251: Parallel Realities – Chapter Fifteen and More Author Art

Title: Parallel Realities
Author: InHarmsWay
Media: Video Game
Topic:  Mass Effect
Genre: Supernatural/Romance/AU
URL: Parallel Realities: Chapter 15
Bonus URL: Nexus
Critiqued by Herr Wozzeck

Hello children, and welcome to the last installment of the first third of Parallel Realities. We already have a ton of massive plot holes here, and we have one more chapter of stupidity to burn through in the Mass Effect 1 arc. And then, we can move on to other things so I can catch my breath for the ME2 arc.

And once we get into the ME2 arc… I might actually have to break the snarking of that in two parts. The thing about the ME2 arc is that not only do the chapters start getting progressively longer, but the ME2 arc takes up every single chapter from Chapter 16 to Chapter 36. As you can imagine, this results in several pacing gaffes, which actually kind of makes me ask why the hell InHarmsWay felt he needed to cram the first two games and a prospective look at the third game into one fic. I mean… have you seen the second game? That one has so much shit to cover that trying to cover it all in a compressed manner is going to result in a lot of pacing gaffes.

But we’ll get to that when we get there. For now, we just have one last chapter to go in terms of the ME1 arc. So let’s dive right in.

Last time, we left off with the last story mission of the first game. After that, Stupard found out that the obvious ploy to follow canon and remove tension Trial of Metamorphosis is going to take place within a month. After relaying this to the only three friends he has who he’s decided he won’t be a dick to, Stupard tells the gang he wants to take them to the parallel galaxy. So they make plans to do that, and… well…

Here we are.

Now, here’s an interesting thing about this chapter: this chapter involves the Nexus, which according to the story is a massive mass relay that also doubles as the hub of all life in that galaxy. Here’s the interesting part: the author also drew up concept art of this Nexus, and even drew it side by side with the Citadel for a size comparison.

We won’t pull it out now, but when the time comes, you’ll see it.

So anyway, let’s get started with this final installment, because the sooner we can finish this, the better for my sanity.

So we begin the final chapter of the ME1 arc with this:

The dock that the rented spaceship was docked at was empty of all personnel. It was early in the morning which meant Shepard could leave with Garrus, Chakwas and Tali without having to answer any questions, either from the dock workers or reporters.

It was empty of all personnel?

*headdesk*

Has InHarmsWay ever been to an airport in the early hours of the morning? Even at four o’clock in the morning (when the airport terminals are typically closed in some airports) there are still TSA workers running around doing stuff! Trust me, I’d know: I was at Boston Logan at 4 in the morning one time—and Boston Logan isn’t exactly a very busy airport on most days of the year! I take it InHarmsWay has also never heard of red-eye flights: the airports need to be ready to receive those things somehow.

And since logic follows that a spaceport would function very similarly to a modern-day airport, then how does InHarmsWay expect us to believe that there would be no dock workers at certain times in what would logically be one of the busiest spaceports in the entire galaxy?

John was walking up the walkway towards the spaceship hand-in-hand with Tali. Garrus and Chakwas were already on board.

“You okay, Tali?”

“Yes,” she replied. “I’m just a little nervous.”

“About what?” he asked in amusement.

“You mean other than going to another galaxy?”

“Right…”

“It’s just that I want to make a good impression.”

And Tali’Zorah is now worried about making good first impressions. I would like to remind you guys that Tali is the one who gets all up in arms over perceived selfishness on her part in the romance track.

*headdesk*

“Just be yourself and you’ll be fine. Now,” he said in a humorous tone, “are you coming or,” he moved his face close to her visor, “am I going to have to drag you there?”

“Mmm… You might have to make me,” she said in a seductive but playful tone.

John grabbed her hands and held them firmly but not enough to be uncomfortable. John started to pull and Tali resisted in moving; just enough to slow them. The act was playful and made the two smile.

“Well… I’m going to have to change tactics to get you to come on board.”

“And what are you going- Ah!” Shepard interrupted her by quickly scooping her up in his arms, one arm under her knees and the other behind her back, and carry her to the ship. “You bosh’tet!” She kicked and softly pounded his chest until they got on board. Tali relented and just relaxed.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is our romance so far: “oh, you’ve done so much for me even though you lied to me for fifteen years, neglected to contact me over that thing with Saren, and logically should hate my guts over what happened with the geth, and now we’re going to behave like prepubescent schoolchildren because that’s what lovers do right”.

