Apathy

by Throwaway1971

Not important please ignore

9. Entry 079-088

Universal Century 0053 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0061 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2165 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0022 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 035-3100 - 40k Universe

A fleet dropped out into Citadel space, the alerts blaring as the ships registered from and unknown make and design. Then again it was extremely clear that they were of a militaristic design given the very open gun ports on either side of the ships as well as the large dorsal turrets. Turrets that quite frankly looked to be rather enormous on some already enormous ships. The largest of them was about the size of the Citadel and there were many of those. The smallest of their ships present were all at least the size of a dreadnought at 1 kilometer in length with weapons similarly oversized.

It did not look like a diplomatic mission or even indeed a scientific one, this was a fleet designed and ready to wage war on a galactic scale.

Strangely enough the dorsal weapons appeared to be rather similar to the weapons offered by the Senti Company, a fact that flashed through the minds of many of the scrambling sailors and soldiers in response to the arrival that was unheralded by any activation of the Mass Relays. There was no way of telling where they had come from and indeed if there were any more of them on the way. The Citadel itself was panicking as it coordinated to send fleets to Ilium where the fleet had stationed themselves over.

It would be a good few minutes before they could arrive however and those on Ilium waited with bated breath. Were they going to be destroyed by an enemy they did not even know they had? Was this the end? A new Rachni war with enemies that could build ships as big as the Citadel?

Then a Senti cargo ship flew out in front of the ships and all but one of them left. Sure it was the biggest one but the thought counted. Perhaps Senti was merely a front?

Councillor Tevos had a migraine. The sudden appearance of a new species that had shipbuilding capabilities beyond that of any other Citadel species or even of the Protheans. A race that apparently sent out a fleet crewed by millions to find a single family that had been lost many years before. From the reports of the Asari out in the field, they were prepared to go to war with the entire Citadel combined fleets over the fates of the one known as Eldrad and his partner who was not Asari at all but a "human".

They had been lost apparently due to an accident with their FTL drives and had decided to sell parts of their technology off to make a living. Only it had backfired and they had become wildly successful, too successful if they were to be believed. What was initially a way to just make ends meet and survive had turned into an enterprise that changed the entirety of Citadel Space forever, shifting the focus of combat from Kinetic shielding to resistant armouring and the introduction of new laser technologies.

Now their people had arrived and looking to make first contact at the same time. Only it looked like they had not quite planned on things being peaceful and were not ready for diplomatic overtures. They were waiting for a ship to arrive and bring with it the diplomats that hopefully would not see every problem as a potential lascannon target. The Councillors were waiting aboard the Destiny Ascension before heading over to begin talks that hopefully would not result in the deaths of everyone in the system. The fact that they left just one of their ships behind in the face of the united Citadel fleets said everything about their confidence in their ships.

Then the diplomatic ship came, or what she assumed to be the diplomatic ship. Tevos had seen the method they used to travel via video captures but it was so very different in person. A disk emerged from seemingly nowhere as lightning arced to and from the inside of the disk as it began to rotate. A dark, blackish disc with swirls of purple and teal mixed in that rotated with increasing speed before it finally vomited out a ship and closed immediately afterwards.

The ships themselves seemed to be of very strange designs, no wings or fins or even connected pieces as the ships of the Asari, Turian and Salarians were, but rather a single entity. It was essentially what looked like a city with spires extending from the middle to rear and a single large spike extending downward from the last third. The mid-section of the ships however were lined with multiple rows of what looked to be cannon and laser batteries, each barrel at least 50 meters wide.

Valern beside her was mumbling to himself, postulating that perhaps the spike was a docking mechanism of some kind for planetary docks? It made sense, something of that size trying to enter the atmosphere would find it very hard to get out again. The Diplomatic ship only the size of a dreadnought (and how ridiculous did that sound) had a much smaller spike, indicating perhaps it could descend much lower in atmosphere. It had a much smaller amount of weapon batteries but each one seemed to be the same size as to what was mounted on the big one, standardization perhaps?

The communication console buzzed and Tevos prepared herself, no doubt the new race was willing to meet now.

The shuttle took them to the larger ship, the dialogue between the diplomats indicating that it was perhaps what they called a "Battleship", a class of ship perhaps? The travel over had been fraught with nervous tension, the weapon batteries certainly looked many times more imposing up close than they did from a distance. Each cannon was big enough that the entire shuttle could enter and leave with enough space to turn around, each laser emitter (at least that's what she thought they were) was enough for a fully grown Krogan to walk through unimpeded. The scale was terrifying and Tevos briefly thanked the goddess that the Senti Company had been content selling weapons and armour instead of waging brutal war by proxy. Tevos was not sure the Citadel could have survived the devastation.

The gaping maw that was their aircraft bay opened and inside they could see array upon array of various aircraft each with different broad designs. Some were rather squat, like a clawed Salarian hand, others still looked to be elongated with small stubby wings on either side. There were many of what appeared to be pilots climbing in and out of several different craft, their general size by Valern's sight indicating that they were approximately Asari in height. That being said there did appear to be two types of humanoids, much like Eldrad and Han'Ah, one tall and rather skinny shape, not unlike the Salarians and the other more squat and wider, Asari-like in other words.

Perhaps they were a coalition of 2 races?

They called themselves the Systems Alliance, such an inane name for such ornate ships. Still it was better than nothing and at least they weren't trying to kill anybody… yet.

The shuttle landed in the marked landing bays and Tevos exited along with the other councillors, their bodyguards and the actual diplomats. It would be better to have anyone other than Sparatus speak after all considering how terrible he and the Turians in general were in regards to diplomacy. Since Sparatus couldn't speak however that meant she couldn't speak either or else she would give him an invitation. So they were pretty much figureheads, dragged here by Sparatus in his quest for more glory, key targets in the event that things didn't go well.

Dammit Sparatus.

The walk to whatever room they were planning on holding the meeting in highlighted just how different things were. Inside it was a very large warren of many curved corridors, walls, hallways and so much more, no sharp angles in sight. Even their escorts wore armour and held weapons that were curved. In fact they didn't wear the Power Armour that the Senti Company had been selling at all. Very strange, she would have thought that it would have been ubiquitous given its defensive properties.

Or perhaps they were just not wearing it to not frighten the diplomats, the suits were after all extremely imposing.

They finally reached the room where the negotiations or rather the "talks" would take place. A journey of over 3 hours given they had walked and Tevos cursed that she had not kept up with her fitness. She was a Matriarch and she was a Councillor dammit. She shouldn't be doing this much walking. At least they had some tracks on the floors to make it easier as they propelled the group along.

The end goal was a small room that contained 6 individuals, 3 of the Asari-likes and 3 of the Eldrad likes. They were ready and waiting, positively anticipatory if their expressions were anything like that of the Asari. They smiled and stood to welcome the Asari and so began the talks.

The Minds approved of the human decision to enter after the Citadel species had gotten over the shock that had been the Senti Company. Adding both in at the same time could have been very unpredictable and the humans had expressed their desire to not kill and subjugate everything. A disappointment to be sure but at least the humans were learning and doing things differently from the Minds. If the Minds wanted a subordinate race that did everything they wanted, how they wanted, they would just create one.

No, the humans had stood their ground on the aspects of what they called "morality". They instead had offered an alternative method by which to do things, a method by which to guide the subject race to the final goal that they wanted without tearing apart them apart and escalating the situation. The Minds had treated the Gundam SEED universe and shudder the Neon Genesis Universe with a callousness that spoke of results while ignoring the methods. It had terrified the humans, if they let the Minds do what they wanted then either there would be a war dragged on for eternity to maintain the "peace" or genocide.

Both situations were unpalatable to the humans and so had petitioned the Minds for the right to administrate the Citadel space as well as the 40k space. The humans had found themselves in the unenviable position of being more "humane" than an uncountable number of A.I.s that at a base level could not understand the "organics". Humanity therefore could be said to have saved countless lives. Not completely due to their care regarding these races but rather as a byproduct of their attempts to mitigate the excesses of the Minds.

After all, if the Minds went too crazy in their handling of different universes, at what point do they begin to do mess with the XCOM humans? It scared the humans enough that they were heading off the Minds early, excess was bad and they were going to do everything possible to limit the Minds. The Game was a good example of what would happen should the Minds have their way which was generally extraordinarily bad for everyone involved that was not part of the Caretakers.

In their home universe they were going to guide the Citadel and Terminus races to destroy the Reapers and hopefully prove to the Minds that they could handle it all. They had a very limited window of opportunity, if they failed to corral the Citadel species into a semblance of order the Minds would do it. The Minds of course considered "doing it" as subverting the entire population and forcing them to fight as a unified whole (even if they did not realise what was happening). The lack of control horrified the Eldar and the humans and this simple fact was enough for them to petition the Minds for the ability to prove themselves. They would not even be able to tell that they had been subverted which was even more unsettling for the organics and worked to ensure that the Minds would never need to activate their subversion protocols.

The Commander had offered them this chance and they would do their utmost to make sure its trust was warranted. They wanted agency over their own actions and would do their utmost to ensure they would always have it.

Universal Century 0055 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0063 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2167 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0024 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 037-3100 - 40k Universe

The System's Alliance which by now had included the Eldar out of necessity if nothing else had revealed itself to the Citadel and the Terminus systems... if only partially. Their first phase of the anti-Reaper plan had exceeded many times above that of what they had expected (not for the Eldar) and now was the time to begin phase 2. Given that this was their test, they were of course planning to do everything as well as they could. The costs for inadequate performance was not one they were willing to contemplate, for themselves and the rest of the multiverse.

The second phase consisted of them threatening the Citadel Alliance races by merely existing, forcing them to accelerate their upgrading of their fleets and standing armies. The mere presence of the humans with their superior in size and firepower fleet kickstarting the many races into action. The mercenaries and auxiliary/reserve units of course were going to be the main recipient of the now obsolete ships which would still be useful in massed formations. It would be a while of course to get the fleets staffed by these new vessels while the crews had to be trained in the operation of the new systems and weapons.

Either way, it was enough that they were accelerating the procedure, the Turians of course being particularly enthusiastic as they took their role as the militant arm of the Citadel very seriously. The Senti Company throughout this period was still operating and kept its current leadership only Han'Ah had now become Hannah. Eldrad was apparently someone of particular importance within the Systems Alliance hierarchy as seen by the dispatch of an entire fleet to find him. The Citadel suddenly had much more respect for Eldrad despite his… eccentricities and did not wish to do anything that might agitate the Systems Alliance like for example taking and questioning him.

So the Senti Company maintained its independence but had also become a means by which to funnel technologies into the Citadel Space, technology that the Citadel forces figured must be either minor or obsolete by their standards. However it was obvious that their technology was based off of the technologies being sold and so the Salarian, Asari and Turian scientists were working overtime trying to crack the technology and then upscale it to at least match the size of the ones on the smaller Systems Alliance's ships. The large caliber cannons were a mystery as well, each one firing shells that were the size of multiple shuttles out of what looked like conventional barrels. They weren't Mass Effect driven or even anything resembling Mass Effect so far as they could tell, except for the shields which seemingly had the ability to deflect physical projectiles with ease. An equivalent weight class ship (their frigate and the Citadel's Alliance dreadnoughts) had shields that could resist a dreadnought's main gun for seemingly forever.

What was strange to the Citadel Alliance was the willingness for the Systems Alliance to assist them in their research regarding the new weapons as well as a means by which to mount the weapons on the ships in the first place.

Ship-Destroyer designs or rather ships designed around their weapons systems were the first designs that were coming out. A stopgap measure to ensure they at least had ships that could at the very least do damage to the Systems Alliance ones or the ships that the Systems Alliance had armed their ships against. Of course given that there were 3 different factions, designing 3 different ships was a frankly stupid idea and it was quickly nipped in the bud. This of course did not stop the politicians clamouring for the construction of racial ships but videos of the destructive capabilities of the new weapons against the now obsolete designs shut them up quickly. There was no time to spend years upon years designing new ships let alone 3 separate kinds for every class when there was a definite need for them now.

