HI THERE EVERYONE, THANKS FOR READING. PLEASE LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK OF THIS CHAPTER AFTERWARDS.
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"This seriously, cannot be a problem Marduk."
"I am sorry sir but it is. The problem with crashing a plague ship into a world is that you need a ship to be the vessel for the plague and to crash it in said planet. And unfortunately, even with your impressive abilities creating, constructing, perfecting and troubleshooting the entire thing would at least take several weeks at least."
"Wait what about my magic, surely they can help?"
"They can, but it can only take the construction effort so far before failure is imminent. Besides do you really want to trust your summonable minions to delicate construction work?"
"Ya, I guess your right they might accidentally slip a spark plug into the wrong charge receptacle and won't be able to pull out in time before they unleash an unwanted premature detonation."
"…Really, sir? A dick joke now?" Marduk was getting really exasperated, it was like caring for retarded baby.
"LET ME COPE BUDDY! Besides when is it a bad time for dick jokes?"
Marduk let out a sigh that really shouldn't be possible for an A.I inhabiting a miniature super-computer on the man's left arm.
"Sir I may have a solution to this little conundrum of ours."
"Okay, go for it Marduk. And don't say steal a ship, remember the last time it happened?"
"Yes, how could I forget. Not only were you drunk that time, you commandeered that Imperial Battle Cruiser, you bombarded the moon so that that impact craters formed giant butt, you then proceeded to suicide smash yourself into the heart of Abaddon the Despoiler's Fourteenth Black Crusade Fleet, where by sheer luck you detonated the Plasma Drive, which was amplified by your Boosted-Gear, all the while Boom-Boxing Richard Wagner's Ride of the Valkyrie to every single Vox-Channel in the entire solar system."
"Buddy, you forgot the most important part that little trip. I did all that and I did it naked."
"Yes, how could I ever forget. Actually, no we can't forget. That Servo-Skull recorded the entirety of your shenanigans and broadcasted on every available channel. Everyone had a full high definition Saga of you going at it, in what is being called "The Buck-Naked Brawl". That last battle has even shamed some the Daemons into hiding, no one wants to show their face after getting tea bagged by a naked man. The Imperium of Man was still stuck in a Civil War in regards to whether that act was Blasphemy or worthy Veneration."
"Why can't it be both?"
"Because it's the Imperium of Man, they have to go to war whatever reason their leaders want."
"Any way, you were going on about something about ship problem? As amusing it is to reminisce on my pure epic awesomeness, none of it really helps our problem right now."
"Yes, sir. I was thinking of going to Aria T'Loak. I believe she might be able to help us."
"Huh? Haria ta Cloak. Wait you mean that blue chick with that massive rack?" a grin was beginning to form on his cloaked face.
"No, sir. You are thinking Hariya C'lok the current Matriarch of the Asari Establishment "Humidity". You have visited there at least sixteen times…"
"Really? I don't remember…"
"This month alone."
"Oh yeah! Every Friday has a two for one special and every Sunday was a Hat Trick Holiday."
"Dammit, sir. Please focus."
"Oh yeah, yeah. Malia tu C'roak, the head honcho of this place. I may not remember her too well. She had B-cups at best but she did have legs to die for and an ass that I could bounce a credit chit of off."
A sigh once again came from Marduk. "At this point I'll take what I can get."
"It would seem that a large portion of her men and her resources have been viciously set upon by what the locals are now calling "The Black Beast"."
"Okay wait, before you get angry I had nothing to do with that blue chick's men. You told me to hunt only at the slave block sites and to avoid any of that blue chick's thugs."
"I'm not angry…or surprised for that manner. Aria hid some of her men amongst slaver scum scattered around various sites, I believe they were either trying to ambush you or were on an information gathering mission. Considering you were in your Lunar Warform, or at least the lowest level of it, I bet all the "evil' you smelled could not be differentiated from her men. Therefore, you most likely killed her men as well as the slavers and left slaves alone, if a bit traumatized."
"Oh, good as long as you're not angry and the innocent are safe we are good."
"My point is, sir. Aria T'loak has been ripping her hair, or at least the hair of her minions from the look of things, trying to find you. At this point she's offering quiet the bounty for your hide."
"Damn I do good work. So how does this help us again acquiring a ship?"
"I'm thinking she's desperate enough at this moment to make a deal with the devil."
