3-3-2184 1944 hours (Citadel standard time)

SSV Normandy

Corvette

Communications

Shepard walked towards the ship's communications deck, beside the armory. Stepping inside, a hologram of the Illusive man smoking a Cuban cigar appeared. "What's going on?" He asked the aging, grey haired, blue eyed man.

Taking a puff of his cigar, the Illusive man addressed Shepard. "We're at war. Humanity is under attack. You and your team may be all that stands between humanity and the greatest threat of our brief existence. "

"What are you talking about? Is it the Reapers?" he asked.

"As of two hours ago the Hegemony has declared war on the Alliance. All Alliance fleets are coordinating patrols along the Attican Traverse. Due to their limited ships, the Alliance can only wage a defensive war."

"Which means that we will have to fight this war ourselves." Shepard finished with determination in eyes.

"You are only half-right Shepard. Cerberus will be leading the charge against the Batarians. This allows us to work outside of galactic law and hit the Batarians where it hurts them the most."

"And where will that be exactly?"

"Their home world, but that will take time. Right now Cerberus frigates are conducting raids on their shipping lanes, allowing time for us to launch a coordinated assault into their territory."

"What's our mission?"

"I need you to lead a small task force and capture a moon in the Maroon Sea. We have reports of that the Batarians are manufacturing ships and weapons. I personally believe that this is a launch pad for incursions into Alliance territory."

"Do you have any idea on their defenses?"

"That is why I'm sending you. If their expecting a large fleet to attack their doorstep, then they won't be expecting a small infiltration team. You'll have three days until then, good luck Shepard." The Illusive man disconnected the com-link and started patching into Alliance fleet QEC's.

Shepard took in the details and decided it would be best to have some rest. Immensely tired from the mission, Shepard staggered to his cabin and fell on his bed. Almost immediately he fell asleep.

SSV Normandy

Gun Battery

Down in the gun battery, Garrus and Nyreen were having a conversation about different types of guns.

"You do realize that a Turian main gun is able to fire more rapidly." Nyreen stated.

"But the Alliance's rail gun fires more power." Garrus argued, as he was attempting to calibrate the Normandy's weapon systems.

"At the cost of rate of fire." She countered.

"Maybe, but then again have a gunner like me and you won't be able to fire more than once."

Nyreen rolled her eyes at Garrus's immense ego. "Why don't you take some time off of that battery and let's go to my quarter to release some tension." She said with a hint of seductiveness.

Garrus smiled at the idea, but being a work alcoholic he couldn't stop working. "Uh…if it's all the same to you I'd like to do it after I'm done with the calibrations."

Nyreen shook her head with a small smirk. "Why do I make you uncomfortable, Garrus?" As soon as she finished she left the battery, but Garrus didn't notice that she had left the room.

Garrus, taking the silence as an indication to continue, said the most awkward thing ever. " You don't ever have to worry about making me uncomfortable. If you'd like I'll gladly test your flexibility. You know me, I always like to savor the last shot right before I pop in the heat sink." He turned around and to his horror saw Ramirez standing in the door way.

Neither said a word and silence filled the room. Finally Ramirez, backing away, said "I'll just let you get back to work."

As the doors closed, Garrus stared at the door and muttured "Right. 'Cause I'm in a great place to optimize firing algorithms right now."

Cerberus Headquarters

Undisclosed Location

In spite of it's obvious lacking in numeric areas, the Alliance Navy was strong in diversity and in was one of most technologically advanced navies in the galaxy. The destroyer, essentially a larger, more powerful frigate is able to offer speed and power. Able to maneuver from Dreadnought fire, the destroyer is able to hunt frigates and scrap a cruiser if it has surprise on its side. It was one of the ships able to retrofitted into a 'drone ship', despite its name it still required a crew and a captain, but did not require Alliance soldiers onboard as the ship's defenses were controlled by an AI. This frees frigates to launch flanking attacks on the enemy fleet without having to worry about protecting capital ships. The destroyers, in turn allows corvettes to act as large troop carries and make hit and run attacks.

