Hello there,
If you enjoy my stories you can read advanced chapters in my patreon page: patreon.com/Samael61
Her Eternal Excellency, a Genshin Impact and ASOIAF crossover, Raiden Ei Reborn as Argella Durrandon, is 15 chapters ahead
DCU:Blacklist, a Raymond Reddington inspired OC SI using his knowledge for his own advantage, as well as the rest of the world, is 15 chapters ahead,
Geek's Guide to Thriving in a Low End Fantasy World, a Robert Baratheon OC SI in an AU, is 15 chapters ahead,
Commander Shepard, The Greatest to Ever Live, a Mass Effect story where Shepard is greater than ever, is 15 chapters ahead,
Loki: The God of Magic , an OC-SI into Loki who is not aware of the MCU, is 4 chapters ahead.
By supporting me, you can read advanced and special chapters, as well as vote on how you want the fanfiction to proceed.
Note: Apple store payments will be refunded, because of the company's 75 day hold policy.
—
"Death once had a near-Commander-Shepard experience"
Serpent Nebula
Widow System
Citadel Defence Forces
Aboard the Destiny Ascension
Matriarch Lidanya, Captain of the Destiny Ascension, the greatest ship in the galaxy, and the pinnacle of Asari technological superiority, was bored.
It came with the position itself, as while it was a great honor to command this ship, it also meant the dreadnought would never see action because no one was foolish enough to attack the Citadel.
"Matriarch, there is unscheduled activity at the mass relay" the maiden stationing the sensors reported and Lidanya straightened herself.
Usually it was a mix up in the schedule, but sometimes ships facing technical problems also entered the system if they were the closest.
"Goddess, the numbers are increasing rapidly" the maiden sounded worried.
"On the map" The Matriarch ordered, on full alert now.
"Yes, Matriarch. 0.2c delay on the feed"
She watched with rapt attention as the first ship arrived. It was a cargo ship, with thick armor but no weaponry, and half the size of a cruiser.
Then a dozen more ships appeared, most civilian, some military, all Batarian.
It wasn't the end of it though, as the numbers grew exponentially. More and more ships of Batarian origins appeared on the sensors.
Matriarch Lidanya, with a sentiment shared by the crew, thought that the Batarians had finally lost their minds and decided to attack the Citadel.
"Hail the Citadel and tell them to close the arms immediately. Have all the ships ready for engagement, and order the civilian ships to retreat to the other side of the system" Matriarch's orders came with centuries of experience and training.
The crew moved to carry out their orders and the Citadel Defence Fleet prepared for a battle for the first time in centuries.
"Matriarch, we are receiving hails"
"Which ship?"
"Most of them are hailing us at the same time"
"Connect us to one, doesn't matter which" She wanted to see what the Batarians were up to.
"Understood"
Rather than a Batarian, an Asari, a maiden by her looks, gaunt and nervous, her eyes darting all over place before falling on the screen.
"Ah, g-greetings. I a-am Ril'sane, w-we are re-refugees es-escaping f-fro-from the He-hegemony" The nervous maiden said, twitching occasionally accompanied by her stuttering.
"All of you?" Lidanya asked. It was one thing for a single ship to escape, but hundreds of them at the same time?
Something definitely was going on.
"Y-yes. Our c-chips w-were dea-deactivated and we es-esc-escaped af-after taking the s-ships"
"Sister, tell those ships to stay where they are and start from the beginning if you can" The maiden was genuine in behaviour as far as she could tell, but she couldn't risk anything, not with that many ships out there.
—
Council Private Chambers
Several Days Later
"Quite a peculiar situation, isn't it?" Valern asked his colleagues, who were in various states of exhaustion.
They had spent more than a week trying to solve this situation but it was more widespread than it appeared. The Citadel wasn't the only one to receive hundreds of ships, as the Turian Hierarchy, Salarian Union and the Asari Republics faced the same situation, with other council species to various degrees.
Ensuring they did not carry some sort of Batarian engineered disease, or had WMDs on the ships meant to detonate at a moment's weakness meant every ship had to be searched and all those refugees had to be scanned.
This was a load of work none of them faced, not even with the disastrous first contact with the Humans.
