A/N: Good evening. Took a short break, did some work. Now I'm back to write some more. I may also start a new story in the Wormverse, because I always enjoyed that setting.

Anyway. Hope you enjoy, as usual.

"Can I ask what you're doing, Joule?"

"Sure, ask away."

"What on Rannoch are you doing to the terminals?"

"Setting up the life support to flood the ship with deadly neurotoxins. You know, usual AI stuff."

Kii sighs. "And actually?"

I laugh. "Good to know you've got some faith in me. No, I've been fiddling around with the terminals, trying to get used to them. It's a really weird interface, so I ended up connecting myself and making something I'm a bit more comfortable with."

Kii approaches after a second, seeming a bit more wary. "Sorry, Joule, but didn't we have a long conversation about you connecting yourself to the computer systems of the ship?"

I nod. "Yep. In fact, when I just tried to set myself to be recognized as a bootable drive device, it almost immediately tore past that and blocked me. Not before I completed my goal, though!" I gesture in pride to the display.

She looks at it, and then to me. "It's blank, with that little flashing box in the bottom left."

"Exactly! I swear, booting up this terminal was a complete disgrace to computer-kind! It's like having tumors on tumors! It was a disgrace to tech-kind! I just had to put the poor machine out of its misery and make things a bit easier."

"And by that, you deleted everything?"

"No, no! Look and listen." I tap away at the keyboard for a few seconds, then hit enter. A wave of information creeps up on the screen, reporting green across the board. A few other statistics show up as well, from components next in need of repair, to onboard tech and cargo. It was remarkably similar to some of those warehouse stock inventories, offering a handy little search bar as well (they hadn't indexed their cargo! Were they mad?).

"Okay...uh - oh wait a second," Kii nods as she comprehends everything going on, "I see. Alright, fair enough. Listen, now that you're done with that, can you come join me in the cargo bay? There's a few items that we're missing and I want to know if we actually have them or we're all just hallucinating."

I laugh, and stand. "Sure enough. Lead the way."

Life is good. Or, virtual life. Or death, if I have turned into a drooling slob back in the real world and my mind is just frantically sparking a few final times before drifting off into the final sleep.

Wow, I'm really good at getting myself motivated for the new day, aren't I?

Of course, it's not like I actually sleep or anything. Hell, I don't even nap or snooze. Even the few times that I've been back to the mind-scape is just me turning off my outer input and just essentially turning my body into a game server to mess around in. Fun, for sure, but I've never really "turned off".

And now I'm waiting for the rest of the crew to wake up, while I do my own thing, which is really just waiting around for them to allow me to do more stuff.

These past few days, the rest of the crew have become a lot more used to me. It's partly easier because they're motherfucking space pirates, and thus don't have many problems with morals or ethics in the first place, up to and including artificial intelligences, but also because I'm clearly the most charming person that they've ever met in their lives.

In all seriousness, I'm getting pretty good at the whole tech thing. Who knew that becoming an artificial intelligence would do that to you? Either way, I've updated a whole bunch of the ship's systems and generally brought it up to the twenty-third century. Is it the twenty-third century? I always forget how the century thing works. If we had a Century Zero, we could have avoided the whole issue, but a little too late at this point, I guess.

Either way, these Quarians may be rocking the rustiest bucket this side of the Terminus Systems, but god damn if they don't have the best damn software running in the galaxy. It helps when I let myself stretch a bit into the systems: since I don't really need an immune system anymore, now catching a virus means a whole new thing. Luckily, I'm equipped to deal with it, and thankfully my mind seems to recognize bad code as, well, bad. Just like your body heals, my mind does the same, except it's an artificial extension of my mind at this point. Like if you have a skin graft, I guess? I'm gonna leave this analogy to die.

My main point is, these motherfucking Quarian space pirates are really liking what I've got, and they're happy to keep me on, which means I'm happy as well. After all, I can float around like this right up until Shepherd pops up from whatever rock (s)he's hiding under.

Of course, I can't let myself stay idle while (s)he prepares to save the galaxy. Instead, I'm doing the best thing I possibly can do in my situation.

Making a sales pitch.

"You want us to go into Human territory." Varan's voice is incredibly blunt, like a baseball hat constantly bashing itself against my face.

I keep up my equivalent of a grin, meaning my eyes glow a little brighter. "Indeed."

He puts his face in his hands, drawing in a deep breath before looking up again. "Ignoring the whole thing where we're gonna be thrown into the brig of whatever ship we cross paths with, thanks to both being Quarian and actual, you know, criminals, I still need a reason for us to go off our usual route on whatever mad trip you want us to make."

I nod. "That's completely fair, and I do understand. But if this goes well, then you might be able to turn quite a profit on the returns."

Kii speaks up from her corner of the room. "You haven't even told us what you're selling! Because it's certainly not our cargo!"

I raise my hands in a placating gesture. "I understand that. But there's something more than just physical goods that we can provide the humans."

"Like what? Hard labor? I don't know about you, but generally humans don't need a Quarian's help to lift things."

"No, not physical! Mental! We can offer our services."

Varan shakes his head. "Perfect! Of course, how could I possibly skip over the option of becoming a mercantile ship for the Human Empire? What a great idea!"

"Hey, no need to be sarcastic. If you really feel that way, then we simplify it down into what I can offer the humans: technical knowledge."

"You're what, gonna repair shit for them?"

"More than that. I'm going to build software for them. We go to some of these new frontier worlds, we build them some solid software to manage everything, and then continue on our way."

"So what do we get out of this, since clearly it's all you?"

"Well, you can still do some physical trade while we're moving on. More than that, though, you're still Quarians. It's not like I'm going to be the only one out in the field."

Kii hesitates, glancing at Varan. "Listen, Joule, great idea and everything, but you're missing something. Aliens don't like us. They call us suit-rats, for Keelah's sake. I don't think it's going to be as easy as walking in and just offering to fix their shit."

I shake my head again. "Kii, these guys are humans. I am kind of a human, and I know from everything I remember that humans honestly don't know or care. Hell, you could walk in and tell them the Pilgrimage was either a search to Uplift everyone to the next level of existence, or an opportunity to go eat some alien babies, and they'd believe you either way."

"So..." Kii seems off balance, "I don't know what that means. Are you going to tell them one or the other?"

"Oh, no, Kii. We're going to tell them the absolute guaranteed method to get them on our side. We're going to tell them the truth."

Oh, boy, how I wish I could grin sometimes.

A/N: Just a quick roundabout the galaxy to establish setting and other characters, before we hit the first big plot point. Joy.