The Guardian Ch 5

Disclaimer: Mass Effect and Destiny belong to BioWare and Bungie

Chapter 5

"What is this Dot, what am I looking at right now?" I'm in disbelief. These aliens, these Asari, if you would change their skin color, and add some hair, they would look like a regular human women. Dot herself takes a moment to just take in the image. "The Asari were one of the founding members of the Citadel Council, the first to find the Citadel to be exact, and if the Turians are the military arm of the Council then the Asari are the diplomatic one's" She starts changing the monitor once again where I can see can see a alien ship heading to Shanxi, it looks completely like a new ship, where the Turians had angles and looked like a bird flying through space, the Asari are more rounded and curvy. I watch as the ship is flying through Shanxi atmosphere to where it so it can land near the colony. "Unfortunately before they were able to bring a cease fire to the conflict, General Williams, who was the highest working chain of command at the time, all of our space fairing parties didn't make it to Shanxi, they only had enough time to send the marines they had on hand ground side to aid in the battle." The monitor changes to a withered looking man who looks like he has seen better days.

"General Williams, with all of our space control all but lost, and the news that while they were able to send out an distress signal it would take weeks before any help could arrive, tried to survive with the colonist and soldiers doing everything they could to buy some time... " the screen start to scroll down slowly. "Unfortunately, he viewed this as a lost cause and thought that the best plan of action was the surrender to the Turians, and make sure that they would be treated accordingly to prisoners of war." Gaining a sense of defeat, I make sure to give this General a good look over. "He's so old, even for the time of the contact war... to be the first human to surrender to an alien force, his life must have become even more difficult when humanity finally showed up." Dot, nodding her head "you would be correct, he was frowned upon once word got back to earth, the System Alliance, earths acting space government, took a lot of fire from this as well."

Dot changes the screen "so to the aid of the Asari, the conflict was put ot rest, and we were able to learn of the acting Galactic Government, and of the Citadel itself." Then I see a structure, its big, real big. Bigger then even the relay's we saw. Dot turning back to me now "this is the Citadel, the center for the Council and all its associated species." The screen starts show more pictures of different species. "Asari, Salarians, Turians, Elcor, Hanar, Volus, Batarians... " that last one, I can catch a hint of anger in her voice when she called them... "Krogan, and Quarians." The Krogan looks like they would have some similarities with the Cabal. Dot gives me a second to get a good look at all of the species she just mention, allowing me to start creating a profile for them in my head. She then starts closing them until only the Krogan and Quarians are left, "these 2 species are loosely connected to the Citadel, it seems in the past there was some problems that caused these 2 to be pretty much exiled form the Citadel."

Giving Dot a questionable look "what happened?" She pulls the Krogan up closer, "the Krogan were an uplifted race, uplifted by the Salarians, to fight in, what was called the Rachni war, again I'll explain them later, just know that they were killed to extinction." She then pulls up the Salarians again, "once the war was over they pretty much set the Krogan free, but that caused another problem, you see the Krogan reproduce exceptionally fast, so fast that it was causing problems." Looking between the 2 I can kinda see what happened. "Let me guess, the Krogans got uplifted by the Salarians to be nothing more the shock troopers, and when the war was over, and the Salarians set them free, all they new to do was war... am I close?" "Your spot on it really, so when the Krogan became a problem, instead of helping them to find a way of life, or talking to them at least to but some birth limits in place, the Salarians decided that it would be easier instead to launch what is called the Geno-phage."

She pulls up everything in the codex explaining the geno-phage. "It was a way to halt the Krogan birth rates, and it worked, they went to an explosive birth rate, to slowly being genocide." Reading over the archive I see something that shocks me to the core "wait, it didn't reduce the egg production, but increased miscarriage instead?!" Dot sounds far like she's far away right now, probably disgusted by what she's saying "yes, instead of lower sperm and egg production the geno-phage makes it to were the mothers womb attacks their own babies... I mean I can understand, desperate measures require desperate calls, but why do it this why, or even better why do it for so long they should have had more then enough time to change it so it doesn't kill the babies?!" She's mad, and I don't blame her I'm furious as well, even I find it disgusting to kill unborn children. I mean, sure if we had the chance we would probably do the same to the Hive or even the Fallen, but not this way, I would fight tooth and nail if this was the answer the Vanguard found. I would do everything in my power to change how the virus acted.

God, not even the darkness attempted something like this during the collapse, human population would have been extinct by now. "Dot, when we get a chance I want to fix this, this abomination to life itself... " Dot looks at me with determination and gives me on firm nod "I don't care if the entire Galactic Council declares us public enemy number 1, this virus will not exist longer then it needs to." Going back to the screen "...so if that's the Krogans, what happened to the Quarians, what was so bad that they got exiled themselves?"

Dot shake's herself back to attention "apparently they broke another of the Citadel Laws... " I give here this look, "really... is it Citadel law to go bat shit crazy for breaking any of them at all?" She gives me this little huff "I would think if it was then that government is crazy, and shouldn't be the working government." Giving a little huff myself while nodding my head, "what law did they break?" Dot pulls up the Citadel law's while saying "they created AI's."

I turn to look at her with a deadpan stare... "AI? It's illegal to have AI's?" Finding the law itself on the screen she turns and looks at me "yes, apparently they decided that AI's were to dangerous to create and made it illegal, excluding the fact that any species can be just as dangerous, I mean I just gave you 2 examples of what these species did, and they find AI's to a line they won't cross?"

She sounds very annoyed by the whole situation. I mean really ban something because it's to dangerous yet release the geno-phage... come on that just sounds stupid. "So, what, the Quarians got caught trying to or already made an AI?" Shaking my head "if that was true then they could have simply shut it down and taken the punishment itself, why the exile?" Dot brings up a new screen titled the morning war, "apparently they we not trying to make an AI, they were trying to interconnect their VI working droids, to boost performance." She pulls another image showing a machine of some type with, what looks like a glowing light bulb for a head. "This is called a Geth, it means "servant of the people" in Khelish, they Quarian language, when they connected the Geth they accidentally created a hive mind." Humming to myself, I start getting a mental image of what must have happened "so what the Citadel sent the Turians forcing them to shut down the Geth and they refused?" Dot starts shaking her head no while she tells me the real reason. "No, when the Geth be came fully active they asked a question "do I have a soul" and apparently this scared the Quarians so much, and in fearing of the Citadel they attempted to shut down the Geth, the Geth did not like that at all and a conflict came out of it." "At the end of it the Quarians had to abandon their home-world and flee to the Citadel, asking for aid to take there home-world back, the Citadel in its immense knowledge decided that this was their own fault and that they couldn't colonies a new world and come back to the Citadel until they defeated the Geth and claimed their home-world back.

I give Dot this look filled with disgust and anger, "WHAT!?"