12th Explorer Platoon
From FABT
 The 12th Explorer Platoon on Freedom's Progress
| |
|---|---|
|
Active: |
|
|
Organization: |
 |
|
Affiliation: |
|
|
Branch: |
|
|
Type: |
Platoon |
|
Role: |
Escort/expeditionary unit |
|
Size: |
30 marines |
|
Part of: |
|
|
Headquarters: |
|
|
Engagements: |
|
|
Commanders: |
Plt Sgt. Prazza'Sal † |
|
Notable: |
|
The 12th Explorer Platoon was a Migrant Fleet Marines combat unit attached to the 1st Exploratory Company and commanded by Prazza'Sal with oversight from Tali'Zorah. Formed in late 2182 CE along with the rest of the 1st Exploratory Company as part of the New Home program, the job of the 12th Explorer Platoon, as well as the 13 other platoons forming the ad-hoc company, was to deploy to uncharted worlds, largely escorting scientists, for the purpose of looking for new worlds for the quarians to colonize, a last ditch measure the Conclave had resorted to as the Migrant Fleet was becoming less and less tenable with each passing century, with the quarians either having to fight the geth to reclaim Rannoch or face the uncertainty of finding a new home to settle. The company was formed from units across the MFM, with the 12th in particular formed from marines of the 34th Marine Expeditionary Force, although their commanding officer, Prazza'Sal, was from the 18th Airborne Division. The 12th Explorer Platoon was garrisoned on the QMFV Delyser Ku, and it would be involved in several exploratory missions under the New Home initiative, although the vast majority were failures, either due to political pressure to leave the planet, previous claimants barring access or the planet simply being unsuitable for quarian habitation. In late 2183 CE, Tali'Zorah, having recently enlisted in the MFM, was assigned command of the 12th Explorer Platoon by her father, Rael'Zorah, who wanted to groom Tali for command. Prazza'Sal resented having to supercede his authority to who he saw as a civilian, believing Tali only had the job because of her father's power, but he nevertheless followed Tali's orders at every turn, as did the rest of his unit: while the platoon admired Tali for her actions in the Eden Prime War, they were ultimately loyal to Prazza, and did not like her style of command anymore than Prazza did.
The 12th continued to perform numerous survey missions under Tali'Zorah without incident until 2184 CE, where they were present on the QMFV Idenna when it came under attack from a Cerberus commando assault team looking for the biotic human child the quarians were protecting. Following the massacre that followed, Prazza had a meltdown, not only because the Idenna was his birth ship, but because his niece had died during the attack, and he quickly began to resent Tali as a result, irrationally blaming her for the attack, and this led to deep seeded animosity between Tali and Prazza, with the platoon sergeant constantly questioning her orders on every occasion, an action he got away with due to Tali's hesitance to file a report on him out of concern the platoon would turn on her, as Prazza was already poisoning their opinions of her, blinded by his grief and hatred of her. Prazza'Sal was placed on temporary leave following the Idenna incident to deal with his grief and seek therapy, leaving Tali in sole command of the unit for a few months until Prazza was deemed fit to resume command, although he remained combative and resentful of Tali, his therapy inadvertently only helping him further rationalize this fact to himself, and this only continued to worsen the 12th's opinion of Tali.
This tension would reach a breaking point in August 2185 CE, when the 12th was pulled from its usual duties to perform a pilgrim rescue on Freedom's Progress, the target being a neurotic quarian pilgrim who had been present on the colony when it became the then-latest victim in a series of human colony abductions, and the 12th was deployed to extract the quarian and ascertain his status. Arriving at the Little Rock colony, the 12th found it abandoned but also swarming with hostile mechs, which Veetor'Nara had hacked and was using to attack anything in the colony that moved, even other quarians. Fighting their way through the mechs and trying to come up with a plan to get to Veetor, the 12th encountered a Cerberus squad also investigating the colony, which was lead by the newly resurrected Commander Shepard, much to Tali's shock. Despite tension, Tali agreed to have her platoon work with the Cerberus squad to get to Veetor, a decision that greatly angered Prazza and his unit, who saw working with Cerberus as treason. Believing Tali was allowing her relationship with Shepard to cloud her judgment and therefore was unfit to command, Prazza staged a mutiny against her on the way to Veetor's office, simply refusing Tali's order to coordinate with Cerberus and took the platoon with him to rush to Veetor's office, hoping to beat Cerberus to him. This decision resulted in Prazza rushing his platoon into an open area, where they were able to clear a group of mechs but had failed to notice a YMIR mech Veetor had placed to defend the office itself. Caught in the open and lacking the heavy weapons to handle such a heavily armoured mech, the 12th was slaughtered by the YMIR's autocannon and rockets, with Prazza himself killed early on and only a handful of survivors, most of them injured, making it to cover in time to survive the onslaught. Of the 30-man platoon, four survived the massacre, thanks in part to the arrival of the Normandy Squad, who were able to distract and ultimately destroy the mech while Tali arrived to treat the injured. Tali returned with Veetor and the survivors after the attack, and the 12th was subsequently dissolved, its surviving members placed on medical leave and, upon convalescencing, were assigned to other units: Tali meanwhile was attached to a science team escorted by the 34th MEF to participate in a scientific expedition on Haestrom shortly after.