Docking Bay, Habitation Level Alpha

0430 Zulu

3 June 2185

Omega (docked), Sahrabarik

Kelsa draws her shotgun even before the Normandy's doors hiss open. Lawson clears her throat just as the reconstituted soldier takes her first step onto the station.

"Are you sure that's wise, Shepard?" The Cerberus operative drawls. "An aggressive posture will invite hostility here."

"I know," the soldier gruffs, forging into the crowded loading area, her eyes flitting around for any sign of a threat. "How many times you been on Omega, Lawson?"

"Counting this trip?" She muses, swallowing her disgust. "Twice. I already feel like I need a hot shower."

Kelsa smirks, shoulder-checking a dirty salarian that takes a step too close. "I grew up somewhere a hell of a lot like this place," she tells the operative, even while she's staring down the overgrown bullfrog; he blinks at her face, and then the gun couched in her hands, and then he does the smart thing. "Here, you either invite hostility or you invite greed," she goes on, drawing nearer to the big cargo doors that'll take her and the two Cerberus stooges to Omega's nerve centre. "Wanna guess which one'll get you dead quicker?"

The woman gives no answer, and Kelsa's content to let the matter drop; unlike both of her companions, she can't manipulate dark energy or offensive technology at a moment's notice, and she'd much rather be ready for trouble when it comes. Right now, it looks like it's coming in the form of a batarian that's wielding a shotgun of his own. But he keeps it checked across his torso as he steps closer. "Shepard," the alien grunts, appraising her with both sets of eyes. "Aria's expecting you in Afterlife."

Kelsa comes to a stop so fast that Taylor nearly trips over her, but she doesn't even flinch at the unexpected contact. Curiosity keeps her from lifting her own gun. "And what would the boss of Omega want to see me about?"

"I got no fucking idea," the batarian blusters. "Aria tells me to fetch her a dead woman, I fetch her a dead woman; I don't ask questions…even when that woman turns out to be not-so-dead after all." He throws a nod at the woman hovering around her left shoulder. "Interesting company you're keeping these days, human."

"Aria wants to see me, she wants to see them," the soldier gruffs, hiding her distaste behind a soldier's solidarity. "But who says I wanna see Aria?" As she speaks, Kelsa lifts the barrel of her shotgun a couple of centimetres, keeping it pointed sideways...for now.

The goon hitches his shoulders, playing it cool. "You've got the message. What you do with it's your business...but on Omega, your life expectancy tends to go down if you piss off the boss." His eyes sweep over the three humans and he gives them a parting nod before he melts back into the hallway he came from, just one more in a grimy pool of aliens.

Kelsa pushes her way into a tight side-corridor that ultimately leads to the Gozu District, where two potential recruits are supposed to be located. One's a salarian scientist named Solus, who's running a med clinic in the slums. The other is a human, a merc, and a damned good one at that...even in Alliance Special Forces, soldiers have heard of Zaeed Massani. Kelsa isn't sure she believes all the scuttlebutt, but it looks like she'll find out soon enough; the hallway's oddly abandoned except for the very end, where two people are squaring off in front of a thick set of sealed doors. The old human man has his back to one wall, but he's eyeballing a young-looking turian. "...here, you little shit," Kelsa hears him growl as she and her companions draw closer. "We've got a goddamned appointment," he claims, pointing an assault rifle with his left hand and gripping a kneeling batarian by the collar with his right. "I don't give a shit what the hell you think your orders are. You wouldn't know discipline if it bent you over a guardrail and pulled the stick out of your arse, but if you make me late for a goddamned appointment, I'll do even worse than that."

The turian doesn't shrink back, his own rifle held cross-ways, like Kelsa's shotgun a few minutes before. "Can that old rusted piece of shit even fire anymore?" He drawls. "It looks-"

But before Kelsa can find out what the turian thinks the gun looks like, the old man acquaints the turian's face with it rather forcefully. "Nobody...says...that...to...my...Jessie!" He snarls, each word punctuated by a sickening crunch of bone and another splash of blue blood. The sudden, tightly-focused rage is almost a wonder to behold, but the man's passion leads him to let go of his batarian charge. Four-eyes can't seem to believe his luck for a single heartbeat, before he starts scrambling backward as quickly and quietly as he can manage...only to scoot back-first into Kelsa's knee. It's the batarian's turn to snarl, and he spins around, all teeth and glinting eyes. The stock of Kelsa's shotgun rattles the bastard's head and he falls onto his side, dazed, but he freezes when Kelsa trains her gun on him. From the upper edge of her vision, she sees the man turn, his face and armour and rusted old gun smeared with turian gore. "Thanks," he gruffs, after glancing at his recaptured prisoner. "You must be Shepard."

