Title: What She Was Told
Series Title: Mass Effect/ Eclipse Phase (MEEP)
Author: curiousyellow
COPYLEFT:
I don't own any IP involved in this work of fiction. Everything here should qualify as a parody. If you don't get the joke, then you're probably a lawyer. It is very dry humor. Also, I disavow the legitimacy of IP as a legitimate form of property. Do with this as you like. For more information, please read "Against Intellectual Monopoly" available for free at: (CENSORED BY SITE?).
METADATA:
This is a piece of fiction derived from the Eclipse Phase game I used to run. It's core theme: "What would happen if Transhumans from Eclipse Phase had their First Contact with the Space Opera Mass Effect setting during the Relay 314 Incident?" Continuity ends pretty much immediately, but people seem to think it's interesting anyway. If you hate this genre or kittens, you should leave immediately and go reread your Spock/Voldemort slash fics you love so much.
Eclipse Phase is amazing, check out their website: (CENSORED BY SITE?)
It is also CC-licensed, so PDF redistribution is permitted. Go google "eclipse phase pdf" and you can get a legal free copy for yourself.
Wardi wanted to biotically slam Berenas head into the floor for the horrible treatment she'd received at the RIIS Archivists hands, but Wardi was barely biotic enough to move a sheet of paper-slightly. As it happened, she had to make due with being foul at Berena as the older Asari sat across the table from her, trying to make polite conversation. It was a different table, in a different room, with a whole bunch of weird metal cages surrounding an otherwise normal table and cot. For the last half an hour, Berena had been trying to talk to her, and Wardi had been pointedly giving her the silent treatment and staring at the cot like it covered in fine literature. When she pulled the silent treatment on her sister, Rotu tended to snap in a matter of minutes. Berena didn't appear to have noticed yet, and just kept talking.
"It's hard for people like me to put myself in your shoes." said Berena. "You don't know anything-not what has been going on, not why it matters. You have no idea what scares me and my colleagues so much that we forceably abducted and stripped a kid like you. It's hard for me to see the world the way I used to, but I can help you understand me." The Archivist paused, taking a thick paper file-folder from a previously unnoticed case near her feet, and placed in on the table in front of Wardi. Glancing at the folder, Wardi could see a very official looking notice stamped on it in red ink: "SENSITIVE DO NOT DUPLICATE". Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. Berena pulled a pen and legal form out of the same case, and placed them next to the folder. "Sign this Non-Disclosure Agreement, and you can read as much of this Dossier as you like. Deal? I know it's marked 'SENSITIVE', but there's a definite need to know involved here."
As much as she wanted to continue giving Berena the silent treatment, Wardi's curiosity got the better of her. She looked over the legal form. Non-disclosure agreements tend to be pretty standard aside from the penalty for breaking them, so she scanned for that. Near the bottom, in large helpful print, the form promised to charge her with "treason" for talking about it. She stopped for a moment, wondering what the hell she had gotten herself into. Staring at the pen, she knew that her mind had made itself up the moment she chose to read the form, even if she didn't want to consciously admit it. It felt like she was in the spy movies she used to watch when she was younger, but her rational side reminded her that treason often carries a fuck you kind of sentence when you're convicted. She shut her eyes and grabbed the pen, only opening them after she had messily scrawled her name on the form. Seeing this, Berena put the form and pen back in her bag and leaned forward, looking Wardi in the eye.
"We have been cooperating with the Justicars," said Berena, "to archive intelligence to help them decide whether or not Transhumanity is inherently opposed to their codes, but now we have a live lead, a chance to find out what the Transhumans are really up to. You and your sister have been targeted by a Transhuman called Surt... formerly Ambassador Surt of the Automists' Alliance, and the CEO of Surtheim Logistics. Every time something suspicious or inexplicable has happened with Transhumans, Surt has been conveniently absent. But now, he's slipped up! You and your browser were covered with spy nanomachines-its why it turned off when anyone other than you touched it. Surt was watching you... probably for weeks... before he sent you that message. He wants to talk to you... for reasons I don't fully understand, but what I do understand is that those spy nanomachines had to have been physically placed on you. Either he is close enough nearby to infect you with his spys, or one of his agents is."
