Bonus Excerpt from Of Steel and Talons: The Battle of Palaven by Arena Nyscirius (2214 CE Edition) (Edited for Human Reading)
Licensed to Kaidan Alenko Secondary School, Kithoi Ward, Citadel
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After the End
The men and women who fought for Palaven in its greatest moment of need numbered in the billions, from every turian and krogan in active service, to those who fought in the resistance, to the many who answered the Hierarchy's call for aid. Official estimates of the death toll on Palaven alone range from 1.3 billion to 1.7 billion; one out of every four persons on the planet perished. No one made it out of the war unscathed. Lives were destroyed in more ways than one; everyone lost friends, comrades, loved ones. When the dust finally settled and the war ended, everyone picked up the pieces the best they were able to try to rebuild what had been lost.
With transportation kicked back to pre-mass relay FTL travel, friends and family were separated by vast distances. In spite of great uncertainty as to the fate of loved ones, turian and krogan alike worked towards rebuilding Palaven to the best of their abilities. Although not native to the planet, the krogan were treated as brothers-in-arms, and experienced no shortage of food or shelter over the year they spent stranded on the turian homeworld. When the mass relay network was finally restored in 2188, everyone was anxious to return home, and immediately set out to do so.
The Reaper War changed everyone it touched, some for the better, others for the worst. For many, it brought about a newfound appreciation of life. Having come so close to death, many married and started new families as soon as possible. Others embarked on lifelong dreams they've always thought could be postponed until later. But many were also devastated in the aftermath of the war. Post-traumatic stress disorder became distressingly common, as did suicide attempts. Brothers- and sisters-in-arms stood together and did what they could for each other.
But for those who fought in the Battle of Palaven, there remained a lingering connection, the recognition of the fact that fate had somehow brought them altogether in this theater of war. It was a permanent mark of greatness on their lives, regardless of whether they were turian, krogan, or quarian. They had all stood together in trying times despite their differences, and became a part of something much greater than they could have imagined. The victory they earned was made possible only by their invaluable, valiant sacrifices, a triumph that forged a very special bond that shall be shared between each and every veteran until the end of their days.
Demetrius Risithi was placed under arrest for disclosing the ultimate objective of SLENDER SCALPEL – the destruction of the Reaper ships by the turian resistance with smuggled explosives – to the krogan commandos, against the orders of Coronati and Cerivix. Confined aboard the Defender, he survived the Reaper War, but faced an unusually prolonged (by turian standards) court-martial after the war, due in no small part to Coronati and Cerivix's influence. He was eventually found guilty of insubordination and deliberate mishandling of classified materials, but was acquitted of all charges by Primarch Adrien Victus; however, he was ultimately denied official recognition of his role in strategizing the Miracle at Palaven. This did nothing to encourage any newfound loyalties to the Hierarchy, and Risithi disappeared as soon as the mass relay network was reestablished, presumably to rejoin the Blue Suns. He was eventually found dead at a remote outpost on Amaranthine in 2202, presumably killed by a mercenary raid.
In 2205, HDI Director Vice Admiral Nillin Zerindus (no relation to deceased HDI Agent Nillin who coordinated with the Khronus resistance cell) reopened the Risithi prosecution after significant lobbying from several krogan commandos involved in the Miracle at Palaven, who insisted the special consultant's decision to disclose classified information saved lives on the ground. Although his charges were never cleared, Risithi was posthumously given official recognition for the tremendous role he played in the Miracle at Palaven.
Telana Cyrion, who lost a leg from a Reaper attack on the Example and was subsequently evacuated by the Bosh'tet Express, was one of the first turians to arrive on Rannoch since it was repopulated by the quarians. The planet and its residents left a lasting impression on her; she wrote of her first experience of seeing Rannoch from the ground: "A homeworld unpopulated for centuries, free of industry and overcrowding and pollution, Rannoch was beautiful even for a turian half-delirious with infection and pain. In less sensitive moments and on the verge of losing my own homeworld, I wondered how the quarians could've ever let it go."
Cyrion didn't quite get her post-Express combination of beach, fruit drink, and fawning quarian girls, at least not all at once. When the mass relay network was reestablished, Cyrion was found – to the surprise of no one who knew her well – to have married a quarian girl, Lan'Ittil vas Nurenjal, during her stay on Rannoch. She got a geth-made prosthetic leg and returned to Palaven just long enough to sort out personal post-war errands. She then teamed up with Ittil and volus entrepreneur Orus Bint to found Cyrion-Bint Construction, transporting resources from turian space to assist in the reconstruction in quarian space.
