"Plain simple water, and levo emergency rations, best the house can do. I'm told it tastes like wood."

Captain Cassius had graciously offered his quarters for Garrus to speak to Commander Shepard in private, and they were seated in the small corner set aside specifically for the informal meetings that didn't belong in the comm room. It had turned out they had Arcturus on their starcharts as an indexed but not named system. Said starcharts had been updated to reflect the new intel, and Garrus had felt his stomach drop for the second time that day when he realised how many uncharted, inactive relays there were in this region. Or more precisely, formerly inactive relays. Citadel had, many centuries ago, simply stamped the systems Garrus suspected now belonged to the humans with a big "do not enter" sign and left them alone. It had been assumed the Batarian Hegemony would get around to settling the region, eventually. At some point. Maybe.

"High quality wood," Shepard said once she'd managed to swallow her first bite.

Garrus grinned and made a mental note to carry edible food for the next time he was sent to a first contact situation, and then hid his grin turning chagrined at the thought, as this was surely the very last time he had to deal with this. He was holding a datapad that had the completely useless first draft of the request for assistance, as well as the gift list, and was wondering how to bring it up. And that was made slightly more complicated by the nagging suspicion that Commander Shepard already knew what he was going to request, and why.

Diplomacy was just not his thing. At least Commander Shepard had turned out easy to get along with, so far at least. Certainly no pricklier than the average asari. And Garrus was feeling more confident about his ability to read her by the minute.

"Again, we're very grateful for the rescue, and I regret the loss of your ship and crew." Not empty platitudes, not from him. He'd lost too much to say it without meaning it. The human seemed to sense that.

"You must've known you didn't stand a chance when you launched those torpedoes."

Garrus scratched at his collar. "Ah, we had a fair idea that it wouldn't be easy, but the cyberwarfare attack came as a complete surprise." He tilted his head, and considered for a brief moment before tossing out a probe. "AIs are forbidden in Citadel space, so we don't have any on our ships."

Shepard chewed on the ration bar, then nodded. "Probably sensible of you, actually. Once one side starts equipping their ships it becomes an arms race that's almost impossible to win."

And that was his confirmation that it had been an AI. Somehow, he should've been happier. "How do you protect yourselves?"

"Either by having superior hardware, which is very difficult against Cerberus, or by dumbing our systems down. We've isolated all ship systems that don't need to be networked, and there's an automatic switch to shut off all wireless access completely the moment a hostile target is detected. Any networking that needs to be done after that is done by hardlines. The AIs can't get to anything that won't accept an incoming signal."

"Ahh. Do you mind if I forward that to my superiors?" Which he would do either way, but it didn't hurt to be polite.

"Go right ahead. You would've figured it out eventually."

"Maybe. Before today, the only AI I ever fought against was a glorified gambling machine on the Presidium that somehow gained sentience. Until we discovered it, all it did was funnel credits. After we discovered it, it tried to blow us all up. Fortunately, I have some skill with percussive maintenance."

Commander Shepard chuckled. "You're lucky have survived a battle against EDI. She tends to prefer opening airlocks and venting the crew out."

"EDI? Is that the name of that Normandy's AI?"

"Yeah. Ruthlessly efficient, hopeless sense of humour."

His curiosity peaked. "You talk like you know her. If I may make that observation." Because getting off topic was probably a bad idea. He fiddled with the datapad. Shepard watched him, then simply shrugged.

"I do. Or did."

"That Normandy used to be your ship," he concluded, and read the change to her face as either surprise, or embarrassment. Or both. Possibly neither. And talking about personal things was definitely a bad idea. Yet those glowing eyes didn't leave his, and she nodded.

"Yes, she was." She sounded sad. "I used to work for Cerberus, and the Normandy was my ship."

"I have to admit, I'm curious. The first time I ever see a human ship, it gets fired on by another. It seemed personal." And his mind was just determined to avoid the gift list at all cost and start digging into the stuff that would cause an interstellar incident. Unrelenting curiosity was a useful trait during an investigation. During a negotiation, not to much.

"Personal... yes, and no." Shepard's hands wrapped around the water-glass. "Cerberus used to be allies of the Systems Alliance, and Miranda used to be my XO. She wasn't always trigger-happy like that. We were... well, I wouldn't say we were friends. I used to think she was a stuffed up brat, she thought I was an (warble) mongrel." Her lips turned up in a smile. "But we worked together through a lot of hard missions." Something in her expressive face darkened. "But then Cerberus went rogue, and something changed. It wasn't just Miranda, it came down from the top of Cerberus' command. I was lucky to get out when I did. Some of my friends... didn't."

"I'm sorry," Garrus said, the condolence genuine. "Do you have any idea what happened?"

