Personal Log - 006 - Sara Ryder, Andromeda Galaxy / Date: 2819 (CE, 0 1:12:37, AA - After Arrival) Continued: Prodromos, the new Outpost.

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A short drive later, we arrived at the site we'd picked for the outpost to be established at, Fairwinds Basin.

As we drove up to the cliff and I got out of the vehicle to take a few pictures, I heard gunfire in the distance. I looked down into the small valley and saw a massive black and yellow form rampaging trough a Kett patrol, that had obviously chosen a bad time to check out Initiative activity in this part of Eos.
Drack, the old Krogan was tearing trough the Knuckleheads like a boulder through bowling pins. I was pretty confident he'd hold his own against the aliens, but then a second shuttle arrived, which tilted the scales a bit in favor of the Kett.
We deiced to step in and help.
I quickly climbed, jumped and slid down the rock wall and came up the alien soldiers from behind, with Liam and Cora close on my heels. We flanked the -expletive deleted- and executed a classic pincer maneuver to crush them between us and the one man army that was Drack.
They never knew what hit them.
One of them though had the bright idea to hide behind some rocks, so I shot myself upwards with the boosters on the back of my suit and managed to hover long enough to pelt him with bullets and drive him out of hiding. A blast from Dracks massive shotgun splattered him against the rocks he'd been formerly hiding behind.
Surprisingly Drack was quite appreciative of our timely arrival and though he insisted of eventually having been able to deal with the reinforcements, he claimed the fight had been fun and thanked me for my help. I'd thought he'd be sour, 'cause we had spoiled his fun.

I was still quite elated from our discovery at the vault and so I asked the old man if he'd like to join us. Someone with about a thousand years of experience fighting and about a year of a head-start fighting the Kett would be immensely useful to our team. Yes, Krogan can get really old. Those that survive their violent lifestyle, that is. And these survivors are about as dangerous as it gets to those who oppose them. These guys can live almost anywhere and even prefer worlds that are toxic to other races. Less competition and lots of things to overcome and fight. There are some good reasons for the Milky Ways dislike and badly concealed fear of these guys. In my opinion this did not justify the use of the infamous Genophage to cull their numbers on their home-world, but well …

Drack agreed to join us. Even if we worked for the Nexus. He's impressed with what we'd done to Eos and he too finds hope for his people in it. I gotta talk to him about what happened to the Krogan in the Helios Cluster. Why they left the Initiative behind?

Anyway, we had an outpost to prepare.

And here came another surprise that made my gut clench with anxiety. SAM and Cora informed me that it was the responsibility of the Pathfinder to decide what the first and all following outposts should be centered around. Military might and security or scientific exploration and research. Which people to raise from Cryo-Sleep and to deploy here.
As a solider myself I could only draw on very limited experience regarding the settling of colonies and what a project like the Initiative needed in times like these. How id Dad expect me to make the right decision? I asked my team but Cora favored a military approach while Liam was all for scientific progress. So, no help from there.

But as I thought of Dad, I came to a conclusion. He'd been a solider too, but a true intrepid spirit and explorer all his life. He was among the first humans to explore space beyond the Charon Relay, back when it had been discovered and activated at the very edge of the Sol system. He'd been away from us so often and long that we didn't see him for month on end, but always he was exploring with an open mind and an open heart. He brooked no ill feelings for the Turians. Although some of his friends had been killed by their soldiers in the first contact war. He had developed and built SAM, the greatest scientific tool humans had ever built. So the decision was clear as day for me.

Anything this new Galaxy could throw at us, we'd have to deal with. I would have to deal with. And while bigger guns and more soldiers would certainly be nice, these would need to be fed and would need to know what they were facing in this new galaxy, this new life.

Scientific research would give us an edge in this and it would show potential allies, that might still be out there somewhere, that we were no conquerors or -expletive deleted- like the Kett. Sure we needed to defend ourselves against the Kett or even more, but if we kept a low profile and concentrated on gaining a foothold, we might just slip by them.

So I gave the order to get the science staff and stuff from storage and deploy it to Eos.

It took only a surprisingly short amount of time for the Nexus to mobilize the needed teams and ships. We'd made ourselves more or less comfortable in one of the prefabs of Site One, as we came to refer to the old outpost. Cora snores louder than Liam, but don't tell her that SAM.

