Inspiration Strikes! (A Quarian Pseudo-SI/OC in Mass Effect)
- Thread starter ShanRevan
- Start date
- Sci-Fi
- Location
- Salt Lake City, UT, USA
It's not just that. The Quarians are legally not a government of any kind in Citadel Space. That is what it means to be exiles.
- Location
- Burien wa
Honestly the most impressive part of the lasgun isnt the laser emitter. It's the power cell.
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fourteen
2170CEThis was not the response I was expecting, but sometimes I forgot I am still a child. In retrospect, a similar outcome was predictable. Actually, I should be surprised I didn't get a handler assigned earlier, but I wasn't working on anything hazardous back then. The journey to the Moreh itself lasted a few short minutes of quiet.
I could barely contain my nerves as we arrived at the Moreh. I was immediately assaulted with the smell of stale Shirol. Shirol is a popular drink with both mild stimulant and antiviral properties, made from the leaf of the shirola tree. Technically it was closer to tea, but it was effectively quarian coffee in practice. I was not a fan of the smell and was forced to activate the scent scrubbers on my mask.
Rael'Zorah led me through the Moreh's network of corridors for a few minutes until we came to an office with a large lab attached. The door was labelled "Daro'Xen vas Moreh, Research Team 3 – Lead". Usually, the door would list other team members below that, but it seems several names had recently been removed.
After announcing his arrival, Rael entered, and I followed behind.
"Daro! I hear you're between projects now. It's too bad about what happened with your last team."
These words hardly filled me with confidence in the women. Considering how she was portrayed in the game, I had a lot of doubts about Rael's ability to choose trustworthy people.
"Admiral Zorah. News travels fast, I see. Yes, I managed to finish the research alone, but it's frustrating when my two protégés suddenly elope and leave my ship to raise their new child."
Which was a lot less nefarious than I was expecting.
"Daro, this is Kirah'Vai nar Iktomi."
"Ah! The child with the mysterious fainting syndrome." Suddenly she turned to stare at me, and after a frankly unnerving amount of time, she smiled. "I remember you! The MRI incident." Then she snapped back to Rael. "Have you brought him here to be examined? I have some theories about that anomalous brain activity."
Which honestly just brought my nerves right back. Right, enough dawdling; it was time to do this properly. So, releasing a breath to relax and closing my eyes, I reached out with my soul and gazed upon the character of Daro'Xen vas Moreh nar Shellen.
It was with great relief I determined the woman was not a sociopath. She didn't lack empathy but was very driven in the pursuit of Science. She held loyalty to the fleet and those she had claimed. She was definitely ambitious and a bit of a schemer, but I was surprised to find she was actually a pretty decent person at heart. I should probably stop getting surprised by that. I got some flashes of buried trauma and realised I had stared too much. This was getting personal, and I didn't want to invade.
Gratefully I hadn't missed much of the conversation.
"Kirah, what do you think? Can I show her your work?"
Did I want to work with Daro'Xen? She was infamous in the games, but I don't see that in the person before me. It's like everything about her was twisted into a self-destructive mockery. . . Was Daro'Xen indoctrinated in the games? No, at least not entirely, but partially? That fit just a little bit too well. Were we being exposed to indoctrination right now?
"Err, this might seem like a weird question, but you haven't been studying any twisted, dark ancient artifacts that give off a creepy feeling, have you?"
Confusion bloomed across both of their bodies before Daro'Xen replied with a short
"No. Twisted, dark, ancient artifacts aren't really my thing, but what does that have to do with anything."
"Kirah, what are you doing?" Rael practically hissed at me.
"It's fine, Admiral Zorah, I'm curious now. What's so bad about these ancient artifacts."
Ugh, how the hell was I going to explain this. Actually, it doesn't matter. Right now, I just need to check if anyone here was indoctrinated at all.
"Kirah?"
"I'm fine, just thinking."
I reached out into with my soul again, and this time, instead of instinctively trying to search out the character of a person, I tried looking for corruption of their being. Would this work? I had a feeling it would, but I don't know. I wasn't getting anything, so I tried focusing a bit harder. I could feel the strain now, but I managed to get a clear feeling. Did that mean they were free of indoctrination, or that I simply couldn't detect it?
Well, everyone seemed fine as far as I could tell, nor had they done anything worth suspecting at this time. I would have to trust them for now, but indoctrination detection just jumped very high in my priorities. As if I don't already have enough of them.
"Ahem", – a very unimpressed Daro interrupted – "are you done yet? I cannot accept you interrupting my lunch break and then ignoring me indefinitely"
"Sorry everyone, it's fine. I would be happy to work with Daro'Xen."
Then with an almost hungry gesture, she held out her omnitool. "Now give me your research paper. I have doubts, but Rael says it looks impressive on the surface."
I pull up the files before stopping short and checking for the red security tag. When I actually looked, they were everywhere. I don't think I have seen so many in my entire life.
"Good job, Kirah. Yes, everything here is secured against digital intrusions. We really cannot afford the Geth to get our research, nor do we want other parties at it either. It's still important to check, though. That will not get you out of the restricted information classes."
Finally, I bundled up the entire working folder and sent it over. Then we all sat in silence as Daro'Xen examined my notes. Sometimes, she would look up at me and ask a question. But I suspect she was mostly just confirming I understood what I had written down.
After about ten minutes, Admiral Zorah got a message on his omnitool and moved to the back of the room to read it in private.
A short curse later caught my attention, and I heard him muttering afterwards.
"Keelah Se'lai! This day is exhausting. Why does all the dramatics have to occur at the same time."
Then he returned to us and spoke in a clear, if resigned, voice.
"Daro, Kirah, something important outside the fleet has happened. I'm sure you will hear about it soon enough. I need to go now, though. We've also been contacted by a large group of missing quarians we had thought lost forever, and they need help. So you keep working. I'll have one of my guards remain outside the door to escort Kirah'Vai back to his hospital room on the Rayya when you're done."
I nodded and wished him well, thanking him for the help. And I meant it. Whatever Daro'Xen became in the game, she was not the person I was sharing a room with, and her genius remained undeniable. It would be a great boon if she was willing to work with me. Now, I can see why she was made an admiral beyond simply scheming her way into the position.
Daro'Xen, on the other hand, simply waved him off with a muttered farewell as he left. Her head remained buried in the field equations.
Eventually, she closed the notes and threw her head back into a cackle with glee.
"Kirah, such beautiful mathematics. This has a lot of promise. Yet, based on these mass effect field equations, you were calculating on your omnitool, and wow, that must have been frustrating, you clearly don't know about Siarpan's exclusionary principle or the Moston-Giralt effect. They make easily three-quarters of your work here redundant."
"Can't say that I have." Which is a real shame. I wish I could have put a second point into mass effect field theory.
"Still, I am genuinely impressed. Here, take a look at this." She said, sending back some of her own work she had done with much simpler equations. Days were wasted iterating, and she achieved a reasonable approximation in not even 10 minutes with the correct knowledge. It was as frustrating as it was humbling.
"So, what do you think. Want to build a prototype? We should have everything we need in my lab."
The excitement in her voice was contagious. My frustration was swept away, and I could only respond with a wicked grin across my whole body. I threw my head back into the same gleeful cackling she had demonstrated earlier. I admit, it was pretty fun.
Working on the device, I realised we may have had a lot of differences, but we were kindred spirits in exploring knowledge. Unfortunately, we didn't quite finish the repulsorlifts test prototype before I had to leave. Still, we had successfully created and captured a very simple space knot. Daro solemnly swore she would not complete it without me, and we exchanged contact information. She then taught me how to secure communications so we could cooperate freely.
I left the ship in a good mood. It's one thing to know something, but it's another thing entirely to build it with your own hands and see it coming together before you.
The mood on the Rayya, however, was confusing. It was a strange mix of jubilance and fear. Then I remembered Rael'Zorah's urgent departure. So, pulling up my omnitool, I accessed the main newsfeed of the migrant fleet.
A single headline dominated the newsfeed:
"Human vigilante 'hacker' organisation REDHAX claims responsibility for the cyber-attack, in response to the raid on Mindoir."
I skimmed through the history of human traditions for coloured hacker hats, and the online human "hacktivist" community "Redhax".
Finally, I got to the part I wanted to know. REDHAX, an offshoot of the RedHax community, claims to have sabotaged a small family of brain interface chips derived from an Asari microprocessor. This family of chips are found in the neural interfaces of every known slave control implant. Without this small family of microprocessors, control implants could not exist.
The Serrice Council produced the original microprocessor as part of a line of Biotic Amps five hundred years ago but were famously discontinued five centuries ago for dangerous feedback into the brain. The design was then sold to a Batarian biotic amp manufacturer for further development.
If you asked me, the end result of that sale was somewhat predictable. Still, given the nature of Asari conspiracies, that may have been intentional. Which is fucked up if true.
This was clearly my fault. Somehow.
It definitely didn't happen in the original timeline. These rebellions were probably more extensive than most people realised. I knew from my research that control chips were very popular and could be found on at least 64% of slaves in the galaxy. In the Batarian Hegemony, that number was much higher. However, as usual, no reports had come out of the Hegemony. Thus no one yet was able to confirm if they were affected too.
For the rest of the day I stayed in my room, not worrying about bioweapon conspiracies, or working on new technologies, but simply wondering - How? What butterfly had I set off to achieve this. Was this good or bad?
Just to make my day that little bit better, I received a message from Daro'Xen following up about the work we did today. There were plans to meet up again soon, and then she had to finish the message off with an ominous little note.
"Oh yeah, I was thinking about what you said about twisted creepy artifacts, and it occurs to me that sounds a lot like the new desk ornament Admiral Zorah's friend, Han'Gerrel suddenly had last week."
Keelah Se'lai. That settles it, I definitely need to do something about indoctrination soon.
Fortunately, mum had some time scheduled off and came to visit. After all, I had been here a month, and she was a head engineer on the Iktomi and my dad a quartermaster. They couldn't take time off indefinitely. So I was glad to have her visit. Sometimes, in a confusing world, all you really need is your loving embrace and the comforting words of your mum.
Academic Writing II
Akashic Links I
Citations III
Chemistry II
Counterintelligence I
Countersurveillance I
Language - Asari I
Language - Batarian I
Language - Chinese I
Language - Drellish I
Language - Elcoran I
Language - English I
Language - Krogan I
Language - Prothean I
Language - Salarian I
Language - Turian I
Language - Volus I
Mass Effect Lore I (complete)
Mathematics III
Medicine I
Metaphysics III
Batarian Culture (Slavery) I
History (Citadel Civilisation, Modern) II
Omnitools
Physics III
Physics (spacetime) I
Physics (Mass Effect Field Theory) I
Psychology I
Psychology of Slavery II
Quarian Physiology I
Quarian Immunology I
Quarian Pharmacology I
Social Engineering II
Technology (Star Wars - Repulsorlifts) I
Translation (Literary) II
Writing III
Akashic Links I
Citations III
Chemistry II
Counterintelligence I
Countersurveillance I
Language - Asari I
Language - Batarian I
Language - Chinese I
Language - Drellish I
Language - Elcoran I
Language - English I
Language - Krogan I
Language - Prothean I
Language - Salarian I
Language - Turian I
Language - Volus I
Mass Effect Lore I (complete)
Mathematics III
Medicine I
Metaphysics III
Batarian Culture (Slavery) I
History (Citadel Civilisation, Modern) II
Omnitools
Physics III
Physics (spacetime) I
Physics (Mass Effect Field Theory) I
Psychology I
Psychology of Slavery II
Quarian Physiology I
Quarian Immunology I
Quarian Pharmacology I
Social Engineering II
Technology (Star Wars - Repulsorlifts) I
Translation (Literary) II
Writing III
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Author's note:
So we finally see Mothra starting to emerge. Next couple of chapters will be some of the interludes I had planned before, with some new PoV characters.
EDIT: Completely reworked the entire reaper-artifact-desk-ornament thing. With injured fingers. I hope you're happy.
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Huh?
Wait... Shit.
I should probably come up with a new name.
I should also read Man off the Moon again, it's a good story.
So, this chapter is basically about a little shit that is basically calculating the volume of a tesseract without even any understanding of the common geometric math equation, and just bruteforcing it from first principle, right?
Thank you for the chapter.
Keep up the good work.
Thank you for the chapter.
Keep up the good work.
Well that was more last chapter, and yeah close enough.
He gave up because it was taking too long and wanted access to a better computer. So he went to get help.
If you're interested, Guass-Seidel Iterations are a real thing that get a lot of use in certain (probably most) engineering disciplines. Fortunately you can let computers chug away at them but when you're modelling something complex like an electrical network, that can take a very long time to arrive at even a basic approximation of an answer.
This Chapter he gets the help and shows it to Daro'Xen who knows the actual equations and calculates what he was doing in about 10 minutes by hand.
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I don't think you should change it.