Shepard shook her head and leaned back in the seat, "I wish I knew. One day everything was fine and we were running cavalry raids on the Union's frontier. The next, she tells me she wants to upgrade my augments, and I wake up on the operating table with a control chip in my head."

"That's..." Barbaric? Horrendous? Vile? Garrus' vocabulary came up short. "I take it since she was shooting at you, it's gone now?"

"Yeah. It didn't take immediately, I had enough control to make it off the base. I don't know if there was a mistake during installation, or if Miranda sabotaged it on purpose as some last act of defiance." She sighed and looked down into the water-glass, eyelids sliding closed, hiding the glow. Garrus' intuition stirred.

"She's the one who gave you those eyes?"

"Yes," she said, and gave him a look he interpreted as curious, and possibly surprised. "How did you know?"

"Just a guess," he deflected, while mentally patting himself on the back for his ability to read humans. Or at least this human. "Are augments common among your people?" Just so he could give Valern a conniption fit by adding an estimated number of unregistered part-synthetics outside of Citadel jurisdiction.

"They're fairly common. If you want to be a super-soldier, then Cerberus is – was – the best choice. Always top of the line augments fresh out of R&D. They didn't skimp on the tech." Her shoulders rolled, as if that little movement said all there was to add. "Anyway, I'm telling you this because I figured you deserved to know who was shooting at you, and the reason why you almost lost your ship. Cerberus hates aliens. They won't parley with you, and they'll do their damnedest to prevent more alien influence on humanity. If your people enter Cerberus systems, you will get shot at. Fair warning."

"Appreciated."

"But not all of us kill on sight." She blinked one eye, very quickly. "I usually fire a warning shot first."

Garrus stared at her a moment before his mental library on human facial expressions came through, and he chuckled.

"Is human humour always about violence?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," she said, with a very much human smile, that Garrus was developing an affinity for. Then, she turned serious. "Lets talk business?"

Yes, Garrus informed his brain. No more distractions. "I'm assuming you already have a fair idea of why we're here?"

"Some, but we're shy on the details."

Garrus looked at the datapad with the half-finished, mostly useless speech, erased it, then started from the beginning, using his own words. As he laid the situation out, Shepard simply nodded, following his explanations without trouble, only asking for elaboration in some places. Garrus suspected he said a bit too much, or maybe a bit too earnestly. But this was for Palaven; Sparatus could go wash his face for all Garrus cared.

At the end of it all, Shepard looked thoughtful, and he found the lack of outright rejection encouraging. Anything else could be negotiated for.

"From what you're saying, the Krogan would need stopping sooner or later. Unless you're feeding me a line, it seems to me they won't stop at just Citadel space."

"Very unlikely, but our worlds will sate them a while. Right now, they're in it for revenge. The hunger will come later."

"And the genophage, it won't work again?"

Garrus shook his head. "There was work being done on a modified genophage, to reinforce what was already in place, but it was rendered completely ineffective by the cure. I'm told the salarians are scrambling to come up with a brand new one, but they're starting from scratch. We don't think they can finish it before the krogan land on Sur'kesh.

Shepard nodded, one finger tapping against the datapad that held the gift list which she had been reading. Then she sighed. "It'll be up to my superiors one way or the other, but this is a very generous gift. They will listen." Her eyes met his with a significant look, maybe a bit apologetic. "But you need to be aware that one of the things they will ask for as payment for committing ships is an agriculture-capable garden world, and it's the one thing they won't budge on."

"That is asking a lot," Garrus said, but without heat. Long as said world wasn't Palaven, it was fine with him. But the Council wouldn't be happy, no sir.

"I'm aware. But we need one, and I'll be honest with you – we're pretty desperate. About three weeks ago there was an attack against the planet Benning. It's the closest garden world to Arcturus, and the main breadbasket for the Systems Alliance. There was a ruse in a neighbouring system, the military governor's fleet went to investigate. While they were away, someone got a stealth ship into low orbit and deployed a bioweapon into the atmosphere. It's... some areas can still support growth with some work, and we've shipped every atmospheric renewer we have there. But the entire planet's season crop was lost."

Garrus sucked in a quick breath, and his head started spinning once the shock settled in. The Spectre part of his mind reluctantly added 'wilful destruction of planetary ecosystem' to his growing list of things he wouldn't enjoy putting in his report about the humans, but that the Council would need to know.

"You don't know who it was?"

"No. But believe me, we're going to find out." That was a promise of murder.

Well. That explained why these humans were willing to negotiate, and why Shepard had been so insistent on defending the Unconquerable to bring these negotiations about. She had as little choice as he did.

He gestured at the ration bar, mostly eaten. She hadn't seemed to devour it like someone who was starving, and she didn't seem malnourished – not that he was certain he'd recognise it if she was. "We don't have a lot of supplies on board, but if you need, they're yours."