Kelsa bobs her head, not taking her eyes off of the batarian. "You must be Massani," she surmises. "Who's this fucker?"

"Him?" Massani grunts, his lip curling as he takes a second look at the batarian. "Just some scum that pissed off someone enough to send me after him," he explains. "And for my bring-em-in-alive rates, even."

"Please," the batarian husks, his voice tinny, like he hasn't had a hit of red sand in too long. "It's all a big mix-up! I swe-"

Massani's boot shuts him up. "No one said you could talk, scum," he spits. "Was a last-minute addendum to my Zorya deal. The client's in the Faia system, so it won't be out of the way to drop this piece of shit off when we go deal with that."

Kelsa arches a brow at the mercenary, but before she can say anything, Lawson breaks in. "That wasn't part of the deal, Mister Massani," she says. "You'll have to take the loss."

From the corner of her eye, Kelsa sees a flicker of biotic blue, and she throws out a hand. "Hold on a fucking minute," she growls, finally tearing her eyes off of the prisoner to look back and forth between Lawson and Massani. "What the hell are you two talking about? What's going down on Zorya?"

Lawson's lip curls, but Massani speaks up first. "Got a job there right before Cerberus made its offer," he says, irritated. "I was given assurances I'd have your help taking care of it as one of the terms of the contract we agreed on."

"Exactly," Lawson drawls. "That was the term, on top of far more credits than you deserve. Not any side-trips." Her brows draw together, another biotic sheen crossing over her eyes.

Kelsa's heard enough. "None of that shit was in the dossier I went over with EDI," she points out. "Don't look at him, look at me, Lawson," she commands, turning more fully to the other woman. Lawson's almost a head taller, so the soldier's gotta look up to catch her eye, but Kelsa squares her shoulders and grimaces. "When exactly were you planning on telling me about this?"

The operative has the good sense to take a half-step back even as she maintains Kelsa's gaze. "If you'd been open to conferring with me in transit, you would've learnt it then," she sneers. "But you're too full of yourself to listen to anybody, so I didn't see the point in bothering."

"We've already had this conversation before, Lawson," the soldier growls. "We ain't having it again. The next time you withhold vital intel from me, you're taking a walk off my ship, whether we're in port or not." She doesn't raise her gun, but she doesn't have to; at this distance, she could take off Lawson's head in half a heartbeat if she saw any sign of an attack. "We clear?"

Lawson bites down on the corner of her mouth, but after a second she nods. "Yes, Shepard, we're clear."

"Good," Kelsa grunts, tilting her head over her shoulder toward the supine batarian. "Take that thing back to the Normandy, then. If it ain't breathing in the brig when I get back, your ass can stay on Omega." She can see another wave of resentment squirming over Lawson's face, but she can't help digging it in. "Taylor," she barks. "You'd better go back too, to make sure Lawson doesn't try to mutiny and take the Normandy for a joyride."

Lawson's gaze shifts from Kelsa's face to look over her shoulder, and the woman's expression goes from murderous to incredulous. "Aye, aye, Skipper," Taylor says, without a trace of mockery in the title. "Let's go, Miranda."

Lawson's mouth works. "But-"

"You've got your orders," Kelsa pronounces, rounding away from the operative and the washout both. When she doesn't get shot in the back after five heartbeats, the soldier steps toward Massani, her face just as grim. "Why didn't that fucking guard let you through to Gozu?"

"Something about a plague," the old merc rasps, after he's satisfied that his bounty isn't about to be torn in half with dark energy. "Whole thing's been quarantined. Humans're supposed to be immune, but the arsehole still wouldn't let me through. Said the Blue Suns and the vorcha were killing everything that moved." He grunts a low cackle, his scarred face twisting into a grin. "Like that was gonna stop me getting to that clinic."

