GS year 2407.1
STG Maximum Security Data Analysis Section
Sur'Kesh
"Three Relays missing, nearly ten percent of entire galaxy isolated from Relay travel, and still no indications of what cause is," Aernann Waeyor, Coordinator of the STG, said evenly as he looked around at the others present in the room. They were under the highest possible lockdown with no data in or out, and everyone present was vetted to the highest possible level.
"Years of research and investigation with nothing to show," he added, for a moment sounding slightly annoyed, but still managing to suppress his irritation with the entire situation. "We know absolutely nothing. This is unacceptable."
"Whatever cause is, extremely good data hygiene involved," Commander Dix, the leader of the covert investigation section, said after an uncomfortable pause. "No traces of ship drives, eezo emissions, or debris from towing operation discovered after multiple detailed searches at each site. No useful data from distant observation of relevant systems. Too long ago to allow for light delay to work even with latest optical systems. As not known when Relays moved technique essentially pointless." He made a gesture indicating futility with one hand. "All it can tell us is Relays disappeared after last survey, which is obvious."
"Search to ten light years around 314 system finally abandoned with no results," Captain Varalan of the Darkwatch commented, sounding patient but baffled. His ship, being the one which had made the initial discovery of the first known missing Relay, had been tasked with multiple missions to the site using ever more elaborate equipment, much of it invented specifically for this task. None of it had worked, and a number of the crew involved had requested reassignment due to psychological reasons which had caused a certain level of worry in various places. "Two years of scanning shows no signs. Relay is simply gone."
"Same result in other locations," Dix put in, shrugging a little. "As expected. Whatever method used to remove Relays, it left no traces."
Coordinator Waeyor studied the holos floating around them for a while, as did everyone else. "Unlikely to derive method without more data and no data available," he finally said. "Chances of working out who rather than how?"
"Probably nil," Dix replied. "Not Asari, they are very worried and completely in the dark. Not Turians, they only know of one Relay and only found out that one last year. Keeping it quiet to avoid panic, same as us and Asari. Not Quarians… They are the highest probability as despite circumstances are still best engineers known to Council species. But they are also confused as much as we are. Rumors of them investigating but nothing solid. Information blackout very good after 314 vanished."
"No one else has technology to move Relays without causing disaster, and leaving much evidence even if that avoided," Captain Varalan remarked.
They looked at each other, then at the data screens. "Who, then?"
"Unknown." Dix hesitated, then went on, "Most likely is new species, not discovered by Citadel species. Somewhere within isolated zone. How, why, and when they did it, no real way to be sure. Some time within last twelve years for 314, other two could have been up to twenty years ago based on last known survey. One by us, one by Turians. 517 a long way off normal routes, not checked often. Quarians noticing was unexpected but helpful. 498 only known to us and not often visited to avoid notice. Removal method and reason completely opaque."
The fourth person in the room, who had been quietly listening while observing, said "The reason is most likely one of wanting isolation and privacy."
They all turned to Dalatrass Zibena, the one person who could be said to be the ultimate authority of the STG. She was well past her prime in body at nearly thirty two years of age, but her mind was as sharp as ever and she was unquestionably the one in charge. She nodded at the large holo over the main table which showed the galactic map, all known Relays, and the section that was now apparently entirely cut off from the Relay network. It was outlined in deep violet and encompassed a huge area, one much too large to practically explore with conventional FTL. "Whoever is in there doesn't want visitors. For whatever reason they have. Religious, societal, military… Someone decided they would make sure no one else turned up unexpectedly. Excellent plan, executed flawlessly."
"How?" The Coordinator glanced back at the map, then returned to looking at his boss. "We couldn't repeat feat. Technology entirely past even us."
"I have no idea," she said quietly. "Possibly Relays have method of self propulsion no one knows about. Possibly unknown species has technology we cannot duplicate."
Varalan, who had gone back to looking at the holo with a certain amount of disquiet visible in his eyes, as had been the case ever since that first mission, added almost under his breath, "Possibly unknown species responsible for Relays in first place."
Everyone exchanged a startled look, then turned to him. "Explain your thoughts, Captain," the Dalatrass requested. He looked up at her, then back at the star map, before deliberately turning his back to it.
"Operating principals of Relays still not entirely clear, construction methods unknown, and date of construction also unknown. Research on them inconclusive and patchy." He paused, then went on, "Possibility in my mind that to move them so cleanly and untraceably requires great understanding of construction and operation, far exceeding any known species. Leads to conclusion that unknown species possibly not new, but very old..."
"Protheans?" Waeyor blinked a couple of times.
Varalan nodded slowly.
Dalatrass Zibena sighed faintly. "Was wondering if anyone else would think of that possibility," she said.
"You considered it," Varalan commented without surprise.
"Yes. Still considering it. Implausible, in the extreme, but… Less implausible than most other ideas. Perhaps."
They all looked at each other for a moment, then as one turned to study the map again. Silence fell for a while.
Eventually, Dix asked, "What do we do about it?"
"Nothing we can do about it, other than watch," Zibena replied. "Watch everyone. And wait to see if anything else happens."
All three of the others nodded. She was right. They had no choice at the moment but to wait for the unknown Relay movers to make their next move, if there was one.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
GS year 2407.2
Councilor Tevos's Private Quarters
Citadel
Councilor Tevos stared at the holo, which was showing two different images of other Asari Matriarchs. Benezia was an old colleague, and had been something of a mentor of hers many years ago before she reached her current position. She still listened to the older asari, although she was now herself a higher authority, as the sheer experience and knowledge possessed by Benezia was far too valuable to ignore.
Matriarch Raana, on the other hand, wasn't someone she'd had a lot of contact with until the last few years. The head of Research Intelligence, Raana was a highly able scientist and an expert on asari and other species' technology. Both of them were among the very few people who knew about the missing Mass Relays, and had been involved in the extremely low-key but urgent investigation into the situation from the beginning.
"Don't be ridiculous, the Protheans died out many millennia ago," she finally said. "There's no way they could be responsible for the missing Relays."
"We can see no way that a Relay could be moved with current technology, from us or any other known species," Raana replied. "Not without leaving a lot of evidence behind, and quite likely causing a disaster that could potentially destroy half a system. We have enough data left from the Kartcha system to be fairly sure that's what happened to it some fifteen thousand years ago." She looked seriously at the other two. "Which is why there are no more Kartcha. Whatever it was that they did triggered a detonation that is best expressed in significant fractions of a nova. The entire system was sterilized of all life. That is why we don't interfere with Relays, aside from them being far too important to risk."
"And as neither the 314 system nor the 517 system have been destroyed, your suggestion is that whoever or whatever was responsible for the Relays being moved knew enough about how they function to avoid this, leading to the concept that it was the people who actually built them in the first place. Which itself ultimately suggests that the Protheans are still around, somewhere in that void..." Benezia nodded slowly, her eyes a little wide. "I follow the thought process although I find it… disturbing."
"And impossible," Tevos commented. "If the Protheans are still in existence, why have they never shown any signs of it in the thousands of years that we've been using their transportation system? Why are there no traces newer than over fifty thousand years old anywhere we've ever found? Why are there signs of some horrible disaster on most worlds we've found Prothean ruins on? Goddess knows we've been looking for more information on them since we first went into space, but aside from fragments here and there, and a very small number of… more intact items..." She paused, but none of them needed more explanation. After a moment she continued, "...with those rare exceptions there's nothing. The Relay network and the Citadel itself are the only real evidence of the Protheans as far as most people are concerned."
Looking between them, she asked, "So, based on all of that, why would the Protheans have been lurking inside a huge volume of space for more than fifty millennia while around them their worlds fell into disrepair, and ultimately other species found and began to use their remaining technology? What would keep them from never once making contact with the newer species?"
Raana shook her head. "I have no idea. As you say, there are a vast number of questions and no answers. The more you think about it the more things you can come up with that don't fit, or cause even more confusion. But the fact remains that somehow those two Relays were spirited off without a single sign left behind that they ever even existed. If we didn't have ample proof that they did I'd suggest that it was a bookkeeping error. Either they somehow vanished under their own power, which admittedly we can't entirely rule out although it seems unlikely, or someone or something moved them deliberately. We know beyond doubt we couldn't do it. If we can't, it's extremely unlikely that anyone else, even the Salarians, could manage the feat. So..." She shrugged. "A hidden Prothean world isn't impossible. Very unlikely, I agree, but what else would you suggest? Some other random species no one has ever met that just one day decided to walk off with a pair of Mass Relays without leaving the slightest evidence of how they did it or why? That's even less likely than that some surviving remnant of the original builders, for reasons of their own, moved the things. At least they'd know how to do it since they put them there in the first place."
All three woman were silent for a while as they thought it over.
"That sector of the galaxy is certainly large enough that it could contain almost anything," Benezia finally acknowledged, her face showing disquiet and thought. "No one knows how many Relays could be scattered around it. Or what lives there. However, the idea that the Protheans could still be around, and are deliberately keeping to themselves even after all this time… It's difficult to imagine. We've assumed they've been long dead for our entire existence. If the public became aware that they might not be… It could cause considerable problems, more so in some quarters than other."
Tevos nodded a little, then slightly reluctantly said, "One of the more worrying questions, if we assume that the Protheans really are still alive and have been sitting out there somewhere for tens of thousands of years without making contact… What are they hiding from?" She hesitated, than added in a low voice, "And why did they pick now to remove those Relays?"
Neither of the other two looked even slightly happy about that line of thought.
Eventually she also vocalized an idea she'd had for a while now. "There is also one more thing to wonder..."
"Which is?" Raana asked.
"We know of two missing Relays. As you said, there is absolutely no trace left behind in those systems." She looked between them. "How many more Relays have been removed without us ever realizing it? And how long has this been going on for? Whoever is doing this could have been taking them for centuries, far beyond the known network… We'd never actually know, would we, if they got to one before we did?"
Benezia and Raana exchanged uneasy glances.
"I have to admit that's both a valid point and something that's not going to make me sleep any easier," the scientist said after an uncomfortable silence.
"The thing that I would most like to know about all this, leaving aside who is doing it, why, and how..." Benezia ran a hand over her crest, looking worried. "...Is what are they actually doing with the Relays they took?"
The silence this time stretched for a couple of minutes.
"We have no way to know, and all we can do is hope that whoever is doing it doesn't interfere with active Relays, I fear," Raana finally said. "We will continue to investigate but I personally doubt we'll find anything useful, unless and until the perpetrators either make themselves known, which seems unlikely under the circumstances, or get careless, which seems even less likely. In either case, I dearly hope they are not hostile, since I rather think anyone who can move Relays around like that is potentially highly dangerous. It implies a level of technology we are very far from."
"So we wait and watch," Tevos commented. The other woman nodded.
"Yes. And do what we can to prevent the public finding out about this. You know what would happen. Mass panic is never helpful, and people in large groups are far more prone to that than ideal."
"Very few people know about this so far, and hopefully we can keep it that way," Tevos replied. "The STG won't tell anyone, I was lucky to have a contact that was willing to talk to me in the beginning. The Quarians… They know of one relay, but they won't have any way to find out about the other one, as since the 314 system was dormant there's no reason for the Migrant Fleet to approach it. And they have their own reasons to keep the one they do know about quiet. They're worried, I'm convinced of that, as information from that direction has dried up completely, so they're probably quietly panicking about it. But it helps us as they're unlikely to talk about it."
"The Turians could be problematic." Benezia looked thoughtful. "They do have a tendency to take any new development as a possible attack and react somewhat more enthusiastically than desired at times."
"They may actually have a point in this case," Raana sighed. "It might be some bizarre form of attack. I doubt it, myself, but I can't dismiss it entirely. But even if that was true, they don't have anyone to react enthusiastically to."
"I have a number of contacts working on getting more information on what the Heirarchy are thinking about 314 going missing," Tevos remarked. "Bypassing the Council, naturally. I want the information without the usual bias if possible. It's taking some time but I'm hopeful that I will get something useful at some point."
"There doesn't seem to be any real urgency as the Relays could have been missing for up to twenty years in the case of the 517 one. Nothing has gone amiss in that time so it seems unlikely we're facing any immediate problem." Benezia looked mildly relieved at her own words. "Thankfully. This is already causing me enough worry as it is."
"All right. So essentially we just wait and see if anything else happens, while attempting to collect as much data as possible via any means available to us," Tevos said, looking at each of her colleagues. "And do everything we can to make sure that this situation doesn't become widely known, as we have been doing since the beginning. Luckily there are only a handful of people who are aware of it and they all have their own reasons to do the same."
"We can do little else, I think," Raana responded with a small nod. "Possibly this is all there is of it, and it will remain a mystery forever. In that case even if it does eventually come out, as will probably happen despite our best efforts, hopefully it will be sufficiently far in the past that it's merely seen as a historical oddity. Such has happened before. On the other hand, if this is an ongoing problem, preventing panic while investigating it is still the correct move. Either way, without more information we have nothing at all to go on except guesses."
"Deeply unnerving ones," Benezia commented with a wry smile, making the other two nod. "I will have to consider the concept that there may be living Protheans very carefully for some time. The ramifications are..." She shook her head a little. "...extensive."
