With Pride and Blood 5 (Patreon)

With Pride and Blood 5 - or ‘Time to make Humanity the Greatest Ever, at the Expense of some scum from outer space!’ (Mass Effect, Senator Armstrong!SI)

Peace is the antechamber of War. Such a concept was as true as it was wrong- a paradox and yet a fact.

There was no doubt in my mind that Peace was not the opposite of War- it was the lack of conflict which worked as pauses between major wars. Since War is something inevitable regardless of the efforts made by those driven by idealistic views of diplomacy.

So, when the business of a Peace to end the First Contact War was advanced by a Citadel ship that had been assigned to perform diplomacy within the conflict, a ceasefire was called and all standards adopted by such an ordeal were adopted. I watched tensely these moments as I was not familiar with the war conduct for Turians on these matters.

Much to my relief, all fighting ceased and allowed us to properly entertain the prospect of a proper armistice. An early request from the Turians to exchange prisoners was rebuked on the basis that it should be entered within the peace treaty.

A few days after the ceasefire, I was sitting on board of a ship that was being escorted to the Citadel. I wasn’t going in without the right amount of protection, and I was ‘vlogging’ through the trip to explain what I was looking at.

I admit the concept felt so shitty considering my ‘importance’, but due to the fact this was a ‘first contact culture shock’, I preferred for the rest of Humanity to see that we weren’t dealing just with the same bastards that had been ‘reskinned into other species’. Salarians, Asari, Batarians and so on- the Citadel was a massive hub that surprised many humans due to its size.

I added on the side it wasn’t ‘built entirely by the council as the husk had existed before that’. A thing that tourists knew for sure, but that surprised the C-SEC guards keeping an eye on me.

I was a tall fellow, a bulky one too- the mere size had the guards uneasy around me as I looked to be far more than they were trained to face if things went badly. Then again, that was just a passing fear as I was the leader of a multi-planetary democracy that avoided punching around idiots. In public.

The entire tour was dealt with in a way to try and sell off the notion that the Citadel was amazing, every new species wanted to join it, and that it can all go right from joining such a group.

I was barely listening to that, the honey-layered words filled with so many half-truths and some outright lies on the many boons of joining the Council were giving me a deep disappointment for the guide. I think the Salarian noticed that as he switched into generic shit. Good for the guy, but it wasn’t the worst I had to face just yet.

After all, I expected the meeting with the council to be a bloodbath. It wasn’t just me to face this sort of ordeal, and although I was limited on who to invite to this meeting, I was able to secure Williams in the team. The man was deeply honored of the invitation and I had a private talk with the guy in regard to any potential outbursts. The point was to be ‘grieving in the right, and not escalating for the worse’. He seemed to get it, and I decided against further stressing the point.

By the time we reached the Council, the vlog had to be stopped and we entered the chamber with great resolution and confidence. Not hesitation or doubt, only true awareness of the one thing that mattered the worst- we had won the war, and we were going to get the spoils out of this.

“President Armstrong, we are glad to see that you personally came to join us for these peace talks.”

I nodded at the Asari Councillor. “Councillor Tevos, your words are kind. However, I believe it’s only fair that I am here to fight for my people like soldiers have fought on Shanxi.”

A hint of tension appeared in my words. I wasn’t there to start a war, but I was going to be fucking damned if I behave too peaceful around these people. They were not nice players, and I wasn’t going to be as such either.

As the human party settled by the table before the rest of the council, we were provided documents in regard to what rules to be followed. No Alcohol, no smoking and other restrictions that were clearly studied by those that had analyzed human behaviors up to this day. Clever, but overall futile if not to try and call us unruly monkeys that couldn’t behave themselves.

I was close enough to just lit up a cigar to piss them off, but I couldn’t go full passive-aggressive. Not until reason was provided at least.

The first step was simple. Recognition of who was at fault. Sparatus looked furious, but he gave up the notion that humans had caused it. He tried to pin it as a case of disobedience that was ‘rare within the hierarchy’, and one of the human diplomats raised a point that was fairly simple to imply.

“How did this behavior even come to be? Why was such an ambitious group of officers able to just expect greatness by attacking an unidentified and unarmed vessel?”

“I don’t…” Sparatus was a bit surprised by this early resistance, but it was his fellow councilors that saved his ass.

“I am afraid that such an investigation has not been conducted by the Turian Hierarchy as it has become a Citadel’s chore. A committee has been created to interrogate and study the topic with objective care to it,” The Salarian Councilor replied quickly. “The commission is already working, but it will take a few weeks to determine a proper understanding of the matter.”

There was no opposition to this. I knew already the Turians were going to turn their unlucky troops into scapegoats, and I decided against ‘dying on a hill that was not even mine’.

With this early but gone thorough, it was time to entertain the ‘meat’ of the situation: the treaty’s points.

