- Pronouns
- They/Them
At last!
Chatfic.
Chatfic.
Til I Change Your Mind (Mass Effect Krogan SI)
- Thread starter Stratagemini
- Start date
Tithed_Verse
Vainglorious
- Location
- Iowa
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Ok, first, Liara breaths some pretty good fire when she's pissed.
Second, Hanako is a god guard fish-dog-thing
- Location
- U.S.
Still not a dragon. I would however accept krell in a puff the magic dragon costume with a flamethrower wandering the halls as an alternative
Krazyfan1
Worrying for the future.
- Location
- Australia
he did breathe fire one time i think?
- Location
- Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
This is such an earnest and desperate plea I can hear it through my screen and I'm cackling. 10/10 chapter.
Every chapter is a riot to read. Also can Krell even die of old age? How old is he?
I assume Krogans can... theoretically, maybe die of old age? Thing is, they can also just live for thousands of years, Krell is one of the oldest Krogan around at over 2000 years old and he's still hale and hearty enough to run around getting into gunfights. It's just that Krogans have a very heavy tendency to not live out whatever theoretical natural lifespan they could have, because they're busy deathmatching everything in sight.
Krazyfan1
Worrying for the future.
- Location
- Australia
i like the idea that they don't have a maximum lifespan.
the reason Drack is feeling his age is due to his cybernetics not being built to last that long, presumably with having to replace a lot of things at once.
not sure if Krogan can regrow organs, but i can imagine it being possible, just Slow (unless the Krogan is Garm) compared to how fast they normally heal (so like a month or two).
Drack, having needed to replace multiple organs, with the replacements being not the longest lasting, would need to consider whether to risk removing one and waiting for it to regrow while hoping the remaining one doesn't break and kill him, while being confined to non-combat roles, or taking his chances by leaving them in and remaining in a combat role.
Plus he likely couldn't remove more than one at a time, meaning even More time out of combat, feeling useless.
the reason Drack is feeling his age is due to his cybernetics not being built to last that long, presumably with having to replace a lot of things at once.
not sure if Krogan can regrow organs, but i can imagine it being possible, just Slow (unless the Krogan is Garm) compared to how fast they normally heal (so like a month or two).
Drack, having needed to replace multiple organs, with the replacements being not the longest lasting, would need to consider whether to risk removing one and waiting for it to regrow while hoping the remaining one doesn't break and kill him, while being confined to non-combat roles, or taking his chances by leaving them in and remaining in a combat role.
Plus he likely couldn't remove more than one at a time, meaning even More time out of combat, feeling useless.
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Iridium Flare
Cyborg Commando
- Location
- AC-130 Gunship circling overhead
If you don't think he has dragon-motif armor complete with a face-mounted flamethrower kicking around somewhere, you really don't know Nakmor Krell.
Krazyfan1
Worrying for the future.
- Location
- Australia
he also has a jump pack.
i can see him creating a weaponized Wingpack.
- Location
- Germany
at that point?
over 2100 years old.
And generally its believed that Krogan can't die of old age, their regeneration is too powerful for that.
clonezero
Is it a bad thing if my t read list keeps growing?
It has no dragons but it probably has a large contingent of dormant geth platforms ready and waiting to defend it. They may end up fashioning dragon heads with built in flamethrowers for themselves to appease those insisting dragons are needed.
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- Location
- Software
The entire mail chain was a riot. Poor Vega, he doesn't know how "interesting" his life is going to become in the near future...
Also:
"Citadel News, with an exclusive interview with Nakmor Krell, about his opinion about the state funeral the Citadel has just did in his honor"
"It was pretty cool, for a Turian designed & executed one! The ones I did back in the old days were less sobering, though!"
"Any plans of dying?"
"Who knows, between my new job as the new Dean of the University of Tuchanka, the side job with the renewed Prothean Empire and the expected ancient giant cuttlefish cyborg invasion I'm having less time for fun, lately!"
"Logica- Wait what was the last one?"
Also:
"Citadel News, with an exclusive interview with Nakmor Krell, about his opinion about the state funeral the Citadel has just did in his honor"
"It was pretty cool, for a Turian designed & executed one! The ones I did back in the old days were less sobering, though!"