Another ship type, first designed before first contact was the battle cruiser. Midway between cruiser and battleship size, these vessels were designed for two purposes; hard, fast assaults and capital ship class commerce raiding. The vessels were armed with two large rail gun cannons, each measuring 367 meters in length. Like their larger cousins, battleships, battle cruisers are made to sustain heavy hits and dish it out. A unique trait among Alliance ships, with the exception of frigates and corvettes, is that their main cannons are able to arc in a certain degree allowing for effective knife fight engagements.

The greatest and unquestionably most powerful elements of the human navy are the carriers. In the ocean going navies of Earth's great super powers, had long believed that aircraft carriers were far superior to battleships. For all the power that battle ships provided, they were incredibly vulnerable to the aerial assaults of dive bombers and torpedo planes. This mentality had carried over to the space bound navy; unlike most races, whose first kilometer ship had the biggest gun the people could build at the time, the Alliance navy stuffed theirs with fighters and bombers. They are heavily protected with armor and their hangars are compartmentalized to reduce damage to the Carriers assets, nevertheless they are still vulnerable to dreadnought fire.

Initially when the first dreadnought was built, many critics deemed it a waste of resources as they believe to be venerable to a carriers' bombers, however in the ocean where you could sink a ship, in space one would have to destroy it meaning a guarantee in a loss of many vessels for one ship. This allows the Alliances other ships to quickly pick off the strays. With the development of shields, the supremacy of fighters over dreadnoughts was no longer certain. The torpedoes launched from fighters would take time to wear down a ship's shields. Thus the Alliance navy, begrudgingly , accepted the large ships into their fold. It was here that the Illusive man's great-great-grandfather Frederic Harper's influence could be seen. Lobbying the Alliance, Frederic was able to stop the Alliance's over reliance on the large vessel by creating a degree that at maximum of 20 dreadnoughts could be active at any time. He was also the architect for the Alliance's Titan program. His contributions to humanity earned him immense wealth

Fast forward to the present and Frederic's great-great-grandson was following in his footsteps. By 2178 the Illusive man managed to assemble an impressive sized fleet. Cerberus maintained and fielded four different fleets with their large income through private donors and many inventions. The total number of ships Cerberus had at their disposal was 1 dreadnought, 10 super carriers, 17 carriers, 25 battle cruisers, 60 cruisers, 72 destroyers, 90 frigates, and 180 corvettes. The Illusive man plan to use all his vessels not guarding his station to wage war on the Batarians. Maybe if he was lucky, he might be able to attend his daughter's birth date. He longed to his wife Eva, and his family again, but other matters made this rather difficult.

As of now, he was preparing the five hundred fifty million Cerberus soldiers about to engage in the upcoming war. Truth be told the Illusive man was a little depressed, he was sending young men and women to their deaths.

'If that is the price we have to pay, then so be it.' The Illusive man continued to make preparations, hoping to end the war as fast as he could.

Council Embassy

Udina's office

Udina sat at his table, flicking through his report to the Alliance High Command, anxiously waiting for their response. His request was bold, for an essentially untried black ops organization to fight the Batarian navy. He hoped his previous service as Human Councilor to the Alliance would sway them.

Udina had made several other requests, some big and some small, but the most important ones were those concerning the allocation of new personnel to establish several new bases on the independent colony world of High Key. The locals will no doubt be unhappy, and maybe even hostile, but when the Batarian navy is at their doorstep there was no doubt that they will be gracious.

Udina's assistant, Eric Bland, was working on his data-pad. He was responsible for reporting any requests from Udina and filing any responses from Alliance High command. The current Alliance Director, Michelson 'Iron Mike' Granger was kind and generous when he needed to be and cold and ruthless when the situation demanded it. At the age of 65, he is amongst the most decorated leaders in the Alliance. Udina just hoped he would see things his way.

