RR

Azreal the deplorable: He just attacked a ship that was Salarian. He fears the repercussions of that considering he was just talking with their friends, he is also sat thinking, is this Council as peaceful as they claim to be if they have a stealth ship in his back yard.

Heartfanglives: In some ways, Humanity in this fic need the rest of the galaxy, but they aren't going to be pushed over. We will see why that is later.

Kira-117: The Hornets nest, is kicking a species whose ally is capable of just sending a QRF fleet into your space without thought.

Bruto22: They may just agree.

DeitarionSSokolow: Yeah, thinking back when I wrote that chapter it was in a rush to get it done, so I could get it pushed out when I had internet. I will be going back to it.

Rydan Fall: I'm not going to go down the route of mixing genes from different species, simply because I dislike those mixed species stories. They are going to be advanced enough to know all about their own genetics though and how to manipulate them.

IhateGenericCereal: The Batarians main purpose in this story is to allow Humanity to question the Citadel Question.

Ralmon: Yes, hands up, last chapter was a muck up that I'll be updating shortly as I have internet back. Cheers for giving me a kick.

HNV Cardeus - Primarch's Chosen's personal dreadnought

The Primarchs Chosen is seated in a chair as he looks intensely at an image projected onto a wall in his quarters. In his hands, he holds an electronic notepad that is displaying the same image projected onto the wall, the only difference between the two images is that some hand-drawn notes adorn the version on his notepad. Since learning of the Human tendencies towards Stealth Vessels, Caredeus has been studying Salarian strategies and tactics, knowing that the amphibious allies enjoy partaking in Stealth Warfare - despite their claims to the contrary. He knows he will need to employ tactics he is not the most rehearsed in, and so, he has been taking any and all opportunities to study stealth warfare.

To his side sits a Salarian Captain, who for the last few hours has explained using a few recordings from battles during the Krogan Rebellions and Rachni wars why Salarian Stealth Vessels acted as they had. Now, after hours of lessons, it is up to Caredus to tell the Salarian Captain on a new recording he has not previously seen or studied as to what the Stealth Vessels will do before they do it.

"They won't engage." Caredus says after a few moments to think some more, "Cluster 1 will move to the far side of the local moon, while Cluster 2 will split into two sub-clusters. The first sub-cluster will break formation and shadow at a distance of 5 million miles, and the second will move to the Relay to block comms."

"Close, and in a similar situation today, we would have followed this logic." The Salarian Captain replies, "But at the time of this conflict only one vessel was required to block Krogan communication channels, they lacked any true sophistication back then," He sniffs, "So only one vessel was sent to the Relay. The other 4 ships in the sub-cluster cluster joined the others behind the moon."

The Turian flares his mandibles ever so slightly upwards, he is glad to know that he is thinking along the correct lines of thought. If he can predict and understand how the Salarians would use Stealth Vessels, then maybe he can predict how the new aliens will use them. Hearing the door to his private chambers chime the Turian stands from his chair and opens the door to see the ships 2nd in Command waiting for him in a rigid at attention posture. After exchanging pleasantries, Fannus asks, "Development, I assume?" The man would not be here otherwise.

"A report has been sent from one of our forward reconnaissance vessels." The Turian 2IC says before he breaks from his rigid posture to hand the Primarchs Chosen a datapad.

Faunus reads the reports blurb before telling the man, "Change formation to A6 and have Fleet Commander Quirinus join me when his fleet arrives."

"As you command," The second Turian replies before saluting the Primarchs Chosen and turning to do as asked.

Closing his door behind him after dismissing the 2IC, Faunus returns to the chair he was sitting in earlier. "So," He says to the Salarian Captain, "Your scouts have indicated the QRF fleets return. They are without battle damage." The Salarian blinks his large eyes twice to lubricate them as he waits patiently, knowing that something else is coming, the Turian would not have changed feet formation on this news alone. "They also report that 65 Batarian vessels are sat in front of the Human Relay."