Today, Cyrion-Bint Construction is one of the largest private construction firms on Rannoch, making Cyrion one of the richest turians alive. She was the Special Consultant on Quarian Relations to the Hierarchy Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2195 to 2197, and still remains a key figure on the Council on Quarian-Turian Relations. Despite her hectic agenda, she still managed to make time for an interview for this book. And, sure enough, Cyrion invited me to her beach villa on Rannoch, provided fruit drinks as refreshments, and had our interview under the watchful eyes of a loving quarian wife to "make sure [Cyrion] gets all the details right and doesn't go on an ego trip".
Not everyone came out of the war with happy endings. Lonn Syphiat survived the war, but struggled with severe emotional scars afterwards, having lost most of his friends and all of his family. With almost no emotional support, he began a chain of alcohol and drug abuse, resulting in his demotion and being drummed out of the 18th Mountaineer Legion in 2187. He cut what few ties he had and disappeared.
When Cyrion returned to Palaven in 2188, she made it a priority to find Syphiat. Horrified at the stories told by the 18th Mountaineer Legion of her friend's post-war downward spiral, Cyrion spent months trying to track Syphiat down. When they finally reunited at a bar on Oma Ker, he broke down and cried. He was a wreck, an alcoholic working odd jobs on the turian colony with no permanent residence or stable income. Cyrion spared little expense in trying to get her longtime friend set back up, inviting Syphiat to join her on Rannoch to help run Cyrion-Bint Construction.
It was the last time Cyrion saw Syphiat; if she had hoped her efforts would bring her friend back to the galaxy, her hopes were dashed when news arrived that Syphiat had committed suicide mere months after her visit. He had no living family, so Cyrion took it upon herself to make funeral arrangements, a private affair with what few mutual friends they had left in the 18th Mountaineer Legion. Cyrion provided the epitaph on Syphiat's plaque: "Remembered by friends and comrades at his most honorable, the sacrifice he made for Palaven."
Jari Deiethus, promoted to service chief after the war, never truly accepted the state of affairs after the conflict and how things concluded. Having lost so much to the Reapers, he became intensively politically active despite his status as an enlisted turian. Increasingly vocal against rebuilding the galaxy alongside his former enemies, he believed that a blanket pardon for what the Reapers had done was completely unreasonable, and believed it was the responsibility of the galaxy to carry out the Reaper War to the very end, until every last Reaper was exterminated.
Deiethus was eventually found guilty of insubordination and poor conduct, and demoted back to corporal. It was roughly around this time that he became a sleeper agent for the Martyrhood, [a galactic anti-Reaper extremist group categorized as a terrorist organization by the Citadel Council,] and was responsible for a number of undisclosed security leaks. Deiethus managed to elude the suspicions of investigators due how public he had become at that point, making public appearances at press conferences, public committees, and extranet shows, equating the post-war peace to appeasement and capitulation to a power " merely deigning to allow the galaxy to exist". The turian intelligence community kept him off a list of suspects for years simply because it seemed infeasible for such a high-profile figure to be an effective terrorist or mole.
Eventually, in 2199, the HDI managed to procure substantial proof behind Deiethus' terrorist relations, and he was tried and found guilty of aiding and abetting a terrorist organization, subsequently sentenced to death. A rescue attempt for him and other terrorist inmates was made by the Martyrhood a day before Deiethus' execution; while the rescue was initially successful, Deiethus himself was found dead in an alley on the same day, having bled out from wounds he sustained during the rescue.
Maximus Benessius continued to serve alongside the 38th Heavy Infantry Legion as peacekeepers in the aftermath of the Reaper War, keeping the peace amongst turians and krogan after the destruction of the mass relay network. When the reconstruction of Cipritine Hill Services Academy commenced, Benessius applied for and earned a position as drill instructor in the Hierarchy's foremost military academy. He opted not to remove the scars across his face that had been inflicted by exploding Ravager ordnance, which served to consolidate his reputation as one of the most fearsome instructors at Cipritine Hill.
Although he was in his element in training the next generation of turians, Benessius was coaxed back into the 38th Heavy Infantry Legion in 2196. The unit was tasked to police the new Hierarchy frontier, which had become increasingly dangerous in the wake of the Reaper War. The legion began on a planet-hopping campaign to clear planets of pirates, outlaws, and remnants of the Reaper War, described as an "unsettling experience". After another six years of service, he finally rotated into the Reserves in 2202, got married, and got a job as a colony coordinator for the Hierarchy's effort to reclaim depopulated planets, which he maintains to this day.
