Petroleum Effect

Chapter Five - Shadows in the Void

The Temple Ship, Sol System, Local Cluster, 2157

Archlord Lordak was born in 1988. He was 169 years old and he was beginning to feel it. The advanced implants and the fruits of psionics, the Transcendence had slowed the aging radically, but he was still more than twice the normal human lifespan as it was when he was born. His mind had expanded greatly over more than a century in a process few had ever undergone and which had never been perfected. It was an ongoing experiment with success measured by the five Transcendent, whose perspective was by definition no longer human. His mind surrounded him, hosted in his augmented brain, in the connections to the datasphere around him, overlayed by his psionic presence.

Physically Lordak looked like a muscular young man in the best of health, on public occasions wearing bulky, silver-and-gold armour. Right now he was in his office in his personal suite, considering the news of a new first contact with an alien power.

Since defeat of the alien invasion by the Greys in 2025 Lordak had known it was his duty to safeguard humanity. It had been a long road. From a blogger with an invention, to corporate overlord, it had been a wild, fun ride. During his corporate ascent, it had not all been work - he had proven the adage once coined by Milo Yiannopoulos, "Masturbation is for poor people". It was easy to find partners when you were fabulously wealthy. From 2024 to 2041, Lordak had known a life of hedonism, indulgence he felt justified by the fact that he and his four fellow Grey Wardens had literally saved the world - saved humanity from extinction.

The First Transcendence had been a weekday matter. He could plug in, he could unplug. It was the Second Transcendence in 2041 that had changed him, changed them all. The permanent enhancements had slowly but surely drawn him away from the pleasures of his youth. With the nanites coursing through his system, with psionic power regenerating his cells, he could survive almost any quantity of any drug. He could be sexually potent for days. He just no longer wanted to very often. Instead, other goals had loomed larger - maintaining the Dominion, maintaining his rule, strengthening mankind. Even now, the Archlord and the four High Lords continued to transcend, to grow in power whilst evolving away from common humanity.

The Temple Ship was one of the fruits of more than a century of labour. The vast vessel was over 50 miles long, 35 miles wide and 20 miles tall. It contained technologies and secrets found almost nowhere else in human space. Some of the most important knowledge including the secrets of Transcendence and Quantum Lenses had been copied to data caches elsewhere, so humanity could replace the High Lords if they were lost, but those copies were hidden in closely guarded locations, dusty and unread. The Book of Transcendence was a sacred trust - a sacred relic to those who kept the copies, a thing venerated, not opened.

On the Temple Ship Lordak and his peers had discovered how to synthesise elerium-115. What had eluded them in 2037 had eventually been discovered nearly a century later. They had experimented endlessly with the Petroleum Effect, with element zero, with psionics, and with the combination of all four of those things.

The Temple Ship was powered by an object called the Dyre Gem. The Dyre Gem appeared to be a beautiful, crystalline, prolate spheroid - shaped like a rugby ball on its end. It was a combination of elerium-115, element zero, gold, diamond and petroleum, all treated by a variety of exotic reactions and energies. At the core of the Dyre Gem, locked inside the crystal, was a strange, organically shaped pool of lighter hydrocarbons permanently activated in the Petroleum Effect. The layers of solid crystal contained strange, circuit-like, patterns of gold, and the whole thing glowed with shifting rainbow hues of pink, blue, purple and gold.

The Temple Ship could open portals to, or from, points over a distance of around 100 light-years, and sustain them long enough for a fleet and the Temple Ship itself to pass through. The surface of the immense structure was studded with weapons, sensors, shields, and communications arrays. There were prodigious banks of redundant computing facilities, and several giant Quantum Lenses, as well as peerless psionic amplifiers. The ship had a reactionless drive that could be adjusted to shove planets. The cavernous interior of the leviathan was large enough for farms and other simulated outdoor environments preserving many Earth species. There were archives of seeds and frozen samples of embryos of many creatures. There were vast laboratories, fabricators and huge cargo holds full of raw materials and parts. The weaponry of the Temple Ship encompassed the mundane, such as kinetic drivers, as well as experimental and eldritch weapons. There were enormous hangars full of fighters, corvettes, frigates and other support ships.

