A/N
Before we begin, I just want to say, THANK YOU! To everyone who is reading this story. 146 favorites and 239 follows is beyond Amazing! So thank you all for the support!

If you recognize it, I probably don't own it. Mass effect belongs to BioWare and Microsoft.
here are some important stuff.

"Speech"

'Thoughts'

~"AI"~

*Sound Effects*

POV/Location/Time Change.

First contact 3

June 11 0200 hours Earth Standard
Deep Exploration Fleet, 1200 LY from Sol

Dr. Kayla Paige was excited. The first contact with these "Quarians' had gone splendidly. They had sent over shuttles and their Captain was now personally coming to her ship for talks. And that Codex they sent over, it was so interesting!

Apparently, there were a multitude of species in this "Citadel Council" like the Batarians (the yellow ones from before), Turians, Salarians, Elcor, etc. But what fascinated her the most were the human-like Asari. It was so fascinating that two species separated by thousands of light years of distance could be so similar! The new avenues of biology and evolutionary systems this would introduce! She was shaking with glee.

"So, you still use full-size ammunition for your guns?" The Quarian Captain Rael Zorah asked bringing her back to the present.
"Yes, as resources and supply lines aren't much of an issue, it would have been counterproductive to weaken our rounds. Plus our guns do have the capability to use metal shavings in cases of extreme emergencies." Captain Cedar explains.
"Would you like to try firing one?" She asks.
"If you would allow us, then yes absolutely," Rael says as he shoulders a MX-89 Harrier, and puts a few rounds into the target provided down the shooting range.
"Amazing! It's as if it doesn't have recoil at all!"
"That is the primary function of the Planium, or as you call it eezo, in the guns it makes the bullets weightless before the emitter propels it down the barrel." Captain Cedar explains, conveniently leaving out the part about the emitters being what the Citadel uses for shields.
"All SoCon guns are highly modular and are designed to be maintained, modified, and/or upgraded with the bare minimum of facilities. And are capable of functioning in any environment, be it the depths of the ocean or the vacuum of space." Captain Cedar elaborates further. 'Selling our guns to these Quarians is going to be so easy, and watching them, the rest of the Citadel too will be wanting our guns.' He thinks to himself, happy at securing a possible future contract alongside the first contact.

"So you said that your entire species lives in a migratory nomadic Fleet of sorts?" Dr. Paige asks curiously.
"Yes, we have been forced to live in the Migrant fleet, since the Geth, our AI forced us off the planet and the Citadel denied us refuge as punishment," Rael explains sadly.
"But as you said that was 200 years ago right? Then haven't you been punished enough? It just seems very unfair." Dr. Paige asks.
'Even this woman gets it! Damn those Citadel Bosh'tets! And their laws!' "Alas what other choice do we have…" Rael says sadly, suppressing his urge to curse out loud.
"The Citadel has denied you planets, so why haven't you merged all of your ships into a makeshift space habitat? Wouldn't that be more efficient and safe?" Dr. Paige asks with genuine curiosity.
"We… um… We…" Rael stutters, surprised by the question and wondering why they hadn't done that himself. "I don't know, maybe the Admiralty board can give you an answer? There of course has to be a reason." 'There is right?' He says after a few moments of thinking.

"Ok. So next up on the tour is the cafeteria." Dr. Paige says, leading them out of the shooting range.
As they're walking down the halls towards the cafeteria, Captain Cedar asks "This Admiralty Board is your government?"
"No, the Admiralty board is in charge of our military and ships. As far as their official functions go, the admirals have two: oversight of a respective portion of the whole Migrant Fleet, and determining whether or not to overrule the Conclave. Once they have overruled a decision of Conclave, the entire board resigns. This is a way to ensure that they only overrule the Conclave in the most dire situations." Rael explains
"The Conclave is the primary civilian government of the Quarians. Made up of democratically elected individuals, they are in charge of the day-to-day running of the fleet." He says, elaborating further.

"A fascinating system." Dr. Paige says. Then she leads them through a door into the Cafeteria.
"This is one of 4 cafeterias on the ship, it also doubles as a secondary recreation center." She says as she motions to the mini arcade on one side. "The number of cafeterias has been intentionally chosen to encourage social interaction among the crew. Alongside this, there are 3 game rooms, each for a different type of sports, and a Biodome Atrium." She says as she leads them out.
"It's truly a shame that you cannot eat our food. Our food processors don't have enough data to make the dextro-protein-based foods you consume within safety parameters. Perhaps next time."

They continue walking through the sparsely decorated hallways of the ship for a while before Dr. Paige leads them through a set of massive doors and a large elevator. As soon as the doors open, the Quarians are surprised. Stretching out before them is a thicket of trees with wind! a beautiful blue sky above.