"Any plans of dying?"
"Who knows, between my new job as the new Dean of the University of Tuchanka, the side job with the renewed Prothean Empire and the expected ancient giant cuttlefish cyborg invasion I'm having less time for fun, lately!"
"Logica- Wait what was the last one?"
- Location
- Germany
Cue a quick explanation about reapers, what they did to the Protheans followed with what they are doing now.
AND what they plan to do.
Javik will call this a masterstroke, bringing together the centuries of Krell's research papers, published documents and "subtle manipulations" of various groups.
Krell will call it "rolling with the punches"
The Nakmor squad member from Andromeda fought in the rebellions.
And the shaman you meet in ME2 is old enough to remember Krogans at the height of their society.
Wrex was born at the tail end of the rebellions, too late to fight in them if I remember right.
Krogan can live a really really really long time.
And the shaman you meet in ME2 is old enough to remember Krogans at the height of their society.
Wrex was born at the tail end of the rebellions, too late to fight in them if I remember right.
Krogan can live a really really really long time.
- Location
- United States
One day, Krell really will die. Possibly in battle, possibly to poison, most likely to his own hubris. When he does, nobody will believe it. Instead, they'll throw him a magnificent funeral expecting him to show up. And he will- but not because he survived. Somehow, he'll have been cloned by one of the few dozen conspiracies and clandestine organizations. The clone will seamlessly take the original's place using tried and tested methods: Never giving anyone a straight answer about anything and just letting them assume everything. More specifically, letting them assume that he faked his own death again because he forgot Liara's wedding anniversary.
- Location
- U.S.
or Krell ended up getting revived through a Cerberus like procedure by a Cerberus like organization with a Cerberus like plan to revive a living legend to help push their goals and agenda but is totally not Cerberus. Cerberus
Krell is a contemporary to Jesus. As in he was born in the same year.
My fucking god, this whole part.
This shit had PHO Vibes from hell and back lmfao.
Great chapter, captured the insanity of the crew real well... also have to agree Shep REALLY did get that prison energy going hahaha
CHAPTER 52: Gods of War
Stratagemini
Totally a Fire Ferret.
- Location
- Central Park
- Pronouns
- He/Him/They/Them
Chapter 52: Gods of War
With the dirty business of unfaking my death to Shepard's team done, the next stop on my Imperial unification tour was Wrex. That meant heading back to Tuchanka on the Friendly Headbutt.
I'd stopped writing to the Citadel. They had all the information they needed.
They probably knew what I was up to anyway.
Come to think of it, was that why Valern was so upset?
Well, he could deal with it a little longer. I wonder if there were any Krell-day parties on Tuchanka? Even odds if Wrex had anything to say about it.
I spent the entire time heading to Tuchanka researching everything that I could about the laws in Javik's empire. The good news was that the empire was basically a blank slate working off Hanar laws when issues of law needed to be decided. No empire level legislation or anything. So there was a fair amount of freedom available for me to fill in that gap.
The bad news of course was that the empire was a blank slate working off Hanar laws and was basically only held together by Javik's blend of religious fanatics, his sheer charisma, and his military might.
That hadn't worked out great for Alexander's empire in the long run, and I didn't want to experience that kind of fallout.
That meant I needed to come up with a system, a working system, which was effective in both the short and long term and which was attractive to a blend of lifespans, polities, and even modes of sentient life.
Luckily there's a relevant system that's pretty well-trod in history: federations.
The less power the empire had over its component states and the more it gives to the states the more attractive the Empire would be.
Javik really only cared about a few things; who had military command, who could declare war, and how much support he could get from the constituent members of his Empire. He didn't care about things like rights, or trade, or succession. I wasn't about to let him cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war. Not after all the work I put into saving this galaxy.
So it was with a mostly blank slate that I approached Wrex.
Well, Wrex approached me. It wasn't a good idea to have these conversations on the ground. Wrex was almost as surveilled as I was now! Though I think I may have finally shaken the last observers with that trip to the library. Hopefully.