The Temple Ship was a focus of psionic power and the locus for the blessings of the Hunger and the Wyrm, vast psionic presences worshipped by many in the Dominion, as a result of a pact they had formed with humanity via the High Lords. Their presence was usually subtle, but statistics showed significant increases in output from resource gathering and refining operations where their gifts were bestowed.

Religion in the Dominion was still a complex, thorny issue. Archlord Lordak had originally intended to make the worship of the Triad - himself, the Hunger and the Wyrm - mandatory and the only religion. However, to his surprise during the communion that had led to the pact he had sensed, well-hidden, fear in the two psionic presences – in the Wyrm especially. They feared the Abrahamic God. As a result of this, Lordak had decided that Christianity and Islam should still be legal in the Dominion. It was a topic the Archlord felt deeply troubled about – wondering if he was in error consorting with the eldritch alien presences. Even so, he believed that the power of the Hunger and Wyrm was an important tool in protecting humanity.

Perhaps the Temple Ship's most powerful weapon of all was that it was a secret. Not the best kept of secrets - it had a vast crew, some of whom would occasionally leave, but a secret from the teaming masses of humanity on Earth and in the colonies in Sol and elsewhere.

The rest of the fleet had not been neglected either. Aside from the Temple Ship there were ten sword-class ships, each a 3-mile long superdreadnought, festooned with weapons and with hangars full of fighters and support vessels. These had a solely military focus, and lacked portal capacity. However, they had Petroleum Effect drives making them far faster then element zero powered vessels. They were all secret and usually stationed with the Temple Ship.

Where once the Dominion had a single ship that could open portals, the Gate Ship, that had become obsolete. It had now been replaced with three larger gate ships stationed in Sol, each able to open portals to, or from, points up to 50 light years away. The unique capitalised Gate Ship had given way to the mundane class of gate ships.

Finally there were 8 smaller fleets which made use of element zero, comparable to the ships mentioned in Prothean records. Each smaller fleet was let by a single, 1-kilometre-long dreadnought and a single carrier, supported by 10 cruisers, and 20 frigates. This was what most humans knew of as the Terran Dominion navy. The vessels were powerful but made use of ubiquitous technology. There were few surprises or secrets to be reverse engineered. The total of the 8 eezo fleets was called the Grand Fleet.

Years ago, when the Archlord had begun the preparation of humanity's defences, the results of prescience were vague. The question was, always, were the fleets enough against whatever lurked outside human space?

The pictures of the small alien frigate that had flown over the R.E.A.P.E.R group in the Shanxi system had provided a focus for the psionic visions of the Transcendent, which was heartening. The aliens were, it seemed, limited to element zero technology. There was no elerium, no Petroleum Effect and no challenge to human psionics. To discover more, however, the humans would have to capture some alien vessels, their datacores, and their crews.

There were decisions to be made about what approach would best serve human interests. Much depended on the degree of alien power and their attitude. The only aliens encountered to date were threats. What if they claimed to be friendly? What if they were more or less advanced?

Much needed to be known. That was where the Righteous Enterprise II came in. The new vessel was very different from the original - a purely military and exploration vessel, it had no oil extraction ability and no large oil tanks. The space was all given over to equipment suitable for its mission. The Righteous, as its crew preferred to abbreviate the name, was a stealth ship making use of purely element zero technology, save that its hull had been subtly treated with psionics. The ship would lie in wait for lone alien vessels, and then scan them powerfully to ensure they had no QEC. Assuming none was detected, or it could be disabled, the plan was for the Righteous to jam radio and call in a sword ship, which would have a gate ship on standby to portal it in. The sword ship would then subdue and capture the alien vessels.

