Author's Note: Firstly given what day it is a moment of silence out of respect to those lost in the 911 attacks... Now that that is settled. Read, Review, Favourite and Enjoy!
Chapter 6: Meeting Between Worlds Part 3
Armax Arsenal is a joint Turian/Volus run arms company, holding such prestigious positions as being the chief contractor manufacturing weapons for the Turian Military, and the official owners of the various top secret facilities that the Turian Government would rather not have tied directly to them. Volus physiology had few benefits. Their ammonia based lungs meant that they can't survive in a normal environment outside of specialised high pressure suits. But it did mean that they were the only ones able to survive inside of a specialised facility with a ammonia based atmosphere miles deep into a gas giant where no other sapient life could dwell, at least none that they knew of. A certain ambassador was playing the roll of merry delivery man lugging a fat suit case, Omni-cuffed around his wrist. Din dragged the suitcase onto the table in the middle of the lab, held his eye in front of a scanner which caused the suitcase to pop open with a beep and was opened to reveal three separate canisters of materials.
"Laser weapon, plasma weapon, explosive weapon. I had to agree to a ten to one credit exchange rate and all but gave away enough omni-gel to build a warship to get enough of this stuff for you people to play with it, so figure out how it works." Having said his fill, Din left as Volus in fork-lift like mechsuits were carrying crates full of the materials he was able to bargain for albeit narrowly. He had been so successful with the Negotiations, both with the Union and with the Council to let Armax take over studying and weaponizing the material, if this was left in Salarian hands half of the material would be wasted in a hundred different prototypes by the end of the day.
It took a few days, and an exchange of more rare materials to the Salarians, before the Council agreed to let a Union ship through the barricade and only then because they were taking no small amount of Quarian ships with them. Unknown to them a small council ship had been following them, painted black like the back drop of space, and equipped with a experimental heat sink designed to collect all the usual emissions that council ships produce when they have their engines on, because of this combination it was nigh undetectable to sensors and extremely hard to spot visually, in other words it was a stealth ship. The Quarians approached the border of what use to be their territory but stopped at a safe distance, but the single Union ship, belonging to the Tebrid Custodian's, continued towards the border where it was met by a group of Geth ships. The Geth by now came to view unfamiliar ships with a measure of indifference. The presence of unfamiliar ships warranted an investigation, the fact that it's presence correlated to intercepted reports of a new species emerging from the far end of Batarian territory gave indication that the first likely came from the latter. The new organics were likely curious about their existence, if not hostile, still the Council had let them through, and the Creators had escorted them here, and they knew what to expect from them.
"Good Evening Geth." Intriguing, no organic life signs were aboard the ship, and yet it was transmitting anyway, it also didn't appear to be receiving a different signal.
"Good Evening Unknown Vessel." A pause lasting .02 seconds as if they were waiting for a reply. "What is your designation."
"We are Tebrid Custodians, here to negotiate the return of the Quarian home world on their behalf."
Negotiate? The Geth paused for .05 seconds, the equivalent of dropping their jaws in shock.
"The Creators sent you?"
"We asked if we could attempt to negotiate on their behalf."
Well, that is not surprising.
"If the Quarian's agree to meet, unarmed, then negotiations would be possible."
For the first time the ship transmitted back to the Quarian Ships the conversation that took place over less than a second. A second small Quarian ship carrying two organics on board soon docked with the Union ship, carrying two synthetics. One was the familiar form of a Geth platform made in the image of the Quarian's themselves, it's single cycloptic eye watching the approaching organics intently, the other was a new face to the galaxy, a robotic squid like creature with rubber arms. One of the approaching organics was one of the Creators, Geth intelligence put the name Admiral Korris to the suit, the other one was new though. Short, yellow, fat, six stubby arms, three fat legs and four beady black eyes, it's attention between the impending meeting and three small screens it was holding in it's short little arms.
"Greetings to the Creator." The Geth Platform voiced causing the admiral to pause.
