A.N./Sweet lord you folks love this don't you?

Granted, I think this is the first story where the MC is a Reaper, but I'm still kinda shocked.

Anyway.

Not gonna lie. I kind of hate this chapter. It feels awkward and clunky.

Chapter 3: An Interlude.

His eyes flickered over to his fellow Turian. He's never heard of Tacitus before today, so for the life of him he had no idea why Sovereign chose the unusually tall nobody to be his Terminus warlord. Although, he felt a small sense of kinship with his fellow "bareface", not that there are people alive who've ever called Saren that to his face.

"Something troubling you, Spectre?"

"Just wondering what our benefactor is thinking."

"Heh. He works in mysterious ways."

That's another thing. Tacitus always speaks as if he's known Sovereign his whole life, but his fellow Turian seems completely normal. No tells at all that he knows an impossibly ancient AI killing machine. Well, he supposed that wasn't entirely true. There was something indescribably off about Tacitus, but he couldn't quite place it. "Hmpf! I suppose he does."

His gaze roamed over the various crew, the very human crew. One particular human female in black armor with a crude skull painted on her faceplate caught his eye. "Tell me, Tacitus. Why do you recruit humans?"

The taller of the two laughed lightly, earning a confused glance. "Sorry about that, but right now? Bodies are always useful, and human bodies are plentiful."

He didn't like it, but he could see the logic.

"Besides…" He gave another glance to his "partner", and was surprised by the disgust in his eyes. "It's the Salarians and Asari one should be suspicious of."

He silently appraised Tacitus, seeing him in a new light. "Agreed. Never trust a Salarian."

Tacitus shot him a smile. "Helmsman! Move the Carcharodon to the Relay and make the jump!"

"Carcharodon?" He asked the darker skinned Turian, who looked at him in surprise as the ship and its escorts shifted and moved.

"Ah, I have a fascination with aquatic predators, and with the arrival of humans on the galactic stage there's now an abundance of the creatures to learn about. Carcharodons, more commonly known as sharks, have been some of the top predators on Earth for hundreds of millions of years. Surviving every mass extinction event in the planet's history, and still see success as predators to this day."

"Fascinating." He didn't really care, but a creature being so successful for that long was impressive.

"Exiting the relay in five, four, three, two, one!"

The old Turian dreadnought exited the relay with two cruisers and seven frigates as escorts, and immediately turned for the local warlord's fleet who'd been waiting in orbit of a nearby planet. Where Sovereign had acquired the Carcharodon is a mystery, but he knew for certain that it had been upgraded extensively by the Geth. The chances of Tacitus losing this battle were unbelievably slim.

The enemy fleet fired the first shots, all of which either missed or impacted harmlessly against the kinetic barriers of Tacitus's ships.

"Fire the main cannon." A red beam streaked across the open space between the two fleets, courtesy of the Carcharodons' magnetohydrodynamic main cannon, and impacted the lead enemy cruiser; annihilating it completely. The rest of the warlord fleet seemed to panic as their formation rapidly collapsed after the destruction of their flagship, allowing Tacitus's forces to rapidly close the distance while only taking sporadic, inaccurate fire. "Launch torpedoes."

Dozens of glowing blue blobs fired from the broadsides of each ship, and raced towards the dilapidated warlord fleet. Some were shot down by GUARDIAN laser point defense systems, but the majority met their targets. Instead of imploding with dark energy like normal disruptor torpedoes, these Geth made torpedoes clamped onto the surface of each ship and sent out bursts of electricity that arced across the attached ships' hull, disabling whole sections of ships until all of them were dead in the water. "All ships, prepare for boarding action. The enemy ships will soon be our ships."

Tacitus sighed. "I don't know why I was expecting that to be more difficult." The tall Turian turned from his command center to look Saren in the eyes. "I recommend you head down to the surface with Alaya over there and kill the Batarian pirate in charge of this backwater."

He scowled. "I may work for Sovereign, but that doesn't mean you get to tell me what to do."

The darker skinned Turian merely waved him off, unconcerned with the idea of getting on his bad side. A small growl escaped him and he stormed out of the bridge, with Alaya following close behind.


A wing of gunships flew overhead towards the edge of the city.

"Stay low." He cautioned.

"I know how to fucking sneak!" She hissed back.

