Chapter 01

Captain Lawrence DeVrill moved slowly through the halls of his destroyer, the USV Northern Drift, as he siped at his small cup of coffee. His ship was joined by one other USMCN Abrams class heavy destroyer, the USV Hero's Veil, and four smaller Dunkirk class frigates in the task of shifting another,currently dormant, Mass Relay that was found near one of the newer colonies to have been made, Shanxi. While it was a slow-going job, it was important nonetheless as these devices were deemed very dangerous and should be moved away from any United Systems Alliance colony at all costs. Once moved, an Alliance science vessel traveling with the small task force, the USSV Levinson, would activate the relay and send a probe through to reconnoiter the area surrounding the relay theirs connected to.

The man of forty-two had a growing sense of discomfort has he watched the towing progress finish out a nearby port-hole, and the relay activate. DeVrill felt as though the entire universe was about to shift, and that the Military Command as well as the Alliance didn't know exactly what to do if it did. Sighing, he took one more sip of his lukewarm coffee before turning about to walk towards the CIC to find out what the probe was sending back.

Unknown to him for the moment, was that his gut feeling was about to ring true.

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On patrol near one of the many dormant Mass Relays that could be found around Citadel Space, a fleet of Turian vessels watch and listen for any possible threats. A general sense of boredom from inaction could be felt around the fleet. The only action they had encountered within the last few months was two separate small smuggling vessels and a civilian craft that had been damaged near an asteroid field.

Onboard the Turian flag vessel, one of the two cruisers in the task force, the operator in charge of the scanners was lazily watching his terminal for any small pirate vessels or smuggling vessels passing through the area when all of a sudden his scanners began screaming, drawing the notice of both the officer and his C/O, Secutor Didinius. They were both shocked to realize that the relay designated 315 was activating.

"Is this accurate?" Secutor asked. The younger officer ran multiple systems diagnostics to see if there were any faults in the systems. He quickly had an answer for his superior.

"Negative, sir. The sensors are working perfectly. Someone is activating a relay that 315 connects to, Relay 314. Sir, I'm detecting a small device coming through the relay," the young officer states.

External cameras began viewing the small device and the sensor operator began making sweeps of the device.

"Is that device a probe of some kind?" Secutor questioned.

"Yes, sir. It looks like it was sent to study this side of the relay system. Sir, I'm detecting a buildup of energy on the device!" Both officers kept their eyes glued to external viewing cameras as they watched the device self-destruct in a small, nuclear fireball. "Sir, the device just destroyed itself with a nuclear weapon of some kind. It was completely vaporized."

Secutor stood still his mind reeling. A new species was opening Mass Relays, a crime in all of Citadel space, and they also used nuclear weapons, which is also against Citadel law. His small hesitation ended with a new order.

"Open communications with the rest of the fleet. Tell them that we are going to pass through the relay and make sure this ignorant species is brought to justice for their crimes against the Citadel." The order was passed along and in just a few minutes, all vessels were assembled in a loose formation, and moved towards the Mass Relay. Several moments later, the relay would launch those same vessels at FTL speeds to their new targets.

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"Telemetry from the probe is coming through now, Sir," a young ensign states. Captain DeVrill nods his head and waits to hear the preliminary reports. Not even a minute later, that same ensign screamed out something that no human has wanted to hear for over 150 years. "Unidentified contacts! I repeat, unidentified contacts on the other side of the relay!"

Everyone was frozen on the deck, even Captain DeVrill. Not a single alien contact had been found since the War of 1996. Fear spread through DeVrill's body faster than adrenaline, but he was quicker with putting it down.

"Prepare First-Contact package, destroy the probe, tell the Levinson to discontinue their research and to fall back behind us," he looked to his communications officer. "Sound General Quarters throughout the fleet." The crew on the deck quickly go to work all while an alarm was blaring.

"GENERAL QUARTERS! GENERAL QUARTERS! ALL HANDS, MAN YOUR BATTLESTATIONS!" DeVrill looked upon his crew with pride as they worked their stations. He could see the underlying fear in all of them, but they pushed it aside to do the jobs they were trained to do. He just hoped that training held. Several minutes later he would get the chance to test his crew and the crews of the small task force.

"Sir, I'm detecting a small force of ships coming through the relay. Two destroyer analogues, four frigate analogues, and seven smaller class of vessels. They are running with defenses engaged and weapons hot!" the ensign readsd out.