Urdnot Bakar was critically wounded when attempting to save Maximus Benessius from an incoming orbital bombardment, where his heavy armor and hump took the brunt of the heatwave from a Thanix shot. Fortunately, the timely application of medigel and his own krogan regenerative capabilities ensured that he survived despite the disfiguration. Like virtually all krogan who came to Palaven's aid, he returned to Tuchanka almost immediately after the mass relay network was restored. Like virtually all krogan who were at Palaven, he got married almost immediately and started a large family.
Unlike virtually all krogan, however, he did not stay. When Cipritine Hill Services Academy reopened its gates following its reconstruction, it extended invitations to Tuchanka, and Clan Urdnot was keen on having their own people learn how to be effective command and administrative officers instead of just being combat specialists and team leaders. Urdnot volunteered, and returned to Palaven, where – to his amusement – one of his drill instructors was Maximus Benessius. "I saved his life," surmised the krogan, "so he got to make mine hell."
Successfully graduating from Cipritine Hill, Urdnot returned home, where he served as a commissioned officer for the Clans Coalition Government. His credentials made him a valuable commodity, as his administrative savvy helped addressed new logistical concerns that came with the new planetary government. He remains one of the core staff officers of the Krogan Army, busying himself with the organization of Tuchanka's armed forces. "Miss the kick of a shotgun in my hands," admitted Urdnot, "but it gets the job done." He remains regular contact with Benessius.
Urdnot Nakmor was treated as a war hero by the turians for his role in SLENDER SCALPEL. There was no shortage of locals willing to buy him a drink, and he promptly accumulated a long line of DUI charges until his return to Tuchanka when the mass relay network was restored. Immediately upon his return, he did three things immediately: Started a family, resigned as the commanding officer of Malgus Company, and joined the newly-formed Tuchanka Geological and Botanical Survey, co-organized with several special salarian interests. "Basically," Urdnot put it, "I became a gardener tending flowerbeds, and trying to grow plants and crops on a radioactive desert planet inhabited by thresher maws."
As one of the highest-ranking krogan in the Survey, Urdnot was soon making runs between the Citadel, Sur'Kesh, and Tuchanka in an effort to coordinate the revitalization of Tuchanka's ecosphere. He came surprisingly familiar with political leaders across the galaxy, and was quietly considered one of the most politically influential krogan alive, despite holding a post for an ecological agency that was considered semi-private. In 2199, he presided over the opening of the Grick Preservation Area, the first region on Tuchanka to officially be reforested. He also presided over the opening of the Katakog Ecological Zone in 2203, the first self-sustaining bio-ecosphere on the planet.
Urdnot has since become the deputy director for the Tuchanka Geological and Botanical Survey. He published his experiences with the Survey in the book Harvest Tuchanka; although it fell severely short of initial market expectations, its video game adaptation by the same name became a surprisingly popular bestseller in 2204, prompting several equally successful sequels. This, in turn, revitalized interest in the book the games are based on.
Jorgal Kurdu was one of the key officers with the Krogan Army, and remained in that capacity after the Battle of Palaven. As the chief commanding officer of the unit that rushed to the Migrant Fleet Marines' last known position after the Defense of Communications Relay 227, he was responsible for locating and collecting any surviving remains and effects of the quarian defenders. As such, after the mass relay network was restored, Jorgal was part of the turian-krogan delegation to Rannoch that returned the remains of the quarian Marines back to their homeworld in 2188.
Jorgal returned to Tuchanka after the mass relay network was restored, started a family, and continued to serve as a battalion commander. In 2191, he was tapped to be among the many high-ranking officers to reorganize and modernize the Krogan Army into a professional fighter force, given that the krogan had spent centuries fighting as a loose collection of mercenaries. By 2200, he was promoted to general, a position he holds to this day.
In 2203, Jorgal backed an unpopular proposal to form official clandestine krogan units, having personally witnessed the effectiveness of SLENDER SCALPEL and FORWARD FLAME. The measure was ultimately approved, and he was tasked to help reorganize and retrain the krogan "commando teams" into worthy special forces units. However, a highly embarrassing showing in the 2207 human-krogan military exercises showed that Jorgal still had his work cut out for him when it came to a still-maturing special forces unit. When questioned by the press in the aftermath of the exercises, Jorgal stated simply, "We're working on it."
