A/N

One thing that always seemed odd to me is that if the protheans were wiped around 48,000 BCE and had reached Mars, why was it that the Reapers saw fit to wipe them out but not humanity? Granted, it could be that the Mars bunker was too obscure to deal with and it's implied that developed species are the prime harvesting targets, the Reapers stripping species' technology and that humanity was too far away from this stage and was best left to the next cycle. Still, got me thinking...

Not that this fic answers it however, simply where the idea took me, along with drawing some inspiration from the 40K novel Mechanicum.

Tears of Ares

It never rained on Mars.

Long ago, in the distant past it had. How else could the planet's spectacular formations have formed, the process of erosion carving out its massive gulleys, its shorelines marking the edge of seas that no longer existed. But that was aeons ago, before even the protheans had took to the stars, before their no longer mysterious benefactors left behind the mass relays for them to dominate the galaxy. But while it was within their power to shape the red world, and indeed the galaxy as a whole, they chose not to. They were not gods, but simply highly sophisticated beings. The universe was not their larder. After all, as recent events had shown, the universe was the larder of the Reapers...

It never rained on Mars.

If it did, if some great flood struck the planet, Olympus Mons would be where its population would be heading. Not a large population mind you, simply a few thousand scientists, support staff and a security detail, not that anyone would attack them out here. Sol was an obscure part of the galaxy, a quiet backwater where nothing ever happened and given the rate of evolution of the apes on Earth, nothing would happen for thousands of years. An interesting opportunity really, to watch the development of the hairy ones. A long time to be sure, but the protheans had time. Time to tinker away in bunkers under the red soil for as long as they wished.

At least before the Reapers came...

As one, the protheans surged up the slopes of the tallest mountain in the Solar System. Few had trained for such a thing, but aided by their power suits, it was a simple task. The horde below ran rampant across the rust plains, scouring for anything that could be used for...well, whatever the enemy harvested the galaxy for. Genocide was the machines' goal rather than conquest, but that didn't stop them from reaping the benefits that conquest usually brought. At least in theory. It had been a long time since the protheans had really conquered anything and were unfamiliar with the schematics. Peace existed in the galaxy. Why should they disrupt it?

No matter. The Reapers had done it for them.

It never rained on Mars. If it did, if by some miracle that enough vapour was taken up into its thin atmosphere and subsequently precipitated, it could have saved the planet's inhabitants. Water surging across the dead plains, washing the Reapers away into oblivion while the protheans, safe on Olympus Mons' slopes, stood firm against the tide. Not exactly a valorous way to win a battle, but as the war had been lost long ago, survival was the only priority the protheans had, even if the chances of it were somewhere between slim and nil.

Nothing happened though. Even if gods existed, they couldn't stem the path of fate. The Reapers had come before, the protheans could see that. Foolishly believing the mass relays were their birthright, rarely questioning their origins. If fate had decreed that eradication was the punishment for hubris, then so be it. Silently, the protheans readied their weapons, awaited the tides of metal to swarm up the mountain. They could go no higher and could not descend into the caldera. Death would come even swifter for them below and as the churning skies of Mars demonstrated, the Reaper ships controlled the planet's skies, the thin atmosphere reeling at their presence. If any water came down, it was due to horrific technology rather than nature. But it didn't.

It never rained on Mars.

The tides surged up the mountain, all matter of projectiles fired into it. As one, the protheans opened fire. As one, the Reapers surged upwards. As one, battle was joined. A lost battle for the organics, but the outcome of the war, and therefore the battle, had never been in doubt. They'd resigned themselves to death so long ago that the pointlessness of maintaining pride by fighting and dying against overwhelming odds never occurred to them.

As one they fought.

As one they died.

As one they were harvested.

Nothing interrupted this. Mars was dead. It was dead until the inhabitants of Earth reached it, found the prothean legacy and became part of the next cycle. Mars would remain still until then. After all, it never rained on Mars. It never would.

If it could, it would be weeping.