"Oh really?" His eyes began to smolder hellfire. And grin formed on his face that seemed to absorb all light in the room. "Been awhile since I walked in Mephistopheles' shoes. Think I still got Marduk old buddy." He smiled at his arm directly linked to Marduk's sensors.
What is the devil's greatest trick?
He made mortals believe he didn't exist.
The smile bore the heat of thousand hells, a grin that damned souls unnumbered, a laugh that reduced the blackest of hearts pale in despair.
A Devil's Grin
The Finest Sin
Never to Win
The Monster Within
"With all due respect sir, I don't think you ever lost it." Once more Marduk was glad he was on this side of the field. He truly did not believe he still be as sane as he was right now if that smile was directly pointed at him.
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Aria T'loak was currently in a dilemma.
BANG!
After shooting the poor fool of a Blue Sun in the face with her trusty side arm, she had made her way back to her sanctuary of solitude that was her lounge chair. With the Beast at large, all matter of idiots was crawling out Omega hoping to take piece of the pie before she could get her bearings. That being said, the cockroaches were having an absolute shit time of accomplishing said take over.
You see she was prepared. She was always prepared, especially for this kind business. With the Beast running around taking chunks out of everyone this forced most military groups in Omega to do one of two things, the first was to leave, the amount of damage the Beast did was not truly significant it was just a major blow to profits and morale, despite how dangerous the Beast was, it was still a force of one and it could only do so much damage. The second option was to fight, unfortunately since the Beast was all but impossible to hunt and always massacred ambushes the military groups turned their attention to her.
They knew that should the Beast continue their presence on the station would be in danger. So as per usual instead consolidating their forces and calling for an alliance they went had a free for all. You would think it was a glory seeking Krogan that started it all but it was a Blue Suns Salarian that made the case to attack and was the first one to fire a shot. But she was prepared, they were not. She had patiently waited for years for this, ever since they first came to her station. She already had plans and plenty ammunition to force those fools down. The groups had more men and more firepower, but they were all fractured in one way or another, fighting in enemy territory and against multiple enemies and fronts. She consolidated resources in advance, had caches set up, traps laid out and spies ingrained in the groups long ago. They never stood a chance, but at least they put up a fight.
First was the Blue Suns, for all their tech specialties they had become far too reliant on them. They stashed the main cache gunships and mecha in a single location. Aria didn't have to do anything at that point. All she had to do was leak information about where it was a and the best time to strike and everyone and their grandmother came to the party. That's when she detonated the whole cache eliminating a large portion of idiots and Blue Suns at the same time. They were not able to recover without their tech backing them up.
The Blood Pack were a little bit trickier than the other mercenary bands. Unlike Blue Suns and Eclipse, they had less tech and biotics and more bodies to throw around. Blood Pack had more battle hardened Krogan and a lot more disposable meat shields, AKA Vorcha. Fortunately, what they had in military prowess they lacked in logistics and information gathering. Aria had her informants pass on information about various caches and supplies from both her side of the field and everyone else's. By the time Blood Pack got wise to her schemes they took a chunk out of everyone's coffers and their own. Plus, a majority of their Battlesmasters fell during those raids, all that was left were the glory seeking young bloods and the Vorcha.
The Eclipse were the easiest. It sickened Aria to know that her own species were this contemptable. Most Eclipse mercenaries were Asari that had failed their Huntress Training or their Commando Training and simply joined up the Mercenary band. As such there was a significant biotic force, even in failure. But, their weakness was discipline, or at least the lack there off. Little command structure, poor logistics, green recruits and over reliance on biotics. She had no mercy for these fuck-ups. She carpet-bombed their base in a combination of red sand and napalm, if they didn't die screaming then the red sand would force their un-disciplined biotics to rebel against them. Most likely in a violent and painful way.
There were other groups of course, but those three were the main source of problem for Omega these day. With all three in shambles it was only a matter of time before Aria had the leaders, or at least the current ones anyway, kneeling before her.
But, now things were different. This galactic fuck up that the mercenary bands called a coup was soon to be done. And instead of weakening her position it was strengthened. She won, her enemies will soon be dead and once more she was at the top of the mountain. It was good to be the Queen. Except one little problem.
At long last during the little skirmish on her station one of her informants finally found some useful information on The Beast and on its handler. The name of Organization behind that Beast was called Section 66. It was a rogue group of military commanders and idealistic scientist that dated during the time the Human Alliance found the Prothean Ruins on Mars. From her sources, it was explained that this group contested the use of Prothean Tech and Element Zero, arguing that it was sourced from a dead species. A failed species.