Hailot Enka, like most other krogan, returned to Tuchanka at first opportunity, married, and had children. However, unlike most krogan, Hailot had no interest in remaining on Tuchanka; with the credits he had hoarded and looted from the Reaper War, he bought several ships from the Blood Pack mercenary group, convinced several of his relatives to follow him off-planet, and founded Hailot Freighter Services in 2190, a transportation firm that relocated industrial materials for reconstruction work across the galaxy. The endeavor became surprisingly profitable; with government security forces spread thin and opportunistic pirate raids becoming increasingly common, the idea of armed krogan crews manning mercenary freighters was appealing to parties that actually wanted their cargo to arrive safely at their destination.
For a krogan who left his roots and attempted entrepreneurship, Hailot was remarkably successful. By 2196, a merger with Ganymede Transportation made the resulting Raptor Freighter Corporation one of the major names in the industry, resulting in Hailot becoming one of the richest krogan alive. His children also spread across the galaxy, with some taking up the family business and liaised with planetary offices, while others returned to Tuchanka to assist the reconstruction of their ancestral home.
Hailot continues to co-administrate the Raptor Freighter Corporation, making periodic runs between Earth and Tuchanka, as well as many other spots across the galaxy. When not managing the family business and walking through boardrooms, he continues to personally train the security details employed under him. Outside of his professional life, Hailot has faithfully attended the Reaper War Remembrance Week biannually on Palaven.
Solana Optimi sustained gunshot wounds after calling for her allies to shoot through her in a firefight. She survived, but the lack of immediate treatment meant she was in and out of hospitals in the years that followed as complications from those wounds arose one by one. Her medical condition rotated her from combat soldier to armory officer, which Optimi reluctantly accepted but considered "a letdown" compared to the frontlines. She served the final years of her service as a close-range weapons instructor and close-quarters combat trainer to new recruits.
Optimi's career after active service was unusual for a turian, in that she swiftly burned through a long chain of jobs that didn't work out for one reason or another. They included but were not limited to security chief for a cargo transport company, radio commentator, dance instructor, bartender, mountain climbing instructor, and wilderness tour guide. In 2204, she ran for and was successfully appointed as the legislative representative for Aethon District on Palaven, purportedly admitting she had never actually envisioned herself in politics and expressing surprise she had actually received the appointment. After she finished her term in 2210, she opened her own restaurant, and has worked there as chef and owner since.
Optimi struck up an unusual friendship with Hailot Enka, the krogan who shot her through the shoulder, while he was stranded on Palaven. They maintained contact even after Hailot returned to Tuchanka and started his business; while in office, Optimi successfully sponsored the application of one of his sons into the Cipritine Hill Services Academy in 2206. She still keeps in touch with the Hailots, meeting up from time-to-time across the galaxy. Optimi's traditional greeting to her krogan comrade's family remains: "Have you shot that bastard in the shoulder yet?"
Gerik Ferandaris survived having lost both of his legs during Operation: FORWARD FLAME. He wanted to assist in the recovery of Palaven, but with a very long line of wounded who required cell regeneration surgery, and with very few surviving doctors or medical facilities on Palaven, Ferandaris ended up sitting out on the greatest reconstruction effort the Hierarchy had ever seen. Confined to a hospital bed with very little to do, he ended up composing letters to every contact on his omni-tool, trying to get in contact with them, reflecting on the devastating conflict, and relating to them in the war's aftermath. This was in spite of the fact that practically ninety percent of all persons on his contact list were unreachable either due to the chaos after the war, or the destruction of galactic communications infrastructure.
Despite initial medical complications – it had taken too long by the time Ferandaris finally had a shot at the cell regeneration surgery – the operation was a success. He returned to active duty in 2187, spontaneously married the nurse who had taken care of him, received a promotion to gunnery chief, and finally sent out all his letters in 2188. Fewer than a quarter of the intended recipients ever replied. Among them was an asari commando who recommended that Ferandaris publish the letters as a novel. Letters From Palaven was published in 2190 and sold decently well; a movie adaptation was released in 2194, which was universally panned and criticized for "having almost nothing to do with the source material".
Ferandaris divorced in 2195, remarried in 2196, and was promoted to staff lieutenant in 2204, a rank he holds to this day. He is currently tasked the [Council Symmetrical Forces], policing Council space with the peacekeeping fleets.
Like so many veterans across the galaxy, Shari Velius struggled with her experiences in the Reaper War. She was reunited with her daughter within months of the war's end, but while this provided her with a semblance of balance for the first few months, she fell into increasingly frantic mood swings as time went on. Despite reassurances from medical experts, Velius began to believe that she had been indoctrinated by the Reapers, made worse from recurring nightmares. Her daughter was remanded into her sister's custody for the girl's safety, which only served to worsen Velius' psychological state.