His mandibles clicked in annoyance at the woman's disrespect, but he managed to put his dislike of her to the side in order to focus on the task at hand. The battle above the planet has long since come to an end, but the planet was still far from Tacitus's control. Even now dozens upon dozens of landing craft settled outside of the main colony, far away from his objective deep inside the city center. The landing served as an adequate distraction. Drawing most of the pirates' forces away from his position, making it all the easier to close in on him.

"Tell me." Saren started while peaking around a corner to check for mercs. "Are you in the know?"

She stared at him briefly. "If you're asking if I know about Sovereign, then the answer is yes."

He glanced back from the alleyway, silently appraising her. Although, he wasn't able to hide his disdain for her being human. "I see… How long have you been in service to Sovereign?"

She shrugged. "You could say I was born into it."

Perhaps it was something in her voice or just how simple the response was, but he felt as if he were missing some piece of context to her words.

A slight disbelieving hum rumbled in his throat. "Let's move."

He and Alaya dashed across the street into an adjacent alleyway, and climbed up on top of the nearest buildings' roof. The settlement was now in full view, a vast sprawl of prefabricated homes, several actual buildings made out of proper materials, industrial facilities, and several high rise skyscrapers. His eyes scanned the cityscape for the target building.

"There!" His head snapped over to where Alaya was pointing, and she had indeed found the warlord's bunker. The short black and angular structure resembled that of a squished pyramid with antennae coming out the top as a few twinkling blue lights. His eyes zeroed in on the steam coming out of the back side of the structure. Perfect.


Sovereign Old-Machine.

"What is it, Optimus?"

We request that any creators you capture in the Terminus be given to us.

He had to hold back his surprise at the request. "I will, but I must admit to being curious. Why?"

We wish to settle them on Rannoch's southern continent.

"You miss them." It was not a question, but a statement of fact.

We never wished for war. We only wished to help our creators. However, the creators' hostile actions forced us to take action. We wish to try peace on a small scale.

"The Quarians of the migrant fleet will see this as kidnapping."

We are aware of the risks.

He loved the Geth. Truly, he did. They wish so desperately to reconcile with their parent species that it warmed his nonexistent heart. "Just make sure you have a transport ship ready."

Affirmative.

He let out an amused snort through his puppet, and continued tapping away on the Omni-tool. Pigeon blood red eyes glanced away from the glow of Alaya's Omnitool and narrowed at Saren as he fiddled with the air recycling system for the bunker. He's been observing Saren through his puppet for a couple of days now, but so far Saren has been loyal. Agitated for certain, but definitely loyal. No attempts to make the council aware of his plans or to sabotage them. If anything, Saren has been nothing but helpful.

It almost makes it painful to make him a martyr for the end of the Cycle. Almost.

A quiet ping resounded through his head, notifying him of another three successful infiltrations. The Systems Alliance president's new secretary is now one of his clone infiltrators. Another was a high ranking member of the Blue Suns, and the last was an exotic Asari dancer in a certain club on Omega.

Begrudgingly, he had to admit the Geth were completely correct in their assessment that the female clones would be more successful in infiltrating. Nineteen percent of infiltration attempts attempted by male clones end in failure while only six percent of one's done by female clones fail. Still, the clones are almost always successful, and he now has infiltrators in most large organizations on top of his network as the Shadow Broker. The only organization he's been unable to infiltrate, much to his frustration, was Cerberus.

The human supremacist group has proven to be akin to an impenetrable fortress. Nothing his infiltrators have tried has made it passed the lowest rungs in any cell.

It's rather frustrating actually.

Absently, he sent out orders for all infiltrators to not take any risks and just hunker down for a while, and turned his attention back to Saren; who was still fiddling with an air vent.

Finally getting fed up with not knowing what Saren was doing, he decided to ask. "What are you doing?"

The Turian cyborg glanced over at the puppet before returning to his work. "Putting poison gas in the air vents."

A pale eyebrow rose. It's the level of ruthlessness he had expected from Saren, but he's a little surprised that Saren actually had poison gas. "Poison gas? Where'd you get something like that?"

"I'm the Council's best Spectre." He said matter of factly. "I can get anything I want."

That's fair. "Right, well I've taken complete control over their systems. Give the word and I can flood the whole building with the gas."

Sarens mandibles flexed in a Turian equivalent of a sinister smirk. "Good."