That might be another thing Valern was pissed off about, come to think of it.
Anyway, I made it to Tuchankan space, quietly lamenting the lack of libraries in orbit. A necessary sacrifice, for now. Tuchanka was one of the least vulnerable planets to the Reapers if only because of the lack of unexploded infrastructure. The shrouds were the big thing we needed to worry about. That made them easy to attack, but also easier to defend. We didn't need to worry about civilian cities like Earth did; not on the same scale.
I sent Wrex a quick email telling him I'd arrived. And then went to go do some more last minute legal research.
Wrex eventually made it to my ship in his shuttle. His own personal shuttle! He was lording it over me. I knew he was! But I couldn't call him on it, even though I knew that he knew that I knew that he knew what he was doing bringing his own, private, personal shuttle into my ship!
Wrex knew me too well. No one else would have known how much this would bother me. They'd see my library and think 'Krell has such a big ship! And so full of knowledge! He'd never be petty and jealous enough to envy my personal shuttle!'
Wrex knew better. He knew exactly how much I wanted a shuttle of my own. He knew exactly what he was doing. He was showing off.
That jerk.
What's that? I'm on a ship in space and the only way to reach me was on a shuttle? That's certainly true. It didn't make Wrex any less of a dick for flaunting his amazing Krogan-built shuttle.
What's that? I could absolutely buy my own shuttle if I wanted to and easily replace the ones I had lost? Sure. But I can't just keep buying shuttles all the time. I'm wealthy, but not that wealthy. I think. I should probably check how much money I have now; get it transferred into something useful, like new space stations, or maybe space news stations...
Where was I going with this again?
Oh Yes! Wrex was here, and it was time to talk politics!
'Krell.' Wrex opened as he strode into my cabin.
'Wrex.' I finally nodded back in acknowledgment, secure that Wrex knew how irritated I was that he took a shuttle to visit me.
Now, how to broach the issue at hand?
The problem with the Citadel is you can't just exile entire species from any sort of political influence while continuing to claim the moral authority to rule over them; it makes for a lot of hurt feelings even without stuff like genocidal sterility plagues involved.
Of course it also makes people wary of joining intragalactic governments, which might presently prove to be a bit of an inconvenience.
'I think we should join the rebuilt Prothean Empire.' I finally confided.
'Two years ago that wasn't even an option. Those words would make no sense.' Wrex replied.
'That's not a dismissal.' I observed.
'It's an observation. What do we get out of this? Why should we join?' Wrex asked.
'You mean aside from help fighting the Reapers?' I asked.
'We can get that with just an alliance. We don't need to join them.' Wrex stated.
'Let me give you some background here and then we'll talk about our options?' I said.
'Sure.' Wrex agreed.
'Okay, so here are the obvious things. This empire is new. It's only a few years old at most. Less, I think. There's no systemic infrastructure, there's no entrenched laws, it's a military dictatorship basically held together solely by military force and Javik's charisma.' I explained.
'Really selling it to me, aren't you, Krell?' Wrex joked.
'You're looking at this the wrong way, Wrex. We don't want to join an entrenched power bloc. We tried that with the Citadel. Didn't work out great for us. We want to be part of the people creating the power bloc.'
'Why?'
'Because if we join an established polity, we will have to adapt to their rules. With Javik's Prothean empire, we will get to write our own. Javik is a warrior, I trust him to know how to handle wars. But you and I, Wrex? We can win the peace. Not just for the Krogan; for everyone.'
'Inspiring. But what do we actually win if we join?' Wrex asked, skeptically.
'We win a whole hell of a lot of worlds in the Terminus, for one thing. Worlds we're going to need once the genophage is gone, and worlds we're going to need to defend pretty soon. We also win the ability to craft the rules governing the Krogan. If you want to cement the power structures that you're building into something more permanent, you're going to a need a legal framework in which to make those structures not just viable, but also important to maintain. With an Empire above us, that's something that becomes a reality.' I reply.
Wrex nodded, slowly.
'Okay Krell, You have my attention. Show me what these laws will look like.' Wrex commanded.
