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Human embassy
"I must say, things have certainly been interesting since you arrived, Shepard," Harkin grinned. "Four gunfights in one day? You must have set something of a record. And now we need a safe space for a quarian? That's a new one."
"Yes, I know." Shepard hesitated. "A word to the wise, Harkin. What's happening is going to get very big, and probably very ugly, with a lot of angry people looking for scapegoats. If anything that happened in the embassy leaks out before the ambassador wants it to leak, there's going to be hell to pay. Make sure, you're in the clear and that doesn't happen."
Harkin nodded, all trace of humour gone. "Don't worry about me, Shepard. My mother didn't raise no fools. I'm not going to get caught on the wrong side when all this blows up. Information may be worth a lot of money, but, eh, that ain't no good if you're not alive to spend it."
-0-0-0-
Councillors' chambers
For once, all three Councillors had cleared their schedule for the meeting. It was a measure of the scale of the problem they faced.
"Benezia." Tevos buried her head in her hands and was silent for a moment. "Of all the people in the galaxy, they're going after Benezia."
"The question is, do we believe them?" Valern objected. "Or should we consider the possibility that their evidence has been faked."
"How?" Tevos shook her head. "They could have faked the recording, yes. Perhaps even beyond the ability of our people to detect it. But they could not fake the quarian. Are you really suggesting that they hired a quarian to run around the station while being shot at by mercenaries? Mercenaries that would also have to be on the humans' payroll for that to work! And they would have had to predict that Sparatus' pet detective would be in a position to witness what happened. Otherwise, they'd be wasting their time."
"True, but that was not my question," Valern said. "I didn't ask if the recording was faked. I asked whether we believe it has been faked. That is not the same thing."
"Very subtle," Sparatus said sourly. "And suppose we don't believe it's genuine. Let us suppose that we believe it to be a fake. Then we can denounce the humans when they present it. Not too difficult, considering that the source is a quarian. But what happens next? Are you ready for a war with the United Systems? Because that would become a distinct possibility."
He thought for a moment. "As I see it, there are four possibilities. One, the recording is real and we accept that. Two, it is real, but we deny it. Three, it is a fake, but we accept it as real, and four, it is a fake and we denounce it. In the first case, we lose face over the behaviour of a Spectre, but it will not cripple us as long as we are seen to be taking action. The main problem would be that the human ambassador is right. Saren would disappear, perhaps for years and he might strike again at any moment. In particular, the next strike might be against us, rather than the humans. Benezia would have more trouble staying hidden, but she could easily flee into the Terminus and hide behind a wall of mercenaries, which would be almost as bad. We'd have to launch a military expedition to dig her out, or stand by while the humans do so. If the recording is fake, and we denounce it as such, well, I doubt the humans would go to war under those circumstances, but I agree with Tevos: It would have required immense effort on behalf of the humans to orchestrate this. I spoke with Detective Vakarian at length. He has no doubt that the humans are sincere. The only open question, as far as he is concerned, is the possibility that the quarians fabricated the recording."
"Possibly," