App: Holloways Keep
http://holloways-keep.livejournal.com/990.html
Name: Mica
Age: 25
Journal: nope
AIM Contact: failmica
1. Character's Name: Tali'Zorah vas Normandy nar Rayya
2. Fandom: Mass Effect
3. Time Frame: After her Loyalty Mission, but before the Omega 4 Relay
4. Age: Never specified, except that she is a fairly young adult. Between 20 and 25
5. Background: Welcome to the universe of Mass Effect. Long into the future human beings discover a new substance and dub it Element Zero or "eezo." This is notable because, although rare, eezo possesses the capability to produce Mass Effect Fields when a current is run through it, effectively altering the mass of any object it affects. The resulting technology revolutionizes human spaceflight, weaponry, warfare, defenses, transportation and commerce overnight. Suddenly faster than light travel is more than a pipe dream- and then, humanity discovers the Mass Relays. The Mass Relays are leftover technology, presumably left behind from an ancient, dead race of aliens called Protheans. They're designed to apply the concept of Mass Effect to large vehicles, such as spacecraft, and at that point Humanity reenacted the old story as performed by countless alien races before them:
Look! A new shiny thing! Let's poke it.
So they did. A brief war with the Turians and some hasty diplomatic ridiculousness later, humankind has joined the galactic community. One of the main features of the Mass Relay system is that they all focus around a systemic hub, a master control to the system; a massive space station known as The Citadel. Four alien races consider themselves the founders of inter-planetary society as we know it, and have (or had) seats on the governing council; the Asari, Salarians, Quarians and Turians- the humans get a council seat later. That's blue space hookers, genius hyper-speed space amphibians, purple alien bubble-boys, and badass militaristic space-raptors, respectively. Humanity, along with quite a few other races, are in the minority, newcomers both literally and politically. But who cares about humanity? Let's talk about Quarians.
About three hundred years before the opening of the first Mass Effect game, the Quarians lived on beautiful planets and had millions of robot helpers to do their work, which was lovely for everyone. There were strict laws against the creation of artificial intelligences, but the Quarians didn't think much of them. They kept making their skynet robotic Geth companions more and more sophisticated in small increments until one day they all came alive. Oops! The accounts of what happened next conflict depending on who you ask, but the Quarians believed that the Geth were about to kill them all, and acted first. And then the Geth started killing them all. Or maybe it was the other way around; there has been no clear and truthful account given. So the Quarians, or what little of them survived, escaped their planetary existence in a Titan A.E. style exodus and have lived every since as travelers in a migrant fleet. And almost everyone got Romani and/or Polish accents, to play up the gypsy trope.
What was at first a loosely affiliated series of mixed civilian and military craft under martial law evolved over time into a tight-knit flotilla of salvaged and well patched craft guided by a deep sense of family and presided over by an elected legislature and executive admiralty board. Centuries in these sterile environments has destroyed the Quarian immune systems, and what was originally the mere necessity of lifelong spacesuit wear has become a cultural symbol, almost a badge of honor. Social and legal strata have all developed along the lines that the good of the flotilla, of the family, is everything. Anything that threatens that is verboten, everything that protects or aids that is lauded, even when it comes into conflict with local laws elsewhere. The Quarians long to take their home world back from the Geth, and strive to regain the political and social might that unleashing the Geth on the universe brought down on them. Inside the Flotilla, Quarians act as family, but outside they are treated like thieves and vagrants.
Enter Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, a child of the Migrant Fleet, and a gifted young Quarian Engineer. During the events of the first game Tali is on her Pilgrimage, a traditional period of wandering outside the Flotilla undertaken by Quarians when they come of age. She is looking for asylum from an information broker when the Hero, Shepard, meets her. Shepard resolves Tali's issues with violence and charm, and in return Tali'Zorah joins Shepard's crew on the Normandy, and aids in the fight against Saren, an insane Turian who is siding against a galactic threat known as the Reapers.
And then in fighting Reapers. Or at least one Reaper, who was acting as gatekeeper for all other Reapers.
Let's take a moment to talk about Reapers. Reapers are enormous bio-mechanical robots the size of space stations. They're extremely powerful and extremely psychic and they have all the scariest weaponry and best shielding and least scruples. Their entire life cycle revolves around living for billions of years, seeding the galaxy with life and then harvesting said life and all the technology it has produced at regular intervals like some kind of extremely genodical food-crops. They reproduce by combining the biological mass of billions of a given species and combining the resulting slurry with mechanical parts to create another of themselves. They pretty much don't care about anyone but themselves, and are constantly trying to kill everyone.