Momentarily, Wardi forget she was mad, and stared with mouth agape at Berena. Sensing that her audience was finally paying attention, Berena continued. "Earlier, when you were man-handled and dragged into the basement Faraday Cage, we had to scrub you down before the spy nanomachines could turn deadly. It's happened before. There's pictures in there if you don't believe me. The last spy victims weren't found until it was too late for us to help them. You were lucky though. This Department needs your cooperation to take advantage of this lead, and we really can't force you to help us. As pissed as you seem to be now, I'll delay asking you till you've calmed down."
With that, Wardi was left alone in the Faraday Cage staring at the folder. She opened it, to find a note inside earmarking the folder as a RIIS dossier about Transhumans. She had heard her mothers views on them, and understood that they were controversial in the news, but she didn't otherwise know very much about them. Since they seemed to be interested in her, she resolved to find out what the fuck was really going on that scared the RIIS staff so much that they sealed her in a radio-proof cage.
This first document that caught her eye was a small one on top of the stack. It was labeled, "Official Codex Entry Transhumans", and was dated just prior to the Citadel's disappearance.
"""
Official Codex Entry "Transhumans":
First encountered during the Relay 314 Incident of last year, this enigmatic race is a newcomer to galactic society. Known primarily through limited interactions with small Expeditionary groups, they are thought to possess advanced technology. Suspected to originate from the quarantined system beyond Relay 314, the home-world of the Transhumans has been identified as "Earth", though its exact location is unknown. Transhumans are mammalian bipeds of similar size to Turians or Asari. Many are known to have extensive cybernetic enhancements, which is apparently common in their culture. Ongoing concerns over their interests in AI have halted technological trade. An unofficial cease-fire has been reached with Transhumans over their base in the Krogan DMZ. Contact with Transhumans has been suspended due to failed armistice negotiations. Pending a resumption of diplomatic relations, the Council has issued a Writ of Interdiction against Transhumans, barring their entry to Citadel Space.
At the bottom of the page is a handwritten note explaining that the entry was accepted for publication in the next Codex update, but the Citadel disappeared before it could be distributed.
Beneath that, she found another Codex entry, this time labeled as part of the "Illium Spur Network" Edition of the Codex. Such a thing didn't exist yet, but there were rumors that one was being compiled. She looked at the printout to find it contained several related Codex Entries.
"""
Codex (Illium Spur Network Edition)
(Transhumans on Illium)
Following Citadel Interdiction roughly ten years ago, all Transhumans were barred from Citadel Space. Within a month of that event, a Transhuman Embassy was established in Nos Astra to promote dialog and trade between the Transhumans and the Asari. Representing the Transhuman faction calling itself the Autonomists' Alliance, the embassy negotiated an agreement enabling Transhumans to settle on Illium and use the surrounding space as a a free trade zone, provided that they followed the appropriate product labeling laws. As a result, more than 50000 Transhumans have passed through Illium on their way to see the rest of the galaxy, with nearly 10000 of them taking up permanent residences on Illium itself.
In keeping with the trade agreements, the Transhumans were permitted to live and act under the contract-based legal systems negotiated by the original Ambassadorial staff, and were not subject to, nor protected by, Illium criminal codes. Being unprotected by Illium law resulted in them being preyed upon by Illium natives, giving them the highest per capita murder rate in the system. Strong pressures like this prevented integration into the Illium community, and led to the formation of Transhuman ghettos where mutual defense against aggressors was easier. Many Ghettos formed in places which were otherwise completely uninhabitable by Asari or Krogan: underwater, in open space, and at the scorchingly hot ground-level underneath Illium Arcologies. Transhumans venturing out of Ghettos typically do so only while well armed, leading to a public perception of them as being inherently violent.
