numbers.

Especially with how the aliens according to the report of the first skirmish beyond the relay don't seem to understand the idea of armouring ships at all and with energy shots going past Eezo based shields, though they do lose a significant amount of power when talking about military ones, you still need a decent amount of armour to stop a half powered directed energy blast when before losing half that power it ranged in the twenty to sixty kilotons depending on what ship fired it.

''Any possible chances of the UTC fifth fleet getting delayed for whatever reason?'' Suddenly the figure of the bunker's organic AI in charge of communications, lieutenant Sergei, appeared on the holo-screen where moments earlier the video of the fight played. ''Sir I apologize for disturbing your conversation but we might have a severe problem, during a check-in with all guard posts to ensure none had come under attack of any kind, one failed to report in.''

As he said this a frown could be seen on his holographic face while his systems alliance uniform was frizzled, a sign of great worry. ''What post didn't report in? And who is in command there currently?'' Sergei looked even more worried, which is very strange, how was there something more problematic then that the post didn't report in in the first place?

''The post not reporting in is the one guarding the shield generator sir and the current commanding officer over there is your younger brother.'' This caused Colonel Miller to turn towards me visibly surprised ''Pardon my language sir, but since when the living hell could your brother be trusted with tasks of high importance regarding the safety of this colony, especially now that this will soon become a warzone?''

''I don't know, the drunken piece of shit will probably had that A.I. friend of his illegally put his name in the system to make it look like he was supposed to be stationed there while switching the name of the actual officer supposed to be there to do his patrols, just so that he didn't actually have to do much of anything.

Colonel Miller, please send your second in command over with a hundred of the reserve militia troops, she'll take over command of the post until we find the officer that was actually supposed to be there, also have her send my brother here so I can remind him that I'm the general in command of the troops on this planet, and he's simply a lieutenant and as such is supposed to follow my orders.''

Why oh why was my brother stationed here again, the worthless bastard always has had a problem with actually doing any work and used all potential ways he could to get out of active duties like patrolling and never took more passive duties such as specific locations seriously. He is probably either asleep or once again playing online video games right now while as the locations commanding officer he should be monitoring the shield generator right now.

Sigh enough about him, that should be dealt with for now. ''Okay so back to our previous topic, is there any way that the UFC fifth fleet could be delayed because of outside of some large scale technical problems with their ships?'' At this captain Smith's face takes on a grim look.

''There are several actually, the Chinese and American governments have asked the EU to move to the relay connecting us with the nearest system and wait on the third fleet instead of going here straight from their own colony with regular FTL engines. And when I say asked I mean they are putting heavy political and economical pressure on the group to have them follow along with their plans.''

What the hell? ''Why would they do that? I know that they aren't exactly friendly to each-other but we're talking about a war against aliens here, potentially a very long term conflict dragging on for years or even decades. Just why the hell would they fuck up international relations in the opening week of the conflict already?''

Smith seemed to sigh at this. ''You really aren't the best with political situations you know that? There are multiple reasons why they could be doing this however there are three main reasons, the first is that the Chinese President is new to the job, as in he's only been integrated for less than two months after the previous one died due to a heart attack.

If the UFC is the one to fight and win the first battle against these aliens on one of China's own colonies especially this early into his term, the public will probably be ready to overthrow not only him personally but likely his entire party considering the whole Chinese Mandate of Heaven approach to rulership.

This would destabilize his country in wartime and also have a good chance of destroying the ideology he has pledged his life to, so both politically and militarily seen it is actually a decent judgement. The problem however with it is that since he isn't a military man he possibly does not realize that there is a good chance that if we stop the aliens as soon as possible and take them out we could easily be able to force the aliens into a cease-fire that is in our favour, giving us more time to prepare for an actual continuation of a war, instead of his idea where the war will be an immediate long term thing no matter if we win or lose here.

He is also disregarding the higher amount of deaths the colony will most likely suffer in case the colony comes under siege anywhere in the next week due to this line of thought, since he believes that they would only lose way more if he does not take this action because of political instability back home. Meanwhile the American president is more of a glory-dog and a war-hawk, he believes that America is the greatest nation in Terran space and as such should be the one to fight and defeat Terra's enemies.