Tevos thought that was something of an understatement.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
GS year 2407.5
Heirarchy Interstellar Intelligence Division
Palaven
"There are two missing Relays?"
Primarch Garicus stared at the man who'd just made his entire body shiver with a feeling of disbelief and if he was honest with himself, slight fear for a moment. "Two?"
"Yes, Primarch," General Exasperus replied, looking steadily at him. "Apparently the Quarians discovered that Relay 517 disappeared approximately a year before 314, but failed to mention it to anyone. A contact of mine located the information some time ago and passed it on to me late last week, when they were able to do so discreetly. I sent out a research vessel to double check and the information is accurate. It's exactly the same as 314. No trace whatsoever of the Relay, nor of how it was moved or who took it. We have no way to know when it was done either. We checked that system last just over twenty years ago and it was present then, but it was gone when the Quarians happened to visit the system five years ago. All we know is that it vanished between those two dates."
"Two Relays simply vanish and no one has the faintest idea how, who did it, or why..." The ultimate authority of the Heirarchy inspected the holo being projected in the data analysis room, understanding why his presence here had been requested with such a roundabout call. This was far too sensitive to let anyone else know about. Speaking of which… "Who else knows about this?"
"Probably the STG. You know how hard it is to keep them out of anything," the general sighed. Garicus nodded, he did indeed know that. The Salarians were at times a real pain in the carapace. "The Asari… We're not sure. Possibly, but just as possibly not. And of course the Quarians know about 517, but are very unlikely to know about 314, since there's no real way for them to have found out unless they sent a ship there, which to the best of our knowledge hasn't happened. The Migrant Fleet hasn't visited that part of the Galaxy for close to a decade in any case. And there is a very low probability of anyone else knowing about either of them for a number of reasons. That won't last forever, we know of a number of species who do intermittently check some of the dormant relays, including 314. The Drell definitely, the Asari very occasionally, and possibly even the Volus."
He smiled a little. "That entire sector of space tends to unnerve people, as it's so large and so unknown. There's a feeling that anything might be lying in wait. So on occasion people go and rattle the gate just to make sure it's still locked."
"Possibly this feeling is not without cause, bearing in mind the current information," Garicus commented, still staring at the projection. He was trying not to remember ancient historical tales of the Rachni Wars, and stories he'd read as a child about things that lived in the space between stars and ate ships every now and then. Foolishness, he knew.
On the other hand, ships did once in a while vanish without any trace ever found of them…
Suppressing his unease, he looked up at his general. "This information is far too sensitive to allow to spread," he said, "no matter what the reason behind it is. We will have to devise some method to dissuade ships from visiting that system. Preferably without involving the Council, as that would only get the Asari involved in turn, and if they don't know about this I don't particularly want them to know about it. Even if they do, they'll just get in the way as so often happens."
Exasperus nodded. "As you wish, Primarch. We can come up with some reason that particular system is off limits, I'm sure. But that won't work indefinitely, no matter what we do. If we make it too obvious someone is sure to investigate merely to find out what we're hiding."
"Hopefully by then we can work out who's doing it and stop them," the Primarch said. He looked back at the display. "Is this the precursor to an attack? Possibly someone practicing on a dormant relay far off the usual path, to refine their methods?"
"We feel it's unlikely, sir, but we can't rule it out entirely." Exasperus shook his head a little. "The Planning section is coming up with ideas as to what this could be constantly, but they're getting more ridiculous by the day and they started fairly ridiculous to begin with. Energy beings from another dimension was one of the more amusing ones. Or giant space lizards who like the taste of eezo. Or even it being some unknown remnant of the Protheans who are reclaiming their technology for reasons no one can understand."
Garicus chuckled. "Some of your people have missed their calling. They should be writing fiction."
"I'm fairly sure that they are," Exasperus sighed. "But they've served us well in the past, so we will continue to use the same technique just in case they happen upon the real reason. I am also fairly sure it's neither energy beings from outside reality, giant space lizards, or not as dead as they should be Protheans, though. Nor the Spirits becoming annoyed with the decadence of modern society and removing the Relays to teach us to be better people."
The Primarch gave him a look. He shrugged. "That was one of the more plausible ones, unfortunately."
"Well, whatever the truth really is, we will keep searching for it. Sooner or later we'll find it and deal with the perpetrators." He shook his head, then checked his omnitool. "I have another appointment, so I must leave. Thank you for the briefing. Keep working on the problem and if you need any other resources you are authorized to requisition whatever is required. Just make sure no one who can't be totally trusted finds out about this."
