A/N

I've held this fic in an indefinite hiatus for some time now, due in no small part to being squeezed dry of ideas and of inspiration. Thanks to the pandemic, however, I've been given ample enough time to go over my unfinished works and I've decided to give this one another go. Being cooped up, after all, has its benefits.

Tempting as it had been, I thought of just scrapping the idea and start from scratch, but then thought it would have gone to waste. There's potential in this, and I hope by the time the reviews start pouring in, I would be proven right.

If I'm wrong, well, too bad. I've got writer's OCD, I need to finish what I've started.

So, think of this rewrite as an addendum to my old idea of the Kondrusa, and allow me to share with you an idea that would hopefully add flavor to a half-dead franchise.

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Like the waves of the ocean, formless space takes whatever influences it and mirrors its nature. From the smallest roll to the crashing tide, beautiful and powerful, the void assumes a brief parody of its environment before fading away into nothing.

Among the stars, hidden from the eyes of the primitives that lived below in their worlds sheltered from the wars raged above, this sentiment could not be more true. The bright flashes of red and white, however, were not the stars, but ordnance detonating against armor and super-heated plasmic discharge piercing energy shields.

Around the Mass Relay, the only conduit of interstellar travel existing in the expanse, dozens of battleships poured out of FTL jump, narrowly avoiding the debris field formed from the derelict war vessels destroyed in the most recent battle. These ships were uniquely shaped like the fissile and laminated form of shale rocks, wore the colors of blackest obsidian, and proudly bore the scarlet standards of their empire. These were Prothean ships, tasked with hunting down their sworn enemy and avenging their fellows who died there.

Their foes resumed their defense upon picking up the energy signatures emitted by the Protheans. The imperials didn't bother masking their presence this time, they wanted them to know they were coming. Their bravado, however, proved costly as the defenders soon showed.

Year after year, the Protheans would come knocking at their door, eager to gain a foothold on the expanse that remained so hard to reach. Their efforts were spurred and fueled by an age-long hatred for the artificial lifeforms, whose civilization spanned an uncharted territory in close proximity to the vast empire of the Protheans. The sacrifices were well worth the cost if they would deny their enemy the hard-worked ground they conquered.

Ixthunn, they called this place, or "The Bloody Expanse". It was an expanse formed by many systems rich with priceless minerals that would benefit whatever power seized it first greatly. Naturally, the Protheans coveted it the most. Unfortunately, their enemy settled there first. They had laid claim to only two systems before the Protheans attacked. Though they had control over such a small territory in the expanse, they would not give them up so easily.

"The Bloody Expanse" they called it, and for good reason.

One Mass Relay, only one, gave access to the expanse. Like a gate to paradise, or rather, to hell. The Empire spent untold resources and manpower to attempt to wrest control away from the enemy and claim the gifts of the expanse for their own.

Though the defenders fought hard, gradually the Protheans chipped away at their strength and soon gained the upper hand. The imperials were as endless as the tide of the ocean, and they, as the flimsy sandbar upon its shores, were doomed to soon break from the waves.

Protected by a small network of orbital space stations set in the gravity wells of every planet under their control in the system, the overseeing intelligence directed every protocol into slowing the Prothean advance, so that it may at least finish its work. These stations, each possessing a deadly arsenal of interplanetary plasma cannons and hangars filled with swarms of unmanned fighters, were ready to deliver their punishing messages to the invaders.

What little remained of the defending fleet was stationed close to the mothership, a massive construct of alien material in the shape of an obelisk. Almost the size of a small asteroid and orbiting a terran world not far from the Mass Relay, the mothership housed the overseeing intelligence, protecting it as it worked undisturbed to perfect its creation.

Named as the Metakon by the Protheans, who could never comprehend the true name of the race as they had long transcended conventional speech, the two had been embroiled in an unceasing struggle for dominance in the galaxy since the day they first met. The Protheans may have forgotten who struck first, but the Metakon never did.

The curse of the Metakon was like the curse of all inorganic beings, in that they could never reproduce as much as organics did. Though seemingly eternal, procreation had always been deemed as the true course to ensure that their race would last forever. Such a gift was sacrificed in their ascension, of course, and proved to be the biggest flaw in their design. Though made free from the trappings of the flesh, the machines still needed a physical anchor and were still subject to harm. With casualties mounting, and the Protheans gaining ground, extinction seemed inevitable and so the Metakon devoted their resources to self-preservation.

One such project, the one undertaken in the Bloody Expanse, saw to the creation of the Metakon's salvation and instrument of vengeance.

