Mass Effect is the property of Bioware, Alien is owned by 20th Century Fox
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USM Anzio
"We're all agreed, then?" Captain Ramirez asked. The boarding party had returned hours ago, but he had waited until the casualties had been taken care of before deciding on the next step.
Anderson nodded. "Yes, sir. That ship has to be destroyed."
"What about the aliens? Do they understand what we're about to do?"
Vickers and Anderson looked at each other. "I believe so, captain," Vickers said. "As much as they understood anything I showed them. The Aliens have seen what we faced. They know their friends are already dead and I showed an image of the Calypso exploding. We may want to send them another image, of the Anzio's guns, with a line, or arrow, to the Calypso, just to make clear that we are not shooting at them. Don't get me wrong. I'm not entirely happy about it. Firing weapons, any kind of weapons, under these circumstances is dangerous, but it is better than the alternative. Lieutenant Anderson is right. We cannot leave the Calypso intact.
"Good, it seems we have a consensus." Ramirez raised his voice to address the crew. "Give me a targeting solution on the Calypso. Stand by forward batteries. Alright people, one more round of communications and then we finish this."
Council survey vessel Light of Dawn
Mordin Solus had been taken to the medical bay, where the ship's doctor was working on him even now. He was not out of danger yet, but the doctor seemed optimistic. Shiana had returned to the bridge to discuss recent events with with Levarn. Her first officer had been busy and it was good to see that they had managed to overcome most of the communication problems. The crew of the Light of Dawn had payed a heavy price, but at least the first contact seemed to be progressing well.
"Captain, we're receving a new message from the human vessel. It looks like another series of images."
Shiana watched as a series of black-and-white drawings appeared on one of her screens. The first showed the human vessel. The second seemed to be a close-up part of the ship that looked suspiciously like a gunport. The third image showed the freighter that they had only recently departed.
"I'm not sure what they mean, captain." Levarn remarked doubtfully. "Do they intent-"
"-to shoot the freighter? Yes. They were quite clear about it. They want to destroy that ship. I see their point. Whatever those creature were that we found on board, they are extremely dangerous."
"But to just casually destroy them like this..."
"Not casually, Levarn. They planned this carefully. Their soldiers carried special medical equipment to deal with acid burns. They knew exactly what they were dealing with and they planned from the beginning to destroy it. In fact, I think they only came on board because we did. I wouldn't be surprised if they had originally planned to destroy the ship without boarding. I have no idea what their relationship is with those things, but they've clearly encountered them before. So, I think we'll leave it up to them to decide what to do. Not that we can do much about it in any case." She looked again at the image. "Let's do the following: Take that image, but break it into two pieces, clearly apart. Then send it back."
USM Anzio
"Look what we got back!" Ramirez said.
Anderson grinned briefly. "Looks like someone has a sense of humor. At least they seem to agree with us. Cannot say I'm surprised, though. I think anyone who has seen a xenomorph up close will hold the same opinion."
"If only, lieutenant." Vickers said softly. "If only."
"Well, no time like the present I guess. Do we have a lock on the target?"
"Yes sir"
"Open fire!"
No-one aboard either vessel was aware of the three ships that were slowly making their way in-system. The newcomeres were moving ballistically, having shut down their engines to avoid detection as long as possible. Aboard one of the ships a discussion was underway that was becoming increasingly heated.
"Captain, the enemy ship is nearly in range. We should engage now!"
"No," the captain's voice remained calm, despite his obvious annoyance. "Not as long as they are sitting right on top of our allies. Even if we hit them with the first shot, there is no way to prevent them from getting at least one salvo off. At that range they cannot miss and they would tear through the shield as though-."
The conversation was interrupted by one of the sensor analysts.
"Captain, we're picking up weapon's fire!"
The captain swore. "Take us in at maximum acceleration. All ships, open fire as soon as you have a targeting solution!"
USM Anzio
"Captain Ramirez! New contacts, closing fast."
Never a dull moment aboard this ship, but I really don't need this right now.
"Can you identify them?"
"No, sir."
Suddenly multiple alarms went off.
"Captain, we're being scanned. I think... I think they're targeting us."
Ramirez swore.
"Full thrusters! come about to starboard and give me a shooting solution."
Anzio's engines powered up and the ship started to turn, fast enough that the crew could feel it despite the inertial dampers.
"Activate ECM and get P.O. Nika back in the combat operations centre. We're going to need her."
Council survey vessel Light of Dawn
"Captain!"
Shiana turned around away from the view screen that now showed the mangled wreck of the freighter as the human warship struck it repeatedly with its mass accellerators. "What is it Levarn?"
"New contacts. Three turian vessels. It looks like two cruisers and a frigate. Captain... They are targeting the human ship. They've opened fire!"
"What?! Open a channel. Get me the idiot in charge of those ships!"
On the screen she could see the engines of the human ship come to live, turning it away even as a mass accelerator round struck it amidships. Battlescreens flared up, then collapsed and the round slammed into the hull. Shiana winced as she saw hull plating fly away. The next thing she knew an alarm rang.
"Massive electronic activity, captain. They're flooding the whole spectrum with noise."