Cultural exchange between Illium natives and Transhumans has been limited by gross differences in understanding. Transhumans claim that they have a variety of arts and media that are simply inaccessible to Asari and other beings lacking the implants that are so common among Transhumans. Cultural biases against augmentation among the Asari has led to very few Illium natives receiving the required implants. Many Asari experience physical illness and mental anguish at even being exposed to Transhumans and their implants, a fact that reinforces their cultural biases with physical sensation, leading to a conditioned disgust at meeting Transhumans at all. Academics and Liberal factions among Asari politics recognize these issues as being key reasons why Transhumans on Illium are by-and-large treated as second-class citizens. While their efforts to single these issues out for correction via legislation are marked, more conservative factions (especially those related to the military and government) block them. The strongest reactions against Transhumans come from those communities which are closest to the Ghettos, where those living there claim that the liberals are unaware of the realities of the Ghettos and grossly underestimate the difficulty of integration.
(Illium Transhuman Integration Act Update)
Roughly five years ago, the Integration Act was passed by a slim margin of liberal support. Its stated aim is to address the root issues keeping the Transhumans from fully integrating into Illium culture. Among its provisions are registration requirements which provide a route to citizenship for Transhumans who have lived on Illium for at least 3 years, as well as provisions to break up the institutions of the Transhuman Ghettos. The Integration Act requires that unregistered Transhumans leave the surface of Illium, which has resulted in roughly three quarters of the population of Transhumans vanishing. Government estimates project that the missing Transhumans have mostly moved either into the deep seas, or up into space. Those remaining Transhumans have embraced the road to citizenship which includes integration training that will help them overcome their history of violence and distrust, as well as their unhealthy reliance on implant technology, to become model Illium citizens.
(Transhuman Underground Update)
A fringe group supporting Transhuman Independence, the self-named Transhuman Underground protests the treatment of Transhumans following the Integration Act. Often seen at political events and rallies, the Underground consists mainly of non-Transhuman members-primarily Salarian and Krogan with a minority of maiden Asari. While the Underground has yet to violate any laws, they are considered a public nuisance, and many companies refuse to deal with them. Sympathizers are known to donate regularly to the group to make up for the difficulties in procuring products and services that they face with the wider world.
(Autonomists' Alliance)
Speculated to be the dominant faction among many governing the Transhuman homeworld of Earth, their involvement with the embassy on Illium has been controversial. Many have declared the relationship between the Republic of Illium and the Alliance one sided, with the Alliance securing free transit rights as well as colonization license of its citizens, and giving almost nothing in return to Illium. Trade and transit agreements only permit Transhumans to travel to Illium from Earth, and forbids any travel to Earth. Only trade has been uncontentious, with parties on both Illium and the Alliance participating commercially. Since the disappearance of the Citadel, the Alliance has discontinued contact with Illium. While no one is sure why, some speculate that they seek to distance themselves from the remnants of the Citadel Council, perhaps to set themselves up to fill the vacuum of power. Others claim that they have withdrawn because the Citadel Interdiction is now unenforceable, and Illium simply lost interest for them. Other than a few basic facts, almost nothing is known about the Alliance. They keep no standing military, nor do they have a unified legal system or currency, but they do have a Constitutional Charter called the "Points of Unity" (quoted below [AUTHOR CC NOTICE: this is from the Rimward book, I do not own it]):
1) We demand autonomy, self-organization, and self-governance for all sapient beings.
2) We support direct democracy and forms of organization where sapients collectively decide their own future.
3) We promote mutual aid and reciprocating altruism between sapients.
4) We affirm the right to engage in self-defense against oppression and coercive authority and stand in solidarity with sapients so attacked.
(Transhumans and EEZO)
By all reports, Transhumanity had never come into contact with EEZO or Mass Effect Fields until they first encountered Citadel Civilization via Relay 314. From what scholars have pieced together, EEZO simply doesn't occur in their volume of space in any usable form. Instead, their technology is based on designs which do not incorporate EEZO or Mass Effect Fields at all. While some importation of EEZO has occurred for research purposes, it does not appear that they have any great demand for it. As such, any Transhuman technologies have designs which are incomprehensible to galactic engineers since many core assumptions about the design of artifacts simply don't apply. This has led to a hesitancy among other races to adopt Transhuman technologies, knowing that they simply could not fix it if it broke.