*groan*

The only reason I say that this romance isn’t the most contrived romance ever written is because I know such a statement would be a lie. After all, we do live in a world in which Nicholas Sparks can get movie adaptations with celebrities filling in the leading roles almost as soon as he writes his next book.

Stupard enters the ship, Garrus asks if they need more time, and Shepard is like “oh, no, we got this”.

Without any sort of <hr> tag (which surprises me, really: about the only thing this author is good at apart from sex scenes is adding in the scene divisions), we jump to the next scene right away.

The flight took around five hours to reach the Hydra system. There the wormhole existed. It was a large distortion in the fabric of space, like the ripples on still water. It was a beautiful sight.

“That’s the wormhole?” Tali asked.

“Yes. You can see how it could be easily missed. Unless you have special sensors, you run into it or know where it is, it can be easily missed.

“Like the ripples on still water” as applied to space…

*pictures that*

…

*nods*

Yeah, I can see how it could be easily missed. I kind of have to give InHarmsWay credit for his depiction of the wormhole: at least it’s not the typical depiction of a wormhole as we see in most space operas of this ilk, and we can kind of see why most people wouldn’t even know it’s there.

Though, I think the fact that it’s in a part of the galaxy that doesn’t actually exist helps considerably there. Just sayin’.

Are all of you ready?”

His three friends nodded.

“Then let’s do this.”

John engaged the thrusters and flew the ship right into the distortion. Everything around the ship glowed bright white light with a slight blue hue. The group had to look away due to its brightness. The light finally dimmed revealing to them a large blue gas giant.

“This is…” Garrus said but stopping himself.

“My galaxy,” John replied.

“Wow… this new galaxy…”

*pause*

“Yes, Garrus?”

“It… doesn’t look that different from our galaxy.”

“Where do we go from here?” Chakwas asked.

Noooooooo!

Damn it, Dr. Chakwas, don’t you realize what you’ve done?

You’ve started him on his exposition thing where he’s going to talk about the composition of his entire galaxy before he actually gets on with explaining where he’s gonna go from there!  And now we’re gonna be forced to sit through more exposition than before! And now nothing is gonna stop it! Nothing, I tell you, no—!

“Unknown vessel,” a voice, that spoke galactic standard, said over the comm.

…

*throws himself at the feet of the unknown ship captain*

Thank you, unknown vessel! You have just saved my sanity!

*phew*

I’d yell at you over the fact that his speaking galactic standard would be translated by the translators of every person on board which thus renders that whole part in between the commas as an unneeded detail, but I’m just glad that we don’t have to sit through another bout of exposition that takes about a week to listen through. Man, that’s a relief.

So, you’re an unknown vessel going into the parallel galaxy. What’re you going to say?

“This is the GSV Scylla. Identify yourself or we will be forced to impound your vessel.”

First of all: this is the parallel galaxy, right? If so, why does the name of its vessel take after something that would be more likely to show up in the ME galaxy? Granted, the vessel’s name kind of makes sense considering what Scylla is in Greek mythology, but in that case, why doesn’t this guy just make up a word that fits that significance? He’s done it rampantly throughout the entire rest of this piece of crap; what’s stopping him from doing it here?

Second: Jesus Christ, man, don’t you think it’s a bit much for you to be threatening to impound every vessel that passes through the wormhole? Jeez, you can’t seriously tell me that you’re threatening every vehicle that so much as touches your galaxy. I mean, I’d expect that out of places like North Korea and Cuba, but in this galaxy? In this galaxy, which is supposedly peaceful and good and all-loving and stuff? No. I don’t believe you for a second.

The only way I can see this being worse is if Stupard had to spout off an authorization code of some sort.

John activated the ship’s comm system to answer back. “This is Supreme Commander John Shepard. Authorization code: 523-Treyo-Nak’ka-Zun.”

…

*headdesk*

There was a silence.

“Sir!” the voice said back. “It is an honor to be speaking with you. I apologize for using your time.”

“You were following procedure, soldier.

And that’s procedure?