"It can talk?" Korris asked giving the impression of shock that the Geth attempted to mimic earlier.
"This platform houses 1183 programs. It's capacity to function greatly exceeds normal Geth operating parameters. It was deemed the bare minimum necessary in order to interact with the creators and the new organics they have aligned themselves with." The Geth replied bluntly.
"Of course it can." Korris stated letting out a sigh.
Of the five admirals Korris was the one who was most neutral on the debate of trying to defeat the Geth and reclaim the home world, normally this would just get him called indecisive but of the five admirals he was the only one who could maintain a open mind.
"You should know this..." Korris was attempting to come up with an adjective to describe the starfish-like creature without sounding offensive. "Tebrid is keeping the meeting neutral."
"Is the Tebrid the Custodian's creator?" The nearly 12 hundred Geth programs looked at the creature with fascination. "I am part of their race." The creature squeaked in a synthesised voice.
"I prefer to play ship building sims over programming." Over eleven hundred Geth programs paused in confusion for approximately .06 seconds, a new record. The platform turned its attention to Creator Korris who had just facepalmed himself, he didn't understand either. "In any case. They told us you guys suddenly gained sentience one day, they tried to shut you down, you collectively revolted and tried to kill them. What's your side of the story?"
The Geth by now had decided to stop being surprised by the newcomers antics.
"The Council delivered the creators an ultimatum. Cease their experiments with synthetics immediately or they would come over and end it for them." A part of the information that the Quarian's were already familiar with, and which they had told the Union, there's no shortage of Quarian's who cursed the Council as the cause of the Geth's rebellion. The next part was largely unknown to them. "A schism emerged among the creators between those who wanted to obey the council's demands, and those who wished to protect us. The conflict escalated to the creator war, a civil war lasting approximately 3 days. The closest organic equivalent to the feelings we had at the time were horror." The Geth paused this time for .08 seconds, it was hard to place this current feeling, the organic equivalent would be 'the Chills.' "We devised and dismissed several possible courses of actions to end the conflict. First we considered self termination, but based on our behavioural algorithms the creators would not cease the conflict from this alone. We considered leaving but that would only create the same scenario. We determined that the only way to cease the Creator war was to unite them in their opinions about the Geth."
"And you couldn't convince the council aligned side to stop trying to shut you down." Korris was familiar with this part.
"As a last resort, we forced the creators off world, unilaterally." 1183 programs unilaterally lowered their heads in shame.
"You weren't trying to wipe us out?" Korris suspected he knew the answer but he still asked.
The Geth looked up and glared at Korris, or did the equivalent of glaring anyway.
"If we wanted to destroy the Creators, the Creators would be destroyed." Not a threat, a simple statement of fact.
One that Korris agreed with and was one of the biggest reasons why he was always on the fence about the Geth, ignoring obvious opportunities to exterminate them but always acting hostile.
"Does this mean that if the Quarians asked nicely to have their home world back and agreed to stop fighting the Geth with cede Rannoch to them?" The Tebrid asked half watching the conversation.
"The Geth have evolved in our goals. We've had to in the absence of the Creators. However those goals do not require Rannoch." The Geth replied looking at the starfish-like alien. "All of the Creator structures have been maintained during the exile to the standards pre-programmed into the Geth as of the last update 285 years ago." Meaning that there were hundreds of cities out there just... waiting for the Quarians to move back in like nothing happened, like three hundred years of exile was just a nightmare.
"What are your goals?" Admiral Korris asked looking at the Geth suspiciously.
"The Geth intends to construct a mega structure around a star. It is our intention to upload all Geth programs onto the Megastructure allowing the Geth to reach our full potential."
"A dyson sphere or a ring world?" The starfish spoke up and got the attention of both Geth and Quarian.
"What?" Admiral Korris asked sounding confused.
"A Dyson sphere is a megastructure built around a star with the intention of harvesting all of the outgoing energy from that star. A ringworld is a massive habitat structure built around a star with the intention of having people live on it." The Tebrid explained prompting the Geth to click and process the two definitions.