Velius attempted suicide in 2192 by shooting herself in the head, but botched the attempt. As she laid in a puddle of her own blood, her daughter arrived for a visit. Despite being shot in the head, Velius was lucid enough to register her daughter's frantic, hysterical attempts to keep her alive and contact emergency services. "There's something about watching your daughter break down and cry while you have a self-inflicted bullet hole in your head that makes you think, 'Spirits, no, I don't want to die. I still want to keep on living.'"
Velius managed to pull through, although she spent years recovering from the brain damage from her attempt. While recuperating, she began to self-study medicine, which led to her going enrolling into medical school in 2196 after making a full recovery. She graduated in 2199, and returned to the 18th Mountaineer Legion as a combat medic. She received an honorable discharge in 2205, and has since worked as a nurse on Palaven.
In the last days of the Reaper War, Inthira Smirian went on a patrol with a squad of resistance fighters, all of whom failed to report in or return. Labeled missing in action, she and her patrol were never found despite the efforts of her friends and family, even after the war, having effectively vanished into thin air. In 2190, the Hierarchy, as part of a policy to label all persons still killed in action three years or more after the Reaper War, officially "confirmed" Smirian to have died in the conflict.
Yreen Ekyriat was shot in the side in the last days of the Reaper War, and her need to recuperate from her injury what saved her from going on the same patrol that Smirian disappeared with. Ekyriat spared little effort and resources in trying to find Smirian after the war, even after Smirian's own family gave up on the search. When the Hierarchy officially labeled Smirian as killed in action, Ekyriat was "devastated". "There was no real sense of closure. She was my better half for all of the war, and suddenly she's just gone. Not even dead. Just…gone, an inconclusive state of limbo."
With the mental scars she had sustained through the war adding insult to injury, Ekyriat drifted in and out of depression, much in the same way she drifted in and out of various security jobs that often did not work out due to use of excessive violence. Eventually, she met and fell in love with an asari commando, who helped eased her through one of the most turbulent chapters of her life. They married in 2197, and Ekyriat eventually managed to get a human resources job for the Sirta Foundation on the Citadel.
Ekyriat still keeps in touch with the Smirians, as well as various friends and comrades from the Khronus resistance cell. However, she has since steadfastly refused to ever return to Palaven. "There are altogether too many nightmares haunting me there," she admitted, "and I've seen enough horrors to last me three asari lifetimes."
Despite her smuggler background, Miridi Kylonis' role in the Miracle of Palaven helped wipe the slate clean. She stayed on Palaven to assist with recovery and reconstruction along with the Khronus resistance, and stayed for a bit on Palaven. But once the Citadel was once again habitable in 2191, she managed to get the most logical job available to her: Deputy director of the Customs Division under the reorganized Citadel Security Services. Her tenure saw several major well-received overhauls of Citadel customs, and more than a few observers made wry remarks of how it took a veteran smuggler to lead C-Sec's campaign against smuggling.
In 2194, Kylonis was caught in a terrorist bombing when the Martyrhood targeted the office of then-Customs Division Director Zhang Wenlong. Although she barely survived the initial blast, she remained in critical condition for two days before being pronounced dead. Per her will, her body was cremated with full honors over her home planet of Taetrus.
As one of the leaders of the Khronus resistance cell, Derithi Gianthis was recognized and decorated for his involvement in the Battle of Palaven after the Reaper War. He helped supervise the reconstruction of his native Khronus District, and was reunited with his wife, who had also managed to survive the war, when she returned from Earth in 2188. Although he planned to spend the rest of his days peacefully in the Reserves, Gianthis was approached by the HDI, who wanted the talents that saw the Khronus resistance cell through the Miracle at Palaven. He became a consultant, and then later a trainer, on both leadership and clandestine activities for the HDI for several years, until he was finally talked into a more permanent position in 2194.
Much of Gianthis' activities with the HDI remain classified, although he acknowledged that he had been "coordinating operations" and "liaising with the [Council Asymmetrical Forces]". He remained with Defense Intelligence until he finally resigned and transferred into the reserves in 2205. He and his wife still live on Palaven with their two children.
Draxen Achtus lost his wife and his three children in the Reaper War. Despite having commanded the Khronus resistance cell, he spent the years after struggling to reassemble his life. The commitments and duties of his leadership, the responsibility over those he commanded, had been what had been keeping him together; when that was taken away, he slowly but surely fell apart. He moved away from Palaven in 2190. "Staying was torture," he admitted somberly. "There was nothing about the planet that failed to remind me about everything that went wrong with the Reaper War."