"Engage shields but do not activate weapons just yet. Let's try and be diplomatic about this. Comms, send over the FC Package on every frequency. Even try it on radio, hell even morse code to try and get it through if they can possibly understand that. Let's hope they are far more diplomatic than they appear to be."

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"Dropping out of FTL now, Sir. I'm detecting two cruiser class, five destroyer class vessels, and a single frigate class vessel. Sir, their power readings are massive. The destroyers are putting out more power than a dreadnought!" the scanner operator reports to Didinius. Before he could give out an order, his communications officer spoke up.

"They are broadcasting something over all frequencies. Looks like a First-Contact Package. Should we respond?" the young Turian asked. The sensor operator spoke up before Secutor could respond, however.

"They have engaged barriers, but their weapons are still offline, Sir."

"Don't bother with their communication. They have broken several Citadel laws and are ignorant to the use of nuclear weapons and the reactivation of Mass Relays. We have to teach them a lesson. Target the lead destroyer first. We'll move through their ranks and then hit that frigate and the two cruisers. Fire at will," Secutor ordered.

Across the Turian fleet, Accelerator rounds were fired and blazed their way to the USMCN vessels.

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"Incoming fire! All hands brace for impact!" Lawrence DeVrill screamed out to his crew. A slight shaking signified the impact of the aliens' weapon fire. "Status?"

"Minimal damage across the board, sir. All ships signify that their shields took the hits in stride. Sir, the alien fleet is changing their tactics. They are all pointing their guns at the same target, the USV Disciple!" one of the command staff reported.

"Have the frigate captains get in close and use their Onagers on the smaller vessels, use MAC's on the frigates if they can. Have the USV Hero's Veil join us in using Plasma lances against the destroyers! Fire at will!" DeVrill felt his ship shudder as the powerful Plasma Lance fired off alongside the lance of the Veil. He watched as the blasts passed clean through one of the two enemy destroyers with ease.

Sadly, the lances were fired too late as the alien ships were able to focus all their fire on the Disciple before the alien destroyer went up in flames. The shields of the targeted frigate held as the first few accelerator rounds hit, but the larger rounds from the alien destroyers drained the shields, letting the remaining rounds hit the armor. Luckily, the antimatter reactors weren't hit, but DeVrill could see a lot of the ship's personnel float dead in space alongside their crippled mothership.

DeVrill's blood boiled at the sight. He was not going to lose any more men this day.

"All vessels, fire everything you have bar nuclear and antimatter ordinance. Teach these clowns a lesson they won't soon forget!" Across his fleet, DeVrill watched with pride as his fleet engaged the enemy force at knife-fight ranges, and though they were outnumbered a bit, the Alliance warships were making quick work of the alien forces. Through the carnage, DeVrill noticed the other destroyer was holding station to the rear of the alien force, firing off its main weapon at Alliance frigates that aren't too close to target.

"That looks like their command vessel. Tactical, I am giving the ok for the launch of a cold fusion warhead. Fire it directly to the rear of that destroyer and detonate it remotely. Hopefully the EMP effect will knock out it's electronic systems. I want boarding parties ready to go as soon as that ship goes dark," he ordered. "All vessels, this is DeVrill. Prepare for Thundershock!" DeVrill yelled over the comms.

Across the Alliance fleet, crews readied for Thundershock, which was the codename for the detonation of nuclear ordinance near friendly targets. As soon as they all gave a green light for ready, the Northern Drift launched the missile. The alien forces opened up with anti-air weapons to try and destroy it, but the missile was moving too fast for the targeting systems to get a solid lock.

The Turians watched in fear as the missile detonated just to the rear of their lead vessel, and the resulting EMP shut down everything aboard the Turian cruiser. Small shuttles were then launched from the Drift to begin boarding actions. The remaining few Turian captains were horrified at the loss of so many of ships and the detonation of one of the most powerful nuclear devices they had ever seen. The individual captains worked together for a fighting retreat. Only two Turian frigates and one destroyer actually managed to escape through the relay.

DeVrill watched the retreating vessels as they passed through the relay. Then he turned his attention to what was left on the battlefield. Bar a few disabled alien vessels firing off their AA weapons in a futile attempt to do some damage, there was only the mopup of the USV Disciple as well as the capture of the alien destroyer and any other vessels that still had life signs aboard them.

"Get me a line to Sgt. Whittaker," he ordered.

"Yes, sir!" A moment later a grizzly voice could be heard over the intercoms of the CIC.

"This is Whittaker, go ahead!" the sergeant exclaimed, munitions could be heard firing through the comms.