Aria smiled a little at the gumption of such a statement but continue to read on the datapad. Section 66 claimed that since the Protheans were already dead then the human race will share the same fate if they went down the same technological path. Their failings would one day be their own. Aria was interested, the manifesto was an inspiring if not bit self-conceited. She could understand where he was going, she continued to read through the history.
Eventually, when the Human Alliance ignored Section 66, but that wasn't all, the Alliance knew that the opinions and views of Section 66 was radical at that time. It went counter to what the Alliance wanted, so they did what all political bodies did with their unwanted. They swept them under the rug. Each man in Section 66 was quietly displaced to new location, away from everyone else in the group. But, then the twist arrived, three years after the research into the Prothean Ruins every member of Section 66 began to disappear, go MIA or KIA. The Twist was that no bodies were ever found. Soon afterwards, the families began to disappear, and finally, several scientists around the Alliance followed suit with the same MO.
Section 66 was alive. Aria allowed her mind shift through the possibilities and that was one of the highest probabilities. She scrolled through the data pad hoping to find info. It would seem that Section 66 had no real Speciality. The info simply made note of their disdain for Element Zero Technology, and their efforts to surpass it. However, from the looks of it they have succeeded in several regards.
The information was lacking details, but it was able to hypothesize that it had several breakthroughs in eugenics, metallurgy, theoretical atomics, genetic manipulation, energy replication and "Gamma" Radiation. Aria was no scientist but she lived long enough to have a modicum of understanding in regards as to what was being developed. From her point of view, it would seem like Section 66 was actually doing what it was claiming to do, or at least to some degree. They were genuinely creating technology parallel or even branching away from Element Zero, a feat that no one has ever done since the Asari first lay claim to their own Mastery of their technology.
And now this. She held a strange device, a small box about the size of her palm. The design alone was robust and simple, clearly not made by anything the she was familiar with. Despite that two hours into her reading on Section 66 this package came in. Apparently, it was delivered by a Tunnel Rat, and yes, they have them here too just like the Citadel. The human boy was paid quite handsomely, nothing to her but a family could be fed a decade given frugal conditions. That being said the boy was contacted, given the package and paid in advanced. The package passed off all the tests to make sure it wasn't a bomb and was now simply waiting there on her table. Curiosity was the only reason this thing was still near her vicinity. And then just as she was about to move on the cube moved.
Like a rubrics cube, she saw the humans bring them around once in a while, it began to twist on its own as if to solve itself. The steel, gunmetal colored cube soon stopped and expanded and break apart. Pieces of it flying apart to the corners of the room. The vision of a man, clearly a holographic projection, then appeared in her lounge. Tall, straight with a rather tasteful looking black suit and tie. The black-haired gentlemen, because he exuded nothing less such aura, had a clean face and head a heavy stare in his dark eyes. No fear as it gazed upon her own. And with a simple, if elegant bow and hand gesture to his chest, his greeting began.
"Hello? Can anyone see me?" clearly something was wrong with the projection. "Is this thing working? Marduk, is this good?"
"Oh, sorry sir, it seems that something is not completing the circuit."
"Did you click TV then Power?"
"Wait, hold on sir I got it. I'm on Video 2.
"No, change it to Video 1."
"Got it." Click.
"Anyway. Greetings Miss T'loak" The man was now smiling, kindness was seen, a very rare trait. She could not help but find it attractive, even sexy if she was willing to be subjective. However, she could not help but be reminded of certain parallels in regards to the smile. It reminded her of an Alliance sea creature she once had a fascination to.
A creature that had far too many teeth and was capable of smelling blood in the water for miles.
What were they called again?
Ah, now she remembered, with a hint of alarms flashing in her mind.
They were called sharks.
. Sharks with, apparently, weird purple eyes.
.. Scratch that, gorgeous, purple eyes.
… Eyes that seem to see through her.
…. Magnificent, broad shouldered…
….. Wait what was she thinking about?...
… Oh right she was going to get a ship for dear friend, with the shark-like smile…
…. One of her dearest friends, who helped her conquer Omega…
….. In fact, it was his information that helped her to her throne…
… She wondered if he's here right now. She was never able to properly thank him for all the help he gave…
…. Plus she had friends? No, associates?...
….. Strippers. She had strippers. Surely, they can help her relay her gratitude.
… Besides she remembered he had a thing for Matriarchs and orgies, and a lot of Matriarchs owed her favors…
…. What pretty eyes he had…