Just the next morning we got the call that a small fleet of shuttles and transporters were approaching EOS to finally get the new outpost going.

What a sight, to see the ships breach atmosphere and slip down the the surface. 
Trailing white mist through the air from the entries heat. The transporters were a clever design. Basically they consisted of a cockpit and fuselage, with a prefab wedged beneath them. Both could be detached and re-used for the next trip. The prefab, already assembled, was left behind and just needed to be connected to the local power-grid and some adjustments. Most equipment had also been stored in the prefab and just needed to be put into place. Within a few hours we had our first, or rather second but this time fully functioning outpost in place. No-one would forget the brave pioneers of Site One and the sacrifices that had been made there of course.

As we'd explored the old site some more the previous evening, we'd found some disturbing sights. Signs of struggle and confusion. SAM was even able to gather enough Data from sensor logs and personal files to recreate some conversations by hologram. Conversations that had taken place at the time the outpost had been abandoned. It wasn't an easy decision and it nearly broke my heart to see the “ghosts” of people who had given their lives for or cause. But without them, we'd never made it this far. Their bravery and unwillingness to give up in the face of overwhelming odds should be an example to all of us.

We'll never forget them.

While the work-crews swarmed around us, Foster Addison came up to me to introduce August Bradley, the head of this new site. Or as he put it with a wry smile, the “Mayor” of “Prodromos”. The first Human Colony in a new Galaxy. 

“Prodromos, Precursor, an apt name for such a momentous site. Dark skinned, bald, with a five o'clock shadow and quite a scar on his right cheek, he seemed like the polar opposite of his superior. Addison was the typical office jockey, with her pale skin, tired face and sourly outlook on everything. This man had an air of optimism around him that was catching. He shared my sentiment for honoring those who had come before us and told me about a another site that I had not known about. That too had ended in disaster. All the more reason to be glad about these efforts finally starting to work out. His enthusiasm for establishing this new site was a welcome change from all the doom and gloom aboard the Nexus.

Speaking of change, to my surprise Addison's attitude towards me was one of compliments and encouragement. As we took a walk through the bustling construction site, she commended my decision of setting scientific endeavor at the top of the Initiatives priorities, though she wasn't sure if other parts of the board would think likewise. We parted ways with my promise to keep exploring and establishing a peaceful presence for the Initiative in Andromeda.

Kallo had flown the Tempest over from Site One and after we'd taken a good look at the construction and already finished houses of Prodromos, we entered her belly to lift off again.

I found the others assembled in the briefing room, in the back of the ship, above the engine room. Cora was about to give bunk assignments to Peebee and Drack, but both already had taken up residence in the galley and a life-pod, respectively. Cora wasn't pleased and said so, but before they could get into an argument, I told them all to try and get along, as we were all we had and would have to depend on each other in the future. I tried to make them see that working as a team would make all the difference in this new life we'd all started, but it didn't seem to work out so well. As they all left without my leave and without even acknowledging my orders.

Some Pathfinder I am …

At least Kallo let me tell him to bring us back to the Nexus.

After we'd left the atmosphere, the first thing I wanted was to change into something more comfortable. As I entered the Pathfinders - my new quarters, I was able to take a good look at them for the first time. Last time I'd been too exhausted to appreciate the luxury and had fallen into bed right away. This cabin was spacious. Located right beneath the Bridge it had a large Viewport with a fantastic view of Eos at the moment. 

The Planet seemed calmer now and the sickly, green tinge had mostly vanished from its atmosphere.

My quarters held a large bed, a wardrobe, a small coffee-table with room for four, a desk with a terminal for SAM and a computer for research and E-Mails. I checked and found some amusing “Hacks” for more Coffee, jumping the cloth-washing queue and other conveniences from Kallo, who had integrated them into the Tempest Systems at its construction. Another message I'd received informed me that I could get a living Pyjack as a pet for the Tempest if I wanted and that my personal stuff had been loaded onto the Tempest. Probably someone had sent it with the Outpost-Crew and some instructions.
My leather jacket and some comfy trousers had finally found their way to me again from where they had been stored at the Hyperion. Finally I could get out of the boring “pajamas” that stood in for crew attire on the ark. I also found that I could customize my Environmental Suits colors so I went with it and gave myself a nice new look in the field.
After that I ordered Kallo to leave orbit and head for the Nexus.
On route I used the time to talk to the crew.