He probably finds the very idea of a much smaller and in his eyes insignificant nation-state like the Dutch Union or Belgium winning the first battle against aliens for humanity very unappealing. One of the things they are threatening with are trade sanctions, mainly on element zero derived technologies and on element zero itself.''

That… is going to be a pain, especially if the war is going to be a prolonged one. The aliens are already more advanced on the subject of element zero then that we are, these types of actions would only cause more problems to our capabilities in such a conflict. ''Since you apparently know a significantly larger amount about the economic situation then I do, how high are the chances that those threats will actually work?

I mean I know that they would never back down in case the Americans or Chinese were threatening with a war against them in an effort to gain something out of it, however right now they might just because of a fear of being weakened due to a foreign threat. So the rough chances?''

At this Smith smiled ''Close to zero sir, they know that the threats are likely bluffs since the Dutch and British are the ones that control the terraforming sector, while the Dutch, Australians and French are the ones that control most of the food exports sector, which with this war means that they are going to be some of the most influential trading partners around as nobody wants to get into a situation where their armies starve to death in the middle of nowhere.

Nor does anyone want to anger the people that can actually repair their lands the quickest and most efficiently after the war is over if those get damaged intensively by these aliens over the course of said war. So while the Europeans need the American and Chinese element zero technology, the Chinese especially need Dutch, Australian and French food and agriculture related supplies even more than the Europeans and Australians need said technology.

Especially considering that they can just use older but still functioning Terran technologies for most of the same functions the element zero technology is used for, while the Chinese can't cough up food from anywhere to feed anywhere near even half of their three billion sized population during wartime, even if the Americans and Australians start supplying them whatever they can spare it would still probably end up with some three-hundred million people starving and a decent portion of the remainder living on bare necessities food wise.''

On the one hand its bad that such a thing would be necessary, on the other hand that is very good for the chances the people of this planet have at surviving. Smith continues ''Also apparently the Vatican wants in on the fun, they started up the process of gathering a civilian relief fleet with medical supplies, food, drink and both the tools and materials to rebuild after damage. They got a large number of volunteers from private ship owners after declaring it the religious duty of any catholic to assist their fellow Terrans in their time of need.

In case we stand to lose the colony they'll instead be used to evacuate all civilians and wounded military personnel back to safer space, with them being defended by the combination of an Italian UFC Flotilla and pretty much all Papal ships that can actually use FTL of high enough quality to keep up with the Chinese fleet, with the Italians also escorting them back again while the Vatican's ships will stay here to assist in the defence of the colony. The total numbers of the military aspects of this fleet will probably be some sixty capital class warships.''

''That is a positive thing for us, now could you please move two of your corvettes into atmosphere to give cover to the capital in case somebody else decides to jump in through some kind of portal? If the group Chinese fought on the other side of the relay also have this kind of technology, they'll be more useful as powerful orbital support rather then small fry in space while there aren't any enemies to fight.''

At this he nodded before saluting. ''It will be done general, captain Smith out.'' As the life-sized and life like hologram left I looked towards the holo-table in front of me. ''Segrei, inform me how well the evacuation is going right now, and how far is the arming up of off duty militia and reservists going along.''

Sergei nods. ''The evacuation is going well sir, the Chinese have signalled that they have gotten the message out well and far more than half of the population they need to evacuate is already being moved towards the various smaller bunkers. Meanwhile percentage of those already evacuating themselves to the main bunker is 70%, with some 5% of those actually already having reached the bunker and are now starting to file into it.

The militia and most of the reservist forces have been called to duty already due to the process having been started earlier after the Chinese ended up in that battle on the other side of the relay. The reservists in the area around the capital have been ordered to follow orders of you as the planetary commander since the Chinese general that is actually in command over their units left with his troops on the flotilla that crossed the relay. The remaining Chinese high ranking officers will be cut off from the capital as per protocol to make it less likely for the invaders to find them, so those also weren't an option.''