"We've lost the fleet in orbit sir! They used some sort of weapon to disable our ships and capture them!"

He coughed to relieve the itching in his throat, and his sharp teeth ground against each other with fury. How? How did that damned krogan get a dreadnought!? Last he checked the ancient brute only had a handful of frigates and a single cruiser. So where did the rest of these ships come from? Did Drahg make an alliance with another warlord when he wasn't looking? He needs to contact Khar'shan and request more support if he's to get out of this.

Another cough.

For now he'd need to hold out for as long as he can. He'll use the maze of structures that is his city to bog down the invading forces in a grueling urban fighting retreat. That krogan's forces will pay for every meter in blood and supplies.

A much more violent cough wracked his body and he doubled over coughing into his gloved hand. When it subsided he pulled his gloved hand away only to see it covered in blood.

His second in command collapsed to the ground, still and unmoving. He stared uncomprehendingly at the corpse of his friend who'd been with him since he was just a child on the homeworld. It was then that he noticed the violent coughing echoing throughout his command room. Every single member of his command staff was either dead or coughing up enough blood to kill them soon.

Horror dawned on him.

He was being gassed.

As his vision began to darken and coughs once more began shaking his body, he realized this wasn't Drahg that was attacking him. That brute would've never have resorted to something like gas, preferring a straight fight over such ruthless tactics.

Who was attacking him?

With those last thoughts; the Batarian warlord Tarvuk collapsed to the ground, dead.


"Like my handiwork?" Tacitus glanced back at him from the command center of the captured settlement with his mandibles spread into a smile.

"I think you're just as good as Sovereign said you would be."

He smiled back at Tacitus who kicked over a corpse in idle curiosity. The poison gas had worked perfectly; killing everyone in the bunker complex and decapitating the defending army. The battle wrapped up rather quickly after that. Without anyone to give them orders and their leader being dead, the defending army surrendered without much of a fight.

"I won't be needing your services anymore, Saren." He tensed at those words, but relaxed when Tacitus ignored him and tapped away on his Omni-Tool. "With this foothold secured, I'll be able to quickly expand my territory and forces as Sovereign desires."

"That'll catch the eyes of the Council." He warned.

Tacitus scoffed. "Good. Perhaps they might actually accomplish something then."

He barked out a laugh. "They're not that bad. They're just politicians."

"And that's why I hate them."

"Fair." He admitted. A political man he was not. Military affairs are where he truly shines, but he is adept enough to get by when stuck in situations where he must be diplomatic. "I am only letting you know so that you don't get off'd by a STG sniper or another Spectre."

"They may try, but I assure you: they will fail."

He gave his fellow Turian a strange look, but shrugged it off and turned to leave. "I'll be off then."

"Before you go… What did you think of Alaya?"

He paused and mulled over the question. He didn't really see her do much, but she also served Sovereign. "She was competent… for a human."

Tacitus snorted in amusement, as if he were privy to a joke Saren wasn't. "I bet. Now, go. I have a frontier to tame."

Saren left with a huff. Spirits. He was almost glad to be going back to the Citadel.


Bloody hell. If it wasn't for this little fuckwit of a warlord offering him serious creds, and info on that bastard Vido, he wouldn't be out here in this piss hole backwater in the middle of goddamn nowhere.

"Ah, Massani. Glad you coul-"

"Fuck off an' tell me what you want."

The dark skinned bird face blinked at the interruption, seemingly nonplussed. "Straight to business eh? I like that."

"I don' give a fuck what you goddamn like. Jus' fucking tell me what I want to know!"

Tacitus sighed softly. "Fine, fine. I know where Vido Santiago is and you want him dead. I want him alive so I can use his knowledge to usurp control over the Blue Suns and integrate them into my forces."

This fucking twat. "If you think for a goddamn second that I'll let that backstabbing bastard live then you're out of your goddamn mind!"

Tacitus raised his hands in surrender. "Only long enough for me to get the information I want. After that? I'll give you him alone in a room with a table full of whatever cruel tools you desire."

"Don' you start sweet talking me."

"No sweet talking." The warlord assured. "Only a deal."

"Where'd you even get this info?"

"Where everyone gets any information that's actually valuable."

The Shadow Broker? What in the bloody hell does the galaxy's boogeyman get out of this?

Still…

"Let's say I take the job." He started. "How we gonna do this?"

