1 Week later
Faunus taps the glass desk in front of him with his talons as he rewatches a video for what could possibly be the hundredth time this week. As it turns out, inviting the Batarians to join the containment effort had unexpectedly paid off, when they joined the containment fleet the Batarians freely offered some recordings they had made on their way to the human Relay. These recordings that Faunus is watching now, without question shows some human stealth tech exiting the Relay. The Human devices are 100 meters long by 30 wide and 30 deep; they appear to be constructed from two Y shaped hulls that have been placed on top of one another, with the bases of the Y facing opposite directions. The Batarians only managed to record them for a few seconds before the optical sensors lost them; the ships are black in colour with no windows, meaning that it is very hard to track them. Still, it is enough for Faunus to know that the Humans are no longer contained to their system, and are actively sending assets into Batarian space. What also concerns Faunus is the fact that these constructs are previously unseen, they look nothing like the Stealth Vessels Quirinus has seen, and he can not judge their purpose. They are too small to be full-blown war-vessels by Citadel standards but too large to be a satellite.
Faunus wonders if they are scout vessels, but he doubts it, the vessels are too small and too cramped to offer any real quality of life onboard, especially for a scout vessel which could be expected to spend months, maybe even years in space and away from replenishing life-giving supplies. No, scout vessels are typically a bit larger, allowing for large storage of supplies, comfort luxuries and entertainment devices on board. His current theory is that they are unmanned drones, but what type of drones they are he is unsure, but if he had to bet, he would put them down as being assault drones - which worries him as he can't find them.
In addition to the concern regarding the unknown Stealth Vessels, Faunnus has also come to the conclusion that something has happened to the vessel they sent forward and into Human space. The Salarian Captain on board was given strict instructions to return from Human space 96 hours after entering their system. It has now been five full days, one day longer than permitted, and Salarians are not known for being late, to the contrary, in Salarian culture being late is viewed as a social taboo. It would be a lie to say Faunnus is not worried for the Salarians; he only hopes their return has been delayed by the minefield, and not anything else.
Pushing the concern for the stealth vessel aside Faunnus begins another playthrough of the Batarian video only for a push notification to make its way onto his screen a few seconds later. The notification is from a Salarian Recconisance Vessel, but not the one he is worried for, no, this comes from the one in orbit of the Human Relay in Batarian space. Wasting no time Faunnus clicks on the notifications icon and loads the message.
The first thing Faunnus sees is a high-resolution picture of what looks like a perfectly spherical ball; its colour is chalk white and size estimates put the ball at 2 meters in radius. Reading the message sent with the picture Faunnus raises a hand to his chin; three of these devices have just dropped out of the Relay, and the spheres have since started to spin at a revolution rate of 1250 revolutions per minute. Each of the orbs has its own direction of spin is in the x,y and z planes.
It does not take Faunnus long to come to the realisation that these devices are sensors of some sort, but what they are sensing the Primarch's Chosen is not sure of. He has seen and heard of EM spectral scanners, radiation sensors, and Eezo sensors to name a few, but these do not meet the requirements to be any of those. EM Spectral scanners are large devices, and typically you need a lot of them to have a high resolution of the sky you are scanning, and radiation sensors are far smaller than whatever these are. This leaves Eezo sensors, but to detect eezo you need eezo to do so, then further to this, eezo sensors do not need to spin.
With yet another mystery added to the fold, Faunnus goes back to planning.
3 Hours later, AEV Destiny Ascension.
Tevos looks up from an email she is typing to Tela Vasair and to the door of her office onboard the Destiny Ascension as an aid walks in. The past week has proven to be an interesting one for the Councillor as the Batarian Hegemony has freely offered the Human Slave to the Council, which is out of character for the Batarian government. Tevos suspects that this, along with the Batarians providing aid to the Containment Fleet, that the Batarians will shortly be making a power move of some kind and expect the Council to turn a blind eye. It would not be the first time that this has happened, so as a precaution Tevos has quietly informed new and poorly defended Asari colonies to be on guard; admittedly there are more than a few ripe for the picking, so to speak.
With the aid now stood in front of her desk Tevos patiently waits for her to speak, and she does not have to wait for long, "The Relay is powering up," The aid says calmly. Tevos stands from her desk in one smooth motion, if the Relay is powering up then the Humans must be sending something through, so maybe they are ready to speak. After walking the short distance to the Ascensions bridge, Tevos enters the command room to find a few screens are displaying a 200m long asteroid. With a raised brow Tevos looks to the ships Captain, searching for an answer. "Just dropped out the Relay." The Captain replies with a small shrug of his shoulders.
