N7. The best of the best. Making it even to N1 is a feat in and of itself, and if you decide to retire from this and go back to regular military, it's a guarantee that you'll get a promotion.

You're curious as to what 'N7' stands for, aren't you? N7 is a term used in the Systems Alliance Military. The 'N' designates special forces. And the number '7' designates the highest level of proficiency. We didn't go to any ordinary boot camps. Or even extraordinary ones. We went through hell and back to become what we are today. We start off by going to an academy, which is oftentimes nicknamed "the villa," and sometimes just "N-School." There, candidates that were attending The Villa would spend 20 hours a day training in combat. We would take small combat teams through hostile terrain with little or no food. Trainees who did well in this were awarded an internal designation of N1 and invited to return. Of course, if you were here and you passed, you obviously would want to return. However, training only got harder for the rest.

Climbing through N2 to N6, training was mostly held off-planet. The main things were zero-G combat, parachuting, jetpack flight, combat diving and instruction, linguistics, and frontline trauma care for human and alien biology. That's right; everyone had to have knowledge of not only their own biology, but alien biology as well.

The highest grade of training goes up to N6. When you are training at this level, you get actual combat experience in combat zones throughout the galaxy. If trainees survive long enough and do well enough, in an "admirable and effective fashion," the trainee will receive the coveted N7 designation. Only those who are designated N7 may wear that designation on their uniform.

Overall, there should be no shame for failing an N course. As I mentioned earlier, even qualifying for N1 elevates an officer to a high level of respect. Those who feel shamed are usually only shamed because they wanted to pass so badly, but didn't quite make it, and are not pleased with themselves.

( Original wording & more detailed info about N7 can be found here. )

Hello, I am N7. Why N7, you ask? It's just a military term, you say? Sorry, but that's all I know. I don't remember anything. I just found myself waking up half-dead one day on a random planet, and the armor I was wearing had 'N7' on it. There was a wrecked ship nearby, and a few bodies, both... alien and human. There seemed to be a green haze over the area, and something in the back of my mind screamed at me to get away from the place. I knew how to walk, but my legs didn't want to cooperate. I had no idea of the extent of my injuries, nor how I would be able to cope with them. But, I listened to that screaming voice in the back of my head, and did my best to crawl and scoot and drag myself away from the site of the crash. After that, I had expended much of what little energy I had, but I was able to oversee the entire crash site. As I had thought, there was indeed a green haze surrounding the area. It was in a small crater, and it seemed to just be hanging around down there. I strained my mind to try and remember something, anything, but to no avail. I didn't know what I knew, only what I didn't know, and right now, what I didn't know scared me to death.

The planet I found myself on was strange. There were no signs of life that I could see, not even plant life. Just a bunch of what appeared to be dried-up ground. It was like... a desert. But the temperature didn't feel like one. Perhaps that was just me being numb to nearly everything. Over the course of I'd want to say the next dozen hours or so, I dragged my sorry ass across barren landscape, hoping to find something to rest in, instead of being out in the open. I don't know how long it was, but I finally found myself underneath some shadows. I weakly looked up to see a large collection of rocks in the distance. It was better than laying out in the open. With my remaining strength, I managed to get to the rocks, but I passed out before being able to barricade myself into a small area.

When I awoke, I felt refreshed, but now I could feel every single injury on my body, and it was all I could do to keep from crying out. I'd left a trail of blood leading to my spot without knowing, and as I lay there in excruciating pain, I didn't even hear the multiple footsteps approaching. So naturally, when I heard voices, it startled me. I panicked and wanted to just scoot back more, but my body was still screaming in pain. I heard them before I saw them, but when I saw them, it terrified me even more. They were all wearing fancy armored suits and had some advanced weaponry with them, most of them in their hands.
"Sir, we found her,"
I was confused by that statement. Who were these people? Why were they looking for me?
"Send a medic down. I don't know how well we'll be able to move her in her current condition,"
Again, more confusion. They seemed friendly, at least. I thought it best to just play possum, and maybe find out what exactly happened here, as perhaps it would trigger something to help with my memory.

After I was treated, I was transported via hovercraft to a ship waiting not too far away. The pain had numbed considerably, but there were still pangs every now and then. Omnigel could only go so far, as I found out. I hadn't said anything yet. Honestly, I didn't know if I could say anything, even if I wanted to.
Everything on that ship looked so strange, yet so familiar at the same time. It was mind-boggling; how could I recognize all of these things, but now know any of them at the same time? As I lay in a quarantined bed in the sick bay, a single doctor I hadn't seen yet approached me with a clipboard. He had a majorly concerned look on his face.
"You know, we thought you were gone. All of the others we found were dead. There were no other signs of life on the planet. We were lucky to even find where you crash-landed. If we hadn't found that blood trail, we'd have just salvaged a few things from the ship wreck and gone. And, quite frankly, we're all surprised you made it out of live. The level of deadly toxins in that crater was enough to kill a dozen men in just a few minutes. We went out blindly, and that was a mistake," the man said. My mind began to race. So, that green haze was hazardous? Well, that probably explained why I felt worse than I was, probably. "You're exhausted. I shouldn't be talking to you this much. I'll let you get some rest, and talk to you tomorrow," the man said, and exited. I was too tired to think, and soon slipped into a deep sleep.

When I awoke, I found myself in an ordinary hospital. Well, as ordinary as ordinary gets. I moved around a bit, testing my limbs. I was feeling quite a bit better. Medical treatment was fairly good for this day and age. And, as I later found out, you get special treatment if you're in the special forces. Of course, I had no idea how long I'd been there. The last thing I remember was being in the sick bay on a ship god knows where.
Come to find out, that toxic haze had left me a bit worse for wear. I'd been in it for far too long, and although it didn't kill me like it should have, it left my brain a mess. They kept on saying my name, but it sounded foreign and wrong, and every time they'd say it, it's like it slipped out of my mind. This is why I cannot remember it now.

