2188

Omega Space Station

"Grizz, get up here."

"My name's not Grizz Ma'am."

"Whatever. Bring me the latest numbers and send someone to find Jarral. I need to speak with her."

Aria T'loak was busy. Busier than she had been in a century not counting when Cerberus had taken her station. The turian came up and handed her a datapad before leaving just as swiftly. She had liked Grizz, but he was a memory now, along with Ahz, Patriarch and dozens of others, the whole lot of them joining the list of the hundreds of former employees she had had over the centuries. Sometimes the names became a habit. Bray was still around though, heading up security in afterlife.

There were many galaxy changing events that she had lived through each one topping the last. The geth uprising. The discovery of the drell and yahg. The arrival of the humans. The Eden Prime War. And of course, the near extinction of the entire galaxy. Aria seriously doubted that anything would ever top that last one. But the war had taught her some valuable lessons.

The main one being that she had not been thinking big enough. Shepard had shown her that, when the largest three gangs in the galaxy had been united under one banner. Her banner. And with the war over, keeping control of the remnants had been easier than expected. Adding them to the mercs already loyal to her and she had a small army. A small fleet. Not to mention that she was rolling in more credits than she knew what to do with. Every government wanted a slice of her eezo. It was priced steeply, but still cheaper than getting the equipment and the manpower to mine worlds themselves.

Sure, they had those projects underway, but until they started getting a big return, Omega was still the fastest way to get what they needed.

She read over the datapad again and steepled her fingers. She had a plan. It would take time yes, but as an asari she had plenty of that. Hell, she wouldn't even be out of the matron stage for another century or two.

And in that time, she could carve out an empire from what remained of the Terminus Systems.

The best part was that it was doubtful that anyone would see it coming. The asari republics were still suffering political backlash for hiding prothean technology, and damn near everyone else was in the process of rebuilding their homeworlds. By the time anyone had the resources to figure out what she was doing, she'd have her power consolidated.

The terminus systems were more fractured than they had ever been. Dozens of fiefdoms established on colonies had been wiped out. The batarian cartels had all but abandoned the area in favor of strengthening Khar'shan. The quarians were busy resettling their old worlds. Heshtok was all but forgotten, and the gang of five on illium were spreading their resources thin trying to keep Illum afloat as a trade capital. In the past six months, she had started making small grabs, rolling into nearly destroyed colonies and offering supplies, asylum and work as long as they joined her army and accepted her as their sovereign ruler. And it worked. Her forces were growing steadily every week. It was only groundwork being laid so far, but there was so much potential.

"Don't fuck with the Terminus." she said under her breath.

Yeah. That had a nice ring to it.

Now this was a fun one to do. Aria's always been one of my favorite non Normandy Crew Characters.