Okay that is a good thing, that will cause less problems when we need to react quickly with only one chain of command. ''Put half of their units with the militia in the reserve for now and have them support the bunker guards, the remaining half is to defend evacuation routes in case they come under attack from enemy saboteurs and form quick reaction units near the front-lines of the defence.''

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Planet: Shanxi, Location: Forest clearing some 40 kilometres North of the planetary capital. Time: at the same moment where Williams starts shouting giving out orders. POV: Steve Rogers

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''Ok, so to be clear no matter what happens or how much we work on it the earliest we can get back to our home dimension is years?'' Loki nodded, an understandably anguished look on his face, with my own probably having that same look. Tony was worse then either of us could ever be though, probably because he had the shortest biological life-span out of all of us and with Pepper having a roughly equal life-span, they will be separated for a large portion of their lives.

And that is if nothing goes wrong, if even a single situation requires us to use part of the power trapped inside those stones we might very well be trapped here for the entire remainder of his life. I was also missing Sharon and our friends badly, and hated that I could not assist more in the defence of the Earth, but I had already dealt with a similar situation once before, and will be able to do so once again if needs be.

We need to find a place to stay on this planet fast, not only that but also learn if it is inhabited by other sapient/sentient life forms, whichever word you use for it. ''Loki, is it possible for you to scan the area for sentient life-forms with your own magic?'' He nods, good that is one positive thing.

''Stark you should start repairing your suit, Bucky stand guard over the two of them while they are busy, I'll go scout the area physically to see if there are any structures that could serve as a temporary home nearby. Also, Loki, store that gauntlet in some dimension pocket of your own making if possible, it would be a pain if it got damaged while we were carrying it with us or during a battle of some kind.''

They all nodded now, clearly at the very least relieved to have something to do and take their minds off just how painful it will be not to see our loved ones for years. ''Ok, in roughly fifteen minutes I'll return here and we'll all put together what information we've gained on this place after having had a bit of time to gain a first impression of the situation.

Loki, if you do find sentient living beings, please focus somewhat on their species looks like if you can, it would be a pain to get into a fight with what we think is a local wild predator while in reality it's one of the planets native sentient beings.'' He nods at this, probably already having thought of it but it is a good idea to make certain in situations like this, that scenario would really be a pain to deal with.

After this I turned towards Tony, ''Stark I know you usually like to work alone more and also understand your reasons why, however it would be better for us if you make up a list of what types of materials you'll need to repair the suit completely so one of us can go to the local markets if his search turns out to be fruitful, probably Loki if I'm being honest because of his shapeshifting abilities, where we can buy it for you.''

Tony nodded at this, good. ''I understand Rogers, you might be a God now but I'm still the Genius here, not you.'' I laughed a bit, even if it was a bad attempt at a joke, it's still better for him to attempt to cope that way rather then clamming up or going into shock, which I had honestly feared would happen to at least one of us given the situation.

I discreetly nodded to Bucky, who nodded back and informed me through sign language 'Will watch them. Stay safe.' My reply was in return in the same language, since he probably feels slightly more comfortable talking that way currently 'Will do old friend. Stay safe yourself.' Before running to the edge of the clearing and starting to climb a tree, using one of the branches as a final push off point and parkouring my way on top of the highest branches in the forest that can still carry me towards the distant edge of it to the South.

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Planet: Shanxi, Location: edge of the forest near a farm 21 kilometres from the capital, 10 minutes afterwards, still Steve POV

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I just hope they aren't trying to kill each other, wait a second how did I not notice that farm earlier, its about a kilometre away from the forests edge, good. Dropping to the ground for a moment to look upon it somewhat more closely I finally notice something. I'm at least half a foot, or in other words some 16 centimetres taller then I was previously. What the hell happened?

I can think on that later, first things first, analysing this place. Ok so the edge of the forest is roughly one kilometre away from the farmstead, which was connected to a more modern newer road by a dirt track leading to it that was nearly a full kilometre long, with fields of what seems to be some kind of wheat extending along most of that track. Wait since when do I think in metric terms for distances and how can I tell the near exact length of such things just by looking at them?