So the politicians were told (very politely) to screw off and to leave the Admirals, Engineers and Scientists alone. They still tried to interject of course, trying to get specific design features in place for the "cultural" look but had been shut down once again, there was no time for frivolous things. Mass Effect technology quite simply did not have the required firepower to penetrate the shields and were forced to adopt new technologies. Luckily the Senti Company had unwittingly (that they knew of) had provided laser technology out of the goodness of their hearts. The technology was the basis of their weapons designs however it was scaled to frigate level. Scaled up was nothing more than a deathtrap, the laser emitters self destructing in explosions that would simply tear out a large part of the ship.

The ship-destroyers were the first designs, much like the old tank-destroyers of the Krogan civil war, these ships were lightly armoured, fast, lightly crewed and held a very powerful main gun. Its chassis or rather superstructure in ship terms were repurposed frigate and cruiser superstructures, their Mass Driver guns switched out for laser systems. The next generation of ships would in reality be more along the lines of a 0.5 generation, repurposing ships in order to reduce costs and more importantly, getting more ships onto the fleet rosters as they attempted to buy time.

The proper next generation ships would be an amalgamation of the information they had received in both designing ships and weapons. The scientific advances regarding a means by which to upgrade the lasers both in scale and efficiency as well as defending against lasers themselves. Ceramics already in design for prototypes as personal armour as seen on the Power Armour suits, were upscaled and made more compact and effective. Its heat dissipation and resistance to heat itself was useful for the Citadel designers as a means by which to counter the effects of the lasers. The physical cannons were still an issue however, something of that size fired in a barrage would still be able to bring down their shields and perhaps tear apart the ship itself. Ceramics after all are brittle and do not handle physical impacts well.

A new branch of research therefore was devoted to handling new hull designs that could meld the heat dissipation effects of ceramics and the plasticity of the metal. One without the other would be useless and consign any ships designed as such to falling apart under fire. The designers had come into their own and came up with an entirely new design method with the help of the Senti Company. They were not sure why the Senti Company was helping them but they accepted it regardless, it was not the Systems Alliance after all, the scientists from the Senti Company were Asari, Turian and Salarian by birth. The new metals being designed were essentially a melding of plastics and metal, plas-metal as it were with the ability to deform upon impact as opposed to shattering or puncturing. While it did buckle, it did not break. Simulations and life-fire tests had it survive 1 shell from the giant cannons before breaking with the second round.

Layering the armour had an effect of magnifying the defensive capabilities against both laser and physical munitions at the cost of space. The designs would have to be carefully considered as of the ship's hull would have to be armoured to protect against the weapons projected on the System's Alliances ships. At the same time it would have to also be capable of mounting the weapons in the first place and be able to both power and withstand the recoil when fired. The vibrations of the laser weapons could shake apart superstructures if mounted badly or on badly designed ships.

The first of the next generation Gen 1 as it had been dubbed were the frigate designs. These ships were original from the ground up as original, sporting crews from all the different species within the Citadel Alliance. Unlike the segregated fleets of before this new one had a forced integration policy placed under Citadel control as a necessity. They simply did not have the capabilities to design multiple different ships with different aesthetics to simply satisfy the politicians and radicals in each species.

The frigates themselves were very simple, a large lasgun approximately 50 meters long ran along the length of the ship. The heat exhaust system was linked to the ship's engines which themselves were a mixture of fusion and Mass Effect energy systems protruding out the rear in an effort to minimize its heat profile from the front. The crew was a very basic and numbered at around 40, their quarters wherever there was space. The bridge was essentially located just after the main aperture of the lasgun itself, the gunnery room directly linked to the bridge. After all the entire ship was pretty much the gun and aiming the gun involved aiming the entire ship itself. It looked very much like an elongated needle, a 50 meter laser emitting needle but a needle nonetheless.

A very practical design that was also cheap and durable. Not capable of surviving a shell as it were but a glancing hit from a laser was fine. It would fall apart in direct combat but that wasn't its role, rather it was designed to operate in large hunter-killer packs of 10-20 ships, savaging the enemies with attacks from all angles and using their mobility to stay out of the kill cones of the ship's weapons. What it could not do alone, it could do with massed fire. The crews tended to be very brash, they knew that it only took a single hit for them to be vented out into space and so they lived life accordingly.

The Power Armour suit was far too bulky for ships which needed to be slimmed down and made more difficult to target, rather a more minimalist Environmental Suit design was put out by the Senti Company. It was perfect for the ship crews, like a second skin but with armour that protected the vitals and segregated sections. In the case of a suit puncture they would survive with missing limbs but it was better than nothing. Each suit had an IFF beacon for recovery teams to pick them up later after the battle was over or during by certain daring crews.

The next design put forth was of a cruiser ship. Approximately 300 meters long it was a ship designed to fight purely in space mounting multiple laser guns on sponsons along with sides of the ship and along the dorsal and keel. Two front facing large 100 meter laser guns along the length of the ship on turrets. Along each side were 3 rows of 10 meter long laser guns. What they lacked in firepower they made up for in numbers. The main dorsal weapons were there to punch holes in enemy ships while the broadsides were there to take advantage of holes already punched by the dorsal guns. There was also a main gun along the center of the ship, mounted much like the frigate's main cannon that required all the other systems to be shut off for it to fire (except the engine). A 300 meter long gun could their simulations presented could at the very least punch holes in the ship's presented by the Systems Alliance. Its power however came at a price, it was at least 20 times the cost of a frigate and was still vulnerable despite its size. It could not survive more than 1 shell, and even the first would severely buckle and warp the hull enough that the side that had been hit would be rendered inoperable.

The two ships were good designs but still suffered from a lack of scale and number. Their manufacturing capabilities had not been able to put out more than a hundred of each class. Industry had been rescaled of course, they needed the ships sooner rather than later and they were rethinking their entire process to get them out quicker. Within the next 10 years the leaders expected at least 2000 of each to at least assuage their minds.

Recap, skip if you don't want to be bored.

So Warhammer 40k. Did not expect it to turn out the way it did at all. The Sojourners, the Caretakers and the Beacons, all of it came out of nowhere. I had a general idea for the Sojourners in being like wandering monks, teaching, fighting then moving on. Then its sort of evolved into this weird mercenary guild system thing.

Then there's the other Legions which have dispatched a bunch of their guys to the Sojourners so they can fake the numbers. The Successor chapters are still around but many of the original legions are in the Sojourners and the Beacon Worlds to assist, like a more general purpose Deathwatch.

Gonna have to have an empy chap soon, Magnus was saved so I could have a plot point to gather the Emperor's soul fragments to make it easier for him to have a coherent conversation with the Commander. Or not, trying to wrap up Mass Effect universe stuff, threat of Reapers not so threatening if they can be wiped out by basic units. Once that's over, break chaps for interludes, Empy there too.

The Mass Effect stuff was also really unexpected. Power Armour, laserguns, etc etc. Was just planning on keeping it small but it kept growing every time I turned around.

Krogan sort of happened, needed something to do and Bam! Krogan.

And the meeting of the council by the Systems alliance, bit earlier than expected and them using Temple Ships crossed with 40k Imperial ships happened too. Oh well, will be interesting to see how it goes.

Kind of an interim set of 20 chaps, more stuff happening once plot happens. Big twist, the Reapers die. Very horribly. As horribly as a sentient goo made from dead people can but hey, the Minds can try.

EVAs in Mass Effect… um… didn't plan that out but… eh. Stuff happens?

Eldar doing Eldar things, fun to write but maybe not the best long term strategy.

Universal Century 0055 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0063 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2167 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0024 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 037-3100 - 40k Universe

John Shepard was a 28 year old human. Urdnot Wrex was too old to count. Both of them were rather uncomfortable but they were making do. John was from this point forward Wrex's direct contact if he wanted to talk to the Caretakers after all. They had come to him a few years earlier with an offer, the salvation of his people and a means by which to indulge their more baser instincts in a manner that would not see censure but rather approval at what seemed to be a tiny cost. They would "bind" themselves to this "Commander" which in practice had very little impact besides allowing them to be functionally immortal and even more powerful.

While Wrex despised his own people for the manner in which they had degraded since the Krogan Rebellions, this offer would allow them a way to both fight and to create enough breathing space for them to have a culture again. Krogan after all grew up on a world that was full of predators, their most basic instincts when faced with danger physical or mental was to lash out with violence. The fact that their entire race was facing extinction placed an extremely heavy mental weight onto the older of their species which translated down to the young. In essence the Krogan physiology saw them through their history but doomed their future. Aggression was just such a key aspect of their culture and physiology.

Either the Krogan changed themselves at a fundamental level, always at the risk of reverting back at the most minor of shocks to their society. Or they could take the offer presented by the Caretakers and send out their more aggressive members of society to fight in the Game as they called it while the more mature ones would stay and try and rebuild their culture. They would not do so on Tuchanka, it was far too open for infiltration, rather they would do so on a world gifted by the Caretakers that was a literal copy of Tuchanka, Tuchanka Prime they called it.

The genophage had been cured and his people were repopulating at the speeds they had prior to the Krogan Rebellions when they fought the Rachni, thousands of births per female per year, all of them reaching maturity with little to no complications. They had been shipped off to fight wars as part of the Game, not as a simple footsoldiers but as mercenaries. The Game said the Minds (the guys or things in charge) needed more variety and innovation. Adding new races into it was a means by which they injected new ideas, stagnation and boredom being the key enemies. The Krogan particularly enjoyed meeting with the ones known as the "Eldar", their ability to parse the future allowed the Krogan to be deployed exactly where the fighting was heaviest and thus the best. A bunch of cunts really but that was to be expected when you could see into the future. They learned to respect the Krogan physiology though, that weird lightning of theirs kind of useless when the Krogan has multiple redundant organs, most of which were resistant to lightning.

Wrex himself had headed over to the Game universe a few times, or as they called it the "origin universe" and participated in a few campaigns. A few weeks to a month or so each but they had been eye opening, his blood pounded just thinking back on it. Nothing as small scale as what the Citadel clients wanted, no this was full scale war and it was awesome.

The first had been a boarding action as auxiliaries to the ones known as the "Federated Suns of Shanada", taller than even the Krogan and blue to boot (without the head tentacles), the Federated Suns were a very… honour bound culture.

Unlike the Krogan that considered any methods necessary for victory to be perfectly fine, even expected. The Federated Suns on the other hand considered declaring war first to be paramount, not sneak attacking an enemy to merely gain a little advantage. At the same time once war had been declared then all bets were off and any methods that were considered necessary could be considered. However surrender was a sacrosanct and those that did were treated with respect. Those that tried to cheat the surrender code, suicide bombing or whatever they may be considering would be dooming the rest of their race. No surrenders would be accepted after the first had been abused.

The Federated Suns however tended to be rather less capable when it came to close combat due to their elongated bodies and less dense musculature and skeletal structures. They instead left the more cramped scenarios like ship boardings to mercenaries like the Krogan and the Humans who were much more adept at close combat than the Federated Suns.

The ship had been disabled during the fleet engagement a few minutes earlier, had apparently been their equivalent of a flagship. The entire thing looks organic, a new race that the Federated Suns had not yet met before and thus required the Krogan to find out as much as possible when they boarded. The vessel looked like a giant hand… literally. The long fingers that stretched out had joints that made it look very much like bones would, the palm holding what looked very much like a mouth. The idea that perhaps this was just a new ship focusing around the idea of boarding actions was vaguely disturbing. Wrex had seen the footage from the Rachni war but this… this took the cake.