"Looks like it's just you and me, Massani," Kelsa muses, throwing a glance at his bloodied, rusted rifle. "Just one question...can that thing shoot?"

"Her name's Jessie," Massani grunts, shipping the gun behind his right shoulder. "Hasn't fired a round in years, but I can't stand the thought of giving her up." He takes up a newer gun from his left shoulder, and when it extends from the compact block, Kelsa sees it's a sniper rifle. "This beaut'll take down a blood-raging krogan at two clicks, though."

"Good enough for me," Kelsa says, her lips curling into a smirk. "Now let's get to that clinic."

Crow's Nest, Afterlife

1115 Zulu

4 June 2185

Omega (docked), Sahrabarik

A batarian moves to intercept Kelsa when she mounts the last couple of steps to Aria T'Loak's private lounge. "Hold, human," he gruffs, and the timbre in his voice jostles in the soldier's memory.

Kelsa stops short, arching an eyebrow at the alien's glowing omni-tool. "You the same asshole that came lookin' for me in the loading bay?"

"Yesterday," the batarian confirms, holding up his arm to sweep a scan up and down the soldier. "See you've got yourself some new friends in the meantime." His eyes flicker, the top set looking over her left shoulder at Massani while the bottom set glances at the scarred-up salarian that she had to cut through sixty-six vorcha and krogan to pry out of his clinic in the slums.

She shrugs, filing away the discovery that batarians' eyes are paired off; they usually look solid black to most humans, but Kelsa's implants let her see enough colour to distinguish the irises from the rest of the orbs. It's just one more thing she owes Lawson. "Massani and Solus are with me, but they ain't Cerberus," she allows, turning sideways so that he can clearly see the shotgun at her back and the pistol at her hip. "And if you're screening for weapons, you're doing a pretty shitty job of it."

The room flares with a sudden blue glow that dissipates just as quickly; in that moment's flash, Kelsa sees Aria T'Loak lounging somewhat carelessly on a sofa, her back to the unending bacchanal that her office overlooks. "Your weapons don't scare me," the asari pronounces, her cool voice hardly discernible through the pulse of the club's music, even to Kelsa's renewed and enhanced ears. "Some imposter walking around with your face, however...that might be cause for concern." Her clear eyes move to the batarian with the omni-tool. "Bray?"

"She checks out, Aria," he allows, before stepping back against the wall. "Still don't trust her, though."

Kelsa rolls her eyes. "I ain't killed you," she points out, stepping more fully into the glass-walled room. "Yet."

T'Loak curves a brow-ridge at the soldier. "I'm willing to overlook that," she offers, "just this once."

Kelsa's lips tip into a frown as she draws nearer to the asari; she looks familiar, of course, since her ego has her face plastered across half the holoscreens on the station...but still, the soldier can't shake a whisper at the back of her mind that she's met the woman before. Blinking, she pushes the feeling down, into the same crowded room in her gut where she keeps the rest of them. "You're the one who told me to come here," she reminds the mob boss. "I'm me, for whatever you think that's worth, and I can leave through the stairs or through you. Your choice."

The asari's eyes narrow millimetrically, a couple of sparks arcing in the air around her; Kelsa stands her ground, shifting her peripherals to her right flank-Massani's got her left covered, and in the last day he's proven himself more than capable of stomping a few aliens, when occasion demands...or even when occasion just waggles its eyebrows suggestively. But T'Loak cuts the tension with a calculated smirk. "I like you, kid," she tells the soldier. "You've certainly got an upturned crest on you."

Kelsa nods, once, acknowledging the asari's compliment...it's the mono-gendered species' equivalent of saying you've got balls. "Why the fuck are we here?" The soldier probes, shrugging at the two companions she's picked up since arriving on Omega. "I've been here often enough without having to meet the boss before."

"That was before you saved the Citadel, massacred its Council, got yourself listed KIA and dropped off the grid for two years," T'Loak counters, still sitting with her arms draped over the back of her sofa, the picture of nonchalance. "Most of the brainless fucks who come here don't deserve my attention because they can't possibly get in my way; you've shown that you could make yourself annoying if you got it in your head to try and fuck with me."

Solus pipes up for the first time. "Only one rule on Omega," he prattles, in that clipped speech that some salarians lapse into when they get excited; it seems to be the only way this particular salarian knows how to talk. "Nobody fucks with Aria."