"We suspected." The Salarian Captain replies when he believes the Turian is finished, knowing that despite not being in the same navy, the Primarchs Chosen is of a considerably higher rank of an allies navy and he needs to respect that. "Should they play the game right, the Batarians will be able to get considerable concessions from the Council."

"Yes." Muses Faunus, "We also predicted something like this would happen. The Primarch has allowed me to act accordingly - but he has made clear we are not to give anything for their obedience. This mission is a Council Operation with the Galaxies security in question."

The Salarian slightly widens his eyes before replying, "We would not have expected anything different. But it is my duty to inform you that while the Salarian Government can not condone any hostilities at such a time, I can inform you that many in power would voice support."

Faunus squints his eyes a little at the Salarian before reaching for his drink and taking a sip of water. Putting the glass down a short time later he looks back to the wall in front of him and says, "So, we have one and a half clusters behind the moon and one vessel at the Relay."

/.../

6 hours later

Faunus returns the salute from Fleet Commander Quirinus before replying to the man, "So, you return unscathed." The statement is a question in its own, asking for the untold story.

"We do," Quirinus responds as he falls into step with the Primarchs Chosen, "The Humans advised us to leave once they noticed the Batarian fleet. They are preparing their system for an invasion."

"I see," Thinks Faunus, "So they must have eyes somewhere close by."

"They do," Quirinus tells the Primarchs Chosen, "But we have not been able to detect them. Human stealth technology has proven to be beyond what our sensors are capable of."

Quirinus moves his mandibles in an agreeing motion, "We have Salarian reccy vessels working on that. One is in their system as we speak; the other is shadowing the Batarian fleet." It is silently worrying Faunus a little that he is learning of the Human eyes from Quirinus, and not the Salarians shadowing the Batarian fleet.

"I do not imagine that it is a good idea to have a reccy vessel in Human space," Quirinus informs as he walks into a briefing room that has multiple monitors decorating the walls. The room's purpose is to gather intelligence from people who have just returned from off-ship missions, meaning it has all the equipment and aids required for someone to inform of what they had done, and seen. "I think they are trying to outswim a territorial Hanar."

Seeing a good bottle of smoked Turian spirits on the table waiting for them, Faunus picks up the bottle and says, "And why would that be?" After speaking, he breaks the wax seal of the bottle and sniffs the contents - A Turian gentleman would not be caught drinking from a bottle that he has not personally sniffed the contents of. After giving Quirinus a sniff, Faunus grabs two glasses from a nearby presentation case.

Fleet Commander Quirinus waits for the Primarchs Chosen to pour two glasses before handing him a datapad. "When we arrived in system, we had no idea the 3rd planet was a heavily built-up garden world, or any of the other inner planets; they somehow managed to hide that from our optical sensors. If that is not good stealth technology, then I do not know what is. Further to this, it is the ground crews assessment that this is their place of origin. If this was Palavern..."

"Hmm," Faunus ponders aloud as he hands Quirinus one of the glasses. A navy defending their homeworld is a navy with a dedicated crew, and a navy with everything to lose.

Quirinus takes the glass from the Primarch's Chosen before clinking the glass with Faunus's own. With the glasses clinked, Quirinus being the lowest-ranked member in the room states, "To the Primarch and the Spirits that guide us." Before taking a sip of the beverage, Quirinus turns to the bow of the ship, as is Turian tradition when making a toast onboard a vessel.

With a toast to the Primarch done, Faunus can make a toast to whatever he desires, "To the Turians of Quick Reaction Fleet 35, and their unwavering service in the face of the unknown."

With the toasts completed Faunus holds the datapad Quirinis give him up so he can read it. After a while, he looks up from the datapad and says, "I see. This news, this stealth technology they have, unfortunately, does not overly startle me."

"It does not?" Asks Quirinus with some surprise.