Tevos was sipping a herbal tea imported from Thessia meant to calm the nerves, while Sparatus chose to push through it on his own.
Valern was just using stimulants as most Salarians would.
"I still say this is ridiculous" Sparatus scoffed. They all had read the reports, and heard the testimonies of the escaped slaves but did not mean they had an easy time believing it.
"Ridiculous or not, we all read the testimonies and watched the recording of that human, Shepard. Speaking of the human, what has STG found on him?" Tevos directed her attention at her Salarian counterpart.
"Jondam Bau in cooperation with Tela Vasir is compiling the information and checking its veracity right now. They will report soon" Tevos nodded and turned to her omni-tool to check on the situation.
Thousands of Asari, Salarian, Turian and other species all crammed into whatever ships they could seize to escape the Hegemony.
More were stuck on those worlds, unable to reach a spacecraft. All thanks to a human named Commander Shepard, who somehow did what the Salarian Task Group could not and accessed the Batarian Network to neutralize the chips.
"Let's hope Saren and his team can confirm what happened at Hegemony space" Valern had already convinced the Salarian Dalatrasses to send STG teams but Saren was the Council's best agent for a reason.
"Councillors, Spectres Bau and Vasir are here" an Asari aidee's voice came from the intercom.
"Very well. Allow them in" Tevos ordered, not in the mood for pleasantries.
"Yes, Councillor"
Tela Vasir and Jondum Bau were the foremost Spectres of their respective species along with Saren Arterius, and as such were the Council's go to agents in a crisis.
Tela Vasir, an Asari Matron, with purple marks on her face and a confident gait walked in, along with Jondum Bau, a light green skinned Salarian, wearing his signature brown and gold armor.
"Councillors" Both greeted at the same time.
"Spectre Vasir, Spectre Bau, I hope your efforts were fruitful" Sparatus asked, implying they better have found something.
"There was a lot to unpack regarding Commander Shepard, so it took a bit longer than usual" Jondum reported, still focused on the datapad he had.
"You may begin then"
"Yes, Councillor. His full name is Jonathan Shepard, born and grew on the streets of Vancouver, he first came into Alliance's notice during an operation against a local criminal organization known as Tenth Street Reds. Under Shepard's leadership, they assumed control of the criminal underground of the city, and extended their influence all across the continent in the span of a year. He was 16 when the Tenth Street Reds were besieged by the Alliance, he surrendered the entire organization as part of an agreement. We couldn't reach the details of the information he provided with our current timeline, but it coincides with the date of massive arrests of influential and wealthy individuals all across the Alliance. All charges on Shepard and his organization were dropped, and the Tenth Street Reds have transformed into a legal entity, called Shepard Technological Solutions, with the Commander possessing a significant amount of shares of the company" Jondaum began, his speech getting faster every second he spoke, and the Councillors except Valern had to take a couple of seconds to comprehend.
"So, he was a criminal?" Sparatus asked, focused on any fault he might just find.
"As I said Councillor, all charges were dropped and his record is clean" Bau reported, raising his head to glance at the Turian.
"What about his military history?" Tevos continued to stop the Turian Councillor from derailing the report.
"He joined the Alliance military at eighteen, having received encouragement from various high ranking officials. His basic training reports say he had the top scores of all times, and was immediately recommended to N7 but was refused due to his young age. The second time he came under spotlight was during the Akuze Incident"
"The one with the Thresher Maws, I believe?" Valern asked, having read the reports of it.
"Yes, Councillor. The Alliance sent a unit for investigation upon losing contact with the pioneers on the planet, but were ambushed by Thresher Maws. Commander Shepard, then a Lieutenant, managed to save his team and sent them to the landing zone, but was stranded when the Maws surrounded the shuttles and cut him off. The shuttles retreated without him to call for reinforcements. A week later he was found at the site of the initial colonization, where he captured the scientists responsible for the trap, as well as rescuing some of the missing soldiers after wiping out the entire nest, through explosives, traps, biotics and his weapon. His psychic evaluation following the incident was clean, as he claimed hunting the thresher maws was fun" Bau quoted with his fingers.