It was a very long night.
__________________________________
Wrex finally decided he wanted in on the ground floor of the empire; after a long and complex civics lesson in entrenched power structures and statutory construction, anyway.
Wrex was an amazing politician, but he was still a Krogan politician. We'd had very few entrenched power structures and even fewer statutes since the genophage.
Still, the idea of winning the peace had appealed to him on a fundamental level in a way I'd never have understood if I weren't a Krogan.
After all, you never realized how important it was to win the peace if you'd never lost the peace; and we Krogan had definitely lost the post-rebellions peace.
We'd lost it harder than any species in the Galaxy.
Besides that? Learning that the Asari were wrong about the Protheans; that Javik was the closest damn thing the Protheans had to a god of war? Well, that certainly didn't hurt my case for joining up.
I needed a rest, but there was no rest for the wicked, and certainly not for me. Not if I wanted this Empire to work, anyway. I quickly dashed an email off to Javik asking what the empire was called, and then another seven emails telling him that calling it the 'Empire of Vengeance' wasn't something that would be at all helpful in any sense of the word, and that: The Prothean Vengeance Empire, The Vengeance Empire of the Enkindlers, The Empire named Vengeance, and the Vengeance for the Prothean Empire Empire were all equally terrible names that he should be ashamed for suggesting. I'm pretty sure he assumed that comment was a joke, but he allowed me to suggest a few options in return.
Javik's naming sense is terrible, by the way.
He rejected the Empire of Krelltopia, the Super Reaper Fighting Force, and the Empire of Smiles.
We finally settled on the Great Empire of the Enkindlers as a compromise choice; mostly because it was apparently what the everyone else was already calling the damn thing anyway.
So I'm now officially the Chief Strategist and Diplomat of the Great Empire of the Enkindlers!
Which meant that I didn't need to change my email signature.
It would have been nice to actually visit Tuchanka, but time was the one resource I no longer had in abundance.
Now all I had to do was get everything ready to take on the army of immense heretofore unstoppable genocide robots that no one had ever stopped before. In a matter of months.
The Reapers were coming.
It was time to do some more diplomacy.
___________________________
Author's Note:
Sorry for that initial post, if anyone saw it.
Anyway, I wanted a song that worked on both the scale and seriousness I want underlying this chapter, with of course some humor too.
Def Leppard's Gods of War is a good fit for all those, if not a perfect fit (I could do without the samples of speeches, honestly). It also works on a coule levels. Javik is called out explicitly, but Krell and Shepard and Wrex and Zaeed and a bunch of others in the team really do fit the bill. That's right. We're fightin' with the gods of war, but what the hell we fightin' for? That's the question I wanted asked and answered.
Hopefully that came across.
With the dirty business of unfaking my death to Shepard's team done, the next stop on my Imperial unification tour was Wrex. That meant heading back to Tuchanka on the Friendly Headbutt.
I'd stopped writing to the Citadel. They had all the information they needed.
They probably knew what I was up to anyway.
Come to think of it, was that why Valern was so upset?
Well, he could deal with it a little longer. I wonder if there were any Krell-day parties on Tuchanka? Even odds if Wrex had anything to say about it.
I spent the entire time heading to Tuchanka researching everything that I could about the laws in Javik's empire. The good news was that the empire was basically a blank slate working off Hanar laws when issues of law needed to be decided. No empire level legislation or anything. So there was a fair amount of freedom available for me to fill in that gap.
The bad news of course was that the empire was a blank slate working off Hanar laws and was basically only held together by Javik's blend of religious fanatics, his sheer charisma, and his military might.
That hadn't worked out great for Alexander's empire in the long run, and I didn't want to experience that kind of fallout.
That meant I needed to come up with a system, a working system, which was effective in both the short and long term and which was attractive to a blend of lifespans, polities, and even modes of sentient life.
Luckily there's a relevant system that's pretty well-trod in history: federations.
The less power the empire had over its component states and the more it gives to the states the more attractive the Empire would be.
Javik really only cared about a few things; who had military command, who could declare war, and how much support he could get from the constituent members of his Empire. He didn't care about things like rights, or trade, or succession. I wasn't about to let him cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war. Not after all the work I put into saving this galaxy.
