Mass Effect is the property of Bioware. 20th Century Fox owns the Alien/Predator franchise.

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Geneva, Earth

Victory at Shanxi!

The public relations office of the United Systems Military informs us that the counter offensive has met with success. Under the command of admiral Kastanie Drescher the heroic men and women of Second Fleet have fought their way into Shanxi Space. In what military experts have called humanity's first Mass Relay assault, second fleet dealt a devastating blow to the invaders, destroying more than fifty percent of their naval strength. The survivors of the alien fleet have been driven from the system. All eyes now turn to the planetary surface of Shanxi, where Colonial marines and Homeguard forces, under the command of general Martin Perez, have landed and are crushing the alien occupation force. Our hearts and our prayers go out to the families of those who sacrificed their lives to achieve this victory. Among these fallen heroes is rear-admiral Pressly, second in command of Second Fleet, who was reported killed in action. Meanwhile-

The reporter kept talking, filling the air with a seemingly endless supply of purple prose, but general Spears had already lost interest. He shut down the television set and leaned back in his chair

"So, we are back in business, and everyone is ecstatic. People always love a winner."

"It comes at a high cost," D'Orsinio commented sourly. "Second Fleet has taken heavy losses."

Spears shrugged. "You want to make an omelet, it's gonna cost you some eggs. A frontal assault is always costly. That's on Hammerstein and her friends. If Second Fleet had been in Shanxi space when the aliens arrived... Well, I think it's pretty clear how that would have ended."

"I'm not trying to argue that point, general, but it leaves the question: can second fleet proceed with its task?"

"Absolutely! The dockyards at Arcturus can do temporary fixes for most of the damaged ships. It won't be pretty, but it'll put them back in action within a few days. On top of that, Graf Spee will be at Shanxi by now, that gives admiral Drescher a fifth carrier and four more destroyers." Spears smiled briefly. "She'll be able to chase the aliens all the way back to their own mass relay. Once that is secured, it's they who will have to launch frontal attacks."

"So, we're safe then?"

"For the moment. Keep in mind, we still don't really know what we're dealing with. It's pretty clear that there are at least three different species out there, but so far we seem to have been fighting only one of them. There is simply no way to predict what will happen once the others get news of the latest battle." Spears shrugged again. "But that's all just speculation. Meanwhile, we have things to do here on earth."

"We?" D'Orsinio raised his eyebrows. "General, you have plenipotentiary powers. I'm not sure what more I can do for you."

Spears smiled. "Quite a lot, assembly member, quite a lot. You see, I've been thinking on the recent past. We dodged a major bullet. Mainly through luck. We cannot afford for something like this to happen again."

"I see." D'Orsinio had been in politics for a long time, and he had learned to hide his feelings quite well. Still, it was obvious that he was feeling very uneasy. "And, may I assume that you have thought of a solution?"

"Solutions, assembly member D'Orsinio. Solutions. I'm afraid that this is not the kind of problem that can be solved with a single action. We will have to make changes, many changes."

Shanxi City, Shanxi

The drone was flying in between the buildings, twisting and turning as it followed the streets of Shanxi, never rising above the rooftops. It was a small craft, small enough that it could have flown quite comfortably through the corridors of an office building. As it moved multiple sensors scanned the streets below as well as the surrounding buildings.

The small drone turned a corner, when, suddenly, a small movement behind one of the many windows caught its attention. The drone continued onwards, noting the location, but never stopping. It was quite smart, as far as such things went. Not sentient of course. Despite all the dire predictions, human computers had never achieved anything remotely like sentience, but it was capable of making limited independent decisions, based on the best combat algorithms human programmers could create. Firing on whoever was inside would only alert them to the fact that they had been discovered. Instead, the drone simply marked the building and send the necessary update back to its controller.

Another corner, more movement, a burst of fire. The drone turned sharply on its three thrusters, evading the incoming rounds. The gunfire triggered a different response. Twin guns, about the size of sub-machine guns, mounted underneath the nose, swiveled and returned fire. The drone turned again and launched two of its wing-mounted rockets through the open window before accelerating away.

Behind another window, a turian officer cursed bitterly. The fools should have known better. They had been fighting the humans for three days and by now everybody was aware, or should have been, that firing on the human drones was the absolute worst thing you could do. Even if you managed to bring the Spirits-damned thing down, it would still advertise your position to the advancing humans, and that was NOT a good idea.

-o-o-o-

Half a kilometer away a marine officer noted the hostile location marked on his GPS. His marines were pursuing an alien unit that had broken contact during the night. Now it looked like they had been found.

"Enemy location confirmed. Isolate and destroy."

Two Ud-4Ys that had been on stand-by moved in at high speed. Then the dropships braked sharply and deposited a platoon of marines behind the turian position, cutting them off from retreat. At the same time, a detachment of heavy armour moved forward. City streets were hardly the ideal environment for armoured vehicles, but they did have certain advantages, especially if you didn't care about preserving the city.
A single Grizzly FSV moved forward, its turret turning slowly from side to side as the crew scanned for enemies as they closed in on the last known location of the enemy. Behind it, two more vehicles kept their distance, covering the first as it moved. The moment the target location came in sight the lead vehicle took aim and fired a high explosive shell through the window that the drone had originally marked. The explosion was somewhat muffled, but still enough to shatter windows all along the street. If anyone had stayed in that particular room, they were now past on the walls. The Grizzly continued forward, looking for new threats.

A turian soldier, looking through a broken window, raised his rocket launcher. His helmet mounted sight automatically compensated for the new weapon, but at this range, it was hardly necessary. The rocket streaked through the air and slammed into the vehicle's flank.
There was a thunderous explosion and the Grizzly slowly rolled to a stop, smoke billowing through hatches that had been blasted open.