So, the mission to save the Galaxy from an insidious threat was a success, Tali's pilgrimage was shaping up to become one of the most impressive in centuries, and Shepard (along with the rest of the Normandy Crew) was a Big Damn Hero. The council, unsure what to make of the whole Reaper business, still thought that Sovereign, the Reaper our heroes had fought and killed, was probably still just a Geth flagship under Saren's control. So they sent the triumphant Normandy and crew out to clean up reports of Geth attacks. To be fair, this isn't unreasonable- for most of the first game there was a huge sect of Geth who worshiped the Reapers as gods and Saren as their prophet.
Except. Uh. Those aren't Geth, you guys. Those are Collectors.
The Collectors are a slave-race to the Reapers, the last remaining heritage of Protheans in the galaxy. Their purpose is to sample the Galaxy's population of intelligent life as they evolve and report back to the gate-keeping Reaper (Sovereign in this case) about 'hey come kill all the things now' when the galaxy is ripe. They also manage the Reaper's reproductive cycle by kidnapping and emulsifying various billions of people. In the case of this particular Reaper cycle, they're taking human beings. Which is bad.
So, the Collectors show up to do some sampling and find themselves in close proximity to the Reaper's least-favorite person's ship. Naturally they open fire and their Reaper-designed weapons naturally slice through our beloved space ship like butter. By good fortune and training nearly everyone makes it out alive, except for our dear Commander Shepard who is presumed dead.
Two years pass in which Shepard is scooped up by the space mafia organization, Cerberus, and is scienced back to health and life. But Tali doesn't know that- she finishes her Pilgrimage and goes back to the fleet, presuming Shepard to be dead. Her reputation soared while serving under Shepard, the cutting edge engineering tech learning she gained on board Shepard's ultra high tech spacecraft, while fighting geth, and the salvage therof. As a result Tali was welcomed back into the Migrant Fleet with great fanfare and awarded her full adult title as Tali'Zorah vas Neema nar Rayya. Her expertise and brilliance saw Tali placed in higher and higher command positions at breakneck speed before she was ready, if not before she deserved them.
This much is obvious when Shepard first meets Tali on Freedom's Progress while conducting a rescue search for a young Quarian named Veetor'Nara. Despite her experience and prestige, Tali'Zorah's squad disregards her orders and recommendations almost instantaneously, even to the point of arguing with her in front of Shepard and physically abandoning Tali in the middle of a battlefield. She's young and brilliant, but where that qualifies her, they also disrespect her- who's this new girl on the Neema? She's an upstart with too many ideas and opinions. Surely we marines know- oops we're all dead.
Although Tali was surprised and pleased to see Shepard on Freedom's Progress, she has obligations now and cannot simply go on a trip around the galaxy just because she thinks it's the right thing to do- so, she finds and returns Veetor to the Flotilla, as promised, and goes on her next assignment when ordered. That assignment is Haestrom, known colloquially as Tali's recruitment mission.
It's a scientific survey mission on a former Quarian colony planet called Haestrom, which is now deep in Geth territory. Because it is so dangerous, Tali is sent with a large squad of Quarian marines and a trusted second in command Kal'Reegar. Kal doesn't ave the insubordination issues the last squad had, but the number and force of Geth prove sudden, unexpected, and overwhelming. Most of Tali's squad, excluding Kal'Reegar are killed in the Geth orbital ambush, and they both require rescuing, hence Shepard's timely arrival. Disgusted by the risk taken for mere scientific data and frustrated at her own helplessness Tali finished the Haestrom mission to the letter then transfers to the Normandy at Shepard's request, following Shepard on the renewed quest to kick Collector ass and save the galaxy from the still-looming reaper threat.
...until she's indited by the Migrant Fleet for treason, that is.
See, all during Tali's stay with Shepard she's been sending back odd little bits of Geth tech to the Fleet, particularly to her father, Rael'Zorah. He's been studying the Geth in great detail, and disregarding safety procedures in the meantime. Inevitably the Geth get out of control and kill everyone aboard Rael's ship- a fact that grieves Tali terribly when she discovers it as part of gathering evidence for the trial ahead.
The real problem here isn't that Tali was careless in sending back geth parts (she wasn't), or that Rael was ambitious to the point of suicide (he was), but that the admirals of the Flotilla are using this trial as a public debate on the topic of the Geth and whether or not the Quarians should go to war against them. Shepard, at Tali's request, hides the truth of Rael'Zorah's involvement and instead calls the entire Admiralty out on their bullcrap.