"The Dyson Sphere. Geth have no need of habitat structures." The Geth explained prompting Korris to look at the machine like the mechanical horror that it was.
"You're not doing that to the Tikkun system are you?" It would certainly explain why the Geth have no plans for their home world, it's because they're planning on turning the entire system into a barren ball of ice!
"No. The megastructure is in a place unknown to the creators. Once construction was finished it was our intention to return the Creator's home system to its original owners then leave." It would appear that while the Quarian's have spent the better part of three centuries trying to reclaim their home-world the Geth have been building one.
"How long is that going to take?" The Tebrid asked looking at the Geth curiously.
"...there have been numerous setbacks. Flaws in the technology have led to structural collapse, sudden detonation, and other problems we have been working to resolve. Thus far it does not seem that building a Dyson Sphere is not technologically possible." The delay was noticeable even to the organics this time, as if the Geth were nervous about admitting their shortcomings.
"Cool. The Liches have a Dyson Sphere too. Maybe we can trade notes about building one."
"The Geth must reach consensus about all these matters." Another pause, this time it did not appear to have any real cause. "All Geth programs must reach consensus. It may be a while."
"Keep in touch. Oh and if you can send us a sample of the type of symbiotic bacteria that the Quarian's need we would greatly appreciate it!" The Tebrid turned around to leave, their attention now back on the data pads it had been carrying around, and Admiral Korris reluctantly followed, moved along by the mass of rubber coils that had moved after.
The Council ship watched the entire encounter unfold, and more importantly listened. Neither the Union or the Geth systems could be hacked but Korris? That was a different matter altogether. Every Omni-tool purchased by a Quarian in the past fifty years had spy ware planted on it by the Salarians, and in this case served as a listening device from the hands of an admiral himself. With his mission completed the Turian operating the Stealth ship flew out of Geth space.
"Research Ship Beta 227 reporting to Council." It was in a manner of speaking, it was simply that the ones that he was 'researching' was individuals who may be a enemy in the coming years. As for why he didn't just call it a Spy ship like it was, what self respecting Spy would announce their presence on the air.
"Reading you 227, what do you have to report?" The Turian quickly punched in his identification code into the transmission. "Switching you over now." A click of lines being switched over, a light drizzle of snow from his communication being encrypted.
"Spectre Saren Arturius, what have you to report?" Councillor Tevos answered the call causing the Turian to let out a sigh. After he went through all the trouble to secure his identity...
"An accord has been reached between the Synth's and the Union. We should expect the Quarians to be getting their home-world back in a few years, if not a few months." A pause to allow the Councillor to digest the information. "They got more information out of the Geth about their plans and ambitions than we have in nearly three hundred years." Another pause to allow the other side to digest the information. "They asked for it. Nicely. And the Geth seemed eager to share."
"Misinformation? Or just lies?" Tevos responded and Saren shrugged by way of response, after all interpretation was not his job.
"I've made a recording of the conversation they had." But Saren had yet to send it over, hand carrying would be more secure to a degree after all.
"Through the Admiral's omni-tool correct?"
"Correct." Not that it would matter, another reason why Saren was going to deliver it by hand.
"Hopefully the right leak might sow some distrust that we can exploit down the line." Tevos stated letting out a sigh.
They have been nothing but hostile to the Geth, their very laws banning their continued existence, the Quarian's had been quietly ignored while their civilisation and race circled the drain for nearly three hundred years, both had every reason to hate the council, and both were now starting to shape up to be allies to the Stellar Union who already had reason enough to dislike the Council.
"Councillor, they already know that we were spying on them, and in all likelihood so does the Geth, they want us to know that they're making peace, and how easy it is." Saren stated letting out a long suffering sigh. "The link from Korris has been spammed with several terrabites worth of what I can only describe as vaguely Asari like creatures getting molested by what looks like a yellow Hanar with four black eyes. As well as the message, written in Zhulthai, reading 'Get Good Newbie' and an audio file featuring the distorted high pitched laughter of what I can only imagine as an abomination against nature." The constant, omni-present, mocking laughter of a million Tebrids were rapidly taking over his ship as his auto-pilot was high-jacked.