The Righteous Enterprise II would have a powerful commander. Director Melissa Coldhardt had impressed Lordak and his fellows over a long period. In 2140, the High Lords and the Archlords had agreed they would need a new class of powerful agents and emissaries to work their will in the expanding Dominion. Coldhardt had been granted limited, partial Transcendence. Her abilities had increased but without sacrificing too much of her humanity. Indeed, some said her libido had actually increased! As a noble in the service of the Archlord, she had taken the name Amaoth and used the titles, variously, of professor, director or witch.

It was this ship and this servant that Archlord Lordak sent to discover the truths of the alien empire.

Shanxi System, 2nd February 2158

General Desolas Arterius sat in his office on the Turian Hierarchy Cruiser Garvix and scowled. The discovery of the mysterious fleet of black dreadnoughts gnawing at the garden world R314-G1 had created a stir in the military. There was clearly a major power active in this region, one of of unknown strength and purpose. Post-contact analysis suggested the aliens were not that advanced, their large ships had relatively weak shields, slow drives and were limited to kinetic drivers - but those ships were big.

Arterius, along with Commodore Geretan Hanenius, had been sent to investigate, and they were failing. The ships were gone. There was evidence of their presence - a desolation on the garden world hundreds of miles wide. Ground searches however had yielded nothing but soil debris. There was nothing in space. The aliens were shadows in the void. Some even suggested it was somehow an elaborate hoax, that the crew of the Daexus were in on it, or had been deceived somehow.

Desolas Arterius knew better. Aside from his innate pessimism, two of the frigates in his task force had simply ... disappeared. These were well trained, well equipped members of the Turian military. They did not just get lost! Something had taken them. That had only been the beginning.

The source of Desolas' present, thunderous, visage was the disappearance of the entire Turian outpost on Quden. Quden was a small, icy, rocky moon with a research outpost and mining station. The planet was located in Citadel space near the Attican Traverse, some distance off the mass relay network. It had just … gone. The buoys nearby had gone offline and by the time a patrol had arrived to investigate … whatever had happened, had happened. The entire colony was gone – just bare depressions in the surface as though a giant hand had reached down from space and scooped up all the buildings, people, vehicles. The planet was essentially untouched – almost as though there had never been a colony.

The consequence of the disappearance had been a vast increase of focus by the higher echelons. The Hierarchy wanted results, and Desolas, so far, had none to give.

Interstellar Space, 2nd February 2158

Amaoth the Witch sat in her office on the Righteous Enterprise II and smirked. The specimen retrieval missions had been a complete success. The small frigate hung in the black space between the stars, accompanied by three other ships, the 3-kilometre long bulk of the sword ship Image of Violence, the bulk cargo carrier Truckin' Fantasy, and the gate ship Circle of Hermes.

The Archlord had tasked Amaoth with retrieving alien specimens. On her office screen were ongoing reports of the analysis of materials retrieved – two small frigate sized ships, the buildings from a small outpost and the crews. The ships had been retrieved more-or-less flawlessly and a few months later, based on preliminary analysis, the colony had followed.

The ships had not been taken to Sol. The analysts' assessments had been clear that the aliens almost certainly did not have FTL communications, except possibly QEC. However, in case that was wrong Amaoth had chosen to take the materials to the void of interstellar space for analysis.

Vivisections, dissections and interrogations along with AI analysis had yielded a wealth of information. A number of aliens had been retrieved, including some juveniles. One tactic that had proved persuasive for cooperation, was to threaten the young in front of the adults. Once the adults had been cooperative and their information had been fully extracted over a period of months, the juveniles were vivisected anyway, of course.

With the data storage devices unlocked the metaphorical galaxy had opened up to the human forces. The human … virtual intelligences … as the aliens would call them, crunched the databases and presented the most relevant information neatly. The aliens were called Turians. They were vaguely humanoid in shape, with a metallic carapace. The Turians were part of a galaxy spanning civilisation called the Hierarchy and they were highly militarised, the Hierarchy being in turn part of a multi-species organisation calling itself the Citadel Council.