A tall figure, regal and majestic, paced calmly across the cold glass floor. A manifestation of a soul transformed long ago from body to formless and complex program, a taboo that welcomed the hatred of the Protheans, but nonetheless a living being, oversaw the final phases to its project. This being, whose form seemed to be made entirely of corporeal light, assessed the information flooding into its mind and concluded that its time was short. The work it had tirelessly hoped to succeed was nearing completion, but it realized it may not remain alive to enjoy its benefits.

The Metakon intelligence watched carefully as, one by one, the orbital defense stations holding the Prothean fleet at bay caught fire and came apart as bright green beams of light cut through their shields. Destabilized by the failing systems buoying them above the heavy pull of gravity, the stations broke down and plummeted into the atmosphere of each planet they orbited.

As the burning debris cleared away following the destruction of the orbital stations, the Protheans were left at last to continue their assault unabated. Slowly, they made their way through space and targeted the Metakon mothership.

The intelligence turned its attention to the lower levels of the mothership, accessing the drones there directly to observe the first successfully re-engineered primitives taken from the local system.

The drones, sleek-bodied machines resembling cephalopods with their bulbous heads directly attached to their torsos and multiple elongated metal tentacles capable of performing multiple tasks at once, hummed to life and hovered over to the room opposite of their storage unit. They passed the heavy security doors on their way out, and stopped upon reaching the chamber holding the nutrient pods that encased the first batch of bio-engineered primitives.

Both drones' multiple eyes made an audible series of clicks as the connection between the overseeing intelligence and the drones themselves weakened, causing their shutters to open and close repeatedly. The intelligence assessed the situation again and concluded that the Protheans were firing some form of subspace signal jamming wave to prevent the mothership from calling out to its allies for help. It adapted quickly, focusing all its efforts on finishing its intended task while the remaining defending ships were ordered to make one last desperate attempt to slow the Protheans' advance.

The drones selected two of the pods and moved them into the testing chamber.

Once they had made certain that the chamber was sealed to prevent escape, they opened the nutrient pods, hovering back quickly as the capsule doors slid open with a loud pop. Thick green juices smelling sweet of carbohydrates and proteins gushed out in torrents, dripping free from the pods as they poured onto the floor. Drainage slits opened in the floor in response to this, allowing the juices to seep through and leave the floor clear of the mess. The pods' occupants stumbled out of their cells and onto the floor weakly as they were so suddenly pulled from sleep. Coughing violently in an attempt to rid their respiratory systems of the stray juices, the primitives instinctively fumbled around their faces for the plastic tubes inserted into their orifices and gently pried them out.

Freed to breathe in the sterile, crisp air of the room, the primitives found strength to stand on their two feet.

Legs and arms wrapped in steely, bulging muscles, stretched and strained against flesh. Course, hard leathery skin filled with overlapping scales of dull brown, red and mottled yellow, grew taut as the impressive forms of the Metakon's creations stood to their full height. Half-webbed toes wiggled upon touching the cold chamber floor. Two reptilian eyes of bright green peered through oval sockets, protected by two sets of eyelids that blinked repeatedly as they adjusted to the brightness of the room.

Both were males, distinguished from their female counterparts by their increased stature and bulky frame. They stood with their necks bending slightly forward, a consequence of extra musculature stretching across their shoulders and back to compensate for the loss of their wings. Overlapping plates, starting from the small of their backs and running up through their spine to meet at the back of their heads, the plates formed a prominent crown that extended over the lobes that functioned as ears, forward into the forehead, meeting only above the apex of the brows. These plates then jutted backwards, forming two prominent horns that seemed to vibrate with each breath they took from their near-flat, protruding noses.

Hands sporting four fingers, with corresponding opposable thumbs, flexed and clenched tightly into fists as the males turned their attention to one another, then to the hovering drones from which the overseeing intelligence observed their behavior.

Then, a device was brought into the testing chamber. A cylindrical object with strange glowing patterns that hummed with power and glowed yellow, the device was brought close to the vicinity of the two primitives. Then, a photonic projection of a Prothean, quickly made tangible by crystals, was presented into the testing chamber. This noticeably agitated the primitives, though more out fear than hostility.

Activated, the cylindrical device emitted a signal that, while almost unnoticeable by most sensors, was quickly picked up on by the primitives.

Their horns vibrated in short bursts, twice in succession, and their overall behavior changed in an instant. They howled, beating their fists angrily on the floor and snapping at one another in a crude display of quickly formed alliance. Then, they lunged for the projection and shattered it into a million pieces.

More projections were used, and obliterated by the impressive strength of the two primitives. Still, this did not satisfy the overseeing intelligence. Intent on finding out the extent of its creation's capabilities, it halted the production of the Prothean projections and waited to see what would happen.