"Fun? Even the Krogan don't find it fun, and wiping out the entire nest by himself? Are we sure this is not a joke by the Alliance?" Sparatus as well as the others were skeptical, just like with the Batarian situation.
"Not as far as we could determine" Bau sniffed at having his work guessed every second due to the Turian Councillor's dislike for Humanity, and left the stage to Vasir.
"His N7 training was controversial according to the reports. He had the highest marks of all times in the fields of Infiltration, Combat, Tech Aptitude, Negotiation, Explosives, Heavy Weaponry and Biotics but his methods of acquiring some of his marks were matters of serious discussion amongst the Alliance military circles. They even compiled a rulebook, called the Shepard Maneuvers, which are explicitly banned due to the high risks they possess" Vasir was centuries old, but even she was impressed by the human's actions.
He was either brave, or extremely reckless. Most likely both.
"They include using a modified shield emitter as an impromptu parachute to scale down a cliff, sub orbital entry with a ground vehicle, bringing down the entire enemy comm systems through a cyber attack during a live fire exercise as well as hacking the Alliance Military Database and stealing the ID's of his commanding officers to infiltrate their lines and, well it is for the best if you see this yourselves" Vasir reported with a straight face.
She too had thought that the Alliance was mocking them by writing a movie script to hide the records, but there were plenty of video recordings, as well as the warnings he received from his commanders for his stunts.
Stunts.
She wouldn't call them that.
Vasir entered some commands on her omni-tool and the video began to play on the screen.
Inside the Exercise Control Station, the humans were recording and analyzing every piece of data they could.
"Sir, there is a problem with one of the missiles" a sensor operative reported to the one star general responsible for overseeing the exercise.
"What? Show me and prepare to shoot it down immediately. Dummy missile or not I don't want an accident" The general reacted without hesitation.
"Yes sir, linking satellite feed now"
The general focused on the main screen as it came alive. There, on top of the missile was a mass effect field with a soldier in it, appearing to be stuck to its surface.
"That's Shepard, isn't it?" He asked, already knowing the answer. One of the operators checked the tag system they used to keep an eye on everyone.
"Yes sir, it is."
"Right, of course, because god forbid Shepard ever do something normal. Keep track of that missile but don't do anything unless it presents a danger to the other soldiers" He had just about enough of Shepard's bullshit, but every ridiculously over the top act of pure insanity he committed had worked so far.
He had expected him to do something, but not this.
"Sir, there is movement" The same sensor operative who detected the anomaly reported again.
Shepard had deactivated the barrier, and whatever it was keeping him on the missile and was flung away like a leaf on a tornado.
Sufficiently away from the missile, he opened his parachute, and began to descend towards the Red Team's base. In the ensuing fight, he neutralized the guards and took the entire enemy leadership hostage, bringing the whole exercise to a short end with an overwhelming victory for the Blue Team.
"God damnit" The general muttered.
The video feed was cut, leaving the Councillor speechless.
"Goddess, does he not have any self preservation instinct? What insanity is this?" Tevos was contemplating what possessed this human to even think of something like this, much less actually do it.
"Could he be a super soldier? Perhaps an experimental unit?" Valern asked, analyzing the feed. While Vasir and Bau wouldn't bring evidence without confirming its authenticity, his own scans had told him the same thing.
It was not a fake, not unless the Alliance advanced more than the Salarians.
"We should have him brought here for questioning and tests to see if he actually is one" If the Alliance had actually done something like that, Sparatus would drown them under a tide of sanctions.
"How has he been allowed to stay in the military, even with Akuze?" Valern could see the value of a soldier like him, but his acts definitely would have broken enough rules to see him discharged from the military.
"He used loopholes to reason he technically hacked enemy systems . Though, it is also reported he was offered and agreed to patch and upgrade the Database in return for no punishment or mark on his record" Bau thought that the Alliance Database had become more well defended, and the reports supported it, at least whatever they could recover before the system kicked them out.
"Anything else?" Sparatus asked, wanting to know more of this Shepard.
"He also has an extensive record of operations in the Terminus Systems, but we couldn't recover them before the Alliance noticed our intrusion" Vasir shook her head.
It took several more hours for the report to conclude and the Councillors retreated to rest, minds heavy with the implications of this impossibility.