"No." Faunus replies before approaching a TV screen on the wall and logging in to it. When logged into the screen, he brings up some documents for Quirinus to read. As Quirinus reads the document, Faunus says, "Higher Command has been busy going over your scans of the Human ships you have encountered. They are constructed from Relay Metal." Faunus lets this settle in for a second before expanding on his statement, "The Primarch fears they have a huge Prothean cache they are mining for technology."

"Faex." Quirinus immediately responds, showing a slight lapse in professionalism, "This all makes sense. The Humans we have come across are adept at the Prothean language, have ring worlds, Quantum communication technology small enough to fit in a box, advanced stealth and weapon technology, and now Relay metal. It will explain why you have come with such a powerful containment fleet."

"Yes," Faunus says aloud. "Now you understand the enormity of this situation; I need you to tell me anything which can give us the edge, should force be needed."

"As you command," Quirinus replies with a small flare of his mandibles before taking another sip of the Turian spirit - the drink is an expensive brand only the most elite in society can afford, so it is enjoyed in small sips. "But let me recap. We have sent a reccy vessel to their home system, there is a Batarian fleet just outside their Relay and ready to knock, and now we are about to arrive with the largest containment fleet seen in centries."

"Hmm." Faunus hums in agreement. "Quite an invasion fleet, would you not think."

"Indeed." Quirinus replies, "And so think the Humans. As we were leaving their system, we witnessed a large build-up of asteroids in front of the Relay exit point - dragged there by human vessels. They also informed us that they had mined the Relay."

Faunus moves to another monitor before grabbing a pen-like device and begins to draw on the screen. First, he draws a quick military symbol for a Relay, and then he illustrates a small circle around it. "How far would you estimate them to have mined?"

"I could only guess, but we detected some ships up to 50km away from the Relay. It is possible that they have gone further, but most activities we could detect was within 50km."

Faunus stops drawing and turns to look at Quirinus, "There must be more to this." A traditional minefield around a relay expands far past 50km, this is due to the dispersal constant of the relays, meaning ships can exit a relay up to 100km from it, this constant is something which the ships have little control over. The Turian Hierarchy dictates that a minefield around a relay should be no less than 150km to be effective.

"I don't think so," Quirinus replies to Faunus, "But this has had me wondering too. It was the CV Avian that opened the Relay, not the Humans, so I do not believe they had previously discovered the Relays."

"Now that is an interesting hypothesis." Faunus agrees as he stands back from the display he was previously drawing on, a hand clasped to his chin "So, do they have another means of FTL do you think?"

Quirinus clucks his tongue in thought before flaring his mandibles downwards slightly, "We saw nothing of the kind, but that doesn't tell me much. What I do know is their system is as barren as an Elcors Deployment Record when it comes to Element Zero, with not a single trace found on their homeworld by the away team." Elcor very rarely deploys their military; thus, it is almost unheard of for an Elcor to have a deployment record.

"Doesn't mean they don't have technology which hid it from you like the fact their homeworld was not a barren rock." Faunus points out, "But if not, then it means they either have a means of unknown FTL, or, they are stuck in this one system, and we just unlocked the door."

"If I were a betting man, I would say those options would be good wages," Quirinus agrees, "But, what has me wondering is if they have a Prothean cache that has gifted them all it has, surely they would have found the Relay."

"Maybe they did not want to find the Relay." Faunus thinks aloud, "Or they were scared of opening it like the Citadel is today."

"No." Quirinus says dismissing the idea, "The ground team have good impressions from the Humans, and they did not give me an isolationist impression, they put in the effort to get to know us even though we can barely communicate as is. If they knew that Relay was there, I think they would have..." The Fleet Commander is cut short as a chime rings on the Primarch's Chosen omni-tool.

The Primarch's Chosen looks down to his omni-tool and sees that it is an important call, meaning he probably has to answer it. "I should take this." He says. Answering the call he says, "Go ahead, Fleet Orchestrator."