Let it be a neat shout out to that fic.
This was a fun chapter. It shows that though he is rather bright, he doesn't know everything. He is a kid and doesn't even have a standard ME education yet.
The kid was surprised that folks started reacting to slavery more due to his little book? Face Palms. The kid likely has little to no real idea just what sort of impact it has had.
He tossed a social boulder out there and now gets to enjoy the waves. His book is the only thing that he has done that really has had any impact outside of his home.
Seems like she was thrilled their experiment was a success and shows signs of being a useful prototype. It'll be more annoying that they can't directly use it, but it would be a neat trade good.
I can see him sort of handing all this off to adults to spread and forgetting about it. It won't be until he is blind sided by seeing some one use one on a planet or hearing about more ships being produced due to more ezzo or something that he finally remembers it.
You know exactly the reason he developed it and wanted the tech to spread. He seems a tad scatter brained and not keeping track of the results of things. Moved on to a different project and forgetting the various social effects of the previous ones.
The kid was surprised that folks started reacting to slavery more due to his little book? Face Palms. The kid likely has little to no real idea just what sort of impact it has had.
He tossed a social boulder out there and now gets to enjoy the waves. His book is the only thing that he has done that really has had any impact outside of his home.
Seems like she was thrilled their experiment was a success and shows signs of being a useful prototype. It'll be more annoying that they can't directly use it, but it would be a neat trade good.
I can see him sort of handing all this off to adults to spread and forgetting about it. It won't be until he is blind sided by seeing some one use one on a planet or hearing about more ships being produced due to more ezzo or something that he finally remembers it.
You know exactly the reason he developed it and wanted the tech to spread. He seems a tad scatter brained and not keeping track of the results of things. Moved on to a different project and forgetting the various social effects of the previous ones.
Boulder? The kid dropped a small mountain into the galactic ocean.
- Location
- Salt Lake City, UT, USA
It's not all that surprising. It's not like he has easy access to extranet links, what with being a perma-refugee and all. And besides: it's one thing to have the information, and another to truly grasp its meaning.
As an aside: there's another tech he might want to consider developing: deep dive VR. Give his fellow Quarians in poorer living conditions a chance to feel that they are living the dream, at least. Plus it's highly extensible into things like augmented telepresence: have real-world audiovisual and tactile data fed into the virtual construct and a Quarian operator could manage small swarms of VI-assisted drones without needing to actually be there themselves. Use humanoid telepresence puppets for the worst factory/ship conditions and you can get even more mileage from a single worker, with the added bonus of not needing to worry about things like industrial accidents, intensive labor exhaustion, or worker physical fitness.
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The whole thing about using the spacetime knots for control of force in a gravity well reminds me of the gravitic reference frame generators from Distance Learning for Fun and Profit...
I like in story physics and tech exploration like that.
Is Siarpan's exclusionary principle related to the Pauli Exclusion Principle?
en.wikipedia.org
I'm surprised he wasn't asked how he knew about the artifact and it's effects, and I feel that could have been handled better.
"Really? Oh dear I once read about something like that in a story, and cautionary tales are important and for good reason."
Just a suggestion, otherwise good chapter and I'm looking forward to the next one.
I like in story physics and tech exploration like that.
Is Siarpan's exclusionary principle related to the Pauli Exclusion Principle?
Pauli exclusion principle - Wikipedia
I'm surprised he wasn't asked how he knew about the artifact and it's effects, and I feel that could have been handled better.
"Really? Oh dear I once read about something like that in a story, and cautionary tales are important and for good reason."
Just a suggestion, otherwise good chapter and I'm looking forward to the next one.
1. I have no idea if it's related to Pauli's Exclusion principle or not. Sadly I do not possess any charges to buy mass effect field theory with for myself. However I will confess that I was inspired by it when choosing a name (shocking).The whole thing about using the spacetime knots for control of force in a gravity well reminds me of the gravitic reference frame generators from Distance Learning for Fun and Profit...
I like in story physics and tech exploration like that.
Is Siarpan's exclusionary principle related to the Pauli Exclusion Principle?
Pauli exclusion principle - Wikipedia
I'm surprised he wasn't asked how he knew about the artifact and it's effects, and I feel that could have been handled better.
"Really? Oh dear I once read about something like that in a story, and cautionary tales are important and for good reason."
Just a suggestion, otherwise good chapter and I'm looking forward to the next one.