(Transhuman Spaceships)
Given their lack of EEZO, the fact that Transhumans still have FTL spaceships is a mystery. While the Spaceships only started appearing in galactic records years after meeting the Transhumans, their ability to travel at FTL speeds without EEZO have been well observed. The most common ship design of this type looks like a black icosahedron, and lack any readily identifiable drive system. Engineering specialist have noted the ships cannot enter atmosphere, and produce vast amounts of radiation. No one claims to have seen the ships actually traveling during FTL, but they are often witnessed after such transits radiating waste heat and radiation through gigantic retractable radiator spars. Top scholars speculate that the ships FTL drives utilize physics that are entirely unknown in the wider galaxy. TRAVEL WARNING: Do not approach a Transhuman spaceship while it is operating. Merchant dialog protocols can be used to request a skiff or shuttle to visit you. This warning is both due to the deadly radiation that these ships give off being unintentionally dangerous, as well as many recorded events of ships being fired upon by even apparently empty Transhuman ships.
(Transhuman Medicine)
The one area in which the Transhuman technology accels is in medicine. Among their own kind, they long ago eradicated disease and plague, and found a way to apparently render themselves immortal. While no one would argue at the effectiveness of their medicines, many Asari philosophers and theologians speculate at what cost the Transhumans have made themselves free of disease and death. By their own admission, many of their medical accomplishments come about through genetic engineering and gene tampering-two technologies that have long outlawed in Citadel Space. Further, their claims of conquering death are also under scrutiny. They claim to capture the dead and place them into new bodies to return to life like an Asari would wake from a dream. Theological debates rage over the nature of the soul with relation to the mind, and Transhuman immortality has been taken as the new exemplar for these arguments. While a majority of Asari on Illium want no part of Transhuman Medicines, a small minority have received treatment without long term ill effects. Krogan dwelling on Illium have no such reservations, and commonly attend Transhuman clinics for Genophage therapy. Similarly, local Quarians have utilized these clinics for immunological purposes, allowing many to live without the fear of death due to suit punctures. Illium government is currently debating whether these kinds of clinics should be allowed to continue without the oversight of the traditional medical licensing boards.
(Post-Citadel Banned Product Development Controversy)
Prior to the disappearance of the Citadel, a major barrier to peace with the Transhumans was their continued unhealthy interest in developing several dangerous banned technologies. From their illegal augmentation research, to their treaty-violating creation of unshackled AIs, to their implied research into various planet-destroyer grade weapons technologies, the Council would not budge an inch. The Citadel issued an ultimatum: adhere to our bans or be forever forbidden from Citadel Space. The Transhumans apparently chose to leave than give up their designs. Now that the Citadel is gone, the Treaties that keep these bans in place have fallen under public scrutiny. As Illium was designated a free-trade zone (and is not itself a signor to the Treaties), the products of these banned research are not technically illegal, though they are heavily regulated. Transhuman developers have complained bitterly of unnecessary bureaucratic restrictions on their research and product development, but the majority surveyed in Illium Polls strongly support current regulations or seek to restrict them further. There has been a strong conservative motion to force Illium to sign the Treaties itself, and fully ban the technologies. This has met protests from both those Illium natives with commercial interests in the regulated industries, as well as those Transhumans who claim to be Unshackled AIs themselves. A leading voice in these protests is the Autonomists' Alliance Ambassador, Surt (of Surtheim Logistics Co). He contends that he and everyone at his company are not only AIs, but people too, with legal rights that would be violated by such legislation. Detractors contend that AIs are nonpersons under the law, and that the employees of Surtheim Logistics Co are technically the joint property of the corporate stakeholders.