Tali swoons, the gallery gasps, paragon points are awarded, loyalty is earned. She heads back to the Normandy and settles in for a long fight at Shepard's side- even if that damned Legion is onboard.
And that's where Tali is taken from her story and dropped into the Keep.
6. Personality: Of all the characters in Mass Effect's main 'crew lineup' Tali is the one who most consistently skews young. She's naive and smart, so when she has opinions she has them very strongly, even to the point of shouting at, and getting right up in, Shepard's face. There's a particular moment on the Alarei where Shepard has the opportunity to criticize Quarian history in particular where Tali explodes. Everyone else on the Normandy seems to get the whole military-commander distance from crew thing, but Tali'Zorah is always, by comparison, offering unsolicited opinions. Her hidden dialogue is peppered with "I don't like it either, but"s and other personal addendum to relayed information. Her attitudes and morality are very typical of the Quarian people; she considers her shipmates to be her family and frames nearly every decision she makes in the context of protecting and caring for that family. Anything that benefits that goal is worth considering, but anything that runs counter to it is absolutely out of the question.
Tali is something of a romantic. She longs to be free of her suit and the confining morality of the Quarian fleet. She waxes poetic on Haelstrom about ancient Quarians walking under the sun with bare heads, and if romanced insists that nothing will do but skin-to-skin- the normal Quarian workarounds of neural stimulation tech just isn't good enough. Her father promised her a house on the home world and Tali is very obviously resentful of the limitations imposed on her, even while she's explaining them with a perverse sort of pride in Quarian ingenuity. She grew up chafing at these rules, wanting more, dreaming of the luxury and freedom experienced by virtually every other species in the galaxy; to smell flowers without a filter, to eat food that hasn't been converted to sterile nutrient paste, to walk in open air with nothing on her head. All her life she was taught that the Geth are the cause of the Quarian exile and subsequent immune-deficincy and she hates them with a rancor verging on racism. There is no in-game way to convince her that Geth aren't a bad thing, even when different sides of the argument are brought to light from numerous sources. She has almost nothing nice to say about them, even to the point of advocating genocide, and often refuses to even entertain arguments to the contrary, a major flaw.
At the same time, her obvious pride in Quarian ingenuity and strength-of-family is a good thing. She speaks about their feats of technological longevity in flippant terms, but it's clear that her skill as an engineeer is what makes her so valuable, "please, Shepard, I'm a Quarian. Give me a broken circuit board and some element zero and I'll have it making precision jumps." She takes obvious care of her suit, and fears the dangers of taking it off, but longs for a time when she'll have the luxury to be so stupid. She loves old things, things that make no sense in the context of the lifestyle of the modern Quarian, but that show that even her people were once free.
7. Previous Game Developments
8. Appearance: Quarians are generally shorter and of slighter build than humans. Quarians have an endoskeleton, lips, teeth, and two eyes with eyelids and tear ducts; they also have three thick fingers on both hands which include a thumb and an index finger, as well as three toes on each foot. Their lower legs are bowed backwards significantly, compared to humans. Aside from hands and legs, their general body shape and sexual dimorphism is similar to humans as well. Their ears (or ear analogues) differ in a noticeable fashion from those of humans, with references made to "what [passes] for the quarian version of an ear," but without any specifics being illustrated or otherwise described.
All Quarians wear beautifully crafted enviro-suits, often draped with cloths or otherwise accented. Females often wear hoods or headcloths over their helmets, a fashion also seen among male Quarians, though not as frequently.
9. Abilities: Tali'Zorah is a particular genius with mechanics and engineering, and is well trained in combat. Unlike many of her squadmates, she is not biotic and therefore possesses no superhuman capabilities or powers. Tali is proficient in the use of both heavy pistols and shotguns, though she favors the later. The majority of her attacks are tech-based, and are deployed using her wrist-mounted omni-tool.
Combat Drone: Tali can deploy a small, semi-disposable attack drone that will shock enemies, distracting and disrupting them. If the drone is heavily damaged it may explode.
AI Hacking: Tali employs a variety of techniques to turn any synthetic enemy to her side, generating shields and extra health for them so they can fight more effectively. It's usually only effective on targets that have taken significant damage to armor, so it's less useful than you might think.
Energy Drain: using wireless power-transfer technology, Tali's omnitool saps energy from enemy shields and systems to bolster her own. Pretty straightforward and makes a lovely sparky effect on the target.