Might have something to do with this whole 'God' thing, will have to ask Loki about it later. Anyways the building style actually looks similar to the design to that Chinese farm I have seen in a picture, might we be on an alternate version of Earth? No, probably not, with how advanced that road seems there would have been a much larger amount of buildings and other forms of settlement in the nearby area then having to walk eight kilometres to even be able to see something made by humans in an area as fertile as this place seems to be.

This means that either we're dealing with some kind of alien species that has an architectural style similar to the Chinese, option two we're dealing with a humanity that has a completely different home-planet then Earth one with larger amounts of fertile land causing humanity to not use up a lot of it even though they've reached a certain scientific level already. Option three we're dealing with some kind of space-faring humanity and this is one of their colonies.

For some reason I don't know which option would be something more problematic to deal with. Sigh I'll just have to get back to the clearing. Turning around I run back towards the forest, jumping up, grabbing a branch, launching myself up with it again and repeating this process another two times before I'm on the highest branch that can still carry my weight, pulling myself up on it so I can stand.

Though while I start running back, a single thought keeps popping up in my mind. If this is a space-faring race, human or otherwise, am I being watched through satellites of some kind, are they potentially even aiming some kind of orbital weapon at me in case I turn out to be a threat to them? Let's just work out the problems related to that once I get back to the remainder of the group and I have their information about the situation.

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Planet: Shanxi, Location: forest clearing 30 kilometres north of the capital, Time: a few minutes after the last scene, POV: Loki Odinsson.

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Ok, all the facts check out, this location is a human colony on another planet not in their home solar system, they have a number of space capable vehicles and at least a small fleet of them is stationed in and outside of orbit with how large the clump of human like life-signs I can feel are out there. However there is something a bit strange, while all signs point towards humans being the ones that live here, there is something decidedly different about the life-signs in comparison to the average human back on the Midgard I am familiar with….

Maybe it is because we are in a different dimension? A question for later, for now this should give enough information. Barnes suddenly becomes more alert, yes I can also hear some rustling now that I am not focusing so much on the effects of the spell. ''Person is nearing, most likely Steve but possibility of a hostile, approaching from the South.''

Stark stopped tinkering with the helmet of his suit, quickly adjusting a thing and then putting it over his head. Meanwhile I conjured a dagger, giving this one to Barns before creating another one for my own use. He gave me a thankful nod before focussing again while holding his hand to his ear. Then he sighed in relief causing me to lower my guard slightly. Almost certainly good news.

''Its Steve, he found what seems to be a farmstead with a road leading to it, both of them are close enough to Chinese designs that he thinks it likely that we are dealing with a space-faring faction of humans. He's also asking if Stark is currently able to fly decently enough, if yes we will be able to reach it within 10 minutes or so of travelling since it is barely nine kilometres away from us.''

Just as he finished talking Captain Rogers jumped out of a tree, rolling once hitting the ground before standing up in front of us. ''I heard Bucky relay pretty much everything I found out through the communicators, what did you guys manage to discover?'' A look shared between myself and Stark indicated I should go first, a shame that is likely to mean his news is less than good.

''I was able to discover this planet has more than 1 million sentient beings living on it, with a large enough portion of them being human that my rough planetary scan couldn't feel any other species. This is not their home planet like captain Rogers rightfully assumed, since there is a either a small fleet or one very large station in space where thousands of life forms are spread out near the planets orbit.

The inhabitants of the planet seem to have noticed us however since there is a move reminiscent of a planetary evacuation going on, though considering the size of our group chances are high it was instead caused by something else and Thanos just made this planet the exit of our interdimensional journey so that whatever else was approaching might finish us off if something happens.''

''So they most likely have some kind of observation post in space that is directed down towards the planet also, a satellite of some kind if nothing else?'' I nodded in answer to Starks question. ''Good, that gives it a much higher chance of them actually believing us on the topic of us travelling here through a dimensional portal.''