(Ongoing Translation Issues Pertaining to Transhuman Language)
Unlike many other galactic species, the Transhumans apparently maintain dozens of unique languages. While they communicate amongst themselves in a strange babel of unrelated tongues, they commonly shift to speaking Krogan when talking to galactic races. A historical artifact of their early contact with Tuchanka, their linguists took great pains to learn to speak Krogan, and shared this proficiency via Transhuman translator software. Many Krogan claim that speaking with a Transhuman in the Krogan tongue is like being insulted by a master poet-a concept which is highly complementary in Krogan culture. In the three years between the appearance of Transhumans, and the disappearance of the Citadel, standard galactic translator updates had been issued to correct some of the more egregious errors in speaking to Transhumans via secondary Krogan translation software. Contrary to popular belief, the corrections are required to eliminate many untranslatable nuances that the Transhumans speaking Krogan utilize during normal conversation. Scholars claim that these corrections indicate that current translation software may not be treating colloquial Krogan correctly, losing information during conversion that may make contemporary Krogan sound less eloquent than they may have in the past. With the disconnection of the Spur Networks, the usual scholarly networks have been broken, shifting priorities from learning exotic tongues to maintaining existing translator software in isolation. In the last seven years, Transhuman translators have apparently learned other galactic tongues, but Krogan appears to be their default tongue to speak with Galactic races.
(Transhuman Weaponry)
REDACTED REMOVE PRIOR TO PUBLICATION; RIIS ORDER 8430-7940-22-1
While they lack Mass Effect technology, the Transhumans are suspected to be centuries ahead of the Citadel races in the field of weapon development. Transhuman operatives have been found to utilize advanced firearms which easily outperform military Mass Effect based weapons, and beam weaponry that completely bypasses conventional shielding. Their most dangerous weapons are the ones which our scientists are only just beginning to understand: invisible undetectable clouds of nanomachinery completely unlike anything we know. These cloud-weapons have the capability to smartly dissolve the enemies of Transhumans, and even momentary exposures are enough to kill. A office complex was rendered lifeless using a cloud-weapon, and the cloud didn't dissipate for over 300 hours, claiming the lives of dozens of rescuers. In addition to man-portable weaponry, their ships utilize advanced weapons designed to bypass shields. Such technologies include the massive gamma lasers utilized by their base around Aralakh, as well as high-energy radiation beams, and it is probable that they utilize anti-matter weapons. Many militaries have found themselves unwilling to conduct operations against Transhumans due to the imbalance in weaponry, not to mention that the average Transhuman appears to be potentially more dangerous on the ground than a Krogan. Observers have noted that Transhumans routinely operate in climates ranging from the cryonic open vacuum of space, to the crushing depths of toxic oceans, to the burning surfaces of planets too hot and radioactive for either Krogan or Rachni to survive. In combat they have been seen to move at supernatural speeds, often killing an entire squad before they have had a chance to open fire. Additionally, unarmed they are thought to be highly poisonous and capable of producing shocks not unlike police tasers. Troops that have survived encounters with Transhuman fighters tend to think that the Transhuman simply didn't want to kill them, but few things are certain. A vocal minority among the Turian Intelligence Service holds that the Transhumans we encounter-including their military base orbiting Aralakh, and their obviously dangerous ships-are civilians. They claim that we simply have not encountered their military yet. Such theories are wildly speculative, but believable enough that military planners are putting great effort into observing Transhumans, and locating a route to their homeworld Earth.
"""
Ten-Thousand of these monsters on Illium... she shivered involuntarily.
A page containing Turian military letterhead caught her eye. It was older than the other documents she had seen, and stained from something brown having spilled on it. "Turian Hierarchy Official Account for the Relay 314 Incident" was its title. The Relay 314 Incident was infamous for being a short lived war between the Transhumans and the Citadel following their first contact. Apparently it was written by one of the ship commanders involved in the incident.
"""
Responding to a Breach of Dormancy-Quarantine, security forces arrived at Relay 314 only to be fired upon by alien forces. Swift action by first responders minimized damage to the security forces, and the distal Relay was quickly seized. Remote forces found a sparsely populated ice-world, with minimal planetary defenses.