10. Languages: Tali'Zorah speaks and writes a variety of programming languages with their origins in Turian, Quarian, Asari, and other races, including humans! For organic languages she speaks the common language of all Quarians and some limited engligh, but as both her hardsuit's computer and her omnitool are equipped with the best universal translators money can buy she is perfectly capable of communicating well with nearly any species in nearly any language in the galaxy.
11. Items:
One (1) fitted Quarian hardsuit/enviro-suit (custom)
One (1) Omnitool, (custom)
One (1) packet of sterilized dextro-amino nutrient paste
Three (3) spare air filters
Seven (7) packets of high-grade medi-gel
Twenty (2o) Unused Heat-sinks (standard issue)
12. Weapons:
One (1) nine-inch serrated combat knife (boot)
One (1) M-6_Carnifex "Hand Canon" Heavy Pistol
One (1) M-22 Eviscerator Shotgun
One (1) Custom Recoverable-Explosive Combat Drone, nickname: "Chiktikka vas Paus"
The guns in Mass Effect operate using a small amount of eezo in their construction. The idea is that, in the instant of firing, a mass effect field is projected into the bullet, momentarily reducing its effective mass to near-zero thus allowing the force applied to it by the weapon's mechanics to fire at incredibly high muzzle velocity, and producing enormous amounts of heat at rapid fire which is channeled into a heat-sink and then ejected at capacity. This is necessary in-canon due to the incredibly durable nature of armor and the ubiquitous use of mass effect shields. Normal bullets would do nothing of value in this setting, so ridiculous ones are the only hope.
That said, even a beanbag round traveling at such high velocity would be more than fatal. For that reason, Tali's weaponry will fire at significantly slower speeds and have effects closer to BB-guns than anything meant to kill. Of course she still has her combat drone, which can and does explode. Even in-game this explosion is small and has a blast radius of no more than two meters, though it does send enemies flying (usually to their deaths) if they're within that radius.
13. Writing sample - Third Person: Talia woke up on the floor. This wasn't by itself a novel experience, but what she saw through a dust-pattered visor was. Stone, held together with ancient and blackened mortar, not even covered with patina, not even smoothed by anything more than the original masons. It was...unprecedented. It took her a moment to clamber to her feet, shake out the lingering nausea, and take a more thorough stock of her surroundings.
It was very quiet, and when Tali touched the comm at her earpiece she found only static; The Normandy was out of range, or blocked somehow.
No Quarian likes a quiet ship, and nobody likes being cut off from their home. A silent craft is a dead one, or worse the silence might mean a broken filter or air pump, signalling that one's life-span had been reduced to minutes. Death by asphyxiation might not have been the worst way to die, but it was far from pleasant, and Tali had no intention of dying here. Not now, not when there was still so much left to do. She drew her shotgun from it's magnetic clamp and in the quiet the sound of the weapon unfolding was ominously loud. The door was wood (real wood!) and it opened to her touch. Tali pressed her shoulder to the doorjamb and swept the hallway in a glance, then stepped out and made sure all was clear.
Nobody- wait! A shadow moved at the end of the hall, someone disappearing around a corner.
"Dammit," she muttered, and hesitated. This was unknown territory, in a strange place- She didn't even know what planet she was on. What would Shepard do?
Well, that much was obvious. Shepard would march up to whoever was in charge and demand to know what the hell was going on, of course. Tali set off at a jog, weapon at the ready. It wasn't much of a strategy, but it'd have to do.
14. Writing Sample - First Person: This doesn't make any sense. Shepard explained how these records work, but it's ridiculous to think that wood pulp and glue can
[The sound stops, cuts off, and remains thus for nearly twenty minutes. Tali was apparently conferring with someone on her end, looking in their record to see her own words in attendance. Quarians haven't have books, or anything like them, for centuries- the entire notion of magical paper is alien to her.]
Amazing. So it really does work. Well then, greetings. I am Tali'Zorah vas Normandy, of the Migrant Fleet. I've been told that most of you aren't aware of what that is, but I'm sure we can...ah. Work together.
[Diplomacy is hard when you're not quite sincere.]
Keelah, I'm still not sure this isn't some kind of fever-hallucination. Shepard, are you sure-
[It cuts off unceremoniously as Tali closes the book. It'll take a while for her to get used to the idea of non-mechanical technology.]