So it was with a mostly blank slate that I approached Wrex.
Well, Wrex approached me. It wasn't a good idea to have these conversations on the ground. Wrex was almost as surveilled as I was now! Though I think I may have finally shaken the last observers with that trip to the library. Hopefully.
That might be another thing Valern was pissed off about, come to think of it.
Anyway, I made it to Tuchankan space, quietly lamenting the lack of libraries in orbit. A necessary sacrifice, for now. Tuchanka was one of the least vulnerable planets to the Reapers if only because of the lack of unexploded infrastructure. The shrouds were the big thing we needed to worry about. That made them easy to attack, but also easier to defend. We didn't need to worry about civilian cities like Earth did; not on the same scale.
I sent Wrex a quick email telling him I'd arrived. And then went to go do some more last minute legal research.
Wrex eventually made it to my ship in his shuttle. His own personal shuttle! He was lording it over me. I knew he was! But I couldn't call him on it, even though I knew that he knew that I knew that he knew what he was doing bringing his own, private, personal shuttle into my ship!
Wrex knew me too well. No one else would have known how much this would bother me. They'd see my library and think 'Krell has such a big ship! And so full of knowledge! He'd never be petty and jealous enough to envy my personal shuttle!'
Wrex knew better. He knew exactly how much I wanted a shuttle of my own. He knew exactly what he was doing. He was showing off.
That jerk.
What's that? I'm on a ship in space and the only way to reach me was on a shuttle? That's certainly true. It didn't make Wrex any less of a dick for flaunting his amazing Krogan-built shuttle.
What's that? I could absolutely buy my own shuttle if I wanted to and easily replace the ones I had lost? Sure. But I can't just keep buying shuttles all the time. I'm wealthy, but not that wealthy. I think. I should probably check how much money I have now; get it transferred into something useful, like new space stations, or maybe space news stations...
Where was I going with this again?
Oh Yes! Wrex was here, and it was time to talk politics!
'Krell.' Wrex opened as he strode into my cabin.
'Wrex.' I finally nodded back in acknowledgment, secure that Wrex knew how irritated I was that he took a shuttle to visit me.
Now, how to broach the issue at hand?
The problem with the Citadel is you can't just exile entire species from any sort of political influence while continuing to claim the moral authority to rule over them; it makes for a lot of hurt feelings even without stuff like genocidal sterility plagues involved.
Of course it also makes people wary of joining intragalactic governments, which might presently prove to be a bit of an inconvenience.
'I think we should join the rebuilt Prothean Empire.' I finally confided.
'Two years ago that wasn't even an option. Those words would make no sense.' Wrex replied.
'That's not a dismissal.' I observed.
'It's an observation. What do we get out of this? Why should we join?' Wrex asked.
'You mean aside from help fighting the Reapers?' I asked.
'We can get that with just an alliance. We don't need to join them.' Wrex stated.
'Let me give you some background here and then we'll talk about our options?' I said.
'Sure.' Wrex agreed.
'Okay, so here are the obvious things. This empire is new. It's only a few years old at most. Less, I think. There's no systemic infrastructure, there's no entrenched laws, it's a military dictatorship basically held together solely by military force and Javik's charisma.' I explained.
'Really selling it to me, aren't you, Krell?' Wrex joked.
'You're looking at this the wrong way, Wrex. We don't want to join an entrenched power bloc. We tried that with the Citadel. Didn't work out great for us. We want to be part of the people creating the power bloc.'
'Why?'
'Because if we join an established polity, we will have to adapt to their rules. With Javik's Prothean empire, we will get to write our own. Javik is a warrior, I trust him to know how to handle wars. But you and I, Wrex? We can win the peace. Not just for the Krogan; for everyone.'
'Inspiring. But what do we actually win if we join?' Wrex asked, skeptically.