Glancing at the newsfeed, Udina couldn't help but feel a little nervous. The Alliance has never actually participated in a full scale warfare, alone. The other Councilors have deemed this an 'Alliance matter', hoping to avoid being drawn into the conflict. Udina could understand their reasons, but it didn't mean he had to like it.

He was snapped out of his trance by a soft cough from his assistant, who had walked over to Udina's desk unnoticed until now. "Councilor, we have received a transmission from Alliance High Command," he murmured softly, his eyes locked on Udina's. "Director Granger would like to talk to you, regarding a matter of great importance that he would not divulge to me."

Udina nodded eagerly, presuming that the Director was messaging him solely due to his report and the request that he had made. It was only when his transmission was patched through, and he saw the grave look on the Director's face, his grey green eyes burning with a barely withheld fury, that Udina began to understand that the cause behind this transmission was something much more serious. Eric grudgingly exited the room after Udina ordered him to, clearly he was unhappy being kept out of the loop.

"Director," Udina began, smiling warmly. "I wasn't expecting such a speedy reply to my report. I do hope and the rest of High Command have seen it fit to grant me, my few, meager requests."

The Director merely frowned, shaking his head slowly. "We have received your reports, Udina, but that is not the sole reason behind this call, though I'll address your requests in a moment."

He paused and took a breath, glancing at a figure behind the camera, out of Udina's field of vision, and raised his eyebrows, clearly signaling for that person to depart. After a few seconds his eyes refocused on Udina's, and with a small sigh he began to speak once more.

"Three days ago, the agricultural colony of Freedom's Progress went dark. When Alliance forces investigated the planet, they found the colony completely deserted. There were no signs of struggle or traces on the reason behind the disappearance. We initially believed that Hegemony forces launched an all out assault on the planet. That was until an A.C.S team lead by one Staff Sergeant James Vega, were able to find evidence proving otherwise. They managed to bring back a tape showing the colonists were abducted by Collectors."

Udina rose from his desk and slammed his fist on the table. "Impossible! The Collectors are a myth, a legend, a Terminus system ghost story."

The Director paused again and took another deep breath, frowning heavily, the bags under his eyes becoming even more prominent at this angle. "I am afraid to say otherwise. The official story will be that Batarians attack the planet, however as the Alliance tries to secure its borders I'm going to need Cerberus to take the brunt of the attack. We are stretch thin as it is and we can't deploy troops into the Terminus Systems without leaving our worlds unprotected."

The Director sighed, holding his left hand to his brow. "We will grant you your requests for an increase in financing. We will also agree to grant you access to one of our old shipyards decommissioned in '64 on Old Traveler."

Udina cringe his fingers, not entirely appeased by the Director's offering, but….it was tempting. The added access to a shipyard in particular would be a bonus.

After some initial thought, Udina made his choice. "I accept your request, Director," He announced slowly, maintaining eye-contact. "But if you intend on using Cerberus I recommend we switch to a war-level ecomony."

"We have given more factories to Alliance suppliers, however that is all that we can do. This is not a war we can wage without heavy losses to our way of life Udina. I hope you can make do with what you have and make sure to keep good relations with the Citadel races. I don't want you to burn bridges."

Udina gave a nod of his head and the Director severed the link. He asked his personal V.I to summon his assistant back into his office. Eric entered through the doors in seconds. "May I ask what the transmission was about, Councilor?" he began before giving him a chance to speak.

Udina merely rolled his eyes in mock-frustration and gave him a tight-lipped smile. "The good Director has informed me of new developments that has occurred recently. Do not worry it is nothing to worry about."

Eric stared at Udina, clearly he did not believe the human Councilor, but refrained from saying otherwise. "Well that is good news. By the way have you seen the news recently?"

Udina gave his assistant a look. Eric responded with turning on the screen TV in his office. Immediately Citadel News began broadcasting, with the usual Asari anchor, Celar Solen.