The asari tosses a glance Solus' way, and for just a heartbeat her expression softens with something like affection, but it's gone so quickly that even Kelsa can't be sure she saw anything at all. "Precisely," she concurs. "I see you've pulled yourself out of the slums, Mordin; does that mean the plague is over?"

"Indeed," the salarian confirms. "Cure dispersed via ventilation; surviving citizens should recover within days. Hours possible." He takes a long, sniffed breath. "Shepard's help invaluable; will assist her in return."

T'Loak takes a measured breath before her eyes hinge back to Kelsa. "Sit," she says, nodding to the side-seats at right angles to the long couch that she obviously has no intention of sharing. "Have a drink. Tell me what you want in my domain, and I might let you leave by the stairs."

Kelsa stands her ground for another moment, but she senses there won't be another grace-saving smirk if she doesn't back off this time. "What the hell," she muses, wiping at a bit of dried vorcha blood on her face as she collapses into the cushioned chair. Solus takes the seat opposite their central table, but Massani stands, his back still to a solid corner. Kelsa swallows a growl. "I'm here-"

"Drink first," T'Loak insists, tossing a glance to her batarian. He produces a tray of two shot glasses and a bottle of light blue liquor, the kind of asari drink that looks pretty innocuous but might give a krogan a few nightmares. The boss herself uncorks the bottle and fills each glass nearly to the brim.

The soldier takes her measure without hesitation, knocking it back as if on a dare. The fire doesn't hit her until she swallows, and then it burns all the way down into her gut, and she nearly chokes on the last of the vapours that tickle her throat. "Kicks harder than I remember," she gruffs, blinking the stars out of her eyes.

T'Loak hammers her own shot and slams her glass down on the table, betraying no hint that it had contained anything stronger than water. "I've seen three humans keel over after a mouthful of Kriala," the asari comments, somewhat approvingly. "Now," she goes on, "you can tell me why you've swept through my slums to take my doctor away."

It takes a few seconds for Kelsa to marshal her thoughts-the asari liquor's hitting her hard, harder than it should, probably because her stomach's only had half an MRE in it since she stepped off her ship. "Human colonies are getting wiped out," she tells the woman. "Thousands of people abducted at a time. I'm building up a team to do something about that."

"Abductors likely source of plague," Solus adds, helpfully. "Humans suspect...advanced alien involvement."

Kelsa nods, grateful that the salarian saw fit to conceal the role of the Collectors; most people don't even think they exist, and the soldier doesn't want to have to convince anyone who might be skeptical. "Solus has skills I need," she states. "But he's not the only one on this rock I intend to pressgang into my crew."

T'Loak arches another brow, the lines of her forehead tattoo shifting as smoothly as fish in a stream. "I'll be generous and assume you're not eyeing up any member of my crew," she says.

"No idea," Kelsa admits. "All I've got is a name and a set of skills-not even a species," she grunts. "Goes by Archangel." A light flashes across T'Loak's eyes. "You know him?" The soldier ventures, tension curling up her spine, just in case the asari wants to take offence.

"Only by reputation," T'Loak informs her. "He's a vigilante, but he knows well enough to stay out of my way, so I've seen no reason to deal with him." Her lips curl into an indulgent smirk. "But if you're going after him, you should know you're not alone...he's pissed off quite a few people, including the leaders of the three largest mercenary bands in the Terminus Systems."

That tension works through Kelsa's sinews to her belly. "Shit," she gruffs, looking to Solus and then over to Massani; the salarian's still hyper, but she and the old mercenary haven't gotten any rack time since cutting through the Blood Pack bastards in Gozu. "Any idea where we can find him?"

"Not a clue," T'Loak insists, but she's probably lying. "I know where you can find somebody who does know, though," the asari goes on, lifting a hand from the sofa to point without bothering to look.

Kelsa follows the line of the crime lord's fingertip, across the dance floor, to a shadowed alcove guarded by batarians in Blue Suns regalia. "Then that's where we're headed," she pronounces, pushing herself to her feet. The room swims, just a little, but her feet are steady as stone as she takes a few steps away from Omega's pirate queen.