Over the next 72 hours, larger and larger asteroids end off leaving the Relay, with each asteroid differing from the last in composition, size and mass. Eventually, the Humans send asteroids too large and too heavy through the Relay, resulting in the QRF fleet having to take emergency manoeuvres to dodge the high-speed remnants of what once must have been a vast asteroid. The Asteroids shredded by the Relays' self-preservation mechanisms. Of the asteroids that did survive, ships searched them for any technology that the Humans may have left behind on them, and sure enough a few pieces of kit which must have been sensors were recovered. Then the Relay went quiet for a full week with not a single peep of activity.
Just when people started to think that Relay is going to be inactive for a prolonged period, a single object came through, and Tevos once more finds herself on the bridge of the Destiny Ascension. On a screen, there is a large white sphere, and a few readings of the construct tells her it is approximately 200 meters in circumference, but nothing much else is known about it. Is it a ship? A station? One would not know from its appearance alone.
"Device has begun to spin." Someone announces, and sure enough, the Human device begins to spin, at first, its angular velocity is quite low, but eventually, after watching for a few minutes, its rotational speed is at 880 revolutions per minute. What is it with Humans and Spinning devices, Tevos wonders quietly.
"Detecting Relay activity." Someone else says moments after the sphere has stabilised at 880 revolutions a minute. Looking to another monitor Tevos witnesses four small vessels dropping out of the Relay; these vessels are the known Stealth Vessels, and they do not take long before cloaking themselves, retreating back into the cold darkness of space. There is a small period before the same voice can be heard again, "Detecting further activity."
Looking to another monitor which is observing the Relay Tevos allows a small frown to caress her face, the rings on the Relay are spinning fast - dangerously fast. "Whatever they are sending through," The ships' Captain begins to say, "It's perilously heavy." The heavier the object, the more a relay has to work to send it vast distances, and this results in a maximum weight allowance on ships travelling through the Relay system.
Eventually, when Tevos does not believe the rings can spin any faster two vessels drop out of the Relay. The first vessel is a new type of ship, its 300m long and its hull looks like it is capable of receiving severe punishment which is confirmed when sensors on the Destiny Ascension verify it is made of Relay metal. The second ship makes Tevos wince; it is the missing Salarian vessel and its engines look warped and malformed, meaning its most likely been subject to extreme heat. So the Salarians either melted their engine trying to run from the Humans, or they were attacked.
"The Fleet Commander has attempted to hail the Salarian Vessel. They are not responding."
"Yes." The Matriarch in command of the Ascension says, "When Salarian vessels are boarded they tend to complete a full electronics purge. They won't have any software to run their comms, meaning they are unlikely to know we are even hailing them. Also, is it me, or does this new vessel look like its drifting?" It is hard to deny that the new vessel does not look like it is drifting, since dropping out the Relay it has started to slowly spin in the X and Y plane, and some lights along its hull are flickering, which tells the Matriarch that it is unlikely to be in control. "Can someone get me a mass reading?"
It takes a few seconds but eventually, a sensor expert says, "Initial reading puts it at 620,000 metric tonnes."
"No wonder the rings were spinning so fast." Comments the Captain, knowing that maximum safe weight allowance for Relay transit is 650,000 tonnes. "How long is the ship?"
"300 meters."
The Matriarch frowns yet again, the ship is very small for that weight. "We are under the impression they have no element zero aren't we?"
"Correct." Tevos informs as the Human ship seems to regain control of itself and stops its uncontrolled spin.
"Then that will explain the weight as they don't have an element zero drive to reduce its mass."
Approaching a monitor Tevos notices something on the unknown vessel and points to it, "Zoom in here." Shortly the monitor is zoomed into a small segment on the ships hull. "SSV Praetorian. Do we have a translation for this?" Asari vessels are given names that reflect their purpose, so for example a scout vessel would be named after some great explorer. Maybe humans follow the same protocol?
After a while someone comes back with an answer for the Councillor. "SSV is an acronym for Systems alliance Space Vehicle. Praetorian as far as we can understand is someone that used to protect a Roman Emperor, with a Roman being a Sea Bream - a fish."
Tevos raises a brow at the last two words, "Are you sure the definition of Roman is correct?"
The Asari who give her the translation looks like she is not 100 per cent sure, "According to their document, Roman is a noun, and its a Sea Bream, a type of red or pink fish."
The Asari do not have long to contemplate what the name means however as the Salarian vessel slowly begins to move towards the QRF fleet, resulting in the Fleet Commander making a small change to the formation of the fleet. How the ship is being moved no one is sure as its engines are visibly fried. After a while of merely observing the Salarian vessel, Tevos witnesses from the comfort of the Destinies bridge as a Turian frigate leaves the fleet and moves to intercept it.
