The setting of this oneshot is Illium, one of the most beautiful commerce worlds in the galaxy, where a young woman awaits the consequence of her choices…
"Are you certain that this can happen? This is my life you're talking about, here!" The nervous quarian woman said.
The asari broker sighed. "I'm sorry," she said, "but I can do nothing to persuade Synthetic Insights to buy your contract." She massaged her blue forehead, trying to soothe the headache that was beginning to form. "Don't worry. We'll work something out."
The quarian whimpered softly. "I hope so…" she murmured.
"What do you hope?" A multi-toned voice asked. The quarian and asari women looked up to see a one-eyed turian male walking up to them. He was dressed in simple black clothes, but he had a small pistol at his side. That wasn't as intriguing as the facemask he wore. It was similar to the facemask the quarian wore, except without the visor. This revealed the long, jagged scar that went down the right side of his face, interrupted only by the patch over his eye. "What do you hope? Is this woman a slave?" The turian asked bluntly.
"We prefer the term 'Indentured Servant'", the asari broker corrected, "but I understand why you called it slavery. The Batarian slavers have prejudiced many people against slavery, and rightfully so. To answer your question, this young lady has some debts she needs to pay off."
"I tried to play the stock market on Illium," the quarian woman replied. "It was easy in the beginning to be successful, but then things started going bad. I lost all the money I had gained, and then I tried taking out some illegal loans to cover my debts." She signed, and added, "this company named Synthetic Insights was supposed to buy my contract, but they … what is the human phrase … got cold feet?"
The one-eyed turian nodded. "How much is her contract?" He asked the asari broker.
The broker looked surprised. "Are you even sure you've got the facilities to keep her healthy? True, your two species share the same kinds of amino acids, but quarians are expensive to maintain. Who the heck are you, anyways?" She asked.
"The name's Camisius'Caazh vas Raahala," the turian replied, causing the asari's eyes to widen in surprise. "Yep. I'm half quarian, half turian. I have clean rooms for when I get particularly sick, although I could use some help from an AI or VI to help keep track of food. Do you know anything about either of those things, miss?" Camisius'Caazh asked the quarian.
"I'm an AI engineer," the quarian replied.
The broker nodded, and activated the omnitool on her wrist. "I'm sending her contract to you now," she said, sending the file to Camisius. "If you have enough money, you can purchase the contract."
Camisius looked at the contract. It cost 10,000 credits, but he had more than enough to cover the cost and keep both him and the quarian woman well-fed. He typed instructions into his own omnitool, and he replied, "I'm sending the money to you right now. My car is nearby."
The quarian looked at the asari broker, who nodded. "Why are you doing this?" She asked. "I'm just draining your food stores and taking up space."
"I don't get sick as often as I used to," Camisius replied, "so the clean room doesn't see much use." He paused for a moment, and then added, "I had a feeling someone needed help, and you're that person. I'm no one special, just a guy lending a three-fingered hand." The quarian woman nodded as they walked to the car, heading off into Illium's sunset as they drove to Camisius' house.
Author's note: In order to purchase an indentured servant contract on Illium, the prospective buyer has to be a resident of Illium. There's a strict limit on the things that an indentured servant can be ordered to do, and the health and wellbeing of the servant must be maintained. Hope you enjoyed this oneshot. Fave and review, please. This is Darkest Nightmare's Dread, signing off.