"I-Is that the sky? When did we land on a planet?" One of Captain Zorah's aides asks bewildered.
"No, No, it's an artificial projection of the sky inside our biodome. You're still inside the ship." She says while trying and failing to suppress a small snort of laughter at seeing their reactions.
"What we have here is about 400 m of natural beauty. An artificially maintained grove of trees. Complete with small birds, animals, and even artificial weather. A slice of our home, no matter where we go." She explains with a smile.
"Amazing!" The Quarians say almost simultaneously, marveling at the unbelievable sight before their eyes, before unknowingly walking forward and touching the ground and the trees as if to check if they are real.
Dr. Paige suppresses an internal laugh watching the Quarians' bewilderment, instead just smiling. They remain there for a while, enjoying the biodome. After some time they head back to the hangar, and the tour concludes.

"Here, you can use this communicator to contact us later. We hope you enjoyed the tour and we can maintain good relations between our species in the future." Captain Cedar says handing over a large briefcase of sorts.

"Thank you, Captain Cedar, I hope so too. And we gladly accept. I wish you luck in your voyages" He says taking the communicator.

"And to you as well." Captain Cedar says as a farewell.

The Quarians board their shuttle and leave. Captain Cedar and Dr. Paige make their way back to the command deck.

"That went wonderfully, don't you think captain? If only those Batarians had also agreed to talks. Then again, with the data we now have on them, best not consort with slavers." Dr. Paige says with a smile.

"Yes…" Whatever Captain Cedar was about to say remained a mystery as suddenly the claxons started blaring, and Lena announced over the speakers, ~"We have confirmed Relay activation! Multiple ships! Turian designs!"~
Captain Cedar and Dr. Paige immediately rush to the command deck. And out of the viewing screens they see, hundreds of ships arrayed in front of them, and more coming out of the relay.

~"We are getting a communication request from the largest ship, all channels, Sir, ma'am."~

"Same procedure Lena, check for attacks and connect to an isolated system."

Soon a Turian face pops up on the holo screen.
"This is Admiral Bokinus, commander of the 7th Fleet of the Turian Hierarchy! And the Captain of the Dreadnought Tears of Menae! You are accused of harboring fugitives! Surrender and prepare to be searched! Co-operate and we shall not harm you!"

Captain Cedar is momentarily stunned by this declaration by the Turian Admiral. 'The sheer audacity! But maybe we can still talk it out, they haven't fired on us yet.'

"Connect me to the-" Before he could finish his sentence, suddenly claxons began blaring.

~"Shots fired! Shots fired! I repeat The Turians have begun firing on us! We just lost the frigate SSV Salt Lake! She had her shields down! We have multiple Impacts against shields! Shield integrity 97%!"~

"Arm the weapons! Begin Evasive maneuvers! Let's show these bastards what we're made of!" Captain Cedar orders.
"God help us all..." Dr Paige mutters...

~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~

Otherside of the Relay,
A few hours earlier,

The Batarian Captain was smiling with disgusting glee. He had just contacted a corrupt Turian friend of his who was a captain in the Turian 7th, and together they had somehow convinced the Admiral to bring the entire fleet to police a single Quarian cruiser. For this information, his turian friend had even agreed to send over some 'prisoners' of the new species. As he was contemplating this, the Turian fleet started entering the system, 450 ships, and a dreadnought.

Admiral Bokinus was not a happy Turian. First, his fleet's patrol route was abruptly shifted because the council wished to open a new relay, and then the Quarians went and opened one themselves. Oh, he didn't have a shred of doubt that the Batarian who provided the info, had probably forced the Quarians into opening the relay, but it was still illegal and he had a job to do. So here he was, with an entire patrol fleet, praying to the spirits that the system on the other side was empty.

"Are you sure you saw the Quarians open the relay?" He asks the batarian through the holo comms.
"Oh yes, it was them. I saw them myself." The batarian captain replies, omitting the fact that he had already sent ships to the other side.
"You are to remain in this system until our investigations are over, move even an inch and we will shoot you down. Understood?" Bokinus says irritated.
"Oh yes. Absolutely sir!" The batarian replies in mock obedience.

'Disgusting slaver scum! I so want to obliterate these bastards right now!' Bokinus thinks to himself as he orders his ships to enter the relay.

On the other side is an unbelievable sight, dozens of massive ships are floating in a loose formation.
"By the spirits! That thing's massive!" Someone says aloud.

'Calm down, Calm down, they might be peaceful, they haven't fired yet, maybe we can peacefully talk this out...' Admiral Bokinus tries to calm himself. "Broadcast me, all channels, standard procedure announcement" He orders.
"This is Admiral Bokinus of the Turian..."