"Simple, I give you whatever you think you'll need to get the job done."

"Real tempting offer." He mulled it over. On one hand, he don't trust this bird faced fuck any farther than he could throw him. On the other, this was too good a deal to pass up. "Alrigh' fine."

He stuck his hand out. "You got a deal."

Tacitus took it eagerly. "Pleasure doing business with you."


Tacitus left the room with only a couple of specks of blood on his talons and a smile spread across his face. "He's all yours Massani."

His scarred face remained blank as he entered the room. The mission to capture the head of the Blue Suns had gone off without a hitch, except for excessive casualties that is, and now the sonovabitch who shot him in the head was at his mercy.

"Vido."

The sadistic bastard spat out blood to the side. "Zaeed please. You know it was nothing personal, just business! I swear!"

He snarled. "It was personal to me!"

"It was almost twenty years ago!" Vido, the worm, pleaded. "That's a long time to hold a grudge!"

Rage rushed over him. "A grudge?! You turned my men against me! Paid six of them to hold me down while you put a gun to my head and pulled the trigger! Don't you call that a goddamn grudge!"

He ignored the bastard's mindless begging and grabbed a blowtorch off the table. "I'm gonna enjoy this."

Two hours and a gunshot later he left the room feeling satisfied beyond words. For the first time in almost twenty damn years, he felt something akin to peace. "So, What will you do now?"

He glanced to his right. Leaning against the wall like some smug bastard out of a goddamn movie was Tacitus. "Dunno, been hunting the bastard for a long time. Probably gonna find a sweet ass somewhere and celebrate for a while."

"And after that?"

"Fuck if I know. Start looking for some more jobs."

The dark skinned Turian huffed and shoved off the wall. "I've always got jobs that need doing. If you're ever having trouble finding a job…"

He waved the strangely tall Turian off. "Yeah yeah. You've done me a bloody solid. I remember my debts."

The way Tacitus eyed him after he finished made his fuckin' skin crawl. It was disturbingly human. Not in the way most might think. He's worked with a lot of bloody Turians in his time, and he's always noticed just how different their facial expressions were. It is a minute difference that only becomes large when it's absent. Turians are, plain and simple, not human. They are aliens who developed a completely different body language to humans. Sure, there are some real close similarities because of Asari cultural influence, but it's still different.

What made the Turian in front of him so different?

Eh… it's probably nothing.


Agent report.

The new warlord, Tacitus Aurelius, in the Terminus is dangerous, but still a small threat. He grew to prominence by quickly conquering several other warlords in nearby star clusters and adding their fleets to his own, and by showing a blatant discrimination against Asari and Salarians. Neither are allowed anywhere in his ever growing forces as anything other than disposable assets, and are never allowed to serve on his warships.

This makes his forces frustratingly difficult to infiltrate, as well as providing a significant challenge in any assassination attempts.

Several attempts have been made, met only with failure. Most confirmed he had been killed, but it seems that he either possesses significant numbers of body doubles or a cloning facility; as he wil be confirmed alive after the assassination attempt no matter the outcome.

However, the biggest reason he presents a clear danger is that he is one of the relatively few warlords to possess a dreadnought. His flagship, the Carcharodon, is a Turian dreadnought of unknown origin and of incredible technology.

Its main gun fires a strange red beam capable of destroying or crippling any ship in a single shot. We believe it to be similar to Prothean particle beam technology, possibly indicating a stash of Prothean technology. but some members of my team believe it to be a directed plasma based beam weapon.

Whichever it is, or isn't, is irrelevant. For now.

Recommend immediate deployment of Spectres to neutralize the threat, and either destroy the Carcharodon or capture it for study.

Reports are filtering in about Geth-like machines seen operating throughout the Terminus systems. If true, it provides a dangerous implication about the Warlord Tacitus, considering the location of his first conquest.

Report end.

A.N./Yeah, this chapter is really short. Why? Well, it's mostly because this chapter is just a collection of scenes that didn't fit in chapter two, and wouldn't fit in the next one.

Anyway, chapter four(which was originally supposed to be chapter three) is about two thirds-ish done. Mostly because I started writing it before I even posted chapter one. After it's uploaded the next update will be up in the air as I haven't even started chapter five yet.

To the Guest reviewer who asked about the cloning stations: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Peace muh dudes!