It was organic, grey with greenish veins that ran along the exterior. Little bulges here and there that pulsated, small holes opened up now and again as little scurrying shadows came out to touch a bit of hull before going back in. The entire thing stank of fucking creepy. But they had a job to do and they were going to board, document and perhaps grab some specimens for study. The boarding ships that they were on were designed for the Federated Suns and thus was… well big. This much headroom made the Krogans rather uneasy, if there was something that could jump or fly there would be panic as it landed right into the middle of their number. Lots of explosions, lots of dying Krogan, lots of pain in general really, bad idea to have this much headroom thought Wrex. The soft shudder that ran through the ship as the boarding action concluded and the following disembarkation onto a ship that looked exactly the same as it did on the outside. Lots of grey flesh, pulsating walls and glowing green veins. It wasn't entirely smooth either, like the exterior there were lots of little bulges, the entire thing pulsated like it was breathing and then the walls burst open and they came.

Big elongated monsters with legs, so many legs, each one of a different design seemingly. Their teeth had been strong enough to chew through their Power Armour (the fully capable stuff, not the pansy stuff from the home universe) and there were a lot of them. The resulting fight had taken nearly 5 full hours as they cleared a ship that was barely 300 meters long, the Krogan mercenaries almost fully destroyed with only Wrex and a few other Battlemasters standing. Still they had finished the job, gotten paid and Wrex had come away with a new understanding of exactly big big the multiverse was while also appreciating the opportunity presented.

Thresher Maws? Bah.

Thresher Maws couldn't fly in space and grow up to 100 kilometers long and devour entire convoys while shooting lasers from their fucking thousands of teeth. The years he had spent in the origin universe had opened his eyes, nowhere else would they have such a concentrated and wildly differentiating number of enemies, he could spend eternity here and face new and exciting enemies every battle. It was enough to make a Krogan cry.

Still the job wasn't done and they had these so called "Reapers" to get rid of. Compared to pretty much everything else in the origin universe they were small fry but at the same time the Krogans were being offered an initiation of sorts.

They had been Bound to the Commander in a process that even a Krogan like Wrex did not want to repeat anytime soon. He thought he knew what pain was, he was so very wrong. Still, he was Krogan and he made it out the other side before uplifting more of his people. This did however come at a price, they had to prove their worthiness to the Minds or be relegated to being nothing more than NPCs or Mind controlled like so many other organics in the Game. A process that understandably the Krogan were very vocal about not suffering through. Should they pass i.e. get rid of the Reapers and also ensure that the Citadel and Terminus systems did not implode while doing so, they would be allowed to join those on the forefront of the multiversal exploration.

The 40k universe where entire armies of Power Armoured enemies along with Titans over 100 meters tall did tickle Wrex's inner warrior.

Which was why he was here today, right now in front of Shepard. The boy was not even 3 decades old and what was worse he was a pilot. A shuttle pilot or a drop pod pilot would have been ok, Wrex was perfectly fine with those. No he was an EVA pilot. A jockey of the worst order. They had been assigned together to get to know one another as part of a human/Eldar/Krogan cooperation effort. Taldeer was there as well but she was easily forgettable to the Krogan considering she was never there unless absolutely needed. It was hard to remember somebody that did their best to fly under the radar.

As a footsoldier first and foremost, Wrex had a fundamental dislike of the human who tended to ride to war on his giant suit. Of course there was that drawback of using the EVA all the time since it kind of tried to eat the human but that didn't excuse him. At least he had some infantry abilities like his biotics which in Wrex's opinion pretty damn powerful. The human had been able to lift up the EVA with little exertion and position it inside its berth, the thing being too lazy to get in by itself.

Still there were 3 of them now on the bridge of the transport taking them deep into the Terminus systems. There they would make contact with the Quarians and perhaps get them onside, the Quarians after all were a disenfranchised people that would benefit greatly from the Commander. On the other hand they were also radically ai-phobic which could prove rather deal-breaking should they meet the Minds. Then again the Minds were rather… organic in their insanity which might make things more palatable to the suit rats.

"Why are we here?" Said Wrex, more to hear the sound of a voice than anything, the twins communicating amongst themselves with their soul-link.

"Why are we here on this ship on its way to meet the Migrant Fleet? Or why are we, a Krogan, a Human and an Eldar here standing next to each other?" Huh, that last one was not what he was expecting. Taldeer speaking out on matters of importance, maintaining her "air of mystery" as John called it.

"Why not just explain both? Let's hear what you think we're here for."

"Well we are on the way because we are important, like really important. This is just a way for us to prove ourselves and and to work on a theory that the Minds have. It leads into the second reason."

"What do you mean we are important?"

"Do you ever talk to the Commander or the Minds Wrex? Like as in sit down and talk, not get orders or ask for directions talk."

Wrex was confused, what could the Minds offer? Their erratic nature was known and their transaction had been completed, salvation for warriors. "Why would I?"

"Because the Minds tell you so much if you can dig. The HeMUs are easily bribed if you know their quirks. A few words here and there and maybe some chocolate and the multiverse is your oyster."

"And?" Taldeer certainly did like talking for someone trying to be mysterious.

"We are all fictional characters Wrex. In the origin universe where the Commander originally came from we are fictional characters inhabiting a fictional universe with fictional enemies. It sounds strange but the multiverse is vast and the chances that there is a universe that holds fiction of others is quite possible. What does this mean? It means that we are being tested to see if we measure up to our fictional counterparts. Given that the original stories have already been torn apart by the Commander's arrival the Minds don't know how much we resemble our fictional portrayals and so here we are."

Wrex wanted to refute that but at the same time it made so much sense, like how the Minds contacted him directly and knew the many tiny little idiosyncrasies that made him, little quirks that nobody outside of those that had known him for a long time would know. It also explained how the Minds knew about certain events that happened before they even entered a gestation phase. Given the nature of the fiction however…

"Yes, there is fanart of you having sex with pretty much everyone in the game"

Fuck.

"And the second reason?" Wrex asked, not wanting the real answer.

"Entertainment. The Minds say we are being tested and all that. Nope. Its to see if we are entertaining enough to warrant further investment. It doesn't matter what we do as long as were are entertaining enough. If the Commander chuckles even once we will pretty much be the most important people ever in this universe. They just tell us we are here to save the universe so we have some direction, running in circles is definitely not interesting to watch."

"So as long as we do everything as interestingly as possible..."

"Yes, its enough. So long as we entertain, then our futures are assured."

Well that was easy, all Wrex needed to do was what he was already doing. Cracking skulls, smashing faces and destroying the enemy (which the highest bidder defined, naturally).

"Heh, nothing to worry about then huh?" said Wrex, John chuckling with him.

"Of course there is something to worry about! There is always something to worry about! Did you know that if a single! SINGLE! Piece of your Power Armour's neural network gets damaged you won't be able to move? Did you know that the ships we are on are all experimental? Did you know that the Minds are all fucking insane? That we are all functionally immortal and they can do whatever they want to our bodies?! DID YOU KNOW!?"

John took this opportunity to hit his sister on the head. "Sorry about that Wrex, she gets really excited when talking about the bad things that could happen to people." Taldeer on the other hand had returned to normal, her cheeks bright red and looking mighty ashamed.

Wrex just laughed, it looked like the twins were going to be interesting after all.

Universal Century 0057 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0065 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2169 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0026 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 039-3100 - 40k Universe

The changes to Canon by the Caretakers had changed some fundamental parts of the Imperium. Rogal Dorn was still alive since there weren't enough Chaos Space Marines to muster a Black Crusade and Corvax remained as he had not doomed thousands of neophytes of agonizing mutation and executions before leaving due to guilt.

Alpharius and Omegon were confirmed not dead, rather they had quietly merged the Alpha Legion with the Sojourners for the long term preservation of the galaxy. The Alpha Legion would simply be part of the investigative and conspiracy branch ensuring things went as planned, assisted by the Minds which gave information from subverted targets. Some others masqueraded as Chaos Space Marines, doing their best to lead the Chaos forces in circles.

Roboute was likely to live past 121.31 considering that Fulgrim was dead and couldn't do that weird stabby thing with the daemon sword. Magnus was still a loyalist and had taken up a place in the Palace on Terra in order to slowly pull in the fragments of the Emperor's soul. Shattered in his fight with Horus and the subsequent mental pain from being placed on the Golden Throne, the Emperor was like a gestalt himself. Many smaller entities that made up a singular entity, each with individuality which itself may or may not be a positive or negative.

Magnus being the only psyker of the strength and training to be able to do the job, had been given the job of pulling the Emperor's disparate soul fragments to a single entity that might have a solution to its incarceration on the Golden Throne. Magnus could feel the warp rift behind the Throne that was only being held shut by the Emperor's willpower. The effort of doing so left very little strength for the Emperor to do anything else, as it was he was barely coherent and rambled on and on about insignificant events from his original life. Magnus didn't want to think about what would have happened should he have turned traitor and there was nobody else to do this. After all, due to his psychic conversations with his father since birth had left him with a very strong impression of the Emperor's soul. Another psyker may have been as powerful but at the same time would have not been able to discern the presence of the Emperor in the many many tiny things in the maelstrom that was the Warp.

The Caretakers had done much for him and his Legion, their assistance being key in genetically modifying the Thousand Sons so that their gene-seed as no longer as vulnerable to wild mutations as it had been in the past. As discovered by the Caretakers who had a large amount of very hands on experience regarding the corruptions of Chaos, they had quickly isolated the fact that the amount of psykers themselves was an indication of what was wrong with the gene-seed. It was not the gene-seed itself that was prone to corruption, rather it was the fact that the gene-seed promoted one's psychic abilities that was the problem. For those that were not psykers, they did not have the strength to resist the the Warp entities that craved physical form and deformed as a result, turning into Chaos Spawn. Lacking in strength, they were open season for the random mutations or even the minions of the Chaos Gods while unconscious and their minds open.

To combat this the Caretakers apothecaries all, had changed the method by which the Thousand Sons processed their neophytes. Instead of putting them under, they would elongate the process by which their Space Marines were trained and having them awake once the initial gene-seed was implemented. The mutations that came about as a natural result of the gene-seed implantation was the key time period where they might become corrupted and so the neophyte must remain awake during this period as to resist the influence of the warp. Once it was done, the Thousand Sons Space Marines would not undergo hypnotherapy like other Chapters. Instead they would learn the hard and long way as to not open their minds to the vulnerability of chaos infiltration. After all hypnotherapy was a means by which to implant information directly in the brain from a mechanical source, a process that required opening the mind to external influences and breaking its inherent defences. Something the Thousand Sons could no longer afford to do if they wanted to remain stable.

The Caretakers assisted further however with the implantation procedures taking place on a disarmed Battle Barge the they had placed over Prospero. Orbiting Prospero, the Thousand Son's homeworld, the Battle Barge possessed extensive medicae facilities in which their apothecaries could assist the process while their souls exerted a natural barrier against all Warp based influences. The Thousand Sons for the first time in their history could afford to recruit in large numbers while also not worrying about them turning into gibbering monstrosities.

Of course it was not without cost, the Thousand Sons were forced to train for a much longer period of time while also being at constant risk of opening themselves to the Warp if unwittingly. Mental discipline was necessary to keep their sanity but having mental discipline all day, every day took its toll. Their forces were thus arranged about their psykers, who would serve as an extremely powerful weapon in and of themselves while also monitoring their brethren for mutations. For this reason there would never be a successor chapter, they could not afford to divide in number where the number of Librarians capable of monitoring brothers would be insufficient and doom the fledgeling chapter to damnation.

A detachment of Caretakers had established themselves in the Prospero system bringing with them a Beacon by which to provide protection for the Thousand Sons while also sending their Sojourners along with any Thousand Son expedition to provide expertise. Needless to say the Thousand Sons were appreciative of their new allies, very much so of their light touch in matters sensitive to the chapter.