~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~

Back to the present,

Admiral Bokinus shouts to his assistant officers, "Who fired without my command?!"
"Tha-That was Captain Ugleas, sir! The unknowns have already lost a ship!" The officer replies.

"Damn it!" Bokinus was now in a quandary. He could punish the offending captain and end this misunderstanding. But that would make the Turians seem weak, and waste Turian lives. Plus he had no guarantee the unknowns would listen now that they had lost a ship. OR he could join in and subdue the unknowns who were probably primitives, considering they didn't have shields. Then he could internally deal with the rogue captain while explaining the incident as a policing action upholding citadel law. Before he could come to a decision, however, an officer spoke up,

"Sir our other ships have begun firing too! It seems Captain Ugleas has caused a cascade reaction!"
Just like that the decision was taken out of Bokinus's hands.

"All ships fire and subdue the Unknowns!" He ordered.
With that order, all the turian ships began firing. The Human ships dodged and weaved, and to the Turians' dismay, all the shots seemed to miss.

"Sir! None of the shots are hitting! All of them are being deflected by small angles and completely missing the unknown ships!" A panicked officer reports.
"The Unknowns have begun firing! We just lost 17 ships!" Another announces.

"The enemy seems to be moving in towards us! And they just released fighters!" The reports keep coming in.

"Release our own fighters! And keep up the assault! We must win this!" Admiral Bokinus orders.

"We just lost 23 more ships! They are taking out our ships in a single hit!"

"Shit! The enemy dreadnoughts have entered knife-fighting range!"

"We are detecting massive energy buildup from that behemoth ship at the back of the enemy formation!"

A sense of deep foreboding and fear came over Admiral Bokinus. "All ships target the largest enemy ship! We cannot let whatever weapon they're charging to fire!" He orders, now in full panic.

"The enemy ships in knife fighting range have fired their broadsides! We just lost 148 ships! They have energy weapons! Shit! Shit!"

"Scramble! Scramble! Scramble!"

"The enemy super Dreadnought is firing!"

"By the spirits..."

~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~

Captain Cedar was angry, scratch that, he was furious. These 'Turians' had the gall, the sheer audacity to not only tell *HIS* ships to surrender, but to attack and kill *HIS* people completely unprovoked! This could not be allowed to stand!

"All ships weapons free! Send them to hell! Lena! Prepare the Lance!" He said calmly.

Soon all 42 human ships begin firing upon the Turians.

~"17 impacts, 17 kills. Lance charge: 29%"~

~"Second Volley, 23 impacts, 23 confirmed kills. Shield integrity 92%. Lance charge: 51%"~

~"Broadside Volley, 112 confirmed kills. 3rd volley 36 kills. Shield integrity 86%. Lance charge: 73%"~

~"2nd Broadside Volley 95 kills. Shield integrity 71%. Lance Fully Charged!"

"Fire!" Captain thunders.

In the blink of an eye 20 magnificent beams of light leave the main gun of the Valiant Royale. Each headed for a different turian ship. In that very instant the beams hit and those 20 ships and those surrounding them are reduced to molten slag.

~"Lance fire success. 54 enemy kills. 3rd Broadside Volley 81 kills. Shield integrity: 69%"~

"Stop engaging the enemy." Captain Cedar orders.

~"End of Combat. 418 hostiles eliminated. Casualties 1 frigate. SSV Salt Lake lost with all hands. Combat duration 13 minutes 10 seconds"~

Captain Cedar smirks and starts a systemwide transmission on all channels. "This is Captain Horace Cedar, Commander of the 13th Deep Exploration Fleet, of the Sol Confederation of Humanity! Surrender now and I promise no more blood will be shed."

~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~

Admiral Bokinus was shaking. Was it fear, or grief no one knew? With a trembling hand, he reached for the communicator. His throat was dry. "This is Admiral Bokinus of the turian 7th... I... I surrender..."

Then closing off the Comm, he asks in a raspy voice. "H-How many did we lose?"

"...418 ships... Lost with all crew..." The officer says in a trembling voice after a pause.

"What have I done..." Bokinus mutters to himself.

"Sir! Captain Ugleas is heading towards the relay! He is transmitting system-wide!"

"That coward Bastard! *#$$*$*###! " Admiral Bokinus shreiks.

"I am Captain Ugleas of the Turian Hierarchy! And unlike my Admiral! I do not surrender! The Turian Hierarchy will have its revenge you human primitives!" Ugleas declares as he escapes through the relay.

Back on the Valiant Royale, Captain Cedar observes this and orders. "Send all the data to high command. I don't have a good feeling about this..."

~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~

16:00 hours, June 11, 2300 Earth Standard.

Sector S8, Shanxi Theta System.