The Fleet Orchestrator wastes little time to reply, "We are 1 light-year from the Batarian fleet."

"Halt fleet," Faunus tells the man at the opposite side of his omni-tool. "And wait for me to arrive in the Command Centre."

/.../

Asari Expeditionary Vessel Destiny Ascension

Tevos looks around a room filled with workstations and experts of all manners before blinking and telling her guide, "We did well to get this organised so quickly." On many of the monitors in the room, there are dozens of pictures the ground team have taken, some are being studied, others are displayed but yet to be analysed. On other work stations, Asari are working over two books the Humans provided, detailing their language, but progress is slow. It is one thing to translate a word, but something else entirely to put those words into structured sentences.

Her guide blinks in return while informing, "There is always a first contact team on 24 hours notice to move. When the call came through, it was simply a matter of picking them up from the Citadel. The hard part was getting the Prothean experts."

"Surely the University could provide on the Citadel," Tevos replies with a frown.

"Yes." The guide answers, "However, the University is a privately owned institution. They demanded an upfront payment before they would lease the experts we needed."

This statement from her guide causes an eye roll in the Councillor, "Truthfully, it shouldn't surprise me." Tevos tells the guide, knowing that the University is a Volus owned institution. "But we have the experts?"

"Yes. We managed to receive four people from the University before we stepped into the abyss."

"All fluent in Prothean?"

The guide looks a little uncertain as she replies, "As fluent as we were going to get with the time we had."

This comment does not give Tevos a warm fuzzy feeling, but she understands the constraints that the team who organised this expedition will have had to work with. "Then we best hope they are fluent enough to converse with the Humans fully."

Hearing someone approach from behind Tevos turns to find an aged Matriarch, Tevos knows the face, but can not for her life remember the Asari's name. "Councillor," The Matriarch speaks when she is a few feet away, "I've got something which needs your urgent attention."

"You have?" Tevos replies with a raised brow.

"Yes." The Asari responds, "Have a look at this." The Matriarch powers up her omni-tool and pulls up a grainy image. "Have a close look at the bottom right."

Tevos squints at the grainy image before feeling her stomach drop a little, "That is a human, isn't it?" Tevos could be wrong, but it looked like the Human was on a Batarian world. "Who sent you get this?"

"Yes, it is a Human. Now, would I not be wrong in thinking that this should be an urgent Council matter." Tevos notices the fact the Matriarch only partially answers her question, but she does not push, the missing information is not likely to provide a likeable answer.

Tevos blinks her eyes, she knows if the Salarians have found out about this image, then they will have the STG launch a raid to capture the Human in order to study it, and the Turians would send the Blackwatch to bring it back for interrogation. Further, Tevos knows that the Human would likely be sold, and incredibly quickly into what would likely be the Batarian hegemony where they would become virtually untouchable. "Yes." Tevos concedes, "Come with me." Tevos guides the Matriarch to a private room where a communications Terminal that is used for Council transmissions can be found. Signing into the terminal Tevos logs into a top-secret program before setting some options which bring up Council assets in Batarian space. Looking through the assets, Tevos sees something which will be of use to her. "Tela Vasair," She says aloud, "She is a Spectre, loyal to the Asari, and her last logged position puts her on a path to a nearby world."

"A perfect candidate to bring the human to ourselves then." The Matriarch comments.

Tevos silently blinks as she taps a message into another terminal to send the Spectre a message through Asari Comm links, that way the message will be untraceable, and she will not need to inform the other species. When the message has almost been sent to Vasir, Tevos looks up as she notices the internal lighting of the ship has changed from a harsh white light to a soft yellow, indicating a change of threat level. After quickly finishing the message and sending it on its way, Tevos makes her way to the bridge of the ship, where she finds the Captain speaking to an ops officer. As the conversation seems to be important, Tevos waits for the conversation to come to an end before speaking with the Captain, "What is the current situation?" She asks.