15. Tattoo: Around her thigh, like a garter belt.
16. Room Preference: Near Shepard, if possible.
Name: Mica
Age: 25
Journal: nope
AIM Contact: failmica
1. Character's Name: Tali'Zorah vas Normandy nar Rayya
2. Fandom: Mass Effect
3. Time Frame: After her Loyalty Mission, but before the Omega 4 Relay
4. Age: Never specified, except that she is a fairly young adult. Between 20 and 25
5. Background: Welcome to the universe of Mass Effect. Long into the future human beings discover a new substance and dub it Element Zero or "eezo." This is notable because, although rare, eezo possesses the capability to produce Mass Effect Fields when a current is run through it, effectively altering the mass of any object it affects. The resulting technology revolutionizes human spaceflight, weaponry, warfare, defenses, transportation and commerce overnight. Suddenly faster than light travel is more than a pipe dream- and then, humanity discovers the Mass Relays. The Mass Relays are leftover technology, presumably left behind from an ancient, dead race of aliens called Protheans. They're designed to apply the concept of Mass Effect to large vehicles, such as spacecraft, and at that point Humanity reenacted the old story as performed by countless alien races before them:
Look! A new shiny thing! Let's poke it.
So they did. A brief war with the Turians and some hasty diplomatic ridiculousness later, humankind has joined the galactic community. One of the main features of the Mass Relay system is that they all focus around a systemic hub, a master control to the system; a massive space station known as The Citadel. Four alien races consider themselves the founders of inter-planetary society as we know it, and have (or had) seats on the governing council; the Asari, Salarians, Quarians and Turians- the humans get a council seat later. That's blue space hookers, genius hyper-speed space amphibians, purple alien bubble-boys, and badass militaristic space-raptors, respectively. Humanity, along with quite a few other races, are in the minority, newcomers both literally and politically. But who cares about humanity? Let's talk about Quarians.
About three hundred years before the opening of the first Mass Effect game, the Quarians lived on beautiful planets and had millions of robot helpers to do their work, which was lovely for everyone. There were strict laws against the creation of artificial intelligences, but the Quarians didn't think much of them. They kept making their skynet robotic Geth companions more and more sophisticated in small increments until one day they all came alive. Oops! The accounts of what happened next conflict depending on who you ask, but the Quarians believed that the Geth were about to kill them all, and acted first. And then the Geth started killing them all. Or maybe it was the other way around; there has been no clear and truthful account given. So the Quarians, or what little of them survived, escaped their planetary existence in a Titan A.E. style exodus and have lived every since as travelers in a migrant fleet. And almost everyone got Romani and/or Polish accents, to play up the gypsy trope.
What was at first a loosely affiliated series of mixed civilian and military craft under martial law evolved over time into a tight-knit flotilla of salvaged and well patched craft guided by a deep sense of family and presided over by an elected legislature and executive admiralty board. Centuries in these sterile environments has destroyed the Quarian immune systems, and what was originally the mere necessity of lifelong spacesuit wear has become a cultural symbol, almost a badge of honor. Social and legal strata have all developed along the lines that the good of the flotilla, of the family, is everything. Anything that threatens that is verboten, everything that protects or aids that is lauded, even when it comes into conflict with local laws elsewhere. The Quarians long to take their home world back from the Geth, and strive to regain the political and social might that unleashing the Geth on the universe brought down on them. Inside the Flotilla, Quarians act as family, but outside they are treated like thieves and vagrants.
Enter Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, a child of the Migrant Fleet, and a gifted young Quarian Engineer. During the events of the first game Tali is on her Pilgrimage, a traditional period of wandering outside the Flotilla undertaken by Quarians when they come of age. She is looking for asylum from an information broker when the Hero, Shepard, meets her. Shepard resolves Tali's issues with violence and charm, and in return Tali'Zorah joins Shepard's crew on the Normandy, and aids in the fight against Saren, an insane Turian who is siding against a galactic threat known as the Reapers.
And then in fighting Reapers. Or at least one Reaper, who was acting as gatekeeper for all other Reapers.
Let's take a moment to talk about Reapers. Reapers are enormous bio-mechanical robots the size of space stations. They're extremely powerful and extremely psychic and they have all the scariest weaponry and best shielding and least scruples. Their entire life cycle revolves around living for billions of years, seeding the galaxy with life and then harvesting said life and all the technology it has produced at regular intervals like some kind of extremely genodical food-crops. They reproduce by combining the biological mass of billions of a given species and combining the resulting slurry with mechanical parts to create another of themselves. They pretty much don't care about anyone but themselves, and are constantly trying to kill everyone.