I… I’m sorry, I can’t get behind that! His galaxy threatens random vessels that don’t know any better with being impounded? I mean, yeah, I know this galaxy already paid the price for being too trusting when Cerberus came around and all, but still, threatening to impound vessels is a bit much, especially after more than 20 years have gone by since then! And even if they don’t easily trust anyone anymore, threatening to impound every vessel that goes through won’t do a thing: it’ll scare the shit out of the innocent vessels, but it won’t deter anyone who actually has hostile intent, whether they function like Cerberus where most of their actions take place under the radar or they’re a Reaper.

Good Christ!

What’s your name?”

“Captain Tev’ra Hiy. Praetorin. Now I’m detecting several other life signs in your vessel.”

“Guests of mine. Garrus Vakarian. Tali’Zorah nar Rayya. Helena Chakwas.”

“Cloak is turning off and you made fly into our cargo bay.”

…

You know, I can suddenly see why these other races haven’t been featured at all throughout a large majority of this story. I mean, look at this: they suffer from a pretty severe case of Cat-on-the-keyboard syndrome and they talk with grammar that would make most kindergarteners blanch in shock.

Yeah, suddenly the decision not to include them makes a lot more sense.

A large vessel appeared before them as its invisibility cloak disengaged. It was a cruiser class vessel.

“Spirits…” Garrus gasped. “Ships that can go literally invisible.”

This isn’t actually as out of character for the ME galaxy’s denizens as you might think, actually: when you consider that the ME galaxy does not have similar technology, it stands to reason that ships that can go invisible would be a cause of some awe for them. Of course, for Stupard, it’s all routine, so… yeah.

So then the small ship docks with this larger praetorin ship, and Stupard and the gang get off their ship.

They followed John out of the ship. Several tall soldiers entered the cargo bay. Each of them were reptilian beings clad in armor. They marched up to the group of four. Tali, Garrus and Chakwas still were uneasy at the approaching group of soldiers. The Praetorin with the longest spikes on the back of its head approached John and immediately saluted him. The other soldiers followed right after.

“It is an honor to be in your presence, Commander.”

And this is a military force in a galaxy that only really began mobilizing and preparing for war in twenty years? Jeez, these guys make the Empire look like they’re disorganized. No, seriously. I have no idea what kind of discipline this involves, but it sounds like an unholy thing that not even Darth Vader could come up with.

“Captain Hiy, I presume?”

“You are correct, Commander. We’ve heard news of the victory against Sovereign. Congratulations.”

“We still have a war ahead, but we are on the track towards victory.”

“Now what do we owe the pleasure of having you back?”

“I am reestablishing the Knights Order and I am going to knight Garrus Vakarian and Tali’Zorah nar Rayya.”

What he should say: “Wait, you’re bringing back an order that hasn’t had any action in over 50,000 years and knighting two people who don’t even hail from this galaxy? You’re insane!”

What he actually says:

“Considering circumstances, a wise decision.”

What circumstances? All you have to go by is Stupard’s word on this! You don’t even know who they are: even if you were in on the intel that everyone and their mother probably has by this point, you, Captain Hiy, know nothing about these people. Okay, yeah, maybe “helped our Supreme Commander stop a Reaper invasion” is a good background to have for something like this, but if that’s the case why not knight the rest of the Normandy’s ground team as well? Well, actually, forget I said that; knighting Wrex, Ash, and Liara would involve having Stupard actually tell them the truth about himself and the parallel galaxy, and we wouldn’t want that, now, would we?

Seriously, one of the main reasons Stupard is knighting Tali and Garrus is because “oh hey, you have kept my secret in the ME galaxy so I’m gonna knight you in the other galaxy”. He didn’t even hide it that much with them last chapter, either. He was like “yeah, this is showing how much I trust you here”. That’s not exactly a wise decision, Hiy; that’s a decision that is at least partially fueled by cronyism, with a potential dash of nepotism in Tali’s case. I’m surprised that Stupard isn’t knighting Dr. Chakwas, but maybe that’s intentional. You know, because of the fact that knighting her would tip the parallel galaxy off to the nepotistic part of the whole ‘I’m gonna knight you guys’ bit.

But then, I guess I shouldn’t be that surprised: after all, this general is talking to the great Commander Stupard, that Gary Stu to kill all Gary Stus. And as we all know, if you’re not with him, you’re an idiot!

*groan*

Tev’ra looked to Garrus, Chakwas and Tali. He bowed his head out of respect. “An honor to meet the three of you.” He looked back to Shepard. “We can take you all to the bridge. Travel to Nexus will take roughly ten minutes.”