USM Anzio
Petty officer Nika was back in her VR chair. She felt a strange sense of elation as she rapidly spun up multiple electronic warfare routines. First contact was all well and good, but ultimately it had been a slow, plodding process that had shown every promise of remaining slow and plodding for the forseeable future. This was different. This was what she had signed up for.
Inside the virtual environment generated by her helmet, she reached out, searching for the hostile presence that was approaching her ship, both in cyberspace and in reality. It was a strange experience, which some people had described as navigating an interactive three-dimensional maze painted in random colours. And that was when interacting with a hostile human ship. This, this was something else altogether. She noticed the presence of the alien vessel they had been communicating with. Her colleagues had been busy over the past few hours, marking the emissions coming from the ship with tentative labels as they tried to analyze their functions. However, right now she was not concerned with those. Beyond that ship, against a background of random noise generated by the universe itself, she could see the electronic presence of the enemy ships, their targeting systems blazing like searchlights. She traced the signals back to their source. The electronic signatures where incomprehensible and there was no time to analyze them, to try to understand. There was only time to disrupt and destroy. Her hands moved rapidly discarding options, selecting others, generating signal patterns that overlapped those of the hostile sensors. As she worked she was dimly aware of her fellow technicians. They were monitoring her progress, refining her work while she continued wandering through the VR environment, searching for a point of entry.
There!
No matter how alien the signals, they had to enter the enemy ship somewhere. A receiver, a data-port; no matter what it was, it was an entrance. The VR environment flared up in a whirling kaleidoscope of shapes and colours as the computers tried, in vain, to make sense of the alien system. It didn't matter. That system, too, had a pattern and even if she could not understand it, she could destroy it. The EW suite locked on to the hostile data-stream, matching its general shape, adjusting until it could enter the enemy computers.
Turian cruiser Wings of Valour
"Captain! Hostiles are interfering with our communcations. We're detecting something... A.., a presence in the data-stream. It's trying to enter our systems."
"Block it! Close all external communications communications and purch the system."
Captain Adrien Victus watched as the second salvo from his ships went wide, missing the human warship that was maneouvering rapidly to get out of the line of fire. With their communications down the effectiveness of his ships would be severely reduced and he would be unable to contact the survey vessel. Still, he could not risk that the humans would penetrate his electronic security.
"Enemy is returning fire. Multiple rounds incoming."
Victus braced himself as the first enemy salvo rapidly closed the distance.
USM Anzio
Captain Ramirez watched as the first salvos went out. His initial maneouvre had allowed him to bring both of Anzio's turrets to bear upon the enemy and volleys of four solid metal slugs a-piece raced toward the enemy vessels.
"Direct hit on the leading vessel. Rounds did not penetrate the shields."
"Damn!" Ramirez looked at the tactical screen. This was a fight he couldn't hope to win. His ship was already damaged, the odds were three-to-one against him and Anzio had never been designed for heavy ship-to-ship action. "Plot a course away from the enemy. Try to keep he planet between us as much as possible and spin up the FTL core. We're out of here."
Anzio shook as a second hit penetrated her overloaded battlescreens and red lights started blinking on several consoles. She was still in the fight, her main battery returning fire and registering multiple hits in quick succession. A cheer went up among the bridge crew as one of her mass accelerator rounds managed to penetrate the enemy shields, but it was simply not enough, the balance in firepower was too uneven. Fortunately, time and distance were on her side. While the enemy was now slowing down in order to match speed, Anzio's engines were at 100 percent thrust, accelerating her rapidly on a different vector and the FTL drive was nearly ready. Ramirez breathed a little more easily. They were going to make it.
He turned toward Anderson.
"What the HELL just happened?"
Council survey vessel Light of Dawn.
"Captain, the turians are hailing us. A captain Adrien Victus is in command."
Shiana tried in vain to keep her rage under control as the holographic image of a turian officer appeared on the bridge. The human warship was accelerating rapidly and her sensors showed the tell-tale sign of an FTL core powering up. There was no way to contact them, to try to explain that all of this was a mistake. They would return to their people, not with a message of peace, but with tales of ambushes and betrayal. A first contact! A ship full of monsters; three people dead! But we managed it. We actually managed to make peaceful first contact and now this!
"Captain Armali. I apologize for not interfering earlier, but-"
"Not interfering...?! You shouldn't have interfered at all! What are you even doing here."
"The council received your message that you had found a derelict vessel of unknown origin. We were dispatched to render assistance, should it be needed."
"As... Assistance?! Do you have any idea what you have just done, captain Victus? You have started a war!"
The turian's expression was unreadable. "Captain Armali, I'm afraid I have bad news. We are already at war."
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They did everything right. Despite the stressful situation they achieved a peaceful first contact. Unfortunately, somebody, somewhere else, screwed up, and now it's spilling over.
The fact that the electronic warfare routines are effective against the turians doesn't mean they have the slightest idea how the turians' systems work. It's more a matter of: 'Hey, I see a bunch of ones and zeros. Let's reverse those and see what happens." That's part of the reason they didn't try that sort of routine during first contact.
I'm using slightly different terminology for the warships, e.g. calling the turian ships destroyers rather than cruisers, because the humans use a different classification scheme than the ME races.