Captain Ammen Dorrell Stood at the command console of the Turian light cruiser Pride of the Ancestors as he read over the morning's duty logs for his defense group's readiness, which according to the commander's of the six frigates and one tender ship serving under him, stood at a very acceptable ninety-three percent. Taking a sip from his caffeinated goren, a coffee like drink made for turians, he shifted over the holo display before his command console to view the local space around the 314th relay and gave a sigh.

Absolutely nothing for parsecs.

Again he sighed. Guarding the un-activated three hundred and fourteenth really was nothing more than a formality. After all no sane species in Citadel space had any interest in activating a dormant relay and potentially encountering the next Rachni or Krogan.

Dorrell's sigh had another source though. Guarding a dormant relay was tantamount of the end of your career unless a friend in the military could pull the strings to get you shifted away from that duty, and so far every string Captain Ammen Dorrell had pulled on had broken under the pressure and left him here to guard the cold lump of metal ahead of his ships. And for the moment it seemed, that things were going to be boring yet again for the two hundred and seventy-fifth day of his deployment.

And then everything went straight to hell.

"Captain!" Ammen's sensor officer yelled, fear and excitement coloring the normal stoicism of the Turian's voice, "The relay is showing activity, someone is turning it on at the other side!"

Ammen nearly dropped his cup of goren in shock at his sensor officer's declaration and the bridge had become very quiet all of a sudden before everything burst into life as he switched the display before him to show the same as his sensor officer's screen.

"Tell me what we know so far, Tlenar," Dorrell ordered calmly as he looked at the data flowing across his screen.

"Not much yet sir," Lieutenant Tlenar replied cautiously, "All we can say for sure is someone just turned on the relay at the other end and we won't know more unless we go through."

For several moments, Captain Dorrell considered his options before giving his next options, especially given he was about to make first contact with a new species, "Comms, get me a line to the high command, I need some orders here. We never expected this thing to get turned on from the other end."

The comm officer, a loyal, competent officer by the name of Nidzer Trilel, nodded and promptly pulled up a communications line to the Turian high command back on their home world of Palaven.
Before him, the holographic view of the local space suddenly shifted to change into the upper body and head of a high ranking turian that Ammen quickly recognized and saluted as the holograph began speaking.

"Captain Ammen Dorrell, for what reason are you bothering, the turian high command?" the turian at the other end of the line said, his voice gravelly and hard, making Dorrell flinch in reaction, clearly he was high on someone's shit list, for spirits' knew what.

"Sir," Dorrell said, "The 314 relay has become active, someone on the far side is activating it and as this falls outside my orders to prevent Citadel species from activating this end of the relay, I wished to request further orders."

There it was, Dorrell had put his issue out in the open, he was passing the buck to someone higher in command to get the possible first contact out of his lap.

And for several moments there was no response, long enough Dorrell worried the line had been disrupted when the general at the other end of the line spoke up again, his voice grave, and filled with and unspoken warning to never try and pass the buck again.

"Captain Dorrell, Your orders are to prevent the activation of the relay in accordance with council law, and to punish those who attempt to with death. So your orders are to proceed through the relay and destroy whomever is attempting to activate the relay. We will have a fleet along behind your shortly to ensure they are subdued." the high commander said.

Immediately, Dorrell snapped off a smart salute as the transmission ended before before turning to his comm's officer and giving a new barrage of orders. "All ships, prep for relay transit and make weapons ready for immediate discharge after we arrive. We have order from high command to subdue whomever is attempting to activate the relay!" he shouted, putting all of his enthusiasm behind the command before feeling the ship shift under him as his seven combat ships pulled away from their tender which would remain behind at the relay to greet whatever turian fleet came behind them.

"Ten seconds to jump," came over the com.

"5... 4... 3... 2... 1... Mark."

At that word, the seven Turian ships were suddenly grabbed by arcs of blue energy from the Mass Relay and hurled through space.

…

Only to arrive an instant later at the other side of the relay beside another active Mass Relay.

"Captain, single contact to port, sixty-seven degrees from our bearing, elevation seventeen degrees, distance forty-seven hundred kilometers!" Dorrell's sensor officer shouted as the ships came to a halt.

"Come about and engage, continue our scan of the system," Captain Dorrell ordered.

"Sir, the ship is hailing us," Nidzer spoke up from communications.

"Ignore them, once all ships have a direct line for their main guns, open fire." Dorrell replied.

There were several moments of quiet as Dorrell waited patiently for his seven ships to come to bear on the single, two hundred and fifty meter ship to their left. When they finally did though, he felt the cruiser beneath him shudder as its main guns fired at the frigate sized target.

It was with satisfaction that he watched as the ship took first one impact then another and another before a shot from the Pride of the Ancestors apparently holed its reactors and the ship disappeared in a fireball. He was slightly worried though that it had taken so many rounds to destroy a ship that hadn't shown signs of shields.

He was about to give additional orders when his Tlenar shouted out in surprise at what had just appeared on his screen.

"Additional contacts, sir! Eleven cruiser and dreadnought sized ships at seventy-five thousand kilometers!" he yelled.

Captain Dorrell felt his blood run cold with forming ice as he looked over the new ships registering on the sensors before the screen suddenly showed what was registering as weapons fire.

OoOoOoOoO

AN: So... yeah, I'm on a roll with writing, so I have another chapter done, this one also ending with what I hope was a decent cliffhanger. Besides that, if you have suggestions, give them, if you want to whine, PM them to me don't fill space on the review pages.

Regardless, I hope you're all enjoying this story.