So, the mission to save the Galaxy from an insidious threat was a success, Tali's pilgrimage was shaping up to become one of the most impressive in centuries, and Shepard (along with the rest of the Normandy Crew) was a Big Damn Hero. The council, unsure what to make of the whole Reaper business, still thought that Sovereign, the Reaper our heroes had fought and killed, was probably still just a Geth flagship under Saren's control. So they sent the triumphant Normandy and crew out to clean up reports of Geth attacks. To be fair, this isn't unreasonable- for most of the first game there was a huge sect of Geth who worshiped the Reapers as gods and Saren as their prophet.
Except. Uh. Those aren't Geth, you guys. Those are Collectors.
The Collectors are a slave-race to the Reapers, the last remaining heritage of Protheans in the galaxy. Their purpose is to sample the Galaxy's population of intelligent life as they evolve and report back to the gate-keeping Reaper (Sovereign in this case) about 'hey come kill all the things now' when the galaxy is ripe. They also manage the Reaper's reproductive cycle by kidnapping and emulsifying various billions of people. In the case of this particular Reaper cycle, they're taking human beings. Which is bad.
So, the Collectors show up to do some sampling and find themselves in close proximity to the Reaper's least-favorite person's ship. Naturally they open fire and their Reaper-designed weapons naturally slice through our beloved space ship like butter. By good fortune and training nearly everyone makes it out alive, except for our dear Commander Shepard who is presumed dead.
Two years pass in which Shepard is scooped up by the space mafia organization, Cerberus, and is scienced back to health and life. But Tali doesn't know that- she finishes her Pilgrimage and goes back to the fleet, presuming Shepard to be dead. Her reputation soared while serving under Shepard, the cutting edge engineering tech learning she gained on board Shepard's ultra high tech spacecraft, while fighting geth, and the salvage therof. As a result Tali was welcomed back into the Migrant Fleet with great fanfare and awarded her full adult title as Tali'Zorah vas Neema nar Rayya. Her expertise and brilliance saw Tali placed in higher and higher command positions at breakneck speed before she was ready, if not before she deserved them.
This much is obvious when Shepard first meets Tali on Freedom's Progress while conducting a rescue search for a young Quarian named Veetor'Nara. Despite her experience and prestige, Tali'Zorah's squad disregards her orders and recommendations almost instantaneously, even to the point of arguing with her in front of Shepard and physically abandoning Tali in the middle of a battlefield. She's young and brilliant, but where that qualifies her, they also disrespect her- who's this new girl on the Neema? She's an upstart with too many ideas and opinions. Surely we marines know- oops we're all dead.
Although Tali was surprised and pleased to see Shepard on Freedom's Progress, she has obligations now and cannot simply go on a trip around the galaxy just because she thinks it's the right thing to do- so, she finds and returns Veetor to the Flotilla, as promised, and goes on her next assignment when ordered. That assignment is Haestrom, known colloquially as Tali's recruitment mission.
It's a scientific survey mission on a former Quarian colony planet called Haestrom, which is now deep in Geth territory. Because it is so dangerous, Tali is sent with a large squad of Quarian marines and a trusted second in command Kal'Reegar. Kal doesn't ave the insubordination issues the last squad had, but the number and force of Geth prove sudden, unexpected, and overwhelming. Most of Tali's squad, excluding Kal'Reegar are killed in the Geth orbital ambush, and they both require rescuing, hence Shepard's timely arrival. Disgusted by the risk taken for mere scientific data and frustrated at her own helplessness Tali finished the Haestrom mission to the letter then transfers to the Normandy at Shepard's request, following Shepard on the renewed quest to kick Collector ass and save the galaxy from the still-looming reaper threat.
...until she's indited by the Migrant Fleet for treason, that is.
See, all during Tali's stay with Shepard she's been sending back odd little bits of Geth tech to the Fleet, particularly to her father, Rael'Zorah. He's been studying the Geth in great detail, and disregarding safety procedures in the meantime. Inevitably the Geth get out of control and kill everyone aboard Rael's ship- a fact that grieves Tali terribly when she discovers it as part of gathering evidence for the trial ahead.
The real problem here isn't that Tali was careless in sending back geth parts (she wasn't), or that Rael was ambitious to the point of suicide (he was), but that the admirals of the Flotilla are using this trial as a public debate on the topic of the Geth and whether or not the Quarians should go to war against them. Shepard, at Tali's request, hides the truth of Rael'Zorah's involvement and instead calls the entire Admiralty out on their bullcrap.