Magnus in his daily contact with the chapter via his psykic sending had grown to very much appreciate the new Chapter or Legion… or whatever it was they were. Divided enough to satisfy the dictates of Roboute but also evading the spirit of the matter. The Fortress Monastery over Terra had joined the Phalanx in both protecting Terra and making it a Beacon World. The hundreds of thousands of ships that entered and departed Terra having a guide by which to never get lost. It was here that the Caretaker Ambassador was stationed, opened to inquiry from all branches of the Imperium that may be in need of assistance. It was also here that petitions for assistance were heard by the Ambassador who would then send a report to the Chapter Master.

The Imperium had adapted rather well to the way the system worked in all honesty. The Caretakers after all did not have wildly divergent cultures like the many Space Marine chapters and since they were still nominally unified, it was much easier to have someone from Terra send assistance from an outpost on the other side of the galaxy. The Caretakers in essence, took care of the Imperium from their scattered outposts throughout the galaxy.

The Inquisition as of course very annoyed at the lack of ability to enter the Void Station without an invitation but the treaties established to allow the Caretakers autonomy within their realms was ironclad. They offered far too much to the Imperium to allow the Inquisition to come and go as it pleased, disrupting operations that might consign entire star systems to destruction should one of them be turned off by a particularly persistent Inquisitor. For the good of the Imperium they were forced to hold off on their more aggressive practices. It would not do to have the Caretakers as a whole submit to the Inquisition a blanket ban on all investigations into their facilities from this point forward.

It did not prevent the Inquisition from attempting to send agents in, to discover what they could of the facilities both via normal and enhanced means. The normals ran a wide gauntlet of difference in their origins, some were nobles who came to requisition the Caretakers, some were instead the poor paid to see what they could find and others still were trained agents. To a man or woman they were unsuccessful, not able to discover much as the Caretakers used extensive teleportariums spread throughout their facilities, the most major ones being located in the grand hall of the reception of the Fortress Monastery.

The other outposts throughout the Imperium took a similar design even if they themselves were small enough that a teleportarium network would be unnecessary. It led to the opinion amongst the various Ordos within the Inquisition that the Caretakers were hiding much more than they should be, but their hands at this point were tied. The grudges were written down however so that their descendents would know to look for any signs of heresy amongst the Caretakers and be ready to destroy them, no matter how devastating it would be to the Imperium. Of course they would make use of the Sojourners as much as they could, their particular passive abilities being highly regarded in the fight against the heretics and chaos spawn.

The Caretakers themselves were slowly being phased out. While they did not use hypnotherapy to train their Space Marines, they could simply just implant the knowledge directly into the minds of the neophytes. That combined with time affecting A.T. Fields saw them simply mass producing thousands upon thousands of Space Marines and retiring their HeMU units from the field. They were in "stasis" to give a good reason as to why they could suddenly pop out again if needed. There were still HeMUs amongst them of course, at least one per system and multiple on the Caretaker bastions. It was simply that being a Space Marine was… boring. All killing then meditating then killing then meditating… bah. They had expected non-stop action and they clearly received stop-stop action.

Highly disappointing.

Which is why the leadership HeMUs were left in charge but the more mundane… everything else as left to the humans. The humans themselves upon reaching Caretaker rank had due to the double infusion of the Commander's blood became rather… apathetic. It took them nearly a decade on average to gain their emotions again and they were allowed to venture back out as Sojourners. However a problem had manifested itself where the gene-seed itself upon activation with the Commander's blood had begun to slowly turn the Space Marine's thoughts more apathetic. Like the Raven Guard became more and more pale, the Salamanders gained red eyes, the Ultramarines became more insufferable and other mutations, the Caretakers had their own. Increased apathy along with what appeared to be enhanced strength. There appeared to be no limits and it increased with age, perhaps in a hundred years there would be human Caretakers capable of lifting and firing a Heavy Bolter one handed. The Gamer System that would be implemented soon would certainly be interesting however.

As to the revelation that this was merely entertainment for a alien species of strength so terrifyingly out of this world… well they took it rather well considering that directly after they became apathetics. From there they understood that they were being given a chance really, entertain and also ensure that their universe did not degenerate over time, and the galaxy itself would be allowed to determine its own fate. Should they fail either dictate then the Commander would simply crumple and crush the galaxy in the palm of its hand in exasperation.

They themselves would have their souls stripped from their bodies and implanted into bodies as part of what was known as the Game, doomed to live and die in a cycle of eternal war for the amusement of the aliens. Either they proved themselves and succeeded or they would doom their entire race and everything else in the galaxy to damnation. Betraying the aliens had no meaningful effect when they were reading your thoughts every moment of the day while doing anything would have negligible impact overall. The Commander as it was known had the capability to simply crush entire galaxies with a thought, it would be very stupid if they entertained in their minds telling someone about it. Said someone would likely try to uncover it as a "grand conspiracy" and in doing so undermine the efforts they had put in and further from there hinder the Caretakers as a whole. If it reached that point it was very likely the Commander would personally purge the galaxy for being "too much effort" and they were not going to let that happen.

They had been chosen based on their intelligence, their souls implanted with part of the Commander's to be cultivated like their gene-seed, their very minds subverted from under them. There was no escape from this situation, they would succeed or be damned. That is not to say they were expected to live for very long, since the aliens understood that war had casualties. So they had been given an incentive, "do your job and you will be freed". Not into the galaxy of course but upon death would be allowed to simply wallow in apathy alongside the Commander in the soulscape. A rather attractive option to the humans who had to constantly fight against the apathy.

Universal Century 0059 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0067 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2171 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0028 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 041-3100 - 40k Universe

The Minds were observing those who called themselves "Cerberus" in the XCOM/Mass Effect universe. They were trying to work on the salvation of the humans from the Minds who they called "cold and unfeeling". While technically true it was kind of annoying to be told that by humans.

In order to save themselves as it were they had been attempting to influence and get rid of people in positions of power. Unfortunately for them since everyone was pretty much immortal at this point they could just come back to their jobs with little to no effort. All that was needed for them to resurrect themselves and arrive at the office the next day, only with a certain anti-terrorist sentiments instead.

They had refused to be bound in order to prevent their anti-Caretaker sentiments from being known but this did nothing but highlight it. If there are only small groups of people not bound and it is very obvious to those that are, then its also very easy to find and corral them. This lack of a binding prevented them from finding any new methods of resistance since they couldn't contact the aliens for help in the matter.

In essence, Cerberus faced the very big problem of just not being able to recruit externally, not being able to bring their influence to bear and not being able to build up support in the public. The binding was total and those within it, could never leave, Cerberus was doomed from its inception. The enforcers were merely waiting for a chance to sweep them all up, get rid of them then forget about them.

It was a very sad thing actually, if they had been able to escape from the Systems Alliance sphere, they could have made contact with the Citadel Alliance and attempted to negotiate an agreement of sorts. All it would need was for them to give technology over and they could possibly be granted asylum instead of being cornered like rats. Here however, all they could do was wait and die, their defiance the only real message they could send.

The Council Alliance was wracking its head as well. The STG was being faced with the singular failure to find out exactly where the Systems Alliance was, let alone infiltrate it. An alliance of two races that quite simply had capabilities outside of their expectations. Despite the advances of the last two years, they were still struggling to catch up considering their lack of a precedent in the technology and having to rediscover principles that were the basis of said technologies.

The fact they had to change their military industry over simply to match their enemies had not helped. Said industries were getting into the hang of things however, ships, weapons and armour was being pumped out by the thousand to keep up with the demands being placed on them by the militaries who had seen how out of date they were.

STG were keeping an eye on many of the Systems Alliance people spread throughout the Citadel and Terminus Spaces. While most of them were rather innocuous, a few drew disproportionately higher attention and as a result, higher leveled responses. Some such as Hannah the head of the Senti Company, her children who were accompanied by a Krogan warlord, the father of her children who disappeared and reappeared with disgusting mystery.

The Krogan was of peculiar note, Battlemaster Wrex who had returned briefly to Tuchanka in order to unite the various peoples before disappearing again. There had been a brief spike in the number of Krogan deaths but it had evened out and not it appeared that peace ruled over Tuchanka by virtue of his enforcers. Wrex appeared to be a bodyguard of sorts but the assignment was peculiar in that they travelled around with very little clear objectives. Their stay over with the Migrant fleet had lasted barely a month before they disappeared again, reappearing in Batarian space which was still wracked by civil war, staying a week before leaving again.

The Krogan's actions were very much outside of his usual patterns as recorded by the STG. Key figures in Terminus and Citadel space need to be kept track of after all and the Krogan was acting very differently. Usually escort jobs would not last this long without any real threat to be afraid of. It made no sense, why did they need the Krogan and why was the Krogan staying without being able to kill anything?

Sense. Sense. Sense. None of it made any.

The ones known as Taldeer and John Shepard were also there, children of Hannah with no real experiences or apparent qualifications were Wrex's travelling companions. So far Taldeer had demonstrated abilities that were quite definitely not biotics while her brother had biotics that outstripped all but Matriarchs in strength. The family as a whole was rather abnormal in their abilities which was quite confusing for the analysts indicating that perhaps the rest of the Systems Alliance crossbreeds were also extremely powerful.

The Migrant Fleet was meeting to discuss the matter of the Systems Alliance. In order to maintain secrecy the Systems Alliance was willing to hire Quarians to crew and service their ships the deal proposed 2 years ago had seen the Quarians peoples suddenly jump in ability as the Quarians were allowed to spend their payments on buying ships from them directly. While a single Quarians would not be able to afford a ship on their own, pooling the funds of thousands of them together would afford it easily.

It was certainly helped by the fact that the ships were extraordinarily durable and robust, reducing the amount of funds they had to set aside for matters like replacements and maintenance. Along with the ships came also the weapons systems, steadily increasing their strength and allowing them to keep pace with the Citadel Alliance in terms of ability and power. The fact that each new arrival was also gifted a new environmental suit as well as a set of Power Armour to interface with it was strange in and of itself. The fact that they wanted to keep it all secret by having their new employees travel through what appeared to be wormholes to reach their designations even more so.

Each new crew member found themselves on a station that was apparently enormous, the size of the Citadel several times over, capable of servicing the massive ships that made up the heavy hitters of the Systems Alliance fleet. The station itself was ostentatious to the extreme, ceilings so high that it was possible for the peaks to be hidden by shadows, the corridors were more like the main hallways of the Quarian's largest ships. On board were millions of humans and Eldar who went about doing their own things. There were clearly enough there to crew the fleet which brought the questions as to why they wanted Quarians to do so. Granted they did not crew the larger ships but their "escorts" which were all the sizes of dreadnoughts, plenty big in the Quarian opinion.

The crews were allowed to buy their ships at the end of their contracts which allowed for an influx of several more dreadnoughts to the Quarian fleet over the past few years. The Migrant Fleet Admirals were pleased and also worried. The official line that they were being used as a means by which to fool STG that tried to infiltrate the ships was fine and all but they weren't even getting onto the ships in the first place. Unlike other ships where STG could use their wireless protocols to breach and enter a ship silently, they couldn't do the same on the Systems Alliance ships. In fact the attempts of the STG to enter the ships all failed abysmally.

Some tried to cut their way in only to realise that the ships had several meters worth of armour. The STG team had been discovered when the anti-boarding alarms had gone off and locked that section off before jettisoning it with the block self destructing soon after. Other methods had been attempting to enter the ships at port but considering that the Eldar and the Humans could detect living beings, that failed quite dramatically as well. Other more drastic means included trying to sabotage the ships and sneaking aboard from the holes. Sadly for them the ships were much more durable than expected and there was no way to do it without alerting the entire fleet that someone was maliciously targeting them.

In short, the Quarians didn't believe the official reason as to why they were being used to crew the ships, even now the Citadel Alliance had not figured out why it was that they had been receiving ships. There were guesses of course but no concrete details had made their way through, the Quarians themselves knew that anyone who talked likely doomed the entire Quarian race. There had been Spectres of course that tried to get their way on board but were rejected, after all the Quarians had no embassy on the Citadel and were not part of the Citadel Alliance anymore, they had no obligation to help those that had rejected them in their time of greatest need. The Citadel had been pressing but with the Systems Alliance ready and willing to provide food, energy and fuel to the Migrant Fleet, their reliance on the Citadel's resources and thus the Citadel's leverage over them had vanished. The Migrant Fleet was happy with the Systems Alliance with that but very suspicious.