When the Turian vessel docks Tevos watches from behind a monitor as Turian Marines board the Salarian Vessel through the cameras on their body armour, and thankfully nothing seems to be out of place. The Salarians onboard seem fine, if not a little bored, but if Tevos wants to find out what happened then she will need to wait. The Turians who boarded are too professional to ask questions out of curiosity, so she will need to wait for the ship's Captain to be interviewed and a report filed.
2 hours later
Tevos sits down at a table in one of the Destiny Ascensions many messes as she reads over a report that details what happened to the Salarian Vessel. As she reads over the report she drinks an Asari tea that is a particular favourite of hers. According to the report, the Salarians were scanning a gas giant when they were attacked from nowhere. They did not receive anything to indicate the Humans attempted contact before hostilities, nor did they have any indication they were even being watched. The attack was a swift affair, with the Humans disabling engines and weapons simultaneously, leaving the Salarian craft helpless. At this point in time, the Salarian Captain ordered a complete purge of all electronics on the ship, which unfortunately deleted any information they did gather, even information of the attack.
Before Tevos can read much further, a voice calls to her, "Mind if I join you?"
Looking up Tevos blinks and she is soon joined by the ships Captain. "So," Tevos begins, putting the report she was reading down. "Any more news?"
"Situation no change." The Captain replies before gesturing to the report now resting on the table. "How is your report reading?"
"Like a diplomatic nightmare. I assume you have read it?"
The Captain blinks, "Yes. The humans attacking doesn't surprise me."
"It does not?"
"No." The Captain clenches her hands around her own mug of Asari tea, "These humans, they are fond of Stealth Vessels, which leads me to naturally believe they will have a lot of doctrine based around stealth warfare. Now, you introduce the Salarians in a Stealth Vessel probing their home system while a alien fleet is in their home system and a Batarian fleet is waiting at their systems door, and you can bet they will not take kindly to that. If I were the gambling type, I would say these humans may even view that as a precursor to invasion, which is why they demanded you leave their space. What has surprised me is that they have returned the Salarians so soon."
"Because you would want to see who comes calling for their lost ship? You could gain a considerable advantage on a political table with this."
"Not quite," The Captain clenches, "Because they are letting us know they have better stealth technology and can find our stealth vessels with ease. We now have a much clearer understanding of how out matched our stealth vessels are and considering we are by design not supposed to know how capable stealth vessels are, we have just gained a greater understanding of their own."
"Or," Tevos counters, "They are trying to stop any more Stealth Vessels from entering their space by telling us outright that we are no match in the stealth department? Or they realised they made a mistake attacking the vessel and are hoping by returning our people we do not do something..." Hearing her omni-tool begin to ring Tevos answers the call before quickly putting placing the Omni-tool down so that the ships Captain can see its display. "The Human box, its beeping," Tevos announces as she presses a few buttons, bringing up a live video feed from the First Contact team.
From the angle of the video, Tevos can see the back of an Asari who is about to accept the human call, and the box itself, meaning she will be able to witness the interaction. After pressing a red button on the human box a holographic image of a human woman forms from the top of the comms device. The conversation that follows is short, with the Human very much taking the lead in the conversation. After what must be about 5 minutes, the human ends the dialogue, and the human communication box deactivates.
It takes no more than 5 minutes for the conversation to be translated thanks to AVINA translation software and Tevos allows a small smile as she reads the transcript's bluff. "The Humans have thanked the fleet for their patience, and have requested for docking procedures. They are going to send a party of ten, to the Ascension."
30 minutes later - AEV Destiny Ascension Hanger Bay.
"The shuttle," The Ascensions Captain says as she gestures to the small human vessel which is just about to arrive, "Check this out. Its hull is made from Relay metal, if that isn't impressive on its own, its age is even more so, it is 2 days old. The Praetorian, 5 days old. They made that ship in under a week."
Tevos clenches her fists slightly, showing a little disbelief, "Sensors must be wrong?"
"I thought that too." Admits the Captain, "But look at this." The Captain raises an image on her omni-tool, "That is a close up of their docking port."
Tevos looks at the image and notices that the port is to Citadel Standards, and it's built into the hull, meaning it isn't an addition to the ship post-production. "Okay," She admits, "They made a vessel of Relay metal in under a week. What our shipyards would do to get some of that capability."
"Eezo tech could make a good trade." Implies the Captain.
Tevos once more clenches her fists. "No. Producing Relay Metal on that scale is the holy grail of material science, and I bet they know it. I think we would have to work hard to make that deal a reality. Also, they have the Hanar ships they half-melted still in their space - they could probably work a few years and get a working model from them."
Seeing that the Human shuttle is about to land Tevos gestures to it with a flick of her head, "Well, let us get this show on the road."