"One more thing," the asari exclaims, from her comfortable throne. When Kelsa throws her a glance, she sees T'Loak's face grow tight. "I've got nothing against human colonies," she insists, "but if you're lying about your reasons for coming here, I will end you," she vows. "And you'll stay dead when I'm through with you. You can count on that."

A combination of the alcohol and another subtle biotic crackle cut through the bravado that Kelsa would normally throw out at such a challenge. "Understood," she says, instead. With a parting nod, the soldier leaves Aria T'Loak to her empire.

Archangel's HQ

1500 Zulu

6 June 2185

Omega (docked), Sahrabarik

After a couple of hours' rest and the second half of her MRE, Kelsa talked her way into the Blue Suns, at least in the guise of a freelancer, some cannon fodder to soak up fire until the professionals could come in and take out the vigilante known as Archangel. Along the way, she learned that Archangel's a turian, and that he's personally wronged the leadership of the Blood Pack, the Blue Suns, and Eclipse. All three mercenary groups span the Terminus, and the Suns've even shown up in the Traverse, but they're headquartered here, in the unofficial capital of the Terminus Systems. Massani paid just a little more attention when they met the head of the Blue Suns, a batarian named Tarak, but afterward he put his nose down again and grunted that they should get on with the mission.

That meant dodging Archangel's bullets until they were far enough down the bridge to his hideout that they could turn their guns on the other Suns freelancers in a bloody show of allegiance to the turian. After that, it was just a matter of cutting through a few actual Blue Suns that had infiltrated the building; now Kelsa and her two accomplices stand at the threshold of Archangel's hide, watching as he snipes a few more freelancers.

The soldier steps into his lair, her shotgun checked across her body, ready to draw at a heartbeat's notice. "Archangel," she calls, speculatively.

The fully-armoured turian takes one more shot through his window, his back turned to the intruders, showing a remarkable amount of trust; if it was Kelsa, she would've suspected three strangers, no matter how many Blue Suns they'd killed to get here. The turian steps backward from the window, easing his rifle down like it's been too long since he's given it a rest. Then, still turned away from Kelsa and her subordinates, he unseals his helmet, peeling it up and back away from his fringe. "Shepard," he says, his two-toned voice cutting into the back of Kelsa's mind. "Heard you were dead."

When he turns to look fully at her, Kelsa feels her throat go dry. "Vakarian?" She chokes, and no matter how many times she blinks, those blue clan markings don't change. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

The turian cackles, exhausted, almost drunk with the effort of surviving the last few days. "Seemed a nice place to retire after my inauspicious career in law enforcement," he comments, shrugging, before he nods to Massani and Solus. "I could ask you the same question, Shepard. Nice visor, by the way."

She's wearing a Kuwashii visor instead of the helmet that she sported for so many years in the Alliance; it gives her a HUD and some improved targeting solutions, though she doesn't really need it for that second purpose. But it lets everybody see the scars that've started growing on her cheeks and her neck, the tinge of red that's just beginning to bud in her eyes and shows no sign of dimming any time soon. "Looks like I've got a second chance," she tells her old comrade, "but there's a lotta strings attached. Collectors are making human colonies disappear, and it's my job to put a stop to it."

"Collectors?" Vakarian blinks, shaking his head; he hits a panel on his flank and immediately heaves a sigh, his eyes clearing. Stims. "Collectors are nasty bedtime stories that turian mothers tell kids to get them to behave...or that's what they're supposed to be, anyway," he says. "I've seen enough in this galaxy to take your word on them seriously...but I don't know how useful it was for you to come here." He glances back through his little window. "It doesn't look like we're getting out without some kind of a miracle."

Kelsa grunts, bringing her shotgun to shoulder level. "I don't believe in miracles," she says, coming up to see just how fucked they are. Eclipse is dropping a huge YMIR mech onto the middle of the bridge, and Kelsa can't help but smirk, since she had Solus reprogram the damned thing to turn on its handlers. "But I do believe in ammo."

"Well, then," the turian muses, as the YMIR swivels around and sends hundreds of rounds into the salarians and smaller mechs who thought to follow it across the bridge. "I just might have a chance of getting out of this hellhole after all."

Author's note: Thanks, as always, to clafount for all of her wonderful beta-reading work, and to all of my lovely reviewers! Kelsa's starting to build her team up!