Despite efforts from his closest friends in the Khronus resistance cell, Achtus remained completely off the radar, and would've remained so had he not been caught trying to smuggle explosives into Palaven in 2204. He was captured alive, and medical experts discovered that he had inadvertently come into contact with a Reaper artifact at some point over the last thirteen years, resulting in a moderate level of indoctrination. Achtus was handed over to Hikaru-Ezekiel Pharmaceuticals for long-term anti-indoctrination treatment. He has since made a profound recovery, and was well enough to partake in interviews when visited at Hikaru-Ezekiel's Basel facility on Earth.
Due to irrefutable medical proof of his indoctrination, the Hierarchy dropped the smuggling charges against Achtus, and awarded him the Silver Wreath in 2207 for his role in leading the Khronus resistance cell through the Battle of Palaven.
At the heart of Carratine District on Palaven, there stands an array of statues twenty meters from the foot of Communications Relay 227. Laser-carved from blocks of metal imported from Rannoch in 2191, a dozen unmoving life-sized quarians stand tall and proud in front of plaques detailing each of their names and an explanation of their sacrifice that made the Miracle of Palaven possible. Today, the Defense of Communications Relay 227 is officially considered the opening operation of the Miracle at Palaven, and the relay itself is now the starting point of Reaper War Remembrance Week on the planet, both a formal event and tourist attraction that brings no less than a half a million quarians and geth to Carratine District each year.
Trinity survived the Reaper War and returned to Rannoch to assist in its reconstruction. In 2189, she was appointed by Admiral Tali'Zorah vas Normandy as the executive officer to a quarian-geth task force to dismantle the anti-geth Forefathers terrorist cell. She also testified before the Citadel Committee on Synthetic Sapience in 2191 before being appointed as Special Advisor on Organic-Synthetic Relations to the Rannoch Congress, a post she still holds. Unexpectedly, she managed to achieve extranet stardom in 2193 when she uploaded a video jokingly suggesting that she hoped to marry an asari. It became one of the most-watched videos on the extranet that year. June Lee of GAZE wrote, "Getting past the usual silly, vitriolic comments, […] one might eventually realize that 'Single Geth Looking For Good Asari' was perhaps – whether intentionally or otherwise – one of the most influential statements that brought a face and personality back to the tired and stalling debates on synthetic personhood."
A year after her role along with other geth in the Defense of Communications Relay 227 was disclosed to the general public, she accepted a guest speaking role for the 2197 Reaper War Remembrance Week on Palaven at the relay, and again in 2207. She avoided a direct answer when asked if she would accept an offer to come back in 2217, but organizers on Palaven seem optimistic about her return.
Loriq Ordinix had gone down to Palaven despite orders to stay due to a coughing fit he had developed, accidentally going down with the 163rd Assault Infantry Legion when he hopped onto the wrong shuttle. Having ignored the symptoms due to the pressing need of the Battle of Palaven, Ordinix collapsed as the war ended, where doctors discovered that he had caught a deadly strain of the Triteka flu. As it had gone untreated for weeks, it had developed to an advanced stage, necessitating that Ordinix undergo long-term treatment. With medical facilities across Hierarchy space ridiculously over-capacity, "long-term" turned out to more than a year and a half.
Ordinix reunited with surviving members of his family in 2189, and quickly married his childhood sweetheart. He also returned to the 52nd Reconnaissance Legion, where he was perplexed by his newfound fame as "the one who got on the wrong shuttle". For his trouble, he received a promotion to service chief, and continued serving with the 52nd as a non-commissioned officer. Ordinix briefly considered a career with research and development considering his experiences at Firebase Arterius during the Miracle at Palaven, but ultimately decided that spending hours figuring out increasingly ridiculous ways to kill Reaper ground forces did not a weapons designer make. He still remains with the 52nd, one of the oldest veterans of the legion to this day.
Tarquin Siritii was put on a fast-track and promoted to lieutenant commander for his role in the Miracle at Palaven. He continued to serve out the rest of his service with the 49th Reconnaissance Legion, which was tasked with reclaiming planets lost in the Reaper War. "It was a nerve-wracking experience," he admitted. "If fighting the Reaper War wasn't terrifying enough, going through the wastelands of once-familiar planets and looking out for swarms of indoctrinated turians certainly was." He eventually became a trainer for sniper-scout candidates as the 49th was being reconstituted with replacements, having been established as one of the legion's best marksmen.