“Ten minutes?” Garrus barked. “Just how far away is Nexus?”

“It’s almost on the other side of the galaxy,” one of the soldiers answered.

“How’s that even possible?”

“All of our ships can create temporary wormholes which we use to traverse extremely long distances almost instantaneously.”

*SMACK*

Ten minutes is not almost instantaneously. Good Christ on a pikestaff, man!

John’s group followed the soldiers into the bridge where they got a large view of the space before them. The navigator mumbled something in his native tongue. She then announced to the bridge, “Preparing jump. 3… 2… 1… Go!”

…

Wow. That has to be the most uncomfortable sex change in the history of fanfiction. I mean, jeez…

Okay, so we get an overly long technical explanation of how the FTL drives on the parallel galaxy’s ship goes. Basically, the ship fires a negative energy bomb at a point in front of them that then opens an unstable wormhole. They then use that wormhole to traverse a certain distance. Of course, they don’t make any mention of exactly how they know where the wormhole takes them to, but hey, we can just assume that it’s Stu science talking here. And they do mention that they allow the extra time so the wormhole doesn’t collapse on them, which is a nice touch I guess. It at least explains why there are no accidents in the vein of what happened to the UNSC Forward Unto Dawn. But then… well.

You know how it is.

So yes, they head on over to the Nexus.

The sight before them was magnificent. (.com/art/Nexus-195289591) Nexus was an enormous structure that consisted of six rings that composed a sphere. Five rings came together in a star formation whereas the sixth ring went along the center of the sphere. The sixth carried the center structure which stretched across the center and two towers, one on top and one on the bottom that connected the convergence point of the five rings. Nexus was stationed between three stars. One red, one blue and one yellow.

*facepalm*

You do not throw in an incomplete URL in the middle of the story! That is just freaking lazy if you have to rely on a different source to describe your location, and it’s even worse if you try to describe it immediately after! I guess I should’ve expected it, though: even though it’s as clinical as the rest of the prose, I have no idea what the hell I’m supposed to be looking at. Okay, yeah, the silly detail of the three stars I can picture, but everything else? I mean, what the hell am I looking at?

Actually, that makes me ask this question: has InHarmsWay never heard of author’s notes? Seriously, I haven’t seen a single author’s note in all the time I’ve been snarking this story. And yet, an author’s note would’ve been the only good place that he could’ve stashed that URL in! This is just… this is weird.

But hey, it means we get to talk about the author art of this installment before we end it, so let’s whip out that concept art, shall we?

Yes, it even comes with a handy dandy sketch of the Citadel with its arms closed as a reference point.

…

How the hell did they build that thing?

I mean, look at it! It’s at least four times bigger than the Citadel itself! This Nexus is larger than some planets in the ME galaxy! How the hell did they manage to build it without depleting the resources of several planets in the parallel galaxy? And furthermore, if they had enough resources to build that, then why the bloody hell didn’t the Oracle think ‘oh hey, maybe something good could come out of talking to the parallel galaxy about the protheans’?

And why the hell did it get described as a star-like thing? Uh, InHarmsWay, that’s not a star-like structure: that looks like a gigantic hamster ball with a peg stuck inside! It’s only a star-like structure from one point of reference: anywhere else, and it would look like a giant sphere.

Really, I don’t have too much else to say about the author art in this instance, except that the fact that it’s a construct that is larger than the Citadel that somehow wasn’t constructed by a race of all-powerful sentient machines is annoying and stupid.

But no, as if that isn’t enough, we have to get the ME galaxy’s denizens to be all “ooh” and “aah” over it.

“Keelah…” Tali muttered.

“Spirits…” Garrus said under his breath.

“My god…” Chakwas gasped.

“Welcome to Nexus,” the Captain greeted.

Welcome to Nexus, where your brain will slowly be sucked out of your soul from how stupid the whole thing is.

Shepard and his friends walked towards the Galactic Order’s Chamber. The excitement his three friends showed were beyond enthused.

“This place is amazing!” Tali said. “It’s enormous!”

“It makes the Citadel look like Omega,” Garrus joked.

*cringe*

Given the crime rate of the parallel galaxy, Garrus, that’s probably a lot truer than you want it to be…

“How big is this station?” Chakwas asked.

“In terms of mass, it is four times heavier than the Citadel,” John answered.