I didn't know what to do once I'd recovered. I felt like I should go back to the Alliance Military. It was like home for me, but then again, not at the same time. I wanted to find something to familiarize myself with. However, the Alliance Military and the doctors thought it best I take it slow, so they sent me off to a regular boot camp. A regular boot camp, of all places. That was the first mistake.

At the boot camp, I was eager to prove myself. However, on the first day alone, I outdid all of the recruits. Being called a 'maggot' didn't seem appropriate. I was able to best all of the drill sergeants with ease. I didn't know what I was doing, it was just instinct. It's like, in the back of my mind, I knew what to do, but up front I couldn't explain it. I'd just know. When the drill sergeants asked me about it, I just shrugged; what was there to tell? They didn't know I had previously been an N7. In fact, I still wasn't sure what an N7 was. I knew it was something military-related, but that was the extent of my current knowledge. They were hesitant to let me continue; I made them look bad. After all, I did outclass and outrank them, but they didn't know that.

A week later, I had re-memorized all of the basics, and they sent me packing. I managed to get re-enrolled in The Villa. There, some of the personnel seemed to recognize me, but didn't say anything. But I could tell by the way they looked at me and whispered behind my back that they knew. It was a sort of learn-as-I-went thing. However, I reacted on instinct. Things came naturally to me; I was just re-connecting things that had been temporarily off in my head, like hooking up a controller to a console. You just have to let the two find each other, and they'll be connected permanently again. The front line medical aid, the parachuting, the zero-G combat fighting, everything. Once I had a go at it, it was like that was all I needed and I'd mastered it. The one thing that bothered me was that I still couldn't remember anything prior to waking up on that crash site, and I couldn't retain my name. I got others to just call me N. I was enrolled as 'N. Seven,' though I usually just signed my name off as N7. It wasn't that I was trying to brag or boast or show myself off as better than everyone; it was the only name that stuck in my head.

A year later, I had risen to the rank of N6 yet again, albeit hesitantly by my superior officers. We were doing a casual check around the mass relays when we ran into an asteroid cloud close to one of the relays. Nobody thought anything of it, but there was something that seemed off about it to me. It was like a voice at the back of my head screaming at me again, but I couldn't quite tell what it was telling me. We steered clear of it, but as we soon found it -- it shifted courses and began to follow us. I was the first to notice, having kept a close eye on it. I talked to the pilot and navigators, and the asteroid cloud seemed to be closing in on us. Everybody was confused and began running around to find out what to do and what was going on; I was straining, thinking about what to do. Minutes later, the ship was surrounded by the asteroids and they seemed to be closing in. When most of our windows were blocked and we couldn't see out, things came rushing back to me finally, and I remembered something; we needed to shut the ship off and let it drift.
"Shut off all engines and systems!" I shouted.
"But, N, that's suicide! If we take down our shields, we'll--"one of the navigators exclaimed, but I cut him off.
"I've been in this before. I know how this works, just do it!" I exclaimed. There was silence for a while, but people began scrambling and soon all engines, shields, communications, and everything else was shut down. It got so quiet inside the ship, you could've heard a pin drop. The rocks paused inches away from crushing the ship, as if they were thinking. It seemed like everyone was holding their breath; a minute passed, two. Then the asteroids moved away and began drifting again, as if releasing us from its grasp. Ten minutes passed, and no one said a word. We were a sitting duck out there, but finally someone spoke up.
"How did you know to do that, N?" someone asked. Then people began mumbling among themselves.
"Because," I said, standing up tall and proudly. "I was part of the first original N7 crew. I was the only female. On a routine inspection, we came across an asteroid cluster quite similar to this. We tried to outrun it and escape, but it attached itself to our ship. It clung to us like a parasite, making everything go haywire. Before we realized we shouldn't have tried to outrun it, it was too late. We'd entered an uncharted planet's atmosphere and crash-landed, but it didn't stop there. Part of the asteroid cluster still clung to our ship, and as the survivors crawled out of the wreckage, we came face-to-face with an unknown enemy. It was chaos. We managed to send out a distress signal, but we were quickly overwhelmed. We fought for what seemed like days, our numbers slowly dwindling, theirs seeming innumerable. We came to the conclusion that the asteroids were a parasite that doubled as ships and a home for an unknown race. We had been focused on killing the aliens, but we finally realized, albeit too late, that we needed to target the small asteroids. We rounded up what and who we had left and assaulted the asteroids. By doing so, it caused a chain reaction; the asteroids exploded, the aliens dropped dead in the area, and a toxic green gas was released, followed by a large explosion that destroyed all ships and killed almost everyone in the area. I was the lone survivor, and I'm not sure how I survived, but I am here today, for a reason -- to prevent this from happening again to any other ships. I unsure why it took so long for me to remember, but I do now," I said. There was silence for a while, but then someone piped up.
"It's good that you have your memories back, N."
"It's not just N, soldier. I am N7, the last of the remaining original N7 crew," I said.

When people refer to 'N7,' they don't usually ask 'The person, or the military group?' They intertwine the two. I am N7, both the person and the term. I am the uncredited backbone of the Alliance Military. Very few know about me, and even fewer have seen me. Not even The Council knows I exist.

Impressed yet? You haven't seen anything.

Art

by Ease


by Christina Alyssa Saenz

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