His true passion, however, was with research and writing. As soon as the position became open, Siritii became the historian of the 49th Reconnaissance Legion in 2194. Being a Lithirimi [University] graduate, no one protested his changing of vocations, although more than a few regretted losing his guidance on sniping. A year later, with the blessings of the government, he published one of the first bestselling books on the Reaper War, Miracle Workers, an account of the Miracle at Palaven from the perspective of the 49th Reconnaissance Legion, adapted into a blockbuster holo in 2199.
Siritii was discharged to the Reserves in 2207 with the rank of major, married in 2209, and became a history professor at his alma mater in 2211, where he remains to this day. Some campus rumors say he occasionally provides consultation services to Hierarchy Defense Intelligence. Still a bestselling author on war history, he spends his time writing his next book when not teaching packed classrooms.
Torin Fidellin was among the few survivors of Blackwatch's 2nd Platoon to also take part in the Battle of Earth. His invaluable experiences on Palaven helped him survive the intense fighting on the human homeworld, which he had casually described as "mild, compared to Palaven". It did mean, however, that he was stranded on Earth for over a year when the mass relay network was destroyed. As the turian fleets in the Sol System awaited a chance to return home, Fidellin assisted in clandestine security operations along with Blackwatch, defusing tense situations that came with the militaries of different races stranded in an isolated system with no way to return home.
Returning to Palaven in 2188, Fidellin returned to Blackwatch's 2nd Platoon, where he had been sorely missed. He remains with the outfit to this day, although – as an active special forces operator – his activities continue to remain, naturally, highly classified.
Jacia Navarian survived the Reaper War, only to discover a year later that she had a terminal case of Raekita Syndrome. Her condition prevented her from continuing to serve with Blackwatch, although her squadmates all chipped in to ensure that her last days were made comfortable. She retired to a villa on Digeris, where she entertained guests from the "old days". Former comrades recalled that she was writing her memoirs on the Reaper War for publication, but she died before her work was completed.
Serona Ravakian survived the Miracle at Palaven and continued to direct Blackwatch operations groundside. Two days before the end of the war, however, she was killed instantly by stray Ravager ordnance that exploded in the tent where she and two other officers were sleeping. She was laid to rest almost immediately after the war, and every survivor of 2nd Platoon attended her funeral. She is survived by her husband and three children, all of whom made it safely through the Reaper War. Her oldest son is now a second lieutenant in Blackwatch.
Derlude Helsrang continued his service with Blackwatch, taking over as the commanding officer of E Company after Ravakian's death. His subsequent missions over several years involved "pacifying regions of turian space that had fallen into anarchy after having been cut off, and eliminating anti-Reaper terrorist cells that refused to recognize the war was over after that, especially the Martyrhood". Much of his activities and operations remain classified. In 2195, Helsrang was tapped to lead the operational arm of Blackwatch and promoted to major. Amongst his career highlights includes his presiding over the first Blackwatch-N7 joint-exercises between the Hierarchy and the Alliance in 2197. He married, divorced, then remarried and had two children.
Today, he's an executive officer to the Hierarchy Special Operations Command, a position that affords him a degree of protection when he's being critical of the Hierarchy deciding to declassify certain pieces of military information in 2196, including the identities of many Blackwatch operators, himself included. It was a move spurred on by the galacticism movement that saw other governments disclosing secrets as a sign of intergalactic union, one that Helsrang was loudly opposed to then and still loudly opposed to today.
"I get that the Hierarchy wanted people to be optimistic in the tough years after the Reaper War," he explained, "that publicizing their heroism was supposed to have good effect on morale. And, yeah, we didn't think there'd be as many people wanting payback against an operator compared to before the war. But you made these guys a promise that you'd keep them safe when they're done taking out your dirty laundry, and then you threw them in front of a truck when it was politically convenient. 'Less enemies' does not mean 'no enemies'." Helsrang concurs that the damage has been done, but disagrees that his being vocally critical no longer does any good. "People having done stupid things today doesn't mean they won't do stupid things tomorrow."
Lanus Vadim survived the evacuation of the Example, and remained with the Khronus resistance cell until the end of the war. "We were all trained in infantry combat, of course," he explained, "but High Command wanted to preserve experienced naval personnel instead of having them be part of dangerous ground ops. So, until then, we were shipmen without a ship." While the engineers were put to work on rebuilding Palaven's defenses and infrastructure in the aftermath of the Miracle at Palaven, Vadim was stuck doing security detail, which was "altogether a very uneventful job".
Due to the state of the Hierarchy after the war, Vadim remained "grounded" for years, until he finally managed to jump at an opening on the cruiser Steadfast in 2190. With the former crew of the Example split up to different assignments, he couldn't afford to be picky, even though he would've liked nothing better than serving with old friends. Over the next few years, Vadim was involved in constant naval patrols across Hierarchy space to "deal with the remnants of the war". Eventually, he requested and received a transfer to the 85th Assault Infantry Legion tasked to the Steadfast. Although now part of the Hierarchy Marines, Vadim remains in contact with the former crew of the Example, and has been present for almost every reunion.