The Systems Alliance appeared to be trying to take control over the Quarians, replacing the Citadel. At least with the Citadel they had a general idea as to why they were doing it but had no idea why the Systems Alliance was. The Quarians had nothing but people but even the Space Station they called the Tetsudo had more people on it than the entire Migrant Fleet combined. Why they were being practically given so much flew over their heads and many a meeting had been called to try and figure it out.

What was even more was that the Quarians were allowed to move and live on the Tetsudo should they serve more than 2 years on the human fleet. Thousands of the Quarians had already moved over into the Tetsudo that had somehow been filled with an atmosphere that allowed the Quarians to live without needing their space suits. There were from atmospheric reports, enough of the microbes and bacteria that were native to Rannoch to allow them to go about freely. The mere gossip of this that had passed back to the Migrant fleet saw many more of them sign up to work with the Systems Alliance fleet.

The ability to live without the need to live in a suit forever was just worth so much that they were willing to spend a mere 2 years of their lives on the Systems Alliance ships. The Admirals all had relatives who were living on the Tetsudo now and the constant reports of more and more children being born had come to their ears. Somehow it appeared that the microbes had a beneficial effect on the Quarians, reinvigorating their immune systems and allowing them physical and bodily fluid exchange with others without the fear of dying.

It would appear that within the decade the Migrant Fleet would only be manned by those that were assigned there with the rest living on the Tetsudo at this rate. It was not Rannoch but it certainly was somewhere they could call home. The Systems Alliance peoples helped them quite a bit in settling in and not demanding pretty much anything from them. It was just strange seeing people that were helpful to Quarians.

The hatred of AIs had been strangled slowly as well, Tetsudo itself had many of them on board. Even if they acted a bit strange they were still full individuals unlike the Geth who appeared to all be the same. It helped them acclimate to the new contacts without fearing a revolt and sudden attack. It was not much and the people were still nervous around them but over the past few years it had been changing steadily.

Even if the Systems Alliance was suspicious, they had helped the Quarians by a significant amount that was for certain and had likely single handedly provided a means by which they could rebuild their entire civilization. The reasons were suspect but the results, self evident.

Universal Century 0059 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0067 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2171 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0028 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 041-3100 - 40k Universe

The HeMUs and the Minds in the Cultivation universe were bored. Like reallly bored. The key word in this case being were bored. In the past few years they had followed the general plan and gotten out of things rather nicely. Everything had gone according to plan, the world in their general area had gone to hell due to the inclusion of the HeMUs and their selling of everything at abysmally cheap prices. So many items, weapons and ingredients had been sold at a fraction of their usual prices which destroyed the economy of many of the larger resource groups.

The shortsightedness and the desire to get one over everyone else had seen the major groups not pay attention to the ramifications of having the resource clans/sects being crushed. Having their entire livelihoods in the hands of a completely unknown entity while also allowing them to supply the main requisite materials to the sects/clans/groups saw them prime for the taking. After the annihilation of the leadership by suicide bomber HeMUs the Sects were leaderless and their heaviest hitters dead.

From there it had been a very simple matter to kill off the Sects, groups and clans before assuming control over the area. It was a relatively small country, only a few million kilometers in diameter, tiny in comparison to some of the larger Kingdoms. It was enough for them to start from however. They wanted a foothold and they had received it, from here however… eh.

They had won and from here it was well… boring.

The Minds had the idea to convert the Kingdom into a production based one where the people would be pressed into service to simply produce items and ingredients. The idea being that if they made their Kingdom very rich and apparently defenceless, they could draw in other nations trying to attack them for some extra fun. The HeMUs were not quite ready to wait that long however and had been moping around. While the mortals were being rounded up the HeMUs moped. While the mortals were pressed into a much more efficient farming method, the HeMUs moped. While the mortals began to change their society to revolve around that of a production/agricultural culture, the HeMUs moped.

It was when the Kingdom had been infiltrated by neighboring spies who being Cultivation universe people began killing people and torturing people to get information. The HeMUs had destroyed them of course and in doing so they had found a way in which they could amuse themselves in the cultivation universe.

There were of course millions of HeMUs that had begun infiltration into the many different organizations either by subverting or joining up to less discriminatory groups. The problem of course being that their souls were extensions of that of the Commander and extremely distinct in terms of what they looked like. The black with purple and teal was extremely distinctive and anybody that could see through one's soul would notice them instantly. Indeed the Kingdom itself had changed, much like the Beacon Worlds in the 40k universe, the Kingdom had itself become covered in the Commander's soul.

The Beacons functioned quite simply, just having a Quantum Communications Buoy that provided a gate by which the Commander's soul could extend its presence into other universes. While it did provide the protection of the Commander through MAGI for the Minds and HeMUs it also made them much more obvious. All the HeMUs essentially had a very clear origin due to the identical colours that was their souls and the miasma that covered the Kingdom.

For the HeMUs that were sent out, they had to join up with various groups that did not judge based on cultivation techniques or styles but rather on actual personal skill. While it did deny them personal invitation to the different Sects, it did give them access to a variety of information, items and ingredients as was available to large peacekeeping forces, army groups and other "large" organizations.

Their souls were a curiosity to be sure but in a world this big, it was not strange to see many different kinds of souls in many different kinds of beings.

Back in the Kingdom however things had started becoming pretty awesome for the HeMUs who had now decided to become law enforcement after watching some Judge Dredd. In essence what had happened was the HeMUs nagged the Minds into figuring out a way in which they could manipulate A.T. Fields to judge people by Law (so it is always done according to the Law), while they themselves worked out a Law Book by which they would judge in the first place.

Since most of the people in the Kingdom couldn't read, they were instead preached to about the new Laws whereas serious breaches would result in death and minor breaches would see punishment to be doled out as the HeMUs saw fit.

It was a lot of work to be sure but the HeMUs persevered, it would be awesome once they got it all working. The last year had been spent on it, educating the billions of people within the Kingdom regarding the Laws, sending out the HeMUs into the various cities and establishing central authorities and finally establishing the A.T. Field settings which would allow them to create an A.T. Field where the Law is final.

The Law after all judged impartially and anyone judged would see the judgement rendered final. It started with a simple spreading of the A.T. Field over an area that hopefully would contain the offender. From there they would apply a "judgement" onto the offender where the crimes would be read out and the judgement would be based on the information within the soul of the offender. If they were actually guilty then the punishment would be automatic and signalled following the defence phase. If the defence phase failed they would be punished and the A.T. Field effect would end naturally.

It worked against anyone of lower or equal strength guaranteed and if they were stronger, then multiple "Judges" would be able to pool their strength and bring them to judgement. Since the HeMUs had much more practical experience in actually using their souls "manually" as opposed to allowing skills to do it for them, defeating pretty much anyone they came up against with ease due to applied A.T. Fields which were rather bullshit.

All the HeMUs whether in the field or in the established judiciary branches would all carry with them a self-updating Law book courtesy of some finagling that saw the creation of a single item that could be divided without issue. Each HeMU would carry one and the book would alert the user when a new Law had been penned in the original Law book via an A.T. Field from authorized users. Their personal weapons were up to them but something that all the HeMUs had to wear was a mask that covered the entire face and the rest of the head actually…

Simply placing it on the face and activating it with the soul would see it envelop the face. In order to make it less intimidating two eyes could be activated that were of a single colour in nature and could be manipulated into different shapes at will. This of course meant that the HeMUs used them to intimidate the enemies further by having them go psychedelic and also flash on and off for the sake of it. They quickly developed a reputation that had all potential Law breakers quivering in their shoes since they were seen as both insane and harsh on their application of the Law.

Clothing was standardized, skintight spandex-like materials with vests that had a variety of pockets to place pens, pads and whatever else as needed as well as food and drink. The main application of the skintight suit was the tiny tubes ran through it. Each of the tubes had water running through that helped dissipate heat or in the case of cold, provide hot water to provide warmth. Over this hung a greatcoat that stretched to their lower shins and had various pockets (but mainly was there to look cool). On a large chain hung a the Law Book that wrapped around the waist and the shoulder. A sword also hung on the same side, both symbols of office. The Law Book to enable the A.T. Field and judge and the sword to carry out the Judgement should it be the death penalty (automating that would be a bad idea).

While under the Law field those being judged could not move but neither could they be harmed until judgement was passed. Certainly an effective way of shutting down a fight but also a way in by which to bring order to a battlefield or a little squabble. Otherwise the Judiciaries would spend the entire time shouting while very little would get done.

Special attention had been paid to ensuring that the system couldn't be abused but it was also at the risk of the Judiciary's own interpretation of the Law. Since they couldn't place every single possible permutation of the Law in dealing with the different situations that one could come across, especially if the organics were to become Judiciaries as well, they were forced to rely on the judgement of the Judiciary. The Law Field came with it a means by which to cross reference previous cases and to see precedence from all the different Law Books in service. It was a means by which to double check each Judiciary to ensure they were not corrupt and rendering improper judgement. Each soul judged was kept safe in the Judicial Gestalt for resurrection should the need arise from a wrong judgement. Appeals were possible but required them to head to a regional office to start the process. The referential system of the Law Field allowed the Judiciaries to see other permutations of the same case and the refinement of the search terms was possible as well. A regular google system as it were, useful indeed.

It was mainly a defensive tool more than anything else, near a Beacon, close enough to feel the Commander's Soul directly allowed them to become exponentially more powerful as they drew on the Commander to make a judgement. It was possible to subdue pretty much anything weaker than the Commander near a Beacon which made it rather ridiculous. The enemies of the Kingdom quickly realized that attacking the Kingdom was a very stupid idea and the best way to go about it was peaceful infiltration.

Judiciaries of course could not judge each other but instead had to do so from a regional office. It was a way to ensure that they could not settle petty disputes and disturb the image of the Judicial branch but at the same time a superior appointed by the Minds themselves could judge all those below. Said superiors however were under much more scrutiny and doing anything that may be construed as rebellion or abuse of power. It was a lot of responsibility and their Law Books and swords reflected that, allowing them to bring a measure of the Commander's power with them outside of Beacon range in which they could render judgement on those who had fled outside the Kingdom.

The civilians/organics of course were very happy with the system, it kept them safe and since the Laws were very clear on what they could and could not do. Those that sought to settle disputes could call on a Judiciary who would then judge the situation as they saw fit. If they wanted to judge a civil case however it was best to do so in a regional office in order that the lawyers (another invented profession) could argue the case properly. If there were those that sought to abuse the Laws they would be killed instantly by a Judiciary and if a Judiciary tried to abuse the Laws then the vows they took upon gaining office would be killed instantly. The perfect anti-abuse system. Corruption of course was possible but another system forced the Judiciary to judge if they were called on to do so, thus forcing corruption to hide where they could not be observed. The regional offices also dispatched inspectors to reassure the mortals.

The system was not localized however and was being ported across to all of the Universes. The Commander was interested and wanted it implemented across the board. It would be particularly interesting to have it implemented in the 40k universe, the Inquisition would certainly be annoyed.

In the Cultivator universe at least it was extremely fun for the HeMUs, the number of people breaking the laws on a routine basis was enough to keep them occupied for years to come. Especially once they turned the Kingdom into a mega-city and began conquering the neighboring regions. They were the Law and the Law would come to the world.