To which I reiterate: how the hell did you not deplete at least an entire star system trying to build this thing?

Seriously, at least the Reapers have the excuse that they at least had billions of years for resources to regenerate themselves throughout their known galaxy. But… oh, forget it!

Though, I’m not sure why the mass is four times heavier than the Citadel unless they used heavier materials to construct this thing with. Seriously, if you look at the thing again, there is so much empty space in that structure that it’s not even funny. The only reason I could see the mass being heavier is because that peg-like tower you show there is roughly half the size of the Citadel.

Which actually brings up this point: if the Citadel is only a fourth of the size of the Nexus, then that means that the Nexus is impossibly huge.

For reference, this is what the Citadel looks like if you zoom in to one of the wards so you can see its buildings.

That the parallel galaxy had a structure that was not built by sentient war machines bent on the destruction of all organic life every fifty thousand years that’s bigger than the construct that was built by the sentient war machines is kinda hard to believe, you know?

But then, there’s the fact that there’s only 10 billion or so people in this parallel galaxy if we do the math from the numbers given in the species biosheet reference. So unless the entire population of the parallel galaxy has abandoned all of their homeworlds to live in this space station, the Nexus is going to be one very lonely place. Granted, the articians did number in the trillions before this fic, and they couldn’t have seen it coming, so maybe that bit is a little easier to justify than most other things in this fic.

They walked by a window and saw dozens of scientists working on what appeared to be ship remains.

“Whoa!” Garrus exclaimed. “Are my eyes deceiving me, or are those remains of Sovereign?”

“You are correct,” John answered. “Several operatives on the Citadel collected some remains and brought them back here for analysis. Anything we can learn from Sovereign can greatly aid the war effort. Though we only took enough to analysis. Didn’t want to raise suspicion.

Because, as we all know, it would be a really bad thing if the ME galaxy actually finds the pieces of Sovereign you stole so they can actually figure out that Sovereign isn’t geth technology. You know, so they could do that thing you said you were hoping the ME galaxy would do on their own before you had to reveal yourselves.

Yes, I get that taking some technology would help you guys out too, but if these are pieces of Sovereign, wouldn’t you be better off handing it over to someone in the ME galaxy as well? You take some of these ‘some remains’, you hand the rest back to the Council’s science teams, and you let them do stuff with that.

*headdesk*

Now you three ready to meet the Ministers?”

“As ready as we can be,” Chakwas answered.

The doors opened before them into a small, but well design chamber. Tali made immediate notice of the minimalist use of space for the chamber. The Council Chamber was so immense in comparison. Very wasteful of space. Here it was a good amount of space to hold meetings.

And the amount of space used in this chamber is important to the story… why, exactly?

Her eyes were then drawn to the individuals who stood at their podiums. These races were so different from her galaxy. They also seemed happier. Very odd considering all they face twenty years ago. John did explain to her that the races of this galaxy see themselves as one people with different cultures. Despite their differences, they work towards the betterment of themselves.

One people with different cultures? Uh, they’re all different species with governments that were fill in the blank and had very different biological backgrounds! How the hell does that make them one people? I mean, jeez, not even the UN thinks like that! This doesn’t make any damn sense!

Well, then again, nothing else about a huge part of this whole involved rigmarole makes any damn sense at all, so I guess I shouldn’t be that surprised.

Also, InHarmsWay… can we get a description of these people the way we got for the praetorin when they first came onto the scene? I know you described the basic tenets of each race in that thing you had after Chapter 5, but that’s nowhere near enough. I mean, jeez, why not provide references for them? Or is the fact that the parallel galaxy’s government meets in a not-too-opulent chamber that we’ll likely never see in this story again more critically important to the story than how these alien species look?

*sigh*

Well, the rest of that part involves Stupard talking to the parallel galaxy’s leaders about stuff. They congratulate him on having stopped Sovereign, the galactic leaders leave benedictions for Tali, Garrus, and Dr. Chakwas, they talk a bit about the things that Stupard found out about Cerberus, and then they knight Garrus and Tali in what has to be the shortest knighting ceremony ever.

The two walked up to him and went down on one knee and bowed their heads. John took out Nemain. He light touched both of Garrus’ shoulders with the flat of his blade and declared, “From hence forth you shall be known as Ser Garrus Vakarian.” John turned his attention to Tali and did the same to her. “From hence forth you shall be known as Ser Tali’Zorah. You two may stand.” They did so right away.