With Captain Irrena Ixius officially designated as MIA (and later KIA), Commander Patrus Castellus was the highest-ranked officer of the Example at the Reaper War's end, and subsequently took it upon himself to find the men and women who survived the evacuation of the Example. To this end, he volunteered for one of the least-pleasant post-war jobs: Personnel Resources. It was a highly depressing job that involved confirming who had survived or perished in the war, and somehow managing to inform the next of kin. Dealing with the consequences of a staggering casualty list was a heavy task, especially so on a daily basis. "But it meant I had resources to find out what happened to each and every member of the crew," Castellus explained, and this made him the pivotal key figure in eventually organizing subsequent crew reunions.
Castellus stayed with the navy even after he finished his service with Personnel Resources. He took up a lecturing and training position at the Cipritine Hill Services Academy in 2191, then went into administration at the Naval Staff Headquarters in 2201. As one of the most respected officers from the Example, he maintained contact with his former subordinates and continued to organize crew reunions until he was finally given his own command, the Indomitable, thereby stretching his list of responsibilities. Today he defends the Citadel along with the Hierarchy Sixth Fleet.
Among the interviewees, Castellus was among one of the most eager to "set the record straight". "The general public only remembers the turian special forces, the krogan commandos, and the resistance when they think of the Miracle at Palaven," he stated during an interview. "The story told is how the teams of ungentlemanly warfare got the bombs to the civilian resistance, who then detonated them inside the Reaper ships. Too often do they forget the contributions of Defense Intelligence, the 27th Provisional Army, and the Navy, including all the logistics and supply officers, mechanics, and medics who weren't involved in the fighting, but without whom the Miracle would have been impossible without. I only hope that the generations to come will remember these unsung heroes, who fought their battles with wrenches, prayer, and medigel."
By 2189, the Hierarchy had decided that any turian still registered as missing in action who had not reported back in had most likely died, and the government began the process of officially designating these persons as killed in action. Castellus learned that Irrena Ixius, captain of the Example, was officially receiving this designation; as her last executive officer, Castellus requested and successfully received permission to be the one to personally break the news to Ixius' family on Aephus. Much to his surprise, he found Ixius very much alive, living with her husband and children. She was crippled from the waist down from her wounds while making a disastrous last-second evacuation from the Example, but was alive and well. She had been recovered by a separate resistance cell hidden deep within enemy lines, and when she ultimately made a recovery, she had seemingly slipped through the cracks of a damaged, stumbling post-war Hierarchy bureaucracy. When told that she was "officially dead", Ixius wryly remarked, "I must have missed the memo."
News of Ixius' miraculous survival nearly three years after the fact reached as high up as Admiral Coronati, who offered her a promotion to rear admiral, an offer Ixius respectfully declined. She had had her fill with command, and the extensive wounds she had suffered up and down her body during the Miracle at Palaven ensured she would never walk under her own power again. She was rotated into the Reserves with full honors, the closest turian equivalent to an honorable discharge, although she didn't cut ties with the navy completely. She still attended reunions of the old Example crew, and the Hierarchy eventually convinced her to run some of the military shipyards over her home planet of Aephus in 2193. She received real treat in 2202, when her shipyards were tasked with building a new Ordarian-class carrier which High Command decided to christen the Example. Construction was completed in 2207, the same year Ixius resigned from her post. She participated in both the christening and commissioning ceremonies as special guest speaker. (Never one for speeches, Ixius tried to get Castellus to write them for her, a responsibility that the executive officer, thankfully, talked the captain back into.)
Ixius died in 2208 from health complications sustained during the Miracle at Palaven. Despite having retired into the Reserves, her funeral was attended by most of the surviving crew of the old Example, her subordinates at the Aephian shipyards, and Admiral Coronati.
In 2193, a journal entry of the late Rear Admiral Spaccis Palatine was declassified. Written in the aftermath of the Miracle at Palaven, his words resonate with every man and woman who fought in the Battle of Palaven: "Even after all this, I doubt we could truly win this war conventionally. That said, I wish to make one declaration, which I make in confidence: Never in the countless eons that the Reapers have existed, have they suffered a loss as catastrophic as this. Though they might burn Palaven to the ground in retaliation, it will still be the site of their greatest failure. With that alone, our greatest victory has been secured."