Universal Century 0059 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0067 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2171 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0028 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 041-3100 - 40k Universe

Brother Maximusius of the Raven Guard had gained the rank of Sergeant a while back to denote his veterancy status. It had been gained when he had joined a Sojourner expedition to investigate reports of "depravity" in a City on a Hive World. It was considered to be a low priority mission by the Sojourner office of the city itself, manned by a single Space Marine and the various neophytes that ran the office and the intelligence. Maximusius on his assignment to the Sojourners had moved according to chapter doctrine (which he noted with amusement different greatly from the encyclopedia released by Guilliman) and had established an intelligence network. Or rather he began to only to realise that the Sojourners already had an extremely effective one already in place. It had made his job easier certainly as he submitted areas in need of attention to the Sojourner Mission Office, areas that he could not enter on his own either due to the nature of his Power Armour or potential threats.

When he did need a team he often operated with the local Sojourner liaison by the name of Mitchellii who appeared to be female… or not… the Space Marine was very androgynous. Others that would sometimes join them were Theodfore of the Salamanders and Barnabery of the Ultramarines. They had also been stationed here by order of their respective Chapters in order to keep a finger on the pulse of one of the most populated systems in this area of space. If there was an incursion alien or insider it would be here.

Not perhaps the most orthodox of gatherings they still enjoyed their time together, particularly given how easy it was to needle Barnabery regarding the Codex put out by his Primarch. The Ultramarine being new, barely a year after he had discarded his scout carapace armour and had donned the his Power Armour. He still held rigidly to the Codex and tried to apply it directly to the many different situations that the Ultramarine found himself in much to the amusement of the others. Theodfore enjoyed being amongst the population without actually needing to kill any of them, a veteran of the Great Crusade and the Horus Heresy where genocide had been a necessary and terrible thing.

Here however he could simply smile and enjoy the presence of the people, talking to them and once they had gotten over his gene-seed mutation that saw his skin turn jet black and his eyes blood red, laugh with them. Theodfore carried on the tradition of his Primarch and was an avid forge master, his goal was apparently to build his own personal Virgo suit from the various bits and bobs found throughout the Hive World. Since it was so very simple it was possible and indeed the other 3 of them had been roped in on multiple occasions to assist the Salamander as he needed a spotter to ensure the larger pieces fit in properly. As it was he had two legs and the codpiece completed with the skeleton of the torso and abdomen standing freely. Finding the pieces for the cogitators would be difficult but the Salamander as nothing if not persistent.

The Sojourner on the other hand was a mystery, even to one such as Maximusius. He/She had a very simple life it was believed, merely doing her work in the liaison office putting up missions and taking them down when appropriate with the other Sojourners in the office. The various teams that operated in the Hive city rotating in and out to pick up missions to investigate and train their personal skills and/or pick up extermination missions for things that had popped up that needed a Space Marine's presence. The amount of things in the universe that were prepared to try and pick a fight with the heavily armoured Space Marines was truly staggering, especially given their inability to even do anything to them. In the years they had been doing the occasional mission together, the Sojourner never spoke of her Chapter/s in their conversations, preferring to remain silent and only answering when directly questioned. That was not to say that the Space Marine did not listen, rather it appeared that the Sojourner listened to everything, even the most mundane of conversations etching themselves on the Space Marine's mind.

Mitchellii certainly did not lack in the desire to help however, no matter how silent the Space Marine was. Always at the forefront of any effort in trying to make the galaxy a better place and had actually led the 3 of them into many a smaller operation to find and destroy various alien or subversive elements that might try to work under their noses. Usually receiving information from the various neophytes that were running about doing their initiation training, the Sojourners would either post the information onto boards for general reference for any who wanted to pick it up, even those that were not Space Marines i.e. basic bounty hunters while for the more important jobs the postings were separate. A different room where only Space Marines were allowed to enter, they either took jobs from postings or they themselves were requested directly by the Sojourners themselves. For things that were even more urgent the Sojourners would lead an operation themselves, gathering their preferred teammates for the operation.

The operation they had been chosen for by Mitchellii had been to investigate a manufactorum, while it was not as urgent as others, it had been reported enough that they were on the way. The Sojourner had apparently needed a break and so they had come along as well, just in case. Luckily for the Space Marine it was indeed a just in case situation and without assistance may have even fallen.

Maximusius himself was here as part of a posting and because after the Horus Heresy, like many of his chapter, needed a slight break from the relentless combat. After the Massacre by the traitor forces they all needed a break. Most of them were posted throughout the Imperium with the Sojourners as a way of taking that break. It had been fine so far, Maximusius' mind had reorganized itself and the contact with the people of the Hive city had shown him exactly what it was he was fighting for. True they were often very terrible human beings but there were always the little bits that made them worth it.

The mission however had shown him that even the greatest of humans were still possibly depraved in the worst of ways. The manufactorum had been dead from long before the Great Crusade, its machinery inert and lacking real purpose. Indeed it could be seen from the gigantic arms that likely used to crackle with life that the Manufactorum built tools or even weapons of enormous size.

It was deep within this that they found things that frankly disgusted the Space Marine and he had seen what had happened to the Traitors on Terra. It was a Slaanesh Pleasure Cult. A small room really, barely big enough to fit a company of Space Marines if they squeezed very tightly without their power armour. There were etchings on the walls that suggested acts that were physically not possible and the writhing mass of people within, a very clear indication that so many things were wrong here. The signs of Slaanesh were embedded in the ceiling and the walls while what looked like Slaanesh daemonettes stood about or engaged in the frolicking and exchanging of bodily fluids or sex as it was known. Only Maximusius was sure that sex was meant to be much more mundane than what he was seeing.

They had a few seconds to take in the sight with horrific fascination as one of the daemonettes gave a screech that saw some of the people stopping in their orgy (the rest continuing) and staring at the Space Marines. From there they engaged the cultists and the daemonettes, bolters from the Salamander, Ultramarine and Raven Guard tearing through priority targets while the Volkite gun that the Sojourner carried incinerated the mass of bodies in the center.

The screams of pain (and what sounded like pleasure) echoed in the space as they mercilessly gunned down all that were in the room. If it had been just one Space Marine they may have been overwhelmed… but since there were 4 of them with reinforcements on the way as per Theodfore's vox communication during the firing… things went rather well. If discovering a major pleasure cult on their world could be considered well.

With the last of them dead, the daemonettes hadn't even had a chance to get close enough with their claws, the Space Marines stood about not sure what to do. They didn't quite have the weaponry needed to get rid of this much taint after all, flamers a necessity in cleanup operations of this scale.

Luckily the reinforcements had the foresight to bring flamers as evidenced by the Black Templar Space Marine that had joined them with his team.

Mitchellii had directed the Space Marine to simply burn everything and the rest of them were to head over to the Sojourner Mission Office now in order to check if they had been tainted or not. The Space Marine and the other Sojourners would run personal checks on them to ensure they would not need to undergo purification. Maximusius certainly hoped the foul fiends had not managed to infect him, the last time Mitchellii had run a purification on him it had been several times worse than the pain he had undergone as an initiate.

The Mission Office was an organized mess when they arrived, the Sojourner receptionists shouting out orders for the various Space Marine teams to head to certain locations and apprehend individuals of note while others would be issued kill orders to make sure. They had managed to identify most of the people involved and their families would be purged just in case while a message would be sent to the Inquisition regarding the incident.

The noble houses would be purged for today's incident given that pretty much all of them were involved. The problem very clearly a systemic one while the leaders of government would face very harsh sanctions brought about by the Sojourners and their sanctioned kill orders. Once the Inquisitors arrived they could hopefully move along but given the zealousness of said people… maybe not. While they would not sentence the planet to Exterminatus given that the Sojourners were going over it with a fine toothed comb and likely to proclaim it taint free (relatively), they would be chomping at the bit to do a bit more investigative interrogations.

Of course the Sojourners would assist them and perhaps deflect them and buy enough time for the Caretakers to arrive and do a mass cleansing via their strange abilities.

Maximusius marched alongside Mitchellii who had turned out to be female towards the center of the Hive City. The reason he knew was because the Caretaker that had arrived called her sister. The Caretaker had donned a strange looking outfit that would not be out of place on an Arbite and led the team along with an Inquisitor to the Planetary Governer's office. The fat man was a gibbering wreck by the time they arrived, certainly not a cultist thought Maximusius, surely they were made of sterner stuff if they were trafficking with the Ruinous Powers.

The Caretaker had ignored the Inquisitor and the Space Marines and donned a rather strange looking Mask, on it flickered two eyes, one smaller than the other by at least half and both of different colours.

She then walked before the man, and slapped the book at her side. It flew up and hovered before her as she proclaimed, "Law Field Established. The Crime, Subversion of the Imperium and Trafficking with Traitors. Sentence, Death. How does the Defendant Plead?"

The man just gibbered about his innocence, the words lost as he urinated and gurgled pathetically. The Inquisitor on the other hand was staring at the Caretaker and very likely trying to see if it was possible to try her for some kind of crime. Maximusius wasn't sure if they could but he wouldn't put it past the Inquisition to try and justify it.

"Let it be recorded that the Defendant has pled Not-Guilty. The Jury? [sounds of shouting could be heard from the side](a side that definitely did not have an angry crowd last time Maximusius checked). Guilty. For lying to the Law you will receive the maximum punishment. May your soul be consigned." And with that she pulled out a rather dull looking sword at her side and cut off the man's head. The unholy scream that followed shook Maximusius to the core as he could see the man's soul being torn apart from the neck down.

"Let it be recorded that the Defendant has been executed, and his soul destroyed for the crime of lying to the Law. This session has been completed."

And with that she left the room, Maximusius not sure whether to follow or maybe talk to the gobsmacked Inquisitor.

For the rest of the week the entire Hive World could not sleep as the sounds of those unholy screams rent the air. The Caretakers and the Sojourners were very clearly cleaning house and he was sure that there would not be thoughts of anything similar for a very long time.

On the plus side the Arbites would be happy.

Universal Century 0061 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0069 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2173 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0030 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 043-3100 - 40k Universe

For the Adeptus Arbites things had gotten rather… well… better. While before they had to judge based on a variety of different factors, many of which they had to use personal judgement rendering the law as an interpretation over anything else. However when the Caretakers had introduced the concept of "Law" to the Arbites, allowing their "Book of Laws" to be empowered and literally pass judgement upon those who have broken the law. Every Book of Laws somehow linked to others of its kind as well as the Book of Judgements in the Hall of Judgements, allowing the Arbite wielding the book to call upon every precedent and directly quote specific decrees.

It had been rather touch and go for a little while, the Caretakers having demonstrated it upon several different instances where they had judged and found guilty various different people in various different positions. The use of the book and the quoting of the decrees had drawn Arbite attention. They were of course using their own laws in the place of the Imperium laws given that they were on Beacon worlds mainly when passing judgement. The Arbites had expressed great interest in potentially gaining access to this ability in order for them to pass their own judgements with full accuracy.

The Grand Provost Marshal had handed off upon the method after it was shown that it did not traffic in heresy of any kind but rather relied on the strength and resilience of the Emperor's soul. As long as they were under the light of the Astronomicon they could conceivably judge all who transgressed upon the laws that made the Imperium great. At the same time, the fact that they were using the book at all allowed them to assist the Emperor who had been entombed on the Golden Throne. As the people in the Imperium slowly moved over to accepting this new order of law, every single part of the Imperium that went according to the laws would in essence strengthen the Emperor. Each well done piece of paperwork according to the dictates, every lawful arrest, every appeal heard in a court of law would be like a prayer, strengthening the Emperor.

The last part cinched it for them, if they were not on board initially, they were on board now. Empowering the Emperor by merely carrying out their duties? Truly amazing. They who had been chosen to learn first had experienced many hurdles on the way, they had to be impartial and pursue the law correctly and not rely on personal emotion. If they did turn corrupt and attempt to use the law as a means for personal gain, they would have their very souls destroyed the the Book of Law itself. Thus a failsafe was installed that ensured that every Arbite was pure as could possibly be. Pure as in not-warp-corrupted, not as in virgin as purely driven snow pure that is.

