Mass Effect: Reaper Dreams

Tuchanka's Tears

"I have heard ballads of great battles, and poems about the beauty of a charge and the grace of a leader. But I did not know that war was nothing more than butchery, as savage and unskilled as sticking a pig in the throat and leaving it to bleed to make the meat tender. I did not know that the style and nobility of the jousting arena had nothing to do with this thrust and stab. Just like killing a screaming piglet for bacon after chasing it round the sty. And I did not know that war thrilled men so: they come home laughing like schoolboys after a prank; but they have blood on their hands and a smear of something on their cloaks and the smell of smoke in their hair and a terrible ugly excitement on their faces.

I understand now why they break into convents, force women against their will, defy sanctuary to finish the killing chase. They arouse in themselves a wild vicious hunger more like animals than men. I did not know war was like this. I feel I have been a fool not to know, since I was raised in a kingdom at war and am the daughter of a man captured in battle, the widow of a night, the wife of a merciless solider. But I know now."

Philippa Gregory

July 14th, 2188

Susan Rizzi

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Susan spat blood and broken teeth onto a primitive cell floor already covered in feces, urine, and rotting flesh. She'd been stripped to her undergarments and systematically abused by her captures, but they hadn't killed her or inflicted mortal wounds—at least not yet. After her capture, she was faced with the fear that the Krogan that had taken her were too stupid to care what she was doing in the area, but then a call came down. Apparently a Warlord, or someone equally as important in the chain of command realized she might be of use to them—lucky for her, lucky for everyone.

It was difficult to make out her surroundings. The light was dim, and what she could see was doubled or blurred by the effects of a severe concussion. It was possible that her skull was fractured. A funny taste in the back of her throat was especially troubling. She suspected it was cerebrospinal fluid, and if that was the case, she didn't have long. Medical treatment was unlikely.

Shaking and sweating, trying to keep herself from vomiting, she crawled to the farthest corner of her cell in the hopes that she could stay out of sight and not attract the attention of one of the Krogan guards. She had her biotics, though they were of little use in her current condition. There was no temptation to attempt an escape. Susan wasn't even sure of where she was. It had all been a blur since her patrol had been jumped.

A voice, wretched and deep, resonating like a sickly bullfrog, croaked out of the darkness beyond her right shoulder.

"Human," it said. "What are you doing here?"

She took a rattling breath through broken ribs before she answered. "What does it look like?"

The Krogan grunted. "I haven't seen an alien on Tuchanka in months."

It was painful to talk, but Susan felt obliged to follow the thread of the conversation.

"Where did they all go?" she asked. "The Relay is still closed."

The Krogan made a sickening sound with his mouth. "Food supplies being what they are, they were butchered and eaten."

Susan made no pretense of being shocked. She'd gotten a firsthand look of Tuchanka these past few days. What had been a desolate world prior to the Reaper War had turned into a burned out graveyard over the course of the last year. The Krogan had rushed headlong into having children as soon as the Genophage was cured. Unfortunately, after the destruction of the Reapers and the damage to the relays meant there was no way to bring the millions of newborn Krogan food and much needed medical supplies. Society had fallen apart in short order.