Eingana - the temple
Irina turned to Vayne and showed him the relic. It glowed brighter than before. She turned to the cliff side not more than 100 meters in front of them, and there was a large door made out of a material they had not seen before. The group approached. The other tribe began to emerge from the forest behind them. Mandu stayed next to Irina.
Naleena was recording everything with her omni-tool. “VERA, are you getting this?”
“Yes, Boss.”
“Analysis.”
“The material is unlike that of the Prothean ship armor, and unlike the Prothean artifacts,” VERA said. “This door is quite impenetrable with standard weaponry. It is made of material similar to that found on Sovereign.”
“That… does not bode well,” Naleena replied as they approached the door.
“Boss, each cycle used technology based upon that of the reapers. I said similar, not exact.” VERA corrected Naleena.
Irina scraped away the moss and other organic growth from the door. It was mirror-like underneath. There was a slot for the relic to go in.
“Well, here goes,” Irina said and inserted the relic as far as it would go.
The door opened and the air sealed for eons escaped along with the stench. Irina removed the key. It was pitch black inside, and the tribe had lit torches. There were steps going down and statues on either side that did not look like the tribe or the Collectors, but instead were more humanoid in appearance.
“VERA, analysis,” Naleena said as she entered.
“My files show that the statues are the same as the ones Dr. T’soni and Commander Shepard found on Ilos, Boss,” VERA said. “Ilos was a Prothean research facility built inside a ruin. The statues are Inusannon.”
“So the Protheans discovered this site, and it just so happens they found a key to it?” Naleena asked.
“As impossible as that sounds, yes.”
She gave the command to continue into the structure down the steps until it leveled out. They walked another 100 meters inside the mountain, and the path opened into a very large chamber. A control panel was in front of them.
“Sensors are reading a mass effect power source in your area, Boss. It has been deactivated,” VERA said over the local comm link.
“The relic must activate it locally, then,” Naleena replied.
“Give me the relic,” Faed said. “From what I’ve seen, this equipment is similar among most races. Perhaps it is similar between cycles? Who knows? I probably know better than anyone here. Frank, why don’t you stand nearby in case I get zapped? Ah, this looks like it might be the key.”
He inserted the relic and tapped the buttons directly above it. A tall object in the center of the chamber began to glow, then it shot four beams outward to four smaller golden objects, and the panel in front of Faed lit up, along with a display in a language that he did not understand.
“By the Ancestors!”
“VERA what can you make of this?” Naleena asked.
“It is an archive, but it is not a Prothean archive. It is Inusannon. The interface, however, is Prothean,” VERA said over everyone’s comm channels. “Perhaps this is what the Thoi’han were after. The Inusannon had seeded this world with the archive and were protecting it. Eingana might have had potential to become home to a civilization if it were not for the eezo poisoning of the environment.”
“But how did the relic get to Kopis? What were the Collectors doing here?” Naleena said. “Are these tribespeople ones who were supposed to evolve?”
Faed scanned of one of the tribesmen. “VERA, analysis.”
“I can only provide general information from such a scan, Faed. Detailed information would need to be performed in the ship’s Medical Bay,” VERA said. “However, the scan does reveal the tribespeople possess a quad-strand DNA. There was only one species known to have possessed that, and they were the Protheans. It would be reasonable to conclude that the tribespeople are what are left of the Protheans.”
Faed had downloaded the universal translator from VERA onto his omni-tool and had been working on the terminal attached to the control panel. It was slow work, but he was figuring out simple algorithms at first, then entering more complex ones. It was as if he was being administered a test to see if he was ready to receive the knowledge within. He wrote a short complex program module and hit send.
A holographic figure of a Prothean appeared on the floor in front of the group. It stood there motionless and then it looked around at the group and spoke with a Jamaican accent. “Cycle terminus not yet reached. Krogan, Human, Turian, Quarian, Asari evolved…. Protheans devolved. This is a secret research facility. Why are you here?”
“We are tasked with finding out as much information about the Reapers and Prothean technology as we can,” Naleena said.
“For what purpose?” it asked.
“A Reaper invasion was thwarted two years ago,” Naleena said, “And recently we have been fighting what might be their servants, the Collectors.”
VERA spoke through Naleena’s omni-tool, completing her sentence. “… a quad-strand DNA race that had most of their internal organs replaced by technology.”
“They were members of my race taken by the Reapers indoctrinated and turned into their servants. The Reapers cloned them and over several generations they replaced internal organs with technology to make ‘improvements’,” it said, “I am called Vengeance. I was programmed with the personality of Researcher Arulen”
“What is this facility?” Faed asked.
“We discovered this facility during the reaper invasion. During one battle several of our dreadnought class vessels destroyed several reaper destroyers. Our technicians went aboard and took their IFFs and installed them on our dreadnoughts. This opened up mass relay travel to these vessels, and some of us found our way here. Where some worlds like the human homeworld have an ozone layer, this one has a layer containing unstable eezo. If you are here, your ship passed through it and no doubt suffered damage. Yet this layer offers an unusual amount of protection. A ship’s sensors cannot detect anything from orbit, and so it must descend through this layer. They will learn too late what is necessary to survive this and crash land on the planet.“
“Then how does a ship get through this without damage?” Naleena asked.
“Do not pass through using shields or mass effect drives.”
“So we should use chemical thrusters only?” she asked.
“That is correct, otherwise you will trigger a dangerous response from the planet. That was the fate of two of our dreadnoughts being pursued by these ‘Collectors’. We came here to hide. 10,000 of us were aboard the ships and only 3,000 survived. Of the 3,000, there were 1,000 female. As you can see, warrior castes on their own do not always advance technology.
“When it was discovered that indoctrinated servants also crash-landed, the scientists locked the archive and fled. They did not want the Reapers to find out what was hidden here. We uplifted many races and may have saved some. Everything you need to know is in the archive. The technology herein is no different than what you already have.”
“How did the reapers not find you?” Naleena asked.
“The reapers do not possess chemical thrusters on their vessels. Only mass effect drives,” Vengeance replied.
Irina stepped forward. “Uh, this might sound stupid, but could you do anything to help us communicate with the tribe?”
“Why would you want to communicate with primitives?” Vengeance asked.
“Because Mandu was a help to us, and I want to say ‘thank you,’” Irina said. “And regardless of what you think of them, they have survived in this environment. And if there are more of them, maybe we could uplift them.”
“No. Do not uplift them. We have had our time,” Vengeance said. “I have been monitoring their communication. When you speak, your omni-tool will now translate.”
Irina turned to Mandu. “Thank you for your help.”
The elder stepped forward. “No. Thank you for helping my people.”
“Are there others? Other tribes?” Irina asked.
“Yes, our villages are scattered around. We will protect this temple.”
Faed was a bit puzzled. “It is simple enough. I remove the key from the terminal, the VI shuts down, then I lock the doors on the way out. And when we return we can power it up again with the key.”
“That is correct,” Vengeance replied.
“Then we need to get back to the ship. We have a lot of work to do,” Naleena said.
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