Shepard shook her head. "I appreciate the offer, but it's not bad yet. We've got a lot stockpiled, other allied systems are chipping in, and we're raiding Union worlds for supplies. But for the long run, the closest available garden worlds we'd be able to hold on to without spreading our forces too thin are in or near Citadel space."

Garrus cynically noted that this would be the same part of Citadel space that was currently so lightly defended as to be an open buffet to an organised fleet. "Surprised you haven't moved in to take them already, if your people are desperate."

"There were some serious plans to," Shepard admitted easily, "but when the diplomats from the Citadel turned up, it was decided to give these negotiations a go. Fighting a war on multiple fronts is usually not a good idea."

Indeed not. "Don't suppose you know what happened to the diplomats? Apparently they returned with ruffled feathers, but I wasn't privy to the details."

There was that wry humour look on Shepard's face again.

"Yeah, they ended up meeting the Reformists. They're xenophobic even against humans, and they definitely don't like aliens. But they don't have much in the way of a fleet either – they're dependant on the Systems Alliance for protection, which is why they let them go alive. Far as intel knows, your diplomats stumbled over them by pure chance."

"Reformists?"

"Yeah, our allies and part of the Exiles, but they mostly keep to themselves." She must've seen his curiosity peak, because she continued, "Believe it or not, Cerberus aren't the scariest monster in the valley. That prize goes to the Humanity Reformed colony of Eden Prime. It's one messed up place. They had several accidental eezo exposures many years ago when they were first setting up the colony, which resulted in a lot of biotics, our first generation of them. Apparently biotics was really interesting to someone in power, because then they started having 'accidents'," she did something with her fingers, emphasising that they weren't accidents after all, "and some time later they simply started deliberately exposing all pregnant women. Their neonatal mortality rate used to be horrendously high, but they got the hang of it in the last decade. Their entire youngest generation is biotic."

Garrus stared. Asari as a species were biotic because of their homeworld being eezo rich, they came by their biotics naturally. What Shepard was describing was... horrendous. That word seemed to pop up a lot in relation to the humans.

Shepard drew a breath to continue the explanation that wasn't quite over. "Us humans? We're considered adults around eighteen years old, but from about thirteen and up we have the physique and emotional stability needed to fight effectively if properly trained. The Reformists haven't been major players so far, but... soon, yeah, things might happen."

Garrus nodded in commiseration. That damn report Just Kept Growing. So naturally, he asked another question.

"Maybe you could tell me a bit about the different human..." What was the word again? "...factions? What is the Exiles?" Because he really needed to know these things before his people were committed to the humans for safety.

Shepard nodded, and took a drink of water before settling in for an explanation.

"We're the Systems Alliance, part of the Exile alignment. We're called that because we don't have any forces in the Sol system, where the human homeworld is. We used to be based on Earth, but when the fourth war started the Union alignment kicked us off the planet, making Arcturus our capital."

"Union alignment?"

"The factions that are based in Sol, or allied with the ones that are." She made a dismissive gesture with her hand. "Not all Union nations – factions – are at war with the Exiles, and not all Exiles are friendly to us – Cerberus is Exile, not Union, but they're not our allies in any way." She sounded rueful, and bit into the chewstick-of-a-ration bar. He gave her a moment.

"You're from Sol?"

"Yeah. I was raised in Vancouver on Earth, military capital of the Systems Alliance at the time. Conscripted at fifteen, shipped off to Arcturus for training. Then the fourth war started a few weeks later. The Union launched a surprise attack and nuked Vancouver. The objective was to break the Alliance's spine." She fixed him with a firm look. "It didn't work, it just made us more determined to win. But there was nothing left to hold on to, so we evacuated or went underground."

"So the Union has full control of your homeworld now?"

"Yes. Or at least mostly. There's a resistance movement, and some of the other Union nations aren't entirely friendly with each other. But... after the bombings, there's honestly not much left on the planet worth fighting for. For all intents and purposes, the Union capital is on Mars. Sol IV."

Heh, they had more in common with the Krogan than he had first realised.

"I'm sorry if I seem nosy, but a few days ago I had barely heard the word human, and now I'm talking to one who isn't pointing a gun at me. I'll stop asking stupid questions if you want."

"It's alright," she tilted her head. "It's honestly better you get your facts from me. The Union has a pretty mean propaganda machine, I imagine some of the rumours about humanity are pretty far out there?"

"Yeah, some are," he said as nonchalantly as he could. Truthfully though, the facts – if what Shepard was telling him was true – was turning out far worse than the rumours.

His people needed allies, but Garrus was beginning to suspect this solution was not quite as brilliant as the Council had hoped.