Left without a foe to destroy, and with the device's signal still buzzing in their heads, it didn't take long for the primitives to find an enemy in one another.

The bigger one turned his wrath on the smaller primitive, and swung his open hand across his victim's face, intent on scratching out his eye. The claws missed the smaller primitive's eye, but opened several cuts across his face. Instinct was strong within the two, and the smaller one displayed this by adapting quickly. Though their combat prowess was crude at best, there was some semblance of inherent technique in the smaller one's actions.

It used the bigger primitive's weight and strength against it, closing the distance between them and avoiding the reach of the bigger one's claws by grappling him from behind. Opening his mouth, the smaller one sank his teeth into the bigger one's neck. The vicious bite caused the bigger one to howl in agony, for this was the first time he had experienced pain, whimpering piteously as the smaller one kept a tight grip on him with his teeth.

The smaller primitive needn't express it as much, but he demanded the bigger one's submission.

The bigger primitive thrashed wildly, attempting to throw the smaller one off of his back. Frustrated with his opponent's obstinacy, the smaller one quickly got up and slammed his knee into his kin's face. There was a loud crack as hard carapace hit bone, and the bigger primitive yelped and curled up into a ball on the floor.

The smaller primitive brought his face close to his beaten opponent's head, and with his mouth still bloody from the bite earlier he roared in his ear. The bigger one slowly sat up. As the overseeing intelligence watched, it assumed that the primitive would try to fight a second time, owing to its size and evidently far superior strength. Surprisingly, the bigger primitive did the opposite, and willingly submitted. It displayed a secondary instinctual response to defeat, showing respect to the strengths that the smaller primitive possessed that he did not.

The intelligence saw a potential structure of the primitive race's hierarchy, and postulated that they would indeed become a well-structured slave race, provided that once this crisis it was currently undergoing passed and its creation survived long enough for the Metakon to make use of.

With that, the intelligence switched off the device and stopped the signal, withdrawing immediately to begin the last stage of its project.

Then, left alone by the overseeing intelligence, an amazing thing happened.

No longer rendered hostile by the signal, the victorious primitive was left quizzical, almost as if nothing of what transpired registered in his mind. Upon seeing the results of his actions earlier, the primitive's expression turned to horror. Mortified by his display of violence, the primitive showed a sudden change in his overall behavior- or rather, he reverted to his normal state. Showing concern for his enemy, he moved to inspect the injuries of his defeated kin.

The bigger primitive looked up, gasping for air as he was left breathless from exertion. He showed his wounded neck to his superior, allowing the other primitive to see that the wound quickly closed over.

Giving commands to the entire vessel, the overseeing intelligence willed the mothership to detach its most precious cargo.

A smaller obelisk, housing thousands upon thousands of vat-grown primitives- future soldiers of the Metakon- encased within nutrient pods, was launched discreetly from the mothership and sent hurtling through space towards a targeted planet far from the system where the Relay was located. This preset world had been scanned and sufficiently terraformed to accommodate the primitives and provide a much needed environment for their population to grow, that one day the Metakon would uplift them and use them to fight against the Protheans.

A new race of bio-engineered soldiers, conditioned to be entirely devoted to the Metakon and fight their wars. The perfect weapon against the Prothean Empire.

But, sacrifices must be made to ensure that these primitives would remain to serve the Metakon, and not their enemies. Access to this system needed to be severed, with the obelisk's automated and heavily encrypted signal used to call out to the Metakon once the failsafe procedure was complete.

The failsafe; a simple and potent protocol that would destroy all intruders but would ultimately destroy the Relay and the system around it. The intelligence calculated that the resulting supernova-level blast from the Relay's destruction would destroy the system, but the maximum reach would be close to the preset world's system without destroying its creation. The variable, dictating that the blast may be stronger than calculated and may destroy several more planets adjacent to the preset world, had been deemed acceptable.

The primitives will survive. They must.

There was a brief moment wherein the mothership started to vibrate intensely as its thrusters pushed it free from the planet's gravity well and off to space. Prothean beams hammered against its shields, some even punching through and cut into the bulkheads. Gradually, the mothership picked up speed as it headed closer and closer to the Mass Relay.

Thinking that the Metakon mothership was attempting to escape the system, the Prothean battleships followed close, firing ceaselessly as they relentlessly pursued the massive vessel. All the while, the seedship sent by the mothership had slipped away, gaining precious distance from the killzone and into deep space.