2. Yeah that part is kind of awkward and will definitely get another pass through when I feel up to it.
At the moment it's kind of just coasting along on the idea that Rael has noticed an unexplained change in behaviour from his friend, and well if he has to replace an ugly desk ornament then it's not a big deal. It's also why he's demanding a proper explanation for the Admiralty board. However that whole section undeniably could do with work.
RavenWolffe77
The Marauder series is the best BattleMech.
- Location
- Deep Periphery, A Long Way From The Inner Sphere
Hopefully the Quarian's very good InfoSec on non-civilian equipment/operations and experience with hazardous materials translates well into dealing with Cognitohazrdous reapertech...
I get the feeling this won't be the last Desk Ornament of Doom they have to deal with.
I get the feeling this won't be the last Desk Ornament of Doom they have to deal with.
Love the fact that his book make human free slaves.
And from the news some of those slave are quariens.
Really hope the fleet take the quarians slaves and some others races of slaves who will like the live with the fleet or be some supporters.
It is me or the more kyrah make waves and splash on the timeline and he gain more and speedly his charges ?
And please tell us if be positif help his charges speed up ?
Hope he will create some new energy sources like STARK arc reactor or some materials or techs soon.
I really hope he create some exosqueletton or power armour.
Also are a race symbiotic with rannoch so will kyrah have the idea of the symbiotic mechs that are the titans from titanfall ?
More so do you think you can recreate the titan pilot tech with the heretic geth biotic tech ?
You know the tech the reaper give heretic geth to use biotic in ME 1 even when they are robots.
Hope he think to be ready for the reaper wars.
And from the news some of those slave are quariens.
Really hope the fleet take the quarians slaves and some others races of slaves who will like the live with the fleet or be some supporters.
It is me or the more kyrah make waves and splash on the timeline and he gain more and speedly his charges ?
And please tell us if be positif help his charges speed up ?
Hope he will create some new energy sources like STARK arc reactor or some materials or techs soon.
I really hope he create some exosqueletton or power armour.
Also are a race symbiotic with rannoch so will kyrah have the idea of the symbiotic mechs that are the titans from titanfall ?
More so do you think you can recreate the titan pilot tech with the heretic geth biotic tech ?
You know the tech the reaper give heretic geth to use biotic in ME 1 even when they are robots.
Hope he think to be ready for the reaper wars.
I would recommend some destructive tests and quick measurements, just in case the information proves useful in the future.
A quick spectrometric test and a few pictures to help in future identification, and afterwards measuring how thermally conductive it is and how hot it can get before it melts as it falls into a star.
If it can be done quick enough maybe a test of electrical properties using a multimeter?
Best to be able to identify these things as quickly as possible for safe disposal.
"My what a strange artifact we have found, now according to protocol let's see if it matches any of these readings or pictures or if it might be safe to keep."
- Location
- Pale Blue Dot
I really, really don't think any politicians are going to be willing to take the reputation hit it would cost to push for those hackers getting caught and put on trial.
Honestly, this is probably the most effective favour-gathering operation that group has ever done, as a lot of people who dislike them and hackers in general? They hate slavers far more.
You forget the batarians better than thou prejudice.
I really want some dumb slaves compagny make protest and be hit by the hackers.
Hope some news that chock some turians and salariens.
Really want someone like kasumi goto to stole slavers money with her boyfriend.
Also what about hackett, anderson, joker, ashley, sheppard and all the other humans heroes ???
What about wrex, the drell, mordin, samara, the walkarian family ?
But also what about tela vasir, saren or the shadow broker ?
And what happen about asari supremacy ?
And tevos ?
And the council of matriarch ?
For THE QUESTION i think the response should be the batariens.
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- Location
- Pale Blue Dot
Oh, the Batarians will most definitely object! Most strenously. Sabotage! Terrorist! Think of the poor, innocent slavers lynched in the streets, and how they have to, at great regret, try to massacre their
I was, obviously, talking about Systems Alliance space, which has, y'know, jurisdiction. In Systems Alliance space. Including Earth. Weirdly enough. Mind you, the Batarians might try to push for Spectres to go to town on Earth and kill off all those pesky Redhax hackers in the streets. To make an example.
Let's just say that would have the potential to kick off the kind of political shitstorm that Cerberus dreams about, and they would happily and with great relish burn resources making sure everyone and their dog knew about it, and had solid proof about it, if it happened.