"As you wish, Primarch." Exasperus dipped his head, then watched as the other man left the room. His bodyguards fell into place behind him on the other side of the door.
Looking back at the holo, Exasperus sighed. "Protheans. Not likely," he muttered under his breath before he went off to prod some analysts into coming up with less silly ideas. This whole situation worried him deep inside for any number of reasons, chief among which was the feeling of helplessness in the face of the unknown and possibly unknowable.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
GS year 2407.5
Quarian Migrant Fleet Exploration Ship Tralket
Captain's Office
Rael'Zorah sat behind his desk and stared yet again at a projection that was so familiar he could probably have recreated it from memory by this point. Yet again, he had no idea what he was looking for, and yet again he wished he could simply ignore the puzzle of what lurked in the dark and move on with his life. It would make things easier.
But he couldn't let it go.
Ever since that moment he'd realized that an entire Mass Relay had silently and unnoticed by everyone vanished without trace, like water evaporating on a hot engine housing, he'd been both fascinated and terrified by the implications. If you discounted the supernatural, the undeniable conclusion was that there was someone out there with technology unlike anything any species he knew of possessed. That, or some bizarre natural phenomena, which he could have believed right up to the point a second Relay vanished. That made it excessively unlikely it was anything other than deliberate.
Four proved it beyond doubt.
There was no way four Relays could vanish without someone doing something to them. All four were spread widely, all four were aimed right into the unknown sector, and all four were dormant. It was definitely the result of someone inside that area wanting their privacy and making damn sure they got it.
He was minded to respect that wish. Not that in reality there was any practical method not to, of course. Even if he'd wanted to, it would take weeks of travel to reach even the nearest system past any of the missing Relays using conventional FTL, and the chances of that one being one that had the putative Relay-movers in it was essentially nil. With literally millions of systems inside that volume, the only way whoever it was would be found was if they wanted to be found, and all the available evidence strongly suggested that wasn't the case.
The game was entirely in their domain, and there was nothing he or anyone else could really do about it except look in from outside.
Turning his head, he looked at the encrypted message he'd received a couple of hours ago from the Admiralty Board and sighed again.
'It's simple to order me to investigate the missing Relays, but I fail to understand what they think I can actually do about it that I'm not already doing,' he thought with a certain amount of irritation. 'I'm the one who gave them the data in the first place, and has gone to a lot of effort to track it all down. What else do they expect?'
The message didn't tell him. Only that the Tralket, under his command, was to continue to investigate the missing Relay situation for the foreseeable future and to immediately pass any information they found back up the chain of command to the Board. What they would do with it was open to question, of course, but knowing the Admirals they were just being the usual combination of nosy, argumentative, and annoying.
He respected them, of course, but he also preferred to be as far away from them as he could arrange most of the time. An exploration ship was good for that, it took him away from the Fleet on a regular basis, although admittedly it did tend to aim him right into situations that were potentially dangerous. There was a reason the Tralket was fairly heavily armed and very fast. Batarian pirates were only one of the possible risks when one was wandering around far from the more traveled sectors.
One day he was probably going to have to settle down and raise a child, they needed to preserve the Quarian species after all, but for now he was content where he was. Mysterious aliens lurking in the depths of space aside.
Or whatever the hells it was.
Tapping his omnitool Rael'Zorah archived the orders and closed the projection, then went back to studying the star map. After a while he decided on a destination, far around that unknown volume, where a good telescope such as the one mounted to the ship could get some possibly useful images that might allow for the map to be extended. He didn't expect it to achieve much but it was all he could think to do at the moment. And you never knew, blind luck might hand him something useful. It did happen.
Standing up he walked over to his porthole and looked out at empty space, dotted with brilliant stars in a display that he'd seen his entire life. For the last few years, he couldn't look at it without imagining what might lie in the dark gaps between the stars.
At times he could almost swear he could feel something looking back.
Shaking his head he half-smiled. Such thoughts were pointless. It led to some strange and uncomfortable places. Best to try to ignore it and get on with his life.
With one last glance out the window, he turned and headed for the bridge, killing the holo map as he passed it. He doubted he'd actually solve the mystery, but he had his orders and he'd do what he could to follow them despite his personal feelings.
Even so he couldn't stop the tiny shiver that went through him as he pondered what was really behind all this.