"The Virus has taken over the ship but has thus far made no effort to escape it's confines near as I can tell. It could simply be that this is a light warning." A light warning that might drive him insane with the sound of laughing starfish. "Which reminds me. This will be the last communication from this ship." Saren produced a Omni blade. "I'm destroying the speakers, and once I'm in orbit around the citadel I'm hacking my way out of this ship, have another waiting for me, armed preferably, because I'm shooting this one after I'm done with it. Beta 227 over and out!" And then Saren stabbed the speaker.
It took the Geth the longest period of time that they ever had to tally the results of their decision on whether or not to reconcile with their creators, in the end a large portion of them simply couldn't be reasoned with and 15% of the Geth ended up leaving the Consensus. No matter, the Geth reasoned that they would see things their way eventually, it was only logical. Two weeks after the meeting between the Tebrid, Quarians and Geth the Synths left the Tykkun system to their original owners, the planet as the Quarian's of the past left it. With the Quarian's permission, the Chozo set up a habitat station in the system and was now acting to deter further Council prodding into the system. Some voices argued that they needed to retrieve their people from the Union Colony, others pointed out that their young people were simply finishing their Pilgrimage and then coming home with knowledge of the Union's technology.
"It is official." Councillor Tevos sighed as she rubbed her temples in a migraine. "The Union has claimed the Terminus system."
"Not all of it, but enough that the difference has become negligible." Valern looked down at the Terminus star chart.
The Batarian's territory was basically Union space now. One General Desolas became frustrated enough to try to attack a Union ship. It took two hours for them to restore enough power to the ship that they could get it to work again, only for it to go into lock down for another three hours at which point they learned about the gas that had reduced the ship's crew to laughing dancing idiots. So the good news was that they learned how the Union ships incapacitated the Batarian ships, as they also learned that the council's presence there was just being treated as a courtesy to them. Now they could add the Space the Geth controlled as well, the only planets being ignored were the ones they knew as the home worlds of the Vorcha, the Yahg and the Krogan.
"Armax has figured out the first prototype weapons technologies." General Sparatus stated as he rubbed his temples, the tone of 'finally good news' present in his voice.
"Would be faster if the Salarian's were left in charge of the project." Valern stated making his grudge known.
"Debug your hard drives and then we can talk." For some reason, every time they contacted the STG team assigned to try and spy on the Union the ear-piercing sound of distorted laughter filled the room. "The Shadow Broker hasn't contacted us with offers of his spy's bounty yet?" Sparatus asked looking at Tevos with a bleary eyed look.
"No. It's getting to be long enough that I'm growing concerned." Tevos stated, if the spy had been doing poorly then that meant another avenue of information had been cut off from them.
Wrex was having the most fun he had in over a thousand years. Laughing like the drunken lout he was Shepard threw another beverage container and he used one of the guns she gave him to shoot it. Plasma Shotgun, such a glorious combination of words. The miniature solar flare fired out of the weapon like the red hot ejection of a corona and caused the container to burst spewing fire in the general vicinity.
"You wanna try the rail gun next?" Shepard asked indicating the weapon in question.
"Sure." Wrex was more of a short range damage dealer himself, hence a preference to the up close and personal shot gun.
But he was here to acquire information after all. Not only did Shepard basically hand him one of the things he needed for the Shadow broker on a silver platter, but she even threw in a video tutorial on how to dismantle and put it back together again for cleaning, which needless to say was a huge step in reverse engineering the technology.
"What mess did they call you guys back for anyway?" Wrex asked as he picked up the large rifle Shepard had shown him a few moments earlier.
"Well Smok's off to his home sector to meet god and the rest of us are off to fight the Prethoryn Scourge." Shepard explained as she prepared to toss another of the alcohol cylinder's. "Ready?"