“The first point that you have raised with your draft, is War Reparation. The amount has been deemed just by Palaven,” Sparatus announced calmly, relieved to some extent as the amount was quite low for what had happened. “Yet, I have to raise a complaint in regard to the side note provided to it- that the low war reparation ‘means’ to the representatives of the System’s Alliance that any grounded ship has to be seen as reparation too. I am afraid this is quite ridiculous.”

“Is it?” I replied cheekily. “Apologies for sounding a bit simplistic on the topic, but would it be correct that the ships can now be seen as property of the planet now as they have been abandoned by your military and thus stripped of Palaven’s ownership?”

“It should not-”

“It technically is,” The only Salarian hummed, interjecting his colleague. “The abandonment of a ship within the ground owned by an enemy during a state of war could be seen as a potential conquest and thus recognized as such. However, the council would be willing to accept payment to return the ship with the price set to a quarter of its original cost to be built.”

“In resources or credits?” I inquired.

“Either are fine,” Tevos assured, and I knew what was up.

They thought we hadn’t recovered the Monolith the Turians had tried to snatch away. Oh boy, was that going to be a nasty surprise when they realized that we had stripped the ships of the monolith and their guns to be studied. All in all, they didn’t ask what was left of the ships after being grounded, but those in their current state.

“I believe an agreement based on a monthly resource exchange can be added, yes.”

No party raised complaints about that. I didn’t need credits as those still lacked proper conversion. Resources were ten times more relevant due to this and could be used to also test out new prototypes through what we were to learn through the Turian weapons.

“The second point is in regard to the exchange of prisoners. I wish to understand the point of this happening on Shanxi and not on the Capital or a neutral planet,” Sparatus remarked. “Why Shanxi?”

“It’s the place where it all started and where it all ends. Let’s be honest, councilor, as much as we try to sell this as the product of a group of rare people, many will see for what it feels like- Turians warred against humanity, humanity fought back and we made you bleed on Shanxi. Regardless of how this peace treaty will go, there will be animosity between our species and this sucks. I am here to remark one point that may not be seen or heard by others- We didn’t start the war, but we fought in it to end it. Why? Because we will always defend our borders, our freedom and our rights. It’s not justice or revenge, it’s a matter of truth against myth. Because like hell I will allow some morons to call it a reason to hate- this clash was between the purity of the ideal, between patriotism and militarism. Too much of the latter can corrupt, too much of the former shall always fill the people of those that follow it with pride and grace.”

I leaned back, smiling smugly. “So, my point is- a border war happened, people died from both sides and we will never understand the pains of each other. So, how about we start from square one on a diplomatic stand point?”

“...you mentioned the idea of an exchange of embassies between the Hierarchy and the Systems’ Alliance,” Sparatus muttered and Tevos jumped in.

“It would be easier for humanity to apply to the council. The process would allow you to attain a proper status within a few decades-”

“I am afraid that’s not something this group can address, Councillor Tevos,” I interrupted. “After all, these representatives have been chosen by the government to act with the sole role to secure a peace treaty. And even in my position as President, I have to go and abide by my duties and by what this meeting is meant to be.”

Tevos looked surprised, but she recoiled fast as she knew it was a fair point.

“Then I hope that a future conversation can be opened on the topic.”

“Dialogue is for free, but taking such a decision may not be that simple, Councillor.”

Not when I personally opposed this council’s existence. And not when I had my plans to try and destroy this thing by removing each major species from its existence. The Turians were my priority at the time.

In fact, something that eluded the rest of the council was that I had left some details that I could tell Sparatus picked up from private conversations we had on a protected line after the meeting. The first line was in regard to a fund being opened to mutually assist ‘orphaned children’. The Humans would pay this handsomely as we could afford it through the war reparation and thus nullify those.

Then there were also plans for the embassies meant to work hard on stabilizing any potential issues with our relations which I could tell the Councillor saw as a way to redeem himself by turning his ‘defeat’ into a victory against his detractors.

Hours went by within the meeting to tackle the clauses, but the end result was a resounding success to sign. The Peace Treaty was signed and would go on to be remembered as the ‘First Contact Treaty’ by the history books and the local news.

I had set the seeds to slowly take over and prepare the galaxy for the reapers. I had plans to follow, and I had ideas to invest to further capitalize on what humanity could do with new technologies from the Council and beyond. But one thing that I hadn’t taken into account was a rather innocent email that I got from ‘someone that understood my points and wanted to join a military academy’ three months after the end of the war.

Such a point didn’t sound that interesting and not as unusual as many would think since many fans liked to send emails to me. Most were vetted out but… this one was not. And the writer was a… young Turian.

I remember the wild grin I had as I finished reading the signature to it, knowing that I may have just found an apprentice.

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Armstrong is about to give the good ol’ Texan treatment to Canon with whom he is going to be sponsoring in the military. Fuck PR, this guy needs to be taken in as Armstrong’s adopted son.