"Whittaker, this is DeVrill. How is the boarding action going?"

"We have managed to take over most of the ship but they are putting up a real good fight when it comes to, what we believe to be, the CIC and Engineering sections of the ship. We have prisoners and are stowing them in the Mess Hall. We could use some reinforcements if you have them," Whittaker reported.

"Alright, I'll have the Veil send over what they can spare but we are capturing other vessels as well out here, so it may take a while to get you those reinforcements."

"Roger that. We'll do what we can. Whittaker out." With that the comms went silent as the crew and their commanding officer, took in what had just occurred. Then DeVrill decided to make one more call.

"Comms, get me Rear Admiral Hiller."

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Secutor Didinius was beyond horrified at what occurred. Not only did the aliens have energy weapons, but their ships were strong enough to take everything his task force could give and more. Basically, his task force was curb-stomped, and the numerous alien boarding parties roaming about his ship was just kicking them while they were down. While he did manage to damage one of their ships, it was ultimately worthless when it came to the full battle. Now he had to fight for his life aboard his very own ship.

He and the remainder of his bridge crew had sealed the blast doors to the room and had their rifles trained on the doorway, ready for when it was to be breached. Secutor could hear the aliens screaming out in their foreign language through the door, most likely orders to find a way through. Several minutes passed and the doors screeched open and every armed Turian opened fire. After everyone began reloading, several small items were thrown into the room from the hall.

Before Secutor could scream out for everyone to take cover, the flashbang grenades had blinded him and deafened his ears. He could feel he was rolling on his side in pain before being pulled up by what he could tell wasn't a member of his crew. That meant that the aliens had managed to take his command staff out and they now had control of his ship, as far as he knew. While there was still fighting to take engineering, a similar tactic would render the Turians in there incapacitated and give the aliens the opportunity to rush in and take control.

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"Early reports have the number of dead from the Disciple being over 120 personnel. Possibly more as the ships communications systems went offline when they were hit, and with all the boarding actions, we haven't been able to send over a team to offer medical assistance. Though I do have reports that we have managed to take full control of, what we believed to be their flag vessel, so I will have any spare teams be moved to offer aid to the crew of the Disciple. Three enemy vessels managed to get through the relay before we could disable them. We are most likely going to see a larger force arrive within the next few weeks, sir," DeVrill reported to Rear Admiral Dylan Hiller Jr., the grandson of one of the heroes from the War of '96. The darker skinned man held a thoughtful look for a moment.

"And you are sure that they didn't offer any sort of communication in response to yours?" he asked.

"As I stated, sir, we tried everything from modern communications systems to old-style radio and even morse code. While I know that is ridiculous, sir, I decided to be thorough and try not to screw this up," DeVrill responded. His shoulders slumped before speaking again. "Sadly I failed in that regard and now the majority of the Disciple's crew is dead because of it."

"Don't beat yourself up about it, son. If what you say is true to what occurred, you did everything beyond correct. This new alien threat is at fault for the losses, and they hold that alone. Now, do you believe these beings to be Protheans? I think we can agree they definitely aren't Locusts."

"No, sir. I don't believe they are. The technology and ships just don't add up to what the Protheans had. If I may, sir, I have noticed something else."

"What is it?"

"Sir, both the ancient Protheans and this new species have something in common. The tech that they both used looks like a reverse-engineered variant of the Mass Relays. I don't think the Protheans, nor this new species, built the Mass Relays at all, sir. I think the relays are older than we think," DeVrill explained. Again, the Admiral looked thoughtful.

"I'll see what the higher-ups think about your theory. But first we have to prepare for a possible alien counter-attack. I'm on my way with my fleet and we'll be picking up several more Pearl-Harbor class defensive stations to deploy over Shanxi. We'll be arriving within the next few hours to help with clean-up and to set up some preliminary defenses around the relay. Hiller out." The Rear Admiral gave a salute that DeVrill reciprocated before the transmission was ended.

As his crew ran about the CIC, DeVrill looked through the monitors to see the stars beyond the battlefield. He was trying to get one last good moment of peace before all hell broke loose over Shanxi.

Author's Note: This is my first chapter of a new series that had intrigued me for quite a while now. A codex for what has led up to these events can be found in my profile as well as my Stargate: Enterprise story if you are interested in a stargate/star trek crossover story. I'll be giving a notification about this first chapter on the codex as well as updating the codex with several new pieces of information. Don't forget to leave comments to help me improve this story. Thank you! - D'terran