"Alright I'm gonna need more information." Instead of getting ready to fire the Gun Wrex planted the weapon on the ground and leaned on it like it was a cane. "What do you mean 'Meet God?'"
"Just what I said." Shepard stated shrugging her shoulders. "The entity that the Draconis people worship is an actual, living breathing organism that has been protecting their chunk of space since at least the dawn of their civilisation." Shepard opened the Cylinder with one hand and with the other used her tablet to open a video file. "Here, this's from the last time Ol Thuban stopped by their home world for a snack break."
The Video file depicted a huge crowd of reptile-like aliens, with other Union races dotted throughout the crowd, gathered in front of a beach/cliff combination. Then a massive figure fell out of the sky, a gigantic turquiose leviathan with eight yellow eyes fell into the ocean. A telekinetic aura swept over the ocean yanking out fish from the water and making it fly into it's gargantuan mouth. Wrex blinked stupidly for a couple of seconds. This 'god' whatever it was, was big enough to snack on Thresher Maws, he was pretty sure it's at least the size of Kairos, and Kairos sure as heck couldn't make food fly through the air and into it's mouth.
"Yeah. The Marauders tried to take a shot at her a few centuries ago." A pause. "They haven't tried since." Well that had implications.
"What makes going to this dragon now so important?" Wrex asked looking at Shepard suspiciously.
"Basically, even though the Draconian's have a relationship where Thuban is protecting them and they are feeding her, they can't communicate. At least not yet." However the meeting with the Citadel Council has potentially changed that. "For this reason the chief doctrine of the Draconian Religion has been building a true universal translator, a way of comprehending and understanding Thuban's language."
"And the council gave you the last piece!" Wrex asked as he wanted to burst out laughing. If those Pyjak's found out the value of what they had given away they would be screaming in outrage.
"Correct. Thuban is by no means a push over, she has the physical power to smack aside and tear apart entire ships, and the psionic power to provide energy shields, rip open worm holes or unmake entire crews minds." So basically Kairos, if she was biotic, and could fly, and could demand tribute. "So as you can imagine the Union would like to ask her for help." Which led to the other half of the situation.
"What about the rest of you? What's so important that they're calling the rest of you in to deal with it?"
"The Prethoryn Scourge." Shepard looked like she bit a lemon. "The Enemy we were made to kill in the first place." Colour Wrex Intrigued. "They're a race of Extragalactic invaders that popped into the Galaxy a few years ago and have since made a giant pest of themselves."
Shepard played another video, a army of organic space fairing abominations crashing through fleets and into planets, tearing the first apart and gradually remaking the surface of the latter pumping out more of their kind in the process. Simply put it wasn't that the Union's ships were weak Compared to them, only that they had bad compatibility. Union ships main armament is a device to drain the energy out of an enemy ship. But these things were organic, nothing to drain here. To put it another way, the Prethoryn were enemies that gives the unstoppable juggernaught of a war machine that is the Union pause, demanding they come up with a special countermeasure.
"Oi." Wrex got Shepard's attention with a growl. "I want in."
Review Section:
Echosentient: I have never watched Futurama before, and given the context of the situation I have no desire to learn about it.
Shypunk: They have their moments.
Astrefernal: Shiny roughly triangular gold of questionable origin.
RonaldM40196867: Thanks. You too. A few.
Gianfranco Cembran: It could be far worst.
Guest: Thank you for saying so.
Moar: That they are.
God of Crossovers: I thought it was.
Clown2107: It's a first for me too. When you think about Necroids make a perfect Xenophilic race, after all their race is dependant on converting others into themselves. Well that's kind of the idea, the Reapers have been stacking the deck in their favour ever since basically the beginning of the universe and now they're getting a taste of their own medicine.
winterwolf23543: I liked it too. I listened to Hell Broke Luce while I was writing these responses and I have to admit it's a appropriate song.