The first batch had graduated successfully with half their number still alive, the others… well they couldn't resist the temptation set before them and had their souls shredded. The others had come out rather dour, strong in their convictions and set in their standards. They would be the bulwark that would set itself between the lawless rabble and the sanctity of the Imperium. Every single one of them was the literal extension of the Emperor's will, bringing down His judgement on all who might attempt to break the laws of the Imperium.

They started at Terra and began to spread out further, each in turn tasked with teaching more Arbites as they too began to spread. They would inevitably cover the Imperium, each world having dozens of them in order to better spread the Book of Law and assisting the Emperor. The more people that believed in the Law, the more strength that the Emperor would receive and the faster He would rise again, or so they believed.

It had been slow going at first, many Planetary Governors not wanting the Arbites to delve too deeply into the ways in which they had been managing their worlds. They were paying their tithes they had said, why did they need the Arbites? Of course since they were the Adeptus Arbites they could ignore the Governors and pushed through their presence regardless. There had been complaints and they were ignored as was proper. The Governors of course had resisted… well some of them. The ones that had particularly corrupt or foolish or even chaos worshippers had been rather desperate, giving themselves away in their actions. They had died, their souls torn to apart when they lied to the court.

Others still prayed desperately as the Arbites uncovered evidence as to their corruption before bringing them to judgement. The laws that the Arbites themselves could cover had been expanded greatly by Roboute Guilliman. The laws had been established by Guilliman and required ratification by the entire High Lords of Terra and the Senatorum in order to modify and change them. In the event that things occurred that required a quick modification to the laws themselves, the High Lords of Terra could along with the Space Marine representatives and the Caretakers could pass an emergency session meeting in which a single law could be changed as dictated by the meeting itself. A single rejection would see the change not ratified at all. While it certainly made change extremely difficult, it was also put in place to ensure that only in times of extreme crisis and extreme need would a law be changed, something of a necessity for an empire as large as the Imperium with different cultures and ethos'.

In the case of extreme emergency it was also possible for them to change the law directly but only for a period of 10 Terran years after which it is required that a ratification from the previously described meeting was necessary. A checks and balance system to ensure that the Imperium would at once not become overbloated and at the same time robust enough to meet threats head-on.

Getting the people of the Imperium to accept the new legal system had been more difficult particularly in the Hive Worlds. Many of them had never been educated at all and the Arbites moving down there faced severe personal danger. The Caretakers and Sojourners however were very willing to assist and many a shattered limb was had as they cleared the way and allowed the Arbites to pass judgement as necessary.

The Sojourner and the teams made up from Space Marines of multiple chapters did their job very well and allowed the Arbites to carry out their duties with a much higher level of effectiveness and efficiency. The more judgements passed, the more the Emperor would be strengthened and the sooner the Emperor could guide the Imperium again. The links between the two groups had been strengthened greatly and now operated almost from the same office for ease of access.

The Sojourner initiates would be paired with an Arbite initiate and sent out to both investigate for crimes and then prosecute them. It allowed the both of them to learn what it was like to operate together while also learning perhaps how to communicate with regular people. The Arbites had become a rather unimaginative and dour peoples, always taking things literally as their station demanded it with no rest periods. Not exactly the worst trait but an irritating one nonetheless.

The Inquisition however had been very annoyed at the changes. Whereas before they were the ones that judged, working around the Arbites and independently, now they had to work alongside the Arbites due to the fact that each judgement was important. While it certainly did infringe on the Inquisition, there was nothing they could really do as its effect on the Emperor was too great. It was also rather minor truth be told, the little crimes, the small annoyances were well within their purview and the Sojourners had already been doing it anyway, now however it was official which irritated the Inquisition that had been trying to pretend that it wasn't as bad as it was.

Some of the more radical Inquisitors had been put out certainly, their pursuit of the chaos worshippers often being shut down while they were still nascent, denied their chance at destroying the enemies that they craved. They had originally tried to try the Caretakers as heretics when the power of the Law had originally been demonstrated but the treaties established at the founding of the Imperium saw them powerless. Attempts at trying to infiltrate their various bastions had also been met with failure and when the Arbites had adopted the power of Law, their complaints had been rendered meaningless.

The Inquisition renewed its vow in trying to find a way to bring down the Caretakers, they were too mysterious for their own good. That is not to say they couldn't make use of the Arbites, their abilities would allow for quick and effective judgement while allowing the Inquisitors in question to escape the situation without needing to engage in direct combat.

The Imperial Guard and the Imperial Navies had seen extensive postings of Arbites to their Regiments and Vessels. They would maintain order, spread the word of Order from the front-line and also punish those they came across. There were still many worlds that were in rebellion and the Arbites were very willing to take the ships and drive straight into the middle of the enemy worlds in order to apply their new faith directly. The more often and more visibly they did it, the more faith would be generated and the more powerful would be the effect upon the Emperor.

In short the Adeptus Arbites were quickly fashioning themselves as a new religion based around the Empire. Unlike prayers of faith which may or may not be answered, the Law was always present and manifested itself openly to all who wanted to see as opposed to praying for some unseen miracle. A religion based around faith in the Law that itself was an extension of the Emperor. A symbiotic relationship where the Law would empower the people and the people would empower the Emperor.

While the religious overtures were not being explored as of yet, the undertones were there and the uneducated masses had certainly picked up on it. They had begun without the acknowledgement of the Adeptus Arbites to worship the Emperor for bringing Order. After all they had nothing else, and the Emperor certainly proved to them very clearly that he was watching over them through the Arbites themselves.

It was in fact proving to be a rather annoying problem as religion tended to not be very orderly in general and they were dealing with various uprisings against the so called "non-believers". Growing pains that were very much a pain to deal with. However they were not breaking any laws, the dictates of the Emperor that there would be a belief in science, reason and order had in fact been obeyed, they were paying homage to the Emperor for bringing to them, reason and order. If the other people were not orderly they said, was it not their duty to bring order even if there had to be a brief period of disorder? The mental gymnastics were proving to be very irritating and too widespread to stomp down. Unless they wanted to Exterminatus every world within the Astronomicon there was nothing they could reliably do and so drastic measures had to be taken.

A new Adeptus was in order, named the Adeptus Ministorum which at its core dealt with the faith of the Imperium. They could not stamp it out for it was too widespread, indeed there were some that did not want it stamped out at all. It was after all worship of the Emperor which certainly was very mundane compared to the many other things they could be worshiping who certainly were not benevolent. And so the Adeptus Ministorum was created in order to funnel the worship in a certain direction, venerating Order (and who on the High Council didn't like that?), seeing the Arbites as the personal messengers of the Emperor and Imperial forces which spread Order into the unknown realms.

To ensure the continued sanctity of the Adeptus Arbites, they were forever banned from trading people between the two and the Law was recorded. Any Arbites that either became part of the Ministorum or began to preach would have their souls destroyed. The Caretakers vowed to uphold the law since the Judiciary system had to remain separate from the state religion.

Universal Century 0061 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0069 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2173 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0030 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 043-3100 - 40k Universe

The Batarians had found that their society was rather inexplicably changing and they were not exactly sure as to why. There were various forces that seemed to move along and cause small effects to happen here and there that would turn the tables of certain events in the favour of the revolutionaries that saw the continued enslavement of their own people via the caste system as a sign that Batarian society needed a new direction.

To constantly tread upon the weak and elevate one's own standing by violence and corruption would lead to a society that was nothing more than a weak parody that would fold when the slightest hint of resistance came their way. Proof of which was evidenced by the crushing of the Batarian slaver fleets at the hands of the Quarians who were considered to be the refuse of the galaxy. So weak that they could not even breathe the air that the lowest slum dweller could before succumbing and dying.

Batarian society needed to become strong again and relying on the strength of those enslaved was not the means to do that it was argued. Arguments that spread throughout the Batarian Hegemony by a strange coincidence that saw an SIU (Special Intervention Unit) agent had been discovered when a vent he was trying to enter clacked due to a screw that had been loose which in turn had them apprehend the agent. Checking his belongings, they found a means to break into and subvert the Batarian Hegemony's aging telecommunications network.

Through this they had created backdoors and backpasses from knowledge gleaned from a manual that had been picked up in a non-descript second hand bookstore near the headquarters of the rebellion. Through it they were then capable of overriding the State controlled media and put out their own message to the millions of slaves and lower caste members in society.

Due to the fear that the state had of a lower caste uprising, the speakers and video screens had been stationed at pretty much every intersection as a means by which to broadcast messages quickly and effectively. Should a rebellion occur (as many did) they could order all the Batarians and slaves into their homes and isolate the rebels more easily. Unfortunately for them in this case it had backfired and the same system used to suppress rebellions helped to ferment them.

The Batarians had been told that the loss of several planets near the periphery of Batarian Space had been nothing but a communications blackout. A blackout that several teams of Batarian specialists were on their way to fixing. The people of course were rather skeptical and saw that it was probably a minor rebellion and a few ships would be dispatched to quell it and life would go on. After all they did livestream an attack on the execution stage of a few revolutionaries and what appeared to be several thousand rebels. It had been a few years ago now but the people weren't really that worried, Batarian infrastructure and military was notoriously slow. They were very clearly waiting for someone to make a move first before being committing to an attack.

So it was to their surprise that the face of one of the revolutionaries popped up all over the Batarian Hegemony and read out his manifesto. One that called for the Batarian people to give up slavery and instead find strength as the Pillars dictated on their own. What used to be war prizes had become their way of life which did nothing but weaken the Batarian people's overall. Your own strength above that of others was what he called for. Of course this was met with derision, slaves were integral to their culture and way of life, it was in effect the focus of their culture at this point.

He pointed out facts as his speech continued, barely 0.089% of Batarians would ever own slaves, they were for the rich, the rich that were even now treating them like slaves. They did nothing but allow the rich, the powerful and the upper caste members to tread on them and act as if it were natural. That being rich was what guaranteed one a place in society and the poor could only ever hope to aspire to reach those heights.

The Pillars certainly did say something about your own strength being the means by which you moved forward, but it also did not say that money would be the strength, nor would caste. The time for castes were over, they were no longer a tribal people who needed clear segregations to ensure that their society functioned properly. Rather they were not a galactic race and should act like it, not segregating and abusing their own people for the sake of maintaining a power structure that was obsolete thousands of years ago.

The Batarian people would be strong again he vowed, they would take up arms and fight to prove their strength, they would not rely on slaves but would rely on themselves. They would not wallow in riches, grow opulent and obese but fit and strong. They would prove that the Pillars favoured those that fought for themselves and not use others to fight for them. They would do it for everyone to see.

And with that the scene cut from the Batarian speaker to the fleet above the world, a fleet that included the Dreadnoughts Hand of the Pillars and the Striker of Faith over the planet. They were still in Batarian Hegemony colours and clearly planning on sending a ground army against the revolutionaries on the world. Only it didn't turn out as they planned as what looked like several frigate class ships arrived in the system, opposing the Dreadnoughts and began to steam directly forward, as if unafraid. Their courage or rather their confidence was proven true when outside of the Mass Accelerator range the frigates opened fire with what was very clearly laser weaponry, likely purchased directly from the Citadel itself. The lasers carving away at the Dreadnoughts that floundered and failed to fire back. Smaller lasers made short work of the cruisers and frigates that escorted the kilometer long behemoths, their entire bulk now resembling fermented dairy produces with the massive holes that cooled into smooth edges dotted about the ships.

The speaker reappeared and concluded his speech. They would destroy the Hegemony, free their people from their culture of servitude and make the Batarian race great again without relying on others for strength.

Of course this was rather controversial and the Batarian Hegemony's leadership began to run about looking for traitors and the like that could have allowed the transmission to cut its way through the entirety of Hegemony space while also being undetectable. The SIU was mobilized and sent throughout the entire government to weed out traitors (and a few political opponents) while the military began an intensive investigation regarding the battle itself. They were going to find themselves answers if they had to kill half the bureaucracy to do it (most of it was redundant anyway). It was far too organized to be a coincidence, there must have been collaborators on the inside that allowed them to do what they had.