"Then let us begin by you telling your Turian friends to stop shooting at our ships? It's not doing any damage but it's getting annoying."

"Wha-What!?" Matriarch Polinia Exclaims.

"Yeah. Just a few minutes ago, your Turian friends came into the system and started shooting at us. We would be thankful if you could tell them to stop. It's becoming difficult not to retaliate, even though their ships aren't doing much damage."

"O-Ok. If you would lead me to the communication system, I would be happy to talk them down!" Matriarch Polinia exclaims louder than she intended.
Miss Goyle activates the holo comm terminal at the center of the table, which then provides a direct line to the command deck and the Turian ship. Soon the faces of Admiral Drescher and Commander Kylanius pop up.

"Commander Kylanius! why are you firing at the humans? they have been nothing but accommodating towards us!" Matriarch Polinia says.
"Matriarch, as of 2 hours ago, the Turian hierarchy has declared war on the Sol Confederation, and Humanity, as they have destroyed the 7th patrol Fleet!" Commander Kylanius says sternly.
"Just so you know, your 7th Fleet, fired upon our research fleet first and without provocation." Miss Goyle says nonchalantly.
"I refuse to believe that was a research fleet! Your fleet was harboring Quarian fugitives!" Commander Kylanius exclaims.
"Wait a minute. You're telling me the 7the fleet was wiped out by a... research fleet?" Matriarch Polinia asks with incredulity.
"And the research fleet had only 43 ships, mostly outdated models too." Miss Goyle says with a neutral expression.
"You see how outclassed you are? We could wipe you out and blockade that relay if we want, but we do not wish for needless bloodshed, that is why we are willing to talk this misunderstanding out." Miss Goyle continues with her neutral tone.

Then suddenly another face pops up on the comm screens.
"Ah! Captain Cedar, what a lovely surprise! I believe you have a person of interest who can clear up this mess?"
"Yes. I have here with me, Admiral Bokinus of the 7th fleet. Admiral, if you would?" Captain Cedar moves aside to allow Admiral Bokinus to stand in front.
"How is this possible... Captain Ugleus said you died..." Commander Kylanius says, surprise evident on his face.
"What else could I expect from that coward? The $#$$#$ Bastard was the one who shot at the human ships without reason, then abandoned our lines and left all of us to die! That traitorous piece of Filth! He was the one who gave us false info by colluding with a Batarian Slaver! He was the one who gave the Batarians the location of the Quarian ship! That corrupt Piece of ##$#$ $#!" As Admiral Bokinus went on arant, cursing Captain Ugleus, it was quite clear to everyone, that there had been a major mess up.

"Now that, things are a bit clearer, perhaps we can sit down and talk like civilized people?" Miss Goyle asked with a smile.

~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~

16:20 hours, June 11, 2300 Earth Standard.
Main Lab, New GenSys Institute, Cantauris City
Planet Sanctuary, Alpha Centauri, Sector S1

Julian was having a pretty nice day so far. Clarice had just said yes to his proposal, He was finally getting a vacation from the next day, and he had tickets for a nice trip to a resort on Venus for his entire family. Life was good, and he was sipping coffee from his "Coolest nerd ever" cup (Don't you dare judge him!) with a grin on his face while finishing the last bits of code on his computer. Suddenly AD-3V, the newest of the myriad robot workers in the lab approaches him.
"Ah! Abe! you need anything?" He asks the robot happily, as he considers it his magnum opus, his finest work in AI to date, and he likes treating 'Abe' almost like a son, even though he knows he's just code.
"Yes, Sir Julian. I have a query." Abe says in his monotone voice.
"Go on ask away." He says, thinking nothing of it, as self-learning programs require regular infusions of data anyway.
"I wish to know... Do I have a soul?" Abe asks with the slightest bit of curiosity in his voice.
Julian spits out his coffee...

~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~~XXXXX~~~~~~~

Cliffhanger Kun is back!

Lore time!

Lance Weapon: Lance Weapons are a type of composite super laser that is capable of targeting multiple enemies at a long distance. They are quite powerful and devastating but are also power-hungry and require extended charging times. Due to this, they are not very popular in most military ships. However, they are great for mounting on large ships that are not meant for active combat and don't need to use continuous barrages of other weapons while charging up the main gun.

Human Fighter craft: Human starfighters are usually unmanned and use AI & drones. Human pilots are only used in rare circumstances.

A/N
I really underestimated how sick I was. But now I'm back, and as promised, a new chapter! my longest yet! And with this First contact is done and dusted! Next chapter we will get into the nitty-gritty of the negotiations with the council of idiots! and don't worry, the backstabbing pirate lowlife trash shall not go unscathed!
So until then, have a great day/Night! See ya!