The Turians and their databases were also a cornucopia of information on their allies. The Citadel Council was led by a triumvirate including the Turians themselves. The other leading races were the Asari, a sinister species with eerily human-like faces and bodies, other than their blue skin and head ridges, along with the Salarians, a race of short-lived amphibians. The stories about the Asari were unbelievably depraved. An entire race, devoted to miscegenation!

The Council had a number of junior member species spread out in a small area of space around the mass relay network. The Turians had a detailed map of space known to the Citadel Council and it was tiny. Less than 1 percent of the galaxy had been explored by the mass effect civilisations.

The aliens, whilst militaristic, had extremely primitive technology. Their FTL was solely based on element zero and they were not able to build or dismantle the mass relays, which they believed were built by an extinct species – probably the same ones who had left ruins on Mars and humans called Protheans. This was clearly wrong - human archaeologists had confirmed the dismantled Charon mass relay was far older than the Protheans. With fuel requirements and the need to discharge static, Citadel Council ships were capable of a maximum average FTL speed of around 15 light-years every twenty-four hours off the relays, for their fastest and best military ships.

The aliens knew nothing of the Petroleum Effect, nor elerium. The aliens had no portal technologies and it was unclear if they had psionics – they had something called biotics but that appeared to be a different effect caused by eezo contamination of biological nervous systems. Post-mortem examination of a small minority of the aliens appeared to confirm this, revealing small nodules of element zero in the bodies of some of the Turians.

The human Grand Fleet was on a comparable technology level with the Citadel – perhaps slightly below in some areas, ahead in others. The sword-ships and the Temple Ship were on another level entirely. The humans also had the advantage that with the dismantling of the Charon relay, as well as some other inactive relays, they had run the central computer devices through a Quantum Lens and recovered control codes. Humanity could turn relays on and off at will – an ability not known to the other races. The relays remained an enigma - experts all agreed that they were vastly older than the Protheans and plainly not built by them. The modern races could not bypass the quantum shielding and were unaware of a variety of hidden controls.

The question now was, what to do about the aliens of the Citadel Council and the mass effect civilisations in general? They had nothing to offer technologically or culturally. It would be imprudent to for humanity to expand only along the limited lines of the mass relays. Far better to expand quietly into uncontested space, using gate technology. However, it would be unfortunate if humanity became known to the aliens in a negative light. The aliens were inferior – some of them had been in space for longer than humanity but still had far weaker technology. However, they were not entirely stupid.

There was a risk that if humanity simply attacked the other races of the galaxy, they might be able to fight back successfully. Even element zero technology could, eventually, get vast fleets to Sol. That was why, after discussion with the High Lords, a strategy of engagement had been decided upon.

Humanity would continue to expand, off the mass relay network. Small numbers of gate ships would be produced as transport hubs for each area, with redundant self-destruct mechanisms remotely controlled by QEC. That knowledge would not fall into alien hands. Petroleum Effect technology would be exclusively for military use. Civilian transport would be element zero based and also tightly controlled. Even the location of Sol would be obscured on star charts. The Dominion was also considering plans for its own private mass relay network, human built, that would be solely available to humans and controlled from the Temple Ship.

At the same time, humanity would establish an outpost on the mass relay network at the Rainbow system and announce itself as a relatively standard eezo based interstellar power. They would send an embassy to the Citadel Council. The R.E.A.P.E.R units would be withdrawn from areas of space near mass relays and declared to be a hoax - blamed on corrupt Turian officers and a race called the Batarian - intended to conceal slaving activities.

Once inside the Citadel and in diplomatic contact with the mass effect civilisations, the Terran Dominion could spread distrust and division, working to ensure the aliens never became a threat whilst humans quietly expanded elsewhere.