The answers they received baffled them. The orders to mobilize the fleet had been sent by an Admiral that been inside of a brothel at the time of sending. It had been cosigned by the head of the SIU that himself had been on an info-sec ship under complete blackout at the time of sending. In short both of them could not have physically actually sent the messages yet they had to be given that it needed their biometrics as well as passwords to work. It was not as simple as a fingerprint, blood sample and other minor things. No, it needed a full dental scan, in-depth eye scans (blood needed to be moving through them), fingerprints as well as blood from the same fingers, spoken password, written password and a secret one in the manner in which one typed the passwords out.

In short it was impossible for them to have sent it but it was also impossible for them not to have sent it. The leadership was baffled and would have likely executed the two of them if the strange occurrences had not been in isolation. The job posting of maintenance for the infrastructure around the government offices had simply vanished, the workers laid off and the posting never renewed, over the past few years as for some reason. And so on the same day at the exact time the speech began, all of their screens and speakers had stopped working. Since they were not on in the first place nobody noticed but an analysis following had the most recent failure being 2 minutes before the speech began. The cabling still barely holding itself together by the barest of margins.

The strange coincidences had not stopped there. The Dreadnoughts in the fight had not fired a single shot in retaliation, even though the frigates should have been extremely easy kills with even the Mass Accelerator cannons when they finally closed into range. However, they had not, the reason for such so improbable that it would have been considered a joke if it had not happened before their very eyes (the recordings being widely available). The screws that held the targeting computers in place had been replaced with the same screws but missing one or 2 revolutions. It would not have been noticed at all if the SIU team sent to covertly examine the ships for their ineffectual performance had not been staffed with a tech geek. The missing threading meant that over time it had unscrewed itself and at the vital moment, likely had disconnected slightly from the console. This meant that when the order to fire came, it never actually transmitted through, the gun disconnected by the slightest of margins from the control panel.

Further, it appeared that the ships themselves for some reason were running their shields on the lowest power setting possible. Something that may have been necessary on a frigate to preserve power but definitely not on a Dreadnought. The in-depth analysis of the black boxes had seen them show a rather chilling tale. Just before the ships had entered the system from the Mass Relay, they had blacked out for a moment. That moment was enough for whatever turned the kinetic shielding down to do its work as the before and after reports were clear as day.

Whatever it was that was working with the revolutionaries had shown that it had the capabilities and personnel to infiltrate the Batarian Hegemony with very little effort and very high finesse. Heads rolled as the Heaven Caste leaders tried to get a grip on the situation. A few of the ones executed had actually been the only ones capable of preventing the rebellion's continued expansion. A few planted copies of pornography on their work computers more than enough to have them sentenced for "laziness". Any protestations were treated with the respect they deserved i.e. none.

The Batarian peoples in response to the events had mixed feelings about it. Rebellions were common as the dirt they slept on and frankly another one would only see their lives get harder as the Hegemony cracked down in everyone. However, they couldn't deny that no other rebellion had destroyed 2 Dreadnoughts in a single engagement with 0 losses and also demonstrated superior infiltration skills than the SIU. The purges in the Batarian bureaucracy itself was proof enough that something serious was going on and for the first time ever they had hope. Perhaps this rebellion wouldn't end in abysmal failure but perhaps it would be what was necessary for the Batarian peoples as a whole.

Unbeknownst to them they would not be sitting this out, certain forces in the galaxy had a vested interest in their involvement with the rebellion, after all a rebellion needed people to rebel.

Universal Century 0061 - Mobile Suit Gundam Universe

After Activation 0069 - Origin Universe

Citadel Era 2173 - Mass Effect Universe

After Insertion 0030 - Cultivation Universe

Millennium 043-3100 - 40k Universe

The "leader" of the revolutionary Batarians, Gurnik had been thrust rather… abruptly into the role. They had a straw-game to see who would be speaking and he had drawn the shortest straw. Now it was final and in the eyes of the galaxy at large, Gurnik was the leader of the revolution and he better act like it. In public that is. Right now Gurnik was panicking slightly as the world imploded around him, there would be no escape now, not that there was before… but the hope was there. Now if they captured him it would all be over and he would likely be tortured and publicly executed rather than just executed.

He cursed that day years ago when it all began. They had been prepared to die, to be part of a long line of revolutionaries that spoke out against the excessive of the Caste leaders as the rest of them were tramped into the ground. They had spoken out at universities, on the extranet and anywhere that would give them the time of the voice to do so. They knew that it was likely SIU would pick them up and from there it would all be over, their lives spent like motes in the wind. But they had been prepared, they were doing it for the good of the Batarian peoples, that their actions would serve to benefit the Batarians, maybe not now but definitely in the future.

So imagine his surprise when the stage had exploded, arms had landed in their arms and he had found himself as part of the leadership of a revolution. A revolution that was made up of thousands of lower caste members that had been forced into the role as opposed to joining up willingly. Then again that was true for all of them. They had regrouped, established authorities and by the time that was done the city was under attack from garrisons from elsewhere on the planet. Luckily it was just one garrison and not the entire planet's worth of Garrisons and they cleared it up. The rest of the day being spent looting the heavy weapons and trudging from hotspot to hotspot clearing up attacks.

Why they had all attacked separately and also at different times was a mystery but it allowed them to use their numbers to the fullest and wipe them out. If the Hegemony garrisons had attacked all at once, their manpower would have been stretched and smashed apart, the rebellion over before it even began. At the end of the 2 days of intense fighting (much of which was uploaded onto the extranet by someone) they had found themselves in nominal control over the entire planet.

The ragtag and very reluctant revolutionaries found themselves hoping, perhaps they did have a chance? Securing it the planet had been a pain however, the upper Castes having taken over and not wanting to relinquish their power. Of course when they had their private mercenaries painted all over the walls and the upper Caste members torn apart by gunfire, the protestations ceased. One had to be alive to protest after all. It had been another week of that, a week where they had looked up at the sky fully expecting Hegemony ships to drop in out of orbit and lay waste to them. The rebellion had picked up quite a few followers as well, the planet was a Batarian State Arms production site and so the many lower caste workers had plenty of weapons to use. Weapons that were of course rather puny in comparison to a starship but everyone had to start somewhere.

They had secured the planet sure but what did they do from there? They had done it since they might as well but now that they had it… well, what were they going to do? Then another strange coincidence had happened and from space came several cruisers and a dreadnought. The rebels had felt a rather large emotional event from their appearance but their inactivity… well, that was suspect. Ships arriving just when they needed ships? Strange.

Still they sent up their shuttles to the now clearly denoted Hegemony ships and prepared for boarding, no doubt they would have to fight for these ships just like everything else in the past week. Only there had been nothing. As in the crews had somehow been vented out the airlocks and the entire ship explosively depressurized choking the hundreds of crew on board to death. The same had happened across all the ships and it could not be said that the rebellion had ships…

It had appeared in their minds at that point that maybe… just maybe there was something out there making sure this rebellion of theirs did not disappear and implode but somehow succeed because the coincidences were piling up. That said there wasn't anything in this galaxy that could do what had been done, the STG lacked the manpower and they preferred to be much more subtle about the whole thing. Rather the rebels had begun attributing it to the Pillars. Perhaps the plight of the people had been heard and assistance rendered.

Of course once one of them got the idea, all of them did and it was trumpeted across the entire planet. No longer were they just there to preach, they were going to conquer Batarian space as per divine mandate. Who got that idea into their heads nobody knew and Gurnik had found himself propelled on a campaign across the sector where they liberated worlds from the Hegemony and formed their own independent government away from the Hegemony.

The worlds themselves took an idea from the Turian position and began to elect their leaders, the rebels staying independent for now to keep things safe. The peoples had been worried at first, maybe they were just like the Hegemony but it never turned out that way. The book that had described democracy to the Batarians had been found in Gurnik's bedroom aboard one of the cruisers they had liberated, the means to keeping government in check in another and so forth. An entire system of government found by playing hide and seek aboard a single cruiser.

The police and bureaucracy and the everything, all of it organically grown from seemingly nowhere. Someone would somehow come up with an idea of how to maybe run the postal office and suddenly 8 others would come out and say they should take X or Y role and suddenly the postal office works and across the sector on a planet at least 4 relays away the exact same process was happening. Due to them being identical the post offices then could simply connect to the each other and expand the network without bickering about protocol. And this happened for so many different things, so many different offices, so many different branches that only a blind person would be unable to see what was going on. The rebellion was getting help and Gurnik was unsure if they didn't want it given that they owed their lives to it.

So they had continued their journey, the presence in the backs of their minds as they liberated world after world until a full third of Batarian space was under their control. The path seemingly to be rather easy as the obstacles in their path turned out to be weaker due to some unseen reason or simply not there. It was rather… underwhelming. To expect to fight a bitter fight to the bitter end only to have it all handed to you on a platter.

Still they were saving lives and he would not argue with that.

They had taken what worlds they could support with the forces they had and began to dig in. There were no doubts as to the result should they face the full Batarian forces in a head to head battle. They were optimistic though, perhaps the Pillars had a solution for this problem as well, like all the other problems they faced. And as if called by their thoughts, ships from the Quarian Migrant fleet had appeared.

The Quarians were not seeking revenge but rather an opportunity to engage in trade. The Quarians having been guided here by an unknown force that had also somehow dumped Lascannons, the very same used by the Citadel fleets into the holds of the ships. The Batarians had traded ore and other minerals before the Quarians left, the rebellion now host to enough weapons to take apart the Hegemony.

It was all too damn coincidental and Gurnik was wondering exactly what it was that the mysterious entity behind it all wanted at the end of this. When the details as to the backdoor into the electronics infrastructure of the Hegemony had been found on the SIU agent, it was very clear what the path forward was going to be, the rebellion would no longer be something that was on the defensive but was now going to take the offensive.

And so they had, the Dreadnoughts had been a surprise but they had been destroyed easily enough, the Pillars no doubt helping them again before the rest of their forces were given the order to move out into the Hegemony proper.

They would be facing proper troops going forth, even if the Pillars helped, there was simply too many of them to do the same little tricks as it had been doing before. Now they were going to prove their mettle and crush the Hegemony and bring the Batarian peoples back to the place they should occupy. Well the Batarians and their slaves, the Pillars no doubt having a hand in the extraordinarily easy integration of the ex-slaves into the new Batarian Republic.

Gurnik repeated the last few sentences in his head, he was an intellectual and thus it meant that he at least had a modicum of intelligence. An intelligence that was telling him that their run of good luck likely should be running out at some point and he didn't want to be at the front when it did. Dying when he should have died would have been so much easier, now he was expected to lead a resistance on a fight he wasn't sure he was going to come back from. The uncertainty was nerve-racking, especially after all that bravado he had mustered for the original death-sentence. Now he didn't know when he was going to die and it unnerved him.

Still, he was the nominated leader and he might as well get to leadering.

The Eldar aboard their vessel over the new Batarian Republic gave a brief chuckle. They had been there from the inception and it was their guiding hands that saw the Republic grow from a puny little weed, easily plucked by any gardeners to something that needed a chainsword to cut down. Every little step had been guided and it had been an exercise in attempting to maintain secrecy but also trying to be as overt as possible. If one was going to play the benevolent God, they might as well make a good show of it was the reasoning.

Still, they would have to let the Batarians do a little of the work themselves, it wouldn't do to coddle them all the way to the end where they would fold like an Imperial Guard regiment when faced with a little difficulty. The one called Gurnik was an example of that, he had steel in him, he just needed it to be drawn out and tempered. The fighting ahead should be just the right forge for him and with their meddling, he shouldn't die barring an act of true randomness.

He was wavering rather hard however… perhaps they should drop a self-help book somewhere near him for the poor Batarian to pick up. It wouldn't do to have the general fold before the battle even began after all.