The Captain leads Tevos to a work station that is manned by a Target Acquisitions officer. "This dot here, it's a Batarian vessel." The Captain informs, "It's just arrived."

Tevos leans in closer to the screen to peer at the dot so she could read the information displayed next to it, "A lone frigate?" She asks.

The Matriarch in control of Asari's most powerful war vessel blinks before pressing a few buttons, "We also just received this." After pressing another button, a video begins to play of a Batarian Admiral. Tevos listens to the Batarian and waits for him to finish before speaking, "They want to join our containment efforts?"

"So it would seem," The Captain affirms, "The Primarch's Chosen..."

"Is against the proposal." Tevos interrupts, "He made his name hunting Batarians so working with them..." Tevos is well aware of Faunus Cardeus and his so-called remarkable victories against Batarian Pirates. Frankly, in Tevos's mind, the man has committed numerous war crimes to achieve what he has. Yes, the man is effective at his job, maybe even the best, the Turians certainly think so, but the standard you walk past is the standard you accept, and in this case, that standard is war crimes.

The ships' Captain clenches her fingers slightly, "Actually no, this was his response a few moments ago."

The Matriarch plays an audio message for the Councillor, in which the Primarchs Chosen unexpectedly accepts the Batarian aid. "What is his train of thought here?" Tevos asks aloud "The Batarians will have an ulterior motive. They almost always do."

"That is what I was just discussing," The Captain informs, "But he actually has sound logic in this situation."

"He does?" Asks Tevos, obviously wanting to know more about the situation.

"Yes." The ship's Captain brings up a zoomed-out image of the local space surrounding the Destiny Ascension, up to 2 light-years out. At this scale, Tevos notes that the Containment fleet is holding position one light year away from the Relay. "We know the Humans have eyes on into space immediately surrounding that Relay, and we know they are scared of invasion. We need the Batarians to move light years away so that the Humans can start to feel ignorantly safe."

"So by accepting the aid, we tell the Batarians to come to join us where we are right now."

"Yes." The Captain affirms, "But there is more to it. The Batarians are going to use any opportunity to try and get concessions from us; we are still in their space after all. If we denied their aid, then they could easily have sold to the press that we are the aggressors, and they could sell it well."

Tevos blinks, knowing just how well the Batarians can sell a good sob story and use that story to get concessions out of the Council. "You are preaching to the priestess about Batarian political tactics. What I would like to know is what are our plans when they show up."

"So, let us assume the PC is successful in getting the Batarians to join our containment fleet. In this situation, the current plan, which I suspect will change as Faunus war games it, is to send Quirinus's fleet back to the Relay, with the inclusion of ourselves, and 2 Batarian ships. That way, the Humans only see a fleet they know with a few extra's, then we have all the experts on board this vessel to help with First Contact, and the Batarians will feel included."

"Included enough to demand resources from the Council for military aid." Tevos muses as she crosses her arms over her chest. "I can not see this working well."

"Nor would I expect the PC to think it will, no plan survives contact. Right now, he just needs the Batarians moved from the Relay, without us using hostilities, what happens after that, well, its Faunus Caredeus we are talking about, if he can't figure out how to dispose of some Batarians, then who in civilised space can."

"That is what I worry about," Tevos replies, "He is a man who knows how to play Batarians, and he has an incredible fleet under him right now. I think he is up to something."

The Captain seems to agree from her body language, "On the way to this space, we crossed a single Batarian ship, the PC took a tough line with it, which the Batarians have already wailed foul about. Now, here they come looking for even more of our fowls, but he has disarmed it by accepting their offer. My bet is the Batarians were once more looking at us to deny them so they could once more go to the press with our injustices."

Tevos sighs as she looks towards an observation window, "I just pray both the Batarians and PC remember why they are here, and who realistically is the real threat."

/.../

Cheers