"We interrupt your usual programming for an important news update. Just minutes ago the Batarian navy has launched an all out attack on Alliance territory in the Attican Traverse. We go to Foarius Laforeck currently near the colony Iris, onboard the SSV New Hope. Foaruis what can you tell us on what is going on?"

The screen switched to a light-skin Turian. Judging from his size and build he was relatively young, possibly just had gotten out of the turian military. "Well as you can see from the observation deck behind me, the Alliance Navy has prepared every available ship they can to defend every colony and others near the Hegemony-Alliance border. From what I've seen, only independent colonies have been hit, thus far. No official Alliance colony has been actually been attacked, however as you can clearly see by the massive battle group, behind me, guarding the planet the Alliance is taking every precaution it can to protect its colonies that are near a mass relay."

The screen showed both Solen and Laforeck as they informed Citadel races on the issue. "What is the overall strategy of the Alliance?" she asked her co-anchorman.

"From what I was able to gather from Captain Tadius Ahern, the Alliance's strategy for the war is to minimize casualties, by forcing the Batarians to stretch their forces and engage the Alliance in their territory where they hold the advantage and have prepared heavy defenses."

"A sound strategy, but one that is also risky. Can the Alliance hold against a longer space-faring race?"

"True, however keep in mind that the Alliance navy, while immensely powerful, is approaching the size of the Volus and cannot risk the chance of stretching their forces. Sti-"

SSV Shakespeare

Cruiser

Mess Hall

Laforeck was interrupted by an Alliance soldier, who approached him, with weapon drawn. "Sir, you must leave this area now or take cover in the hangar bay."

Laforeck signaled the camera man, which was a Volus by the name of Bib Fide, to cut transmission. Fide did as instructed and lowered the camera.

"What is going on?" Laforeck asked clamly. His years in the Turian army has give him the experience to be calm in every scenario.

"We have just gotten word that the Batarian 9th fleet is about to attack! We need you to get to safety."

"As a turian, you can rest assured that I do not need any better treatment than any of you." Laforeck responded with grace and humility.

The Alliance soldier gave him, her sidearm. "Well take this then. If things get FUBAR, then you might as well be able to defend yourselves. If you need any more weapons take the mass effect powered rifles in the training hall."

"What is your…name Earth-clan." Fide asked.

"Jenifer." The Alliance soldier said as she departed to her assigned post.

"C'mon we need to gather better weapons and quit flirting with the female humans. They aren't going to chose a Volus over the plenty of males onboard this ship." Laforeck told his co-worker as they both walked towards the armory. Laforeck took the camera in hand as he was able to carry it far easier than his companion."

"You don't know…that. I might just…get lucky."

"As the humans say, keep dreaming."

Upon reaching the training range, Laforeck asked the requisitions officer for two rifles, a shotgun, and a sidearm.

"You do realize that if I do that, you will have to be under supervision. My supervision." The human stated.

"Yes, yes of course." Laforeck said with impatience.

"Alright. What's your name so I can put in the record?"

"Foarius Laforeck and my co-worker's name is Bib Fide." The requisition officer typed the information in his console and both the Turian and the Volus separate records popped up. Seeing how neither had a criminal record he gave each of the two reporters weapons and he himself took one.

"Don't you Earth-clan…have better weapons for…yourselves?' Fide asked.

"Pfft, that is only for soldiers. I'm only a requisition officer and as such, have access only to the weapons that I need to be in charge of. By the way my name is Daniel if you guys didn't notice the name tag." Embarrassingly enough, neither did notice, but were thankful that they were able to avoid a rather awkward moment.

Just then the sound of Admiral Ahern's voice could be heard. "Attention all Alliance vessels prepare for enemy contact. I repeat prepare for enemy contact." The ship shook as it moved into position, along for all other Alliance vessels for upcoming defense.

"Well this might just …be interesting." Fide said as he held up two pistols.

Daniel and Foaruis glanced at each other, not sharing the enthusiasm of their Volus companion.