“You are now Galactic Knights. Your loyalties are not to me, nor to the Order; it is to the people. To protect them from the evils that emerge from the shadows. Never shall an innocent be needlessly sacrificed in the pursuit of justice. Never shall you give into your fears and allow it to control you. Your strength is derived from your willpower and morality. Congratulations to the two of you.”

“We won’t let you down,” Tali said.

“I know you two won’t. The resources of the Guardians are open to you, so if you ever be in any help during my two-year absence, do not hesitate to ask.

Wait… if this is a peace-keeping order, then why the hell was it abolished 50,000 years ago? You’d think that this parallel galaxy would’ve kept something like that! And even if it lost all of its people to that Reaper invasion, then why the hell did it take them so damn long to re-establish that?

*headdesk*

So then, Stupard offers to give Tali, Garrus, and Dr. Chakwas a tour of the Nexus. So then they do that, and we jump to the next scene, which takes place hours later.

Hours have passed since their knighthood. John managed to take them to a lot of the main locations around Nexus. Every where they went they encountered fans of Shepard. He wasn’t just a hero to them. John was a savior.

You know who else looks at Shepard as a savior? Conrad Verner.

And now, Stupard has a ton of little Conrad Verners running around the Nexus trying to get at him. Y’know, because they’re too blinded by his awesomeness to see the massive amounts of fridge logic concerning his actions.

Seriously, it’s like the denizens of this parallel galaxy are made up of alien races that Mel Brooks ultimately ended up cutting out of Spaceballs because their collective intelligence was a distraction from how stupid President Shroob and Darth Helmet are…

We then jump to sometime later before their stay at the Nexus ends, given that it takes a few days. It cuts to Tali ruminating on the fucking stupid excuse to stick to canon Trial of Metamorphosis again. John comes in quickly after the scene is established.

John walked up behind her and wrapped his arms her waist and held her against himself and rested his chin on her right shoulder. Tali’s hands rest on his. “Hey,” he said.

“Hey,” she replied in a somber tone. “Your meeting’s finished?”

“Yeah.” John looked at the view. “Beautiful isn’t it?”

“Yes. There’s nothing in our galaxy that can ever compare to this station. It’s so advance and beautifully designed. It’s almost as if your race focused on being artistic while designing this station.”

Gajigga-what?

T… The Nexus is artistic?

“In a way yes,” he replied. “This station took close to two hundred years to create. Articians are an expressive specie, and most of the time our expression is through our art. We tried incorporating it in every facet of our culture and architecture.”

*headdesk* *headdesk* *headdesk*

Okay, giving us massive plotholes and having a moronic twat for a protagonist is bad enough, but now you have to claim that the Nexus is artistic, too?

I’m sorry. As the resident musician here at the Library, I have to set the record straight:

The Nexus is a gargantuan take on a sphere! There is nothing artistic about that! I mean, Jesus, the only reason I’d be ogling at the Nexus would be because of its sheer size! My foot is a more beautiful work of art than the Nexus! I mean… I can’t even see the Nexus as a minimalist piece, it’s so unartistic! Does this author even get that Modernist art (which is the only era of art that the Nexus could conceivably be linked to, given what it is) is representational of a concept? If he does, then what the fuck is the Nexus supposed to represent? How the fuck is the Nexus a work of art?

Besides, saying that “most of the time our expression is through art” is so redundant that it would make most people facepalm in derision. Art is always an expression of any sapient species. Hell, Mordin Solus from the second game comments about how art is integral to any sapient species in the second game, and you’re talking about the scientist whose only real experience with the arts is singing reworked Gilbert and Sullivan operettas! Oh yeah, and art always bleeds out into other things. Being a musician myself, I can tell you that trends in music and art run parallel to each other, particularly in the 20th Century!

Good Christ, does this author understand anything about art? I mean, seriously; if a giant sphere that floats in space is what the articians call art, then their artistic sensibilities make people who think Michael Bay is the best filmmaker ever look like the patrons of the Metropolitan Opera!

*groan*

“Now what are you thinking about up here?”

“The Trial of Metamorphosis,” she replied plainly.

“Oh…”

“It’s just knowing you’re going to die in a month scares me.”

“But I will come back.”

