A Mass Effect/StarCraft crossover written by Xeno Major.
An undisclosed time after the events of Wings of Liberty, the Korpulu sector went From Bad to Worse, so much so that quite a few Terrans decided to just pack up and leave. Eventually, they find a new home for themselves on a planet they called Shanxi, and it looks like they might just have found some peace.
A few years later, a science vessel discovers a mysterious object buried under the ice of a distant moon, and run right into a Turian patrol fleet off of Relay 314. A brash young Turian General sees a chance for glory and improvement, but unfortunately for him, Jim Raynor and the Terrans have experience dealing with alien invasions.
The story is on Fanfiction.net as a complete story here
, as well as on spacebattles.com with commentary here and here.
Terran Ingenuity contains examples of:
- Adaptational Villainy/Adaptational Heroism: General Oraka, who is a shamed-yet-sincere former general in the original game, is a The Neidermeyer Glory Hound who started the whole Relay 314 incident. Conversely, General Kuril, who's best known as a Too Dumb to Live Smug Snake in the second game, well, see the entry for A Father to His Men.
- Alternatively,
they could simply be different people. People having similar names is fairly common in human society, after all.
- Alternatively,
- A Father to His Men: Kuril, the Turian General in charge of the Battle of Shanxi's ground forces, is most definitely one. General Oraka, in charge of the fleet, on the other hand...
- Jim Raynor is another example, as he is greeted with cheers when he enters a bar in the first chapter.
- Bad Boss: One of Garm's Krogan gets his leg blown off in a minefield. Garm gripes that he has to do everything himself, then picks up the Krogan with his biotics and throws him foward, detonating the remaining landmines with the still-living krogan.
- Can Not Tell A Lie: The Protoss do not lie, and they are apparently incapable of exaggeration. Merely implying that they lie is a bad idea.
- Dating Catwoman: Tosh and Nova are a couple now. A few years ago, Nova was literally hunting Tosh down, with Tosh trying the same in return. See the entry for New Old Flame for clarification.
- Doomed Hometown: The Korpulu Sector. Whatever happened has not been disclosed, but most of the Terran people have decided to leave. Make of that what you will.
- Fire-Forged Friends: Officially, the Terrans and the Protoss are not allies; the Protoss owe Jim Raynor a debt of honor for his service in the Battle of Aiur, and will not tolerate anyone talking bad about him. This debt overrules the previous Protoss aggression of eradicating Terran planets from orbit, which Councilor Tevos finds hard to believe."My apologies, but... when you first met the Terrans, you burned one of their worlds?" Tevos questioned incredulously. "And yet, now your people are allies?"
- Hollywood Tactics: Justified to some extent. Because the Turians do not know about Terran capabilities in the Battle of Shanxi, Raynor uses a Spider-Mine rush against them, despite that tactic performing poorly back in the Koprulu Sector.
- In Spite of a Nail: While some events have occurred (Relay 314, attacking a colony to secure a beacon), they have different outcomes. Desolas Arterius, despite not finding a Reaper artifact on Shanxi, still became indoctrinated and tried to activate Temple Palaven; without Jack Harper, Saren himself calls the Hierarchy down on him. In addition, the roles of Benezia and Saren appear to be reversed from canon.
- Mildly Military: The Terrans, full stop. They don't actually have an active military, instead using local militias to deal with any problems. There are some exceptions, such as the ex-Dominion Colonel Benning, but for the most part, Terrans appear to approach military matters in a joking manner. During the Battle of Shanxi, there is a wave of unexpected reinforcements (consisting of elite mercenaries) from a nearby bar.
- Note, however, that virtually the entire adult population has combat training and experience, so in effect everyone can serve as infantry.
- Mook Horror Show: During the First Contact, the view point alternates between the groups, but it usually focuses on the Turians when they struggle to deal with the Terran's...interesting choices for military hardware, like a spider mine rush, or the more outright terrifying, like a squad being picked off one by one by one of Tosh's Spectres.
- New Old Flame: Tosh and Nova, when they were still Ghost trainees, started a brief romance, which was understandably ended once the brainwashing part of the training started. Now that they aren't at each other's throat's, they've entered a relationship again.
- Noodle Incident: Four full out wars and countless alien invasions couldn't convince the Terrans to leave the Koprulu Sector, but something must've prompted that move. Xeno Major has not yet revealed what that something is, however.
- One-Hour Work Week: The ideal working situation for Magistrates of each Terran planet, such as Jim Raynor, Valerian Mengsk, and Horace Warfield.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Whatever happened in the Koprulu Sector, it was bad enough for that a large portion of the Terran population decided to leave the Sector altogether.
- Squick: Protoss tend to make a point of flat-out avoiding curious Asari, even when a simple "no" would suffice.
- Underestimating Badassery: General Oraka saw the opportunity to seize amazing new technologies under a legal technicality that allowed him to annex Shanxi. Unfortunately...
- Garm knows that General Warfield is the commander for Eden Prime's defenses, so Garm tries to kill him as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, Warfield's front yard doubles as a minefield.
- Time Skip: From Raynor and the war on Shanxi to Shepard and the Beacon.
- Too Powerful To Stay Involved: The Protoss have tech and psionics vastly superior to anyone else, but they are busy handling their own problems.
- Justified in story, as the Protoss are struggling to prevent a civil war due to the loss of Aiur and the shrinking of their communal psionic bond, the Khala. Instead of unifying under the Khala, individual Protoss are starting to form tribes, a step backwards into the Aeon of Strife. Artanis is trying to prevent this, but his presence is required on Shakuras at all times to deal with issues.
- Justified in story, as the Protoss are struggling to prevent a civil war due to the loss of Aiur and the shrinking of their communal psionic bond, the Khala. Instead of unifying under the Khala, individual Protoss are starting to form tribes, a step backwards into the Aeon of Strife.
- We ARE Struggling Together: The Terrans are so used to this that in one omake, Terran Marines are extremely confused that the turians are stopping their attack for no other reason than that they don't want to fight any longer. In fact, they seem to immediately default to thinking that there's a Zerg invasion incoming, because that's the most likely scenario that they can think of in which an abrupt appearance by inexplicably hostile aliens would suddenly halt.
- We Will Wear Armor in the Future: Terrans are rarely seen without a suit of CMC-armor nearby. Most Terrans own one, which helps them form citizen militias, and it is culturally seen as normal for dozens of Terrans to be drinking while wearing the full set of armor.
- Worthy Opponent: Captain Calixto thinks this about his Terran opponent in the Battle of Shanxi. Hilariously, his opponent does not think the same about him.
- Wrestler in All of Us: While sparring with a tank-bred Krogan, Saren Arterius chokeslams him into the deck plating.
- Survivor Guilt: Discussed; an Asari anthropologist contacts Valerian Mengsk, because she hasn't been able to contact any Terran anthropologists. Valerian informs her that while there are some Terran anthropologists who survived the Great Wars, they are ashamed of not doing their part. Valerian specifically points out that in the realities of planetary invasion by the Zerg, it's entirely possible that those men could have saved their families or friends if they had been prepared for combat.
