Time: May 19th, 2172
Location: Faldur Badlands, Tuchanka

Be it hunter or fisherman, surfer or salesman, politician or painter, they all dream of the same thing:

The Big One.

The one achievement that will carve their names into legend. More often we hear about the ones that got away. The "almost-was-es" and "could've-beens." Boasts and claims with less substance than the alcoholic beverages they're recited over. But once in a great while the odd fish tale is attached to a whale of a story. And the impossible… is made real…

Ravanor Pran and Gueyyan Baltik were two of the best hunters and trackers that ever lived. At least that's what they claimed. An odd pairing, Pran was the senior of the two, well into eight hundred years of age, with Baltik just shy of two hundred. Their true stock and trade was scavenging and odd jobs. Dead end jobs no self-respecting krogan would take on. But together they eked out a charmed life for themselves filled with romance, adventure and credits while recovering parts, supplies, corpses or restoring machinery left deserted out in the Badlands. At times they also indulged in a little hunting and there was no shortage of game to choose from. Each trip out was a challenge due to roving packs of wild varren, carnivorous plants, disease-bearing insects or other beasts, to say nothing of the forbidding weather and terrain. They are common threats throughout all of Tuchanka, but in the Badlands… doubly so. But like many krogan, Pran and Baltik prided themselves in coping with danger and adversity. And they too dreamed of their Big One: bagging a thresher maw. In local legend, Urdnot Wrex was the only one to accomplish this on foot for as long as anyone can remember.

Averaging over ninety meters in length from tip to tail and fiercely territorial, thresher maws are gigantic worm-like creatures that are the undisputed rulers of their domain. A strange cross between plant and animal, they are able to take in sustenance from both organic prey and absorption of starshine and minerals from the soil. Solitary beings, their entire life cycle revolves around two activities: reproduction, via spores that can spread through and survive the rigors of space, and feeding. Every second of its life, every chance it can get. It's the thresher maw's raison d'etre: feed and breed.

And kill anything that gets too close.

One fateful afternoon, Baltik ran back to camp after scouting an area a ways ahead. Minutes before, the region was hit by a series of tremors. Pran was shaken but not stirred and had a bit of a time trying to get Baltik to speak coherently. A few panting breaths later, he was able to explain the reason for his excitement: the shaking earth wasn't caused by planetary plate shifts. Rather by something moving over and through the earth…

Baltik had spotted a thresher maw!

The couple didn't come prepared for a hunt this time around. But they did have the good fortune of salvaging a wrecked tonka earlier that morning carrying two working missiles. Using their combined know-how and some available spare parts, they were able to cobble together a rudimentary sled with a slope to mount and launch the missiles. Baltik led the way as he and Pran carefully dragged their homemade launcher to the maw's current resting place.

The eager hunters could just make out where the maw had settled underneath the sands. Pran got into position atop a rock face overlooking the exposed plain with the launcher while Baltik trotted out to the edge of the sand plain with another improvised concoction: an explosive lure made using a warhead from one of the missiles. Their plan was to get the thresher maw to pop up and swallow it. The resulting explosion, if it didn't knock it dead or unconscious, should be able to stun it long enough for the hunters to finish it with their remaining ordnance. Baltik began to whirl around with the lure like an Olympic hammer thrower, faster and faster. Finally, he released and it soared several dozen feet before hitting the ground hard. It was enough to stir the beast below and with a mighty roar it burst from the depths, taking the lure into its mouth… along with several hundred cubic feet of sand…

This was no ordinary maw Pran and Baltik had roused. This was none other than Kalros - the mother of all thresher maws!

It is to Tuchanka what Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster are to Earth. Scores of blurred and low resolution holopics allegedly depicting the colossal beast have been taken over the years. Tales of its awesome destructive power have been passed down for generations. Many adventurers even set out to find it only to turn up with nothing… or not turn up at all.

Our intrepid hunters would have settled for any other maw – taking one down was challenge enough. But the cruel bitch goddess called Fate served up a true legend, one that was not in the least fazed or happy with its combustible snack. The Grand Maw pointed its head downwards as Baltik scrambled for the safety of the rock plateau, but it didn't lunge for him. Instead it spit out a highly corrosive stream of acid, the thresher maw's alternate mode of attack. Pran watched as the love of her life was doused and reduced to a melting, shrieking glob of flesh. To add insult to injury, Kalros then leaned in to dab up the remains. Pran launched her missile and managed to drive the creature back. Discouraged, it went back underground where it stayed while Pran stood over what little was left of her beloved.

This hunt just got personal.

The settlement she lived at was surprised to see her return from the Badlands alone. Pran marched back into her house and gathered up every weapon and explosive she could get her hands on, along with a vidcam and her life savings. She then burst into the local watering hole to hire out the most able, willing, or sufficiently drunk patron with access to a tonka to drive her back out to settle the score and record the battle for posterity. Deveg Granz accepted her offer. It wasn't as if he had better things to do. And if this was indeed the legendary Kalros, he would be the envy of town and the galaxy at large for confirming its existence, if he lived. He helped load up her stockpile and drove her back out to the campsite.

Using a small hoverskiff stowed inside the tonka, they closed in on the thresher maw's location. Pran strapped explosives all around her body. She could not bear to live without her dear Baltik. She would use herself as bait and then join her beloved in the afterlife as the mighty Kalros was brought down by her blaze of glory. Granz maneuvered his hoverskiff into the position Pran had taken earlier after letting her off. Filled up on liquid ryncol courage, he activated the vidcam and focused on Pran as she began her death march further and further out. She soon found herself in the middle of the sand pit, but Kalros wasn't taking the bait. Infuriated, Pran screamed and jumped about to get its attention. A few moments later, Kalros obliged. Again, the mighty maw reared skywards, bellowing just as Pran triggered her explosives. Granz caught every bright flash and crystal clear moment on vidcam. The creature began to sway back and forth and could be heard gasping. But then Kalros shrugged it off and arced downwards to spit out the pulpy mess of damaged tissue and leftover krogan from its throat before it disappeared into the ground again.

All over Granz and his hoverskiff.

The next morning a tonka was seen driving back into the settlement. Granz slowly and silently emerged from it and climbed down, still covered in slimy, smelly maw guts. Blankly, he went right back to the bar and sat down in his favorite chair. His friends and some of the locals wanted to know what happened. The bartender nudged his shoulder and he let out a bloodcurdling scream that lasted over a minute. After taking a few prescribed shot glasses of tranquilizer, Granz told a tale of a heartbroken woman's ineffectual last stand against a massive, spiteful beast: the thresher maw Kalros. Naturally, no one believed him. He reached to his side for Pran's vidcam… only to find it was missing. He searched over his tonka and hoverskiff with no luck. Apparently the vidcam was washed out of his hands and out of the hoverskiff when Kalros vomited on him. But he was in no hurry to run back to get it. So the legend of Kalros remains so to this day, just another tall tale spun by the odd barfly and traveler as caution or entertainment. But one still can't help but wonder: is this Big One real? Could such a colossal thresher maw really exist?

Just ask Deveg Granz…

Way #1091: Harrowed & Mawed

Author's Notes and Thoughts:

- Special thanks to DN7 for suggesting this story – sorry it took such a long time! Better late than never!

- Also based on Mass Effect codex entry for thresher maws, which are described as being carnivorous but also plantlike, thriving best on worlds with little or no atmosphere. Makes it kinda hard to get a meaty snack… unless they may have been specially engineered to prey on space faring species. Hmmm… can they also metabolize dextro-DNA as well as levo-DNA?