The turian victory was short-lived. A second FSV turned its turret around, co-axial and top mounted machine guns raking the windows. The main gun blasted, once, twice, and the upper floors of the building collapsed on top of the defenders. The remaining Grizzlys rolled onward. Behind them, a company of marines moved forward, using the vehicles as cover as they approached the buildings. Rooting out the turians was going to be a dangerous job, but it was something they were trained for, and in the close, no-holds-barred environment of indoor fighting their heavy firepower gave them a crucial advantage.

-o-o-o-

Shanxi, Central Turian command

Desolas' eyes burned as he looked at the tactical plot. When general Oraka had informed him of his decision to withdraw Desolas had thought he'd be able to hold out long enough for reinforcements to arrive. After all, the humans had managed to draw the battle out for weeks, and even then they had only been defeated by the threat of orbital bombardment. Surely, his own soldiers should have been able to do the same, especially since the humans were unlikely to bombard their own city. Instead, after only a few days, he was looking at disaster, not only here on the planet, but on a larger scale as well:
His soldiers were dying out there and they were not dying alone. Something else was dying as well: a reputation. Turians were the galaxy's best soldiers. Everyone knew that. Sure, krogan might make for better shock troops, but they fought as individuals, not as a team, and no matter how hard you trained them, they always lacked discipline. Asari and even salarians might produce better special forces, but they lacked the fortitude and strength for frontline duty. Strangely enough, it was the batarians who had come closest to matching the prowess of the turians as all-round soldiers, but they had never actually matched it.
Now, things had changed. His soldiers were fighting bravely; no one had ever accused turians of cowardice and that would not happen today either. Time and again, human marines had to dig the turian defenders out of cover and kill them hand to hand, often at great cost; but, for the first time since the Krogan Rebellions, the Hierarchy had found an enemy that was willing to do just that, and had the tools to do so. As a result, his soldiers were simply being overwhelmed. Wherever they fortified up the humans flowed around their positions like water. If they couldn't go around they called up armour support and gunships to flatten the target, and when all else failed they would storm the buildings and kill the defenders one at a time, no matter how long it took or how many lives it cost. The turians tried to stop them, but these were not the veterans of the Armiger Legion. Most were conscripts, doing their required service to the Hierarchy before moving on to other jobs. They would fight, fight well even, but somebody needed to tell them what to do and that took time, not much perhaps, but more than the humans allowed them.
By now he had effectively lost control of the entire planet, with the sole exception of the capital city, and even there his troops had been forced to give ground, abandoning position after position in order to avoid being cut off and exterminated.

Destiny Ascension, Citadel space

Matriarch Lidanya looked around the conference room, which contained the assembled commanders of the CItadel Defense Fleet. Normally meetings like this were done remotely, but somethings just had to be said face-to-face. Besides, it had the advantage of isolating the captains from their ships, just in case one of them decided to go rogue.

"As you are all aware, general Desolas Arterius invaded human space in an attempt to force the humans to negotiate" Well, that was his excuse. "That strategy has ended in disaster."

That had everyone's attention.

"Official word has reached the council-" In a way. "-that the humans have launched a counter-offensive. They have retaken control of the space around their colony and forced the turian fleet to retreat to Relay 288. General Arterius and the ground force remained planet-side and have been either killed or captured, or soon will be."

The gathered officers seemed frozen. No turian force had suffered a setback of this magnitude since the Krogan Rebellions.

"As a result of a mishandled first contact and of general Arterius failed strategy-" Let's make sure we're all clear about that. "-citadel space now faces a potential invasion from a hostile force of unknown strength. General Oraka's remaining ships are in no condition to effectively defend the mass relay. His force has been reduced to one damaged dreadnought and eight cruisers, several of which have been severely damaged. If they are overrun; and they will be, if the humans decide to launch a counter attack; we will be in an impossible position. Relay 288 has three possible destinations within citadel space, so the humans will have their choice of targets and we cannot defend them all. Clearly this is unacceptable. Therefore, the Citadel Council has decided that they can no longer stand on the sidelines. As of one hour ago I received orders, signed by all three councilors, to deploy the Destiny Ascension along with elements of the citadel defense fleet to Relay 288 and take charge of the situation."

Lidanya hesitated. This was the tough point. She had to keep the momentum of the meeting going to prevent the turian captains from realizing that they were being pushed into a policy that might run contrary to the wishes of the Hierarchy. At the same time it was imperative that everyone present was convinced of the seriousness of the current situation. She continued:
"We will have two mission objectives. First and foremost, we will ensure that the humans do not enter citadel space. This will require that we defend relay 288 at all costs. I believe that with general Oraka's help we will be able to do so, at least until reinforcements arrive. Our second objective is far more difficult. The council wants this war to end, and end quickly."

"How?!" Someone blurted out. All eyes were quickly drawn to the speaker, a salarian captain. " I mean... We don't even know what we're fighting. We don't know how many humans there are, how many ships they have... How can we formulate a strategy if we don't-"

"We cannot." Lidanya studied the speaker, wondering if perhaps councilor Milnori had briefed him in advance. It was a little too convenient that he would speak up and voice exactly those concerns she needed to convince the others. Then again, these were the things a salarian would worry about.
"Thanks to general Oraka's reports we know more about the humans than we did, but the information is still incomplete. You are right. We don't know enough to plan a military campaign. Fortunately, our intended goal may be achievable without such a campaign. There is one thing we can try, what we should have tried right away: We will try to open communications."

The room erupted in chaos.

For the drones I'm thinking of the small flying craft from Terminator, Rise of the Machines, rather than the ones from Mass Effect. I always thought the drone design from ME1 and ME2 rather ugly.

FSV: Fire support vehicle, Grizzly based, but with a tank-like turret.