There was truth in that statement, the likelihood of them believing we were actual dimensional travellers and not some kind of genetic experiment humanity seems to love performing in modern times is much higher with them having actual proof of it recorded by their own devices. Now Stark is moving to speak again.

''Yeah ok, that's all good news, sadly enough I now have the duty of telling you all some bad news. We have as you all already know very little to no supplies to repair anything significant of any of our gear sets. This makes my current predicament even more problematic then it usually would be: the main flight control of my suit has become too heavily damaged to be of any use right now.

There is a backup installed that I activated and used, however since this was merely one of the many spare suits I brought out of storage and used once most of the other dozen or so got destroyed on the battlefield, that backup flight control is very much a backup, my ability to steer and actually control my flight will be extremely limited outside of flat open areas or planetary orbit.

If I try to fly any significant distance in this forest chances are high I will crash into something every other fifty meters or so without an AI available to assist me in controlling the suit.'' He breaks up at the last words and seems to whisper 'my children…' while forcing himself not to give in to grief.

I myself have a similar predicament, thinking back on everyone I had to leave behind back home, with the others being in similar situations so we respectfully ignore it and let him have the moment. He catches himself back shortly afterwards. ''But anyways to summarize it I will not be able to fly anywhere near that distance Rogers, however me walking would slow us down significantly, any solutions?''

The Captain nods. ''We can have either myself or Bucky carry you towards the area, while we will have to slow down a bit due to the problems inherent with carrying another person on your back through a forest, we'll still easily be able to travel at a speed of roughly 30 kilometres an hour if not faster, instead of the 7 or 8 kilometres per hour we would be limited to with you travelling on foot while in the suit.''

Stark looked between the two. ''Hmm that offer would make millions of women back home swoon captain, being carried on the back of either yourself or your friend the strong super soldier both very handsome men. I'll take Barnes, you will probably need to do most of the diplomacy or fighting if we come upon somebody Rogers, but Barnes, no feeling me up alright? I'm not ready for that type of relationship with you yet.''

At this jape, some of the tension that had been in the group was lost, with all of us laughing slightly, before Barnes continued it ''Oh Tony, don't break my heart! Why can't you let me feel that delicious body of yours?'' after that comment he put a fake look on his face as if appreciating Stark's physique, with everyone else nearly falling to the ground from how much we were laughing.

The captain recovered first and had to break it up. ''Ok, that was good guys, but we all know Bucky that you are more interested in strong females that can kick your arse with ease, and Tony, if you go on like this I might have to suggest a threesome between you, Bucky and your fiancée when we return.''

Suddenly Tony paled drastically ''No I'm good, I'll go up the back of your sidekick no problem.'' Bucky could be heard yelling ''hey'' but over everything my own laughter could still be heard. It was a sorely welcome change in the mood of our group, even if only for a moment.

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And this is chapter four of the rewrite. Okay I'm literally months behind my original schedule, so I'll keep this note short and start working on the other chapters. I have taken a few looks at what the next chapters are and nearly fell down crying with how badly they contrast with what I am actually intending to make of this story, and how much of a pain it would be to actually just go rewrite them.

So instead of rewriting the remaining chapters, I'll be writing almost completely new chapters with parts of the old chapters used if they still fit. As can be seen in this chapter I realised just how much the scale of the conflict was off… I mean think about it I want to partially use scenes from the games of Mass Effect however for that I need humanity to actually have a good reason to be somewhat suspicious of specific species.

A small incursion by less then 50.000 citadel personnel into human space in which a few thousand people die where it is pretty damn obvious they didn't have orders from high command to act as they did? Not really what I'm aiming for. I need it to be so that human leaders will have good reason to doubt that this incursion was done without support from other high-ranking members of the Turian Hierarchy or other less open support from high ranking officers in other species militaries.

This in combination with the fact that the ships used by the Citadel will be much cheaper and easier to mass produce things means that there will be a much larger fleet and more forces from mercenary/non-council factions supporting it. More explanation on the how and why will be in the text of future chapters.