'We win a whole hell of a lot of worlds in the Terminus, for one thing. Worlds we're going to need once the genophage is gone, and worlds we're going to need to defend pretty soon. We also win the ability to craft the rules governing the Krogan. If you want to cement the power structures that you're building into something more permanent, you're going to a need a legal framework in which to make those structures not just viable, but also important to maintain. With an Empire above us, that's something that becomes a reality.' I reply.
Wrex nodded, slowly.
'Okay Krell, You have my attention. Show me what these laws will look like.' Wrex commanded.
It was a very long night.
__________________________________
Wrex finally decided he wanted in on the ground floor of the empire; after a long and complex civics lesson in entrenched power structures and statutory construction, anyway.
Wrex was an amazing politician, but he was still a Krogan politician. We'd had very few entrenched power structures and even fewer statutes since the genophage.
Still, the idea of winning the peace had appealed to him on a fundamental level in a way I'd never have understood if I weren't a Krogan.
After all, you never realized how important it was to win the peace if you'd never lost the peace; and we Krogan had definitely lost the post-rebellions peace.
We'd lost it harder than any species in the Galaxy.
Besides that? Learning that the Asari were wrong about the Protheans; that Javik was the closest damn thing the Protheans had to a god of war? Well, that certainly didn't hurt my case for joining up.
I needed a rest, but there was no rest for the wicked, and certainly not for me. Not if I wanted this Empire to work, anyway. I quickly dashed an email off to Javik asking what the empire was called, and then another seven emails telling him that calling it the 'Empire of Vengeance' wasn't something that would be at all helpful in any sense of the word, and that: The Prothean Vengeance Empire, The Vengeance Empire of the Enkindlers, The Empire named Vengeance, and the Vengeance for the Prothean Empire Empire were all equally terrible names that he should be ashamed for suggesting. I'm pretty sure he assumed that comment was a joke, but he allowed me to suggest a few options in return.
Javik's naming sense is terrible, by the way.
He rejected the Empire of Krelltopia, the Super Reaper Fighting Force, and the Empire of Smiles.
We finally settled on the Great Empire of the Enkindlers as a compromise choice; mostly because it was apparently what the everyone else was already calling the damn thing anyway.
So I'm now officially the Chief Strategist and Diplomat of the Great Empire of the Enkindlers!
Which meant that I didn't need to change my email signature.
It would have been nice to actually visit Tuchanka, but time was the one resource I no longer had in abundance.
Now all I had to do was get everything ready to take on the army of immense heretofore unstoppable genocide robots that no one had ever stopped before. In a matter of months.
The Reapers were coming.
It was time to do some more diplomacy.
___________________________
Author's Note:
Sorry for that initial post, if anyone saw it.
Anyway, I wanted a song that worked on both the scale and seriousness I want underlying this chapter, with of course some humor too.
Def Leppard's Gods of War is a good fit for all those, if not a perfect fit (I could do without the samples of speeches, honestly). It also works on a coule levels. Javik is called out explicitly, but Krell and Shepard and Wrex and Zaeed and a bunch of others in the team really do fit the bill. That's right. We're fightin' with the gods of war, but what the hell we fightin' for? That's the question I wanted asked and answered.
Hopefully that came across.
- Location
- Pale Blue Dot
So many assassins are going to be so annoyed.
Those politicians will not know how to fight (mostly), but... they will absolutely get the best armor and shields they possibly can, just to show up others about how important they are.
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Mr. Mica
Capitalism cannot fix Global Warming.
- Location
- Earth
And that was the goal all along, wasn't it?
- Location
- Germany
I am almost dying... Just imagine Krell coming to visit the Citadel with his "Library Station" and wanting to do a "Cultural Exchange".
Krell: "Wahh, ups, wait ... *Tractor Beams Ships in the way to safety* Uaaaaah, Citadel Traffic Control did not account for my Library, sorry guys. Hey, nobody died, we cool, right? I did spin the Citadel right, did I? What, it was never spinning? Eeeeee"
Krell: "Wahh, ups, wait ... *Tractor Beams Ships in the way to safety* Uaaaaah, Citadel Traffic Control did not account for my Library, sorry guys. Hey, nobody died, we cool, right? I did spin the Citadel right, did I? What, it was never spinning? Eeeeee"
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