Oh, for the love of—

Shut up, Tali! We’ve already had this conversation at least two other times! Jesus Christ on a pikestaff, why are you dwelling on things so much? This isn’t like you at all!

*headdesk*

In response, Stupard brings up that he always keeps his promises. (Except for the time when—oh, forget it, you know where this is going just as much as I do.) And then, they kiss and stuff.

Phew. Only one <hr> tag away from the ending of the ME1 arc. Let’s do this.

So then, we cut to one month later, when Stupard is running around the galaxy taking out geth in the Terminus systems on orders of the Council. (Not that this is established in-story or anything: I guess finding out how a room we’ll likely never see again uses space is more important than explaining what the hell Stupard is doing before he dies.) Personally, I’m surprised the Alliance and the Council didn’t get on Stupard’s ass for quite literally vanishing for several days, but hey, what do I know about military procedure?

So then, we cut to a month later.

There were fires all over the Normandy. It was attacked by an unknown vessel.

…

Oh, fuck you, fic! Here I thought I was done with the plot regurgitation, and now you have to regurgitate the prologue of ME2?

*sigh*

Well, I might as well get this final bit of plot regurgitation over with.

Most of the crew managed to get off, including Tali. She hesitated to leave for an escape pod at first, but Shepard simply said to her, “I’ll come back! I promise.” Tali left for the escape pod with Shepard’s most valuable possession. Nemain.

Now John was hulling Joker towards the last escape pod which was situated behind the cockpit. He managed to get Joker inside, but an explosion knocked Shepard off of his feet. Shepard flew back and grabbed onto a wall next to the control pad. The beam from the vessel struck through the ship hull and went between Shepard and Joker. This was the moment he dreaded for most of his life. It was his time to die.

“Goodbye, Joker,” he said. “Godspeed.”

“Shepard!” Joker yelled.

Another explosion knocked Shepard away, but he was able to hit the launch button before floating out of the ship. Finally the Normandy blew apart.

John felt burns all over his body from the blast. The pain was unbearable. He heard a hiss in his suit and realized that his oxygen tube was punctured. John tried in vain to block it. Oxygen levels dropped. His consciousness was starting to fade. Shepard could feel the warmth of the atmosphere of Alchera as he entered its atmosphere.

*headdesk*

The burns that Shepard’s body sustained were likely from the re-entry into Alchera’s atmosphere, not from that final blast. God, has this guy ever taken a science course before?

As everything started to go black, visions flashed through his head. First were of a Cerberus attack against the Migrant Fleet. The next was Tali on Freedom’s Progress. Again her on a Quarian world called Haestrom. Images of newly recruited soldiers went through his mind. Salarian, Krogan, Drell, Thief, Mercenary… Finally it ended with an image of an angry Illusive Man.

…

Wait, he dies, and sees visions of what’s to come? How the hell does that work?

John sat up in his bed hyperventilating.

…

So all that was a prophetic dream sequence.

…

You know what? I’m tired of having to point out how stupid things in the ME1 arc are. So you know what? Let’s just get this over with.

Tali woke up from his scream. “John, are you okay?”

“The time has come,” he replied. “Today. There is much you need to know about the future.”

Oh, so he’ll tell Tali about a little prophetic dream he had and how things’ll unfold in the future, but he won’t say a word about his true origins and the parallel galaxy and what they know of the Reapers to the Council and the Alliance and especially his ground team?

*groan*

I hate this son of a bitch.

But you know what? I don’t care! We’re finally done with the first third of Parallel Realities!

Now… let’s get all those counters together, and see what the final count is:

Our Hero Ladies And Gentlemen Count: 11

Ah, Yes, “Badassery” Count: 8

“Stepping Stone Character” Moment Count: 3

Ass Pull From Hell Count: 1

Okay. So far, the “Our Hero Ladies And Gentlemen Count” is in the lead. The others haven’t been visited that much, but you know how it is.

*sigh*

Well, that’s the ME1 arc. That’s the ME1 arc, in which Stupard is a prick who won’t help people prepare because he thinks they’re idiots, the Tali romance is contrived and soley based on the fact that she is now a massive bimbo, and where just about every single plot twist makes no sense whatsoever.

I think Pinkie Pie puts it best:

And see where this is going is what we’ll do when we rejoin this story for the ME2 arc. For now…

I need to find something else to yell at. So here’s hoping I can find something.

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