Chapter 2: An Unusual Suspect

When you're hung over, the sound of a knock at the door sounds like a jackhammer pressed up against the head and about as painful.

"C, it's Narsus." His shouts might as well have been over a loudspeaker, "We gotta head in."

When I finally managed to drag myself out of the coma I put myself the night before, I realized that I hadn't even made it to the bed; I was on the floor beside it. I guess that's better than most nights.

"CEA said they've got somethin' for us."

Customs, or Custom's Enforcement Agency if you wanted to be formal. They originally were a part of C-Sec, but the reaper war brought extra precautions and they broke off into their own agency. They liked to think of themselves as the big heroes in charge of putting an end to smuggling and other off world trafficking, but in the end, they always called in C-Sec.

The CEA saying they've got something meant one of two things; either they managed to stop a shipment of weapons for the Black Maw, or they've made an arrest in relation to the Black Maw. I would make a bet on which one it would be, but I wasn't in the mood. My head pounded; everything was brighter and louder.

"Are you alive or dead in there?" Narsus asked.

"Dead." I groaned, "Let me take a shower."

I didn't even bother waiting for the water to heat up. I was in the shower for about a minute before I was out, hoping that it would wash out the smell of alcohol and the hangover. When I got out, I wasn't sure if it did either.

Narsus was waiting outside my apartment door, his back pressed against the grimy wall of the alley, his foot tapping impatiently on the ground. I reached into my pocket, digging around for a cigarette. A fragment of my night came back to me and I realized that I smoked all of them.

"Do you have a cigarette?" I asked.

Narsus shook his head, "I quit, remember?"

No, I didn't remember. Then again, I usually tone out half the things he says. When he wasn't arguing against me, everything he said was about him and his narcissistic ego. Maybe I was exaggerating a little, but it didn't change the fact he annoyed me to no end. I was stuck with him two months ago after his old partner retired.

"So what did CEA want?" I pushed my hands into my pockets as we began the walk from my apartment to the station.

"They've made an arrest," He informed me, "They want us to interrogate."

Damn, that's exactly what I would've bet on, "How is related to our case?"

"An entire load of weapons." Narsus was smiling, or the closest thing to smiling that a turian could do, "They told me he dropped his name."

It wouldn't be the first time we've made an arrest who cried 'Black Maw'. The first time, it was just a sorry ass scumbag hoping to get out of serving time for smuggling a bucket of red sand, and the second time, the suspect ended up killing himself before we even got a chance to interrogate.

"Did they double up security?" I asked. The last thing I needed was for this guy to croak on us before we even got into the interrogation room.

Narsus nodded, "I asked, and they did."

I guess that should've been a weight off my chest, but I had a strange feeling in my gut, and not from last night's scotch either. By the time I arrived at the C-Sec station, I was twenty minutes late. As long as I kept my head down and on a straight line to the interrogation room, the captain wouldn't even notice.

Luckily for me, he didn't. The last thing I needed was for him to give me an earful of shit for being late for the fifth consecutive week. The captain was a human, and ever since the council started shouting that a human ended the war pretty much singlehandedly, he's held his nose a little higher.

A lone officer stood on guard duty in front of the interrogation room. I guess one guard is the closest to double security that C-Sec could manage. They've been stretched thin by the refugee situation, or more accurately, the riots. The officer stepped aside as me and Narsus approached.

I'm not sure if it was my hangover or just a new form of making the suspect uncomfortable, but the interrogation room was bright. Sitting handcuffed in a chair was a salarian, his hands jittering on the table like an addict deprived of a fix. His eyes nervously darted around the room, though most salarians I knew had a habit of examining everything in fast forward.

I couldn't figure it out, but there was something unsettling about the salarian. It wasn't his nervousness or his shiftiness. I couldn't pin point it, but I knew the moment I walked in the room, there was something off about him.

Narsus picked up the file on the table in front of him. Surprisingly for a criminal, it was thin, with only a single sheet stuffed inside with his information on it. He was the kind of guy who didn't even have a parking ticket.

"Dr. Amidon." Narsus read off the page, "Neurosurgeon."

Smugglers were normally blue-collar clowns with rap sheets as thick as their heads and whose modus operandi consisted of smuggling red sand in bags up their asses. Seeing a neurosurgeon involved was unusual. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, with enough credits, you can make anyone do just about anything.

"Wh-where's my lawyer? I'm not saying anything until I have my lawyer." The salarian said nervously.

"You already said 'Black Maw' to customs, so we want to know what you know." Narsus took the lead on the interrogation.

"W-what? I never said that. I mean... Yes, yes I did." He fumbled over his words like a drunk running a tire drill, "H-He must've planted those guns on me."

"You work at a hospital, right? How about I just call over there and tell them what's going on." I threatened. It was nice to see the good doctor squirm.

The salarian raised his hands as high as they could before the cuffs stopped them, "All right, all right. I'll tell you. He said to get the cargo here and that I'd be cleared to dock. He offered me a lot of credits."

"Where you supposed to meet him anywhere?" Narsus asked, leaning both hands on the table.

The salarian shook his head, "No, no, just dock it, and he'd take care of the rest." The salarian's eyes darted from me to Narsus, "I've told you all I know, I swear! Can I go now?"

"I guess we could release you, but then he might know you talked to us." I informed, "We could arrest you and then you can go when you post bail. I'll tell the judge."

Me talking politically; The thought made me sick, but I guess every once in a while we do things that make us sick, some more than others. Making deals with criminals was never my idea of justice, but sometimes it happens that way.

"I'll take my chances. Just release me." I had to give it to him; the salarian had balls, "You'll want to check over the cargo, he might have put something else in there. Something I didn't know about."

Narsus took off his cuffs and let the salarian doctor walk out of the room. Now we knew a fraction more than we did the day before. The Black Maw claimed to hand out docking privileges, though as that poor salarian bastard quickly found out, it was a lie.

"I'll get someone to keep tabs on him." Narsus said as the door shut.

It was a small victory for what it was worth. When you're hunting down a criminal, baby steps are better than none at all.