From military reports, the humans even had the name and image of the officer, Etarn Corvannis, who had buzzed their ships. He would make a gratifying scapegoat. First, however, Amaoth needed to arrange the abduction of some Batarian slavers …

Shanxi System, 29th April 2158

The Garvix continued to patrol the worlds in the region of Shanxi. There had been no sign of hostile alien activity for the past two months and Commodore Hanenius feared it could cost he and General Arterius their chances of promotion at the very least. All he could do was spread out his ships, in small groups of three. At least the Hierarchy had sent him more ships since the outpost at Quden disappeared.

The Garvix itself was in far stellar orbit, holding position relative to the secondary mass relay, acting as a command hub for the search fleets.

An alert chimed on the bridge, a welcome distraction from the tedium of failure and the fear of damage to his career.

"Detecting mass relay activation", reported the sensor officer, "the secondary relay". "Detecting a fleet!", shouted the same officer, a moment later, "Unknown configuration, 1 dreadnought, 10 cruiser, 20 frigates".

That got Hanenius' attention. Were these the aliens responsible for the disappearances? Regardless, his ship could not fight a fleet. "Shut down all non-essential systems. Run silent!", Commodore Arterius barked the order to the Captain, Fesenix Axeius.

"Silent running!" ordered the Captain.

A few moments later … "Incoming message", reported the communications officer, "message is being tight-beamed to us, using standard protocols, video and audio". The Captain looked at the Commodore. Their attempt at hiding had failed completely.

"On screen if you would, Captain", ordered Hanenius, "– and send a message for General Arterius to join us."

A moment later, the central communications screen showed the face of an unknown alien – which could best be described as a pale pinkish Asari, with pale yellow hair where an Asari would have head crests. "Greetings in the name of the Terran Dominion", said the alien. The audio was in perfect Turian, suggesting the use of a translator.

"I am ambassador Amaoth, and we are the humans. We come in peace at a time of mutual tragedy." On a number of levels, that, was not expected. "Send a response", ordered the Commodore, "thank the aliens for their greeting and ask for a few moments to gather our command staff". About a minute later, General Arterius arrived on the bridge and they replayed the message to him.

"Thoughts, General?" asked Hanenius.

"We have no choice but to respond, and they are between us and the relay. I suggest you respond thanking them for their greetings and ask how we can assist. If they are responsible for the disappearances, I strongly suspect a force that size can make us disappear too so we may as well talk."

Hanenius nodded, "Agreed. Captain, have your sensor officer record the following message and send to the aliens, in Turian, since they seem to have our language:"

"We greet you, humans and we also come in peace. How can we assist you?"

The message was sent and a few moments later the sensor officer spoke again, "Incoming message – the aliens wish to approach to real-time communications range". "Confirmed", replied Hanenius.

The message was sent and the alien dreadnought, supported by 5 cruisers and 10 frigates, flashed into range. On cameras, the dreadnought was white and grey with a vaguely rectangular core and angular wings. It looked nothing like the black cylinders reported by the Daexus. The other human ships were similar.

"Incoming video call", reported the sensor officer, "standard protocols". "Accept. On screen for the Commodore", ordered Captain Axeius.

Once again the pink, Asari-like, alien appeared on the viewscreen. "Thank you for agreeing to speak", began the alien, "as I said I am Ambassador Amaoth. This is the Terran Dominion eighth fleet and we come to you, the mighty Turians, at a time of mutual tragedy. My people have just begun to explore this area of space and we are here to investigate mysterious disappearances of our people, including a small outpost from a garden world in this system. In the course of our investigations, we discovered that you also suffered disappearances and we believe that we have uncovered the cause."

"We recently pursued a ship we believe was responsible, from a race you call the Batarians. They were part of a larger group that has been working with corrupt members of your own military to take sentient beings from this region of space as slaves. We believe this includes some Turians as well as our colonists. We have some video recordings and other materials we recovered from the debris of a destroyed Batarian ship, that we would like to share."