First I approached Cora. She was rummaging around in the Biolab, unpacking stuff and generally projecting an aura of slow boil, close to boiling over. She kicked a crate in frustration as I entered and her Biotics flared up. I was stunned that her anger had gotten the better of her. The talk I had planned on having with her needed to happen. She was frustrated that she as Dads second in command had not been made Pathfinder, as I had suspected. Me, an untrained rookie had usurped her position. She conceded to respect my fathers wishes though and promised to act as a second in command to me just like she had done for Dad. We also talked about her time as a part of an Assari Special Forces or Commandos Unit. They called themselves the Huntresses. Telling me about it calmed her down and she obviously enjoyed remembering her former teammates and their exploits as a team. Her powerful biotic abilities had brought her to the Alliance military and later to Thessia, the Assari home-world. Dad asked for her specifically to be assigned to his team in the Initiative and so she ended up here.

Next I visited Gil Brodie in the engine room. From his accent I guessed that he was Scottish. Seems a fun guy, sarcastic and with nice sense of humor. Just what I like. He knows the engines of the Tempest in and out and I'm sure he'll be a great asset to the crew.

As I stepped out of the engine room I heard Liam causing a ruckus in the hold and stepped inside to investigate.
He was pushing an old, battered, sand colored couch around. No, that definitely wasn't regulation. With a grin he admitted to spinning some BS about its fabric being able to help discharge an overclocked Omniblade to get a requisition permit for it. Then he offered my a a can of beer.
Who can say no to that?

As we made ourselves comfortable on the couch, feet propped up on a crate, we exchanged stories of your lives before the Initiative. In his own words, he was a “piss poor cop” but a great first responder. He'd joined HUST-1, Heavy Urban Search-Terrain 1, or “HUSTL” as it came to be known, after he'd gotten frustrated with the bureaucratic hell that is police work. HUST-1, was the human part of a joined, inter-species Heavy Urban Search and Crisis Response team that someone on the Citadel had come up with. Cool thing.

I told him a bit about my days as a soldier, protecting dig sites and of my dreams and reasons for coming to Andromeda, he did the same. I was here for the scientific possibilities and the adventure. He was here because he believed in what the Initiative stood for. A new start for everyone. We finished our beers in contend and companionable silence. I think this guy could be a great friend some day.

On my way to the galley to talk to Drack I ran into Doc T'Perro at the med bays entrance. I had expected Harry to be on the Tempest, but she informed me that he and her had switched places after H7. Harry claimed it was too much action for him and he'd be better suited to look after Scott, while the Assari was uniquely suited to the task of looking after the Pathfinder and her crew. Doc T'Perro has several masters degrees in exo-biology, psychology and other things. Her enthusiastic request for a dead Kett specimen to study and examine was a bit odd, but I had to agree that it's always better to know as much about your enemy as you can.

As I approached the galley I overheard Drack talking to someone on the Coms. He called her “Rushan”. It was Superintendent Kesh, back on the Nexus. Turns out, she's his granddaughter. She told him not to get on my nerves too much, which he laughed off with a sly smirk. He had made himself comfortable in the kitchen and obviously traveled light. His few belongings barely even taking up a table. He's reluctant to speak about the other Krogan and their role in the uprising that had partially caused the bad situation on the Nexus, but I understand that. He promised me to look out for me in the field tough. Well, with an old Krogan at my back, what could go wrong.

On the Bridge I finally had a time to talk to Kallo and Dr. Anvar. Kallo surprised me with his idetic memory and his dedication to the Tempest. As he put it, he could have been standing by the docs waving goodbye or join in and see his creation in action. He was part of the team that designed and built the Tempest, her test pilot. I think I told you that already, right?

Dr. Suvi Anvar was another, pleasant surprise.

As we talked about her reasons for coming to Andromeda, she revealed a deeply religious spirit, that nevertheless also believed in science. She claimed that she could see the works of a higher power in the intricacies of creation and all things that she could examine, the patterns and miraculous forces that held the cosmos together. I've never thought about it that way before, but I can understand her point of view. Its comforting, somehow. Gotta talk some more to her about that. She agreed to getting a drink some time.

After that, we pointed the Tempest toward the Nexus and I got down to my cabin, to get a bit of sleep. That's why I'll stop this recording now, SAM. Good night and please wake me an hour before we arrive at the Nexus. Thanks.

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