Tali swoons, the gallery gasps, paragon points are awarded, loyalty is earned. She heads back to the Normandy and settles in for a long fight at Shepard's side- even if that damned Legion is onboard.
And that's where Tali is taken from her story and dropped into the Keep.
6. Personality: Of all the characters in Mass Effect's main 'crew lineup' Tali is the one who most consistently skews young. She's naive and smart, so when she has opinions she has them very strongly, even to the point of shouting at, and getting right up in, Shepard's face. There's a particular moment on the Alarei where Shepard has the opportunity to criticize Quarian history in particular where Tali explodes. Everyone else on the Normandy seems to get the whole military-commander distance from crew thing, but Tali'Zorah is always, by comparison, offering unsolicited opinions. Her hidden dialogue is peppered with "I don't like it either, but"s and other personal addendum to relayed information. Her attitudes and morality are very typical of the Quarian people; she considers her shipmates to be her family and frames nearly every decision she makes in the context of protecting and caring for that family. Anything that benefits that goal is worth considering, but anything that runs counter to it is absolutely out of the question.
Tali is something of a romantic. She longs to be free of her suit and the confining morality of the Quarian fleet. She waxes poetic on Haelstrom about ancient Quarians walking under the sun with bare heads, and if romanced insists that nothing will do but skin-to-skin- the normal Quarian workarounds of neural stimulation tech just isn't good enough. Her father promised her a house on the home world and Tali is very obviously resentful of the limitations imposed on her, even while she's explaining them with a perverse sort of pride in Quarian ingenuity. She grew up chafing at these rules, wanting more, dreaming of the luxury and freedom experienced by virtually every other species in the galaxy; to smell flowers without a filter, to eat food that hasn't been converted to sterile nutrient paste, to walk in open air with nothing on her head. All her life she was taught that the Geth are the cause of the Quarian exile and subsequent immune-deficincy and she hates them with a rancor verging on racism. There is no in-game way to convince her that Geth aren't a bad thing, even when different sides of the argument are brought to light from numerous sources. She has almost nothing nice to say about them, even to the point of advocating genocide, and often refuses to even entertain arguments to the contrary, a major flaw.
At the same time, her obvious pride in Quarian ingenuity and strength-of-family is a good thing. She speaks about their feats of technological longevity in flippant terms, but it's clear that her skill as an engineeer is what makes her so valuable, "please, Shepard, I'm a Quarian. Give me a broken circuit board and some element zero and I'll have it making precision jumps." She takes obvious care of her suit, and fears the dangers of taking it off, but longs for a time when she'll have the luxury to be so stupid. She loves old things, things that make no sense in the context of the lifestyle of the modern Quarian, but that show that even her people were once free.
7. Previous Game Developments
8. Appearance: Quarians are generally shorter and of slighter build than humans. Quarians have an endoskeleton, lips, teeth, and two eyes with eyelids and tear ducts; they also have three thick fingers on both hands which include a thumb and an index finger, as well as three toes on each foot. Their lower legs are bowed backwards significantly, compared to humans. Aside from hands and legs, their general body shape and sexual dimorphism is similar to humans as well. Their ears (or ear analogues) differ in a noticeable fashion from those of humans, with references made to "what [passes] for the quarian version of an ear," but without any specifics being illustrated or otherwise described.
All Quarians wear beautifully crafted enviro-suits, often draped with cloths or otherwise accented. Females often wear hoods or headcloths over their helmets, a fashion also seen among male Quarians, though not as frequently.
9. Abilities: Tali'Zorah is a particular genius with mechanics and engineering, and is well trained in combat. Unlike many of her squadmates, she is not biotic and therefore possesses no superhuman capabilities or powers. Tali is proficient in the use of both heavy pistols and shotguns, though she favors the later. The majority of her attacks are tech-based, and are deployed using her wrist-mounted omni-tool.
Combat Drone: Tali can deploy a small, semi-disposable attack drone that will shock enemies, distracting and disrupting them. If the drone is heavily damaged it may explode.
AI Hacking: Tali employs a variety of techniques to turn any synthetic enemy to her side, generating shields and extra health for them so they can fight more effectively. It's usually only effective on targets that have taken significant damage to armor, so it's less useful than you might think.
Energy Drain: using wireless power-transfer technology, Tali's omnitool saps energy from enemy shields and systems to bolster her own. Pretty straightforward and makes a lovely sparky effect on the target.