The alien's words were pleasing to the Turians. Batarian slavers were an explanation they could understand. Hanenius replied evenly, "Thank you, humans. I am Commodore Geretan Hanenius. I am the commander of a task force of ships from my people, the Turian Hierarchy. We are also investigating disappearances in this region of space. Could you please provide us the materials you recovered and give us some time to consider them. Also, do you mind if we send a message to alert our people to this contact?"

"Of course, please do Commodore", replied the human. Hanenius had been trained in alien body language. The humans were unknown to him, but the expression was what an Asari would call a smile.

Amaoth went on, "This information should be shared as widely as possible. We will send you the video now and await your further communication. Please do contact your superiors also. This grave wrong to both our peoples should not be hidden. Ending call". The video link cut out.

"Aliens are sending us a data transfer request – large number of files", reported the communications officer.

"Accept", ordered Hanenius.

Turian Cruiser Garvix, en-route to Turian Space, 3rd May 2158

The videos provided by the humans had been shocking. They were fragmented images of the garden world R314-G1. A beautiful colony attacked by a small fleet of Batarian reavers, human adults and children carried off. Then, a Turian military ship, the Daexus, launching an unknown missile that devastated the landscape for hundreds of miles, destroying the evidence.

Later, footage from a hold in a Batarian cruiser, as Captain Etarn Corvannis, clearly intoxicated, used a cruel, military knife on Turian slaves, including children, and did things to them that were simply too awful for Hanenius to want to contemplate.

The entire incident with the mysterious black ships – just a hoax to cover a slaving ring?

The humans had also obtained messages that suggested one of the Batarian slaving ships would visit a nearby system in the next few days. The humans had offered support but suggested the Turians might want to capture the Batarians themselves, moving a short distance from the relay to allow the Turian task force to muster.

The Batarian vessel had been if anything, too easy to find. Their ship had indeed been caught in the nearby system. At first the Batarian slavers had blustered defiance, taunting the Turians that he knew their kind, "inside and out", but once it had become clear that they could not escape, the entire Batarian crew had committed suicide. The Batarian slaver captain had sliced open his own veins on a live video link and when his ship was boarded and disabled, all of the Batarians were found dead by their own hand.

Tragically, what was also found was a number of horrifyingly mutilated Turian corpses in a slaving hold, along with a number of appallingly incriminating records and videos. Worst of all was a still living female Turian child. She had lived long enough to give a statement about the depraved things Corvannis had done before taking her own life.

Captain Etarn Corvannis had been taken into custody – Hanenius now regretted giving him the benefit of the doubt at first.

Their mission complete and the disappearances explained, the Turians were returning to their own space and, in a surprisingly agreeable first contact, the humans had offered to send emissaries to the Citadel.

Terran Dominion Frigate Righteous Enterprise II, en-route to the Citadel, 3rd May 2158

Amaoth was in a good mood. She had just sent her report to the Archlord and was now relaxing in her private quarters, wine in hand. Amaoth was wearing little more than a blouse and a thong, waiting for a visit from one of the flight officers she had found to be a … gratifying ... companion.

The plan was going perfectly. Terran Dominion technology had proven easily equal to the task of fabricating evidence against Captain Corvannis and the crew of the Daexus. The Daexus' own recordings had been dismissed by the hierarchy as somehow falsified. The Batarian slavers had been kidnapped and psionically brainwashed ruthlessly by Terran Dominion military. Several had died during initial tests but the remainder had been thoroughly enslaved. They had proved a realistic quarry for the Turians to chase. The R.E.A.P.E.R units were now believed to be a hoax. The final masterstroke had been the brainwashed Turian female child who had denounced Corvannis.

The Righteous Enterprise was on its way to the Citadel where she and her diplomatic attaché Donnel Udina would open relations and if possible set up an embassy. The cargo hold was full of refined element zero which would be sold in order to obtain an initial fund of Citadel credits. The Dominion had no intention of becoming a member of the Citadel Council, of course, just a supposedly 'friendly' power that traded – like one of the Terminus systems.

Once humanity had access to the Citadel, the galaxy would never be the same ...