In accordance with official doctrine, the alien's capacity to further damage the fleet was quickly eliminated through orbital bombardment of large heat signatures. Key installations were identified as nuclear reactors and orbital launching systems. They were subsequently bombed from orbit.
While preparations were being made to invite Citadel Diplomatic personnel to conduct surrender negotiations, the aliens ambushed an orbiting frigate, and captured it.
Apparently part of a planned counter-attack, the aliens launched a ship hundreds of times larger than the Citadel. Through unknown means, the alien ship transited from the alien world to the proximal end of Relay 314. The alien ship proceeded to grapple Relay 314, and drag it with it as it moved at FTL speeds to its present orbit in the corona of the star Aralakh in heart of the Krogan DMZ.
Science teams studying the alien vessel have had several chances to observe the warship during operations, but all attempts to approach within a specific radius of the ship result in defenses vaporizing the offending ship. Researchers have determined that the ship is harvesting energy and mass from the star it is orbiting, and based on the rate at which it ejects solar harvesting satellites, it is currently swallowing 1% of the total power output of Aralakh. What it is using all of this power for is not yet obvious, save that it seems to possess amazingly high-yield lasers. Their use was demonstrated when a single volley of the warship catalyzed fissile meltdown of the asteroid that was host to the last round of diplomatic negotiations.
Prevailing opinion on the warship is that it is an obvious standing threat on behalf of the Transhumans. By placing it within the Krogan DMZ, they have effectively placed a fortress on our borders, with armaments facing our direction. A dissenting opinion (held only by a vocal minority of researchers) is that the warship is not a warship at all, but some kind of large-scale manufacturing facility. This opinion is not widely accepted, due to the obvious flaw that a manufacturing facility of sufficient size to harvest a star to power its operations would have to be producing something with all of that energy and mass; as nothing other than stellar harvesting satellites have been seen ejecting from the warship, there would need to be some other massive thing being created (due to the conservation of energy and mass, and all that).
Transhumans have been deemed a threat to Galactic peace, though the Council is too caught up in the motions of diplomacy to realize the full extent. Our agents have reports indicating that Transhumans are not what they seem: a lone unarmed Transhuman defeated a Krogan in melee combat on Tuchanka, another used biotics to assault the Asari ambassador, and at least five vastly different creatures all claimed to be part of this "Transhumans" (including something that looked like a Hanar, something that looked like a mech, and another thing that claimed to be a fully sentient AI). What do we face? The Transhuman world on the far end of Relay 314 seemed to fall easily enough, but everything after that point belies the earlier evidence. Presently, the wisest course is to discover the true extent of our enemy, before we strike their homeworld (as so many of our staff have been advising).
"""
So the Turians had been calling for blood even back then? That made sense, she guessed, since Turians still get sore over it ten years later.
While she was flipping though the rest of the papers in the packet, a small photo slid out of the papers and fell face-down on the table. Written in marker on the back was, "Spy Nanomachines - Victim #5 - Death took 4 hours". Immediately, she knew this was one of the pictures Berena had warned her about, of the other people who had died from the Spy Nanomachines. There was nothing in the world that would make her look at that photo. She just did not want to see the fate that she had been spared through such humiliation. Curiosity though, did not care what her rational mind decided. She couldn't help herself. She turned the photo over to see the picture.
It was an Asari maiden, like herself. Or, it must have been at some point. In the photo, all she could initially see was a jumble of limbs. Macabre interest made her look closer, and she could see that the visible arm bent wrong at the elbow. There was a small piece of bone that pierced through the skin just below the elbow. The lower arm was obvious broken and bent backwards at the elbow, extending backward like a U-shape. It intertwined with one of the legs, which was broken at the pelvis and hip, and pulled up behind the back. All of the muscles in the limbs looked taunt as bowstrings, but she couldn't tell how the bones had broken.
The face was the worst though, frozen in a tight grimace that pulled the sides of the mouth so hard she could see where the lip was split and pulled apart under the tension like torn meat. But the eyes said it all-they stared at the camera, and the look of helpless pain could not be clearer. Death took four hours.