10. Languages: Tali'Zorah speaks and writes a variety of programming languages with their origins in Turian, Quarian, Asari, and other races, including humans! For organic languages she speaks the common language of all Quarians and some limited engligh, but as both her hardsuit's computer and her omnitool are equipped with the best universal translators money can buy she is perfectly capable of communicating well with nearly any species in nearly any language in the galaxy.
11. Items:
One (1) fitted Quarian hardsuit/enviro-suit (custom)
One (1) Omnitool, (custom)
One (1) packet of sterilized dextro-amino nutrient paste
Three (3) spare air filters
Seven (7) packets of high-grade medi-gel
Twenty (2o) Unused Heat-sinks (standard issue)
12. Weapons:
One (1) nine-inch serrated combat knife (boot)
One (1) M-6_Carnifex "Hand Canon" Heavy Pistol
One (1) M-22 Eviscerator Shotgun
One (1) Custom Recoverable-Explosive Combat Drone, nickname: "Chiktikka vas Paus"
The guns in Mass Effect operate using a small amount of eezo in their construction. The idea is that, in the instant of firing, a mass effect field is projected into the bullet, momentarily reducing its effective mass to near-zero thus allowing the force applied to it by the weapon's mechanics to fire at incredibly high muzzle velocity, and producing enormous amounts of heat at rapid fire which is channeled into a heat-sink and then ejected at capacity. This is necessary in-canon due to the incredibly durable nature of armor and the ubiquitous use of mass effect shields. Normal bullets would do nothing of value in this setting, so ridiculous ones are the only hope.
That said, even a beanbag round traveling at such high velocity would be more than fatal. For that reason, Tali's weaponry will fire at significantly slower speeds and have effects closer to BB-guns than anything meant to kill. Of course she still has her combat drone, which can and does explode. Even in-game this explosion is small and has a blast radius of no more than two meters, though it does send enemies flying (usually to their deaths) if they're within that radius.
13. Writing sample - Third Person: Talia woke up on the floor. This wasn't by itself a novel experience, but what she saw through a dust-pattered visor was. Stone, held together with ancient and blackened mortar, not even covered with patina, not even smoothed by anything more than the original masons. It was...unprecedented. It took her a moment to clamber to her feet, shake out the lingering nausea, and take a more thorough stock of her surroundings.
It was very quiet, and when Tali touched the comm at her earpiece she found only static; The Normandy was out of range, or blocked somehow.
No Quarian likes a quiet ship, and nobody likes being cut off from their home. A silent craft is a dead one, or worse the silence might mean a broken filter or air pump, signalling that one's life-span had been reduced to minutes. Death by asphyxiation might not have been the worst way to die, but it was far from pleasant, and Tali had no intention of dying here. Not now, not when there was still so much left to do. She drew her shotgun from it's magnetic clamp and in the quiet the sound of the weapon unfolding was ominously loud. The door was wood (real wood!) and it opened to her touch. Tali pressed her shoulder to the doorjamb and swept the hallway in a glance, then stepped out and made sure all was clear.
Nobody- wait! A shadow moved at the end of the hall, someone disappearing around a corner.
"Dammit," she muttered, and hesitated. This was unknown territory, in a strange place- She didn't even know what planet she was on. What would Shepard do?
Well, that much was obvious. Shepard would march up to whoever was in charge and demand to know what the hell was going on, of course. Tali set off at a jog, weapon at the ready. It wasn't much of a strategy, but it'd have to do.
14. Writing Sample - First Person: This doesn't make any sense. Shepard explained how these records work, but it's ridiculous to think that wood pulp and glue can
[The sound stops, cuts off, and remains thus for nearly twenty minutes. Tali was apparently conferring with someone on her end, looking in their record to see her own words in attendance. Quarians haven't have books, or anything like them, for centuries- the entire notion of magical paper is alien to her.]
Amazing. So it really does work. Well then, greetings. I am Tali'Zorah vas Normandy, of the Migrant Fleet. I've been told that most of you aren't aware of what that is, but I'm sure we can...ah. Work together.
[Diplomacy is hard when you're not quite sincere.]
Keelah, I'm still not sure this isn't some kind of fever-hallucination. Shepard, are you sure-
[It cuts off unceremoniously as Tali closes the book. It'll take a while for her to get used to the idea of non-mechanical technology.]
15. Tattoo: Around her thigh, like a garter belt.
16. Room Preference: Near Shepard, if possible.