The overseeing intelligence, content that its work would live on, ignored the reports screaming at it of the critical damage done to its ship and fixed its attention on the Mass Relay. By the time the Protheans realized what the mothership was actually doing, it was already too late. They had crossed the terminal threshold, their fate was sealed.

The massive, ringed construct sensed the presence of the vessel and pulled it close to its core, further accelerating the mothership deeper and deeper into the stabilizer rings that functioned as interstellar FTL jump propellants. The rings came apart, slicing the mothership's prow into pieces, and unleashed the energies housed within. A brilliant flash of blue light momentarily blinded all who looked upon the relay's destruction, then followed by a powerful wave of fire and pure, unadulterated element zero.

Like the waves of the ocean, formless space takes whatever influences it and mirrors its nature. From the smallest roll to the crashing tide, beautiful and powerful, the void assumes a brief parody of its environment before fading away into nothing.

The seedship arrived upon its intended destination.

The preset world, a terran paradise filled with huge forests, crystalline lakes and towering snow-capped mountains, had been deemed the most suitable breeding ground for the primitives. This was also due to the fact that the primitives, prior to their alterations, had been taken from this planet. To the intelligence, it seemed logical that their homeworld would be the most hospitable and adapting to its environment should be easy.

Hovering above a chasm within the earth, the seedship twisted itself about so its prow would face the bottom of the chasm before slowly descending into it. A violent shudder ran through the planet surface and a large dust cloud burst free from the landing zone as the seedship tunneled its way deep into the crack until only the barest tip of its rear could be seen above the chasm.

Fulfilling its first directive, the seedship unleashed a swarm of construction drones, not unlike the ones presiding over the test subjects back on the mothership. These were tasked to spread out across the planet and given a single design to construct. Each drone, supplied with a black metalloid fluid on special packs latched onto their torso plates, was grouped with its fellows into a dozen each. These groups were relayed with the planetary map, systematically designated a sector to build upon, and dismissed.

As the drones dutifully spread out to carry out their orders, the seedship began its next directive.

The doors were opened, and the seedship's precious cargo was finally introduced to its new home.

Hours later, hands emerged from the dark chasm and grasped the edge of the cliffs. The first primitive emerged, a towering giant, hoisted himself up onto solid ground, away from the chasm from which he climbed free from, and beheld the land before him. He took a moment to take in the beautiful grassy plains, the pink and red horizon in the distance, and the sky that now displayed the stars in all their splendor. The primitive male looked down and bent over to extend a helping hand to the one that came next to him.

A female, who had awoken him from his pod when he had been slow to adjust to the Great Awakening, held firmly to his hand as he pulled her out of the chasm. Upon seeing what he saw, she too gazed in wonder at their new home.

Now, others emerged from the chasm too. They came, male and female in equal number, still damp from the green nutritious juices of their pods, to claim the world as the dominant species. When awe and wonder faded, the unrelenting instinct to seize control of the land- their new territory- overtook the males.

Those with the largest horns, the Great Horned Ones, emitted a vibrating howl as their horns shook their many plates together. These Great Horned Ones were fewer in number than those with less prominent horns, but were by far the largest of them, standing at an impressive seven to eight feet in height. A massive brawl immediately ensued, with the lesser horned males looking on to see who would be victorious.

It was not for sport that they looked on, but for an eager anticipation for the strongest male to lead. An inexplicable and quite basic instinct, undoubtedly left there by their creators, but a necessity in this case.

An hour later, only two remained alive out of the dozens of Great Horns that battled there. One was the giant, the first primitive to emerge into the light. The other was distinguished by a broken left horn, more in bad shape than the bigger one.

As the giant loomed over him, the broken one fell to his knees and bowed before the stronger primitive. His one good horn vibrated as he uttered a low, defeated growl. The victor, accepted his surrender and yanked him to his feet. All around, the primitives, especially the males that did not have any horns, uttered a cacophony of yells, whoops and howls of celebration.

The Great Horned One turned his attention to the female who led him out of his slumber and beckoned for her to come closer.

The female, impressed by his strength and brutality, approached with little hesitation. Like all females, she was smaller than her male counterpart. She possessed a lithe, tightly fit form with less prominent scales for skin. Long smooth legs led to wide hips that swayed gently from each step, a sight that all males universally found pleasing to the eyes. From what she lacked in prominent horns, the female made up for with prominent breasts.

The Great Horned One had found his mate, and moved to claim her.

Shamelessly, he pushed the female to her knees and bent her over in front of the crowd around them. Clumsily, taken over by the overwhelming urge to mark her as his own, he mated with her.

Now led by the strongest male among them, and blessed by the first of a thousand offspring, the first Kondrusan people claimed Khondasaar Prime as their own.

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