Ok restarting this story after a loooong hiatus.

This chapter will be more background information, I've decided to not use codex format for this because this is more about the story that the universe in the story.

First, there are no reapers because I don't want to find some way to shoehorn them into the story. Instead, the Protheans built the relays and were wiped out by a nanovirus during a galaxy spanning civil war.

This story covers a combination of the events of Mass Effect 1 and 2 with a little 3 sprinkled here and there.

This story is primarily about Balak and his (mis)adventures. So there will be less of an emphasis on the Shepard side of the story.

The Normandy that Shepard is using is the SR-1

Balak's ship, the Ugly Stick, can best be described as a WW2 LST with legs that fold into the sides large engines on the back. My intent with this ship was to make a ship that has stealth capabilities, but is the opposite of the Normandy more or less. For example, where the Normandy can conceal its heat, the Ugly Stick can use a combination of holograms and light absorption to become invisible, relying on active jammers and decoys to evade sensors. And while the Ugly Stick are similar in maximum speed, the Normandy is more acrobatic at high speed, where the Ugly Stick can precisely hover at low speed and land on most terrain. In addition, the Ugly Stick has more internal storage space and micro manufacturing capability, allowing it to produce its own escort drones and equipment where the Normandy has better tech/computers/communication systems. Over all, I also tried to make the ships match their commander/captain. The Normandy is clean, quiet, spacious, orderly, new, and accomplishes its mission with surgical precision, while the Ugly Stick is large, dirty, cramped, industrial, chaotic and accomplishes its mission by hitting it a sledgehammer.

Just to give you a mental image of what the crew of the Ugly Stick looks like, the Pyke twins are a combination of a Cerberus Guardian, Centurion, and a Havoc soldier.

Grayson Hunt and Trishka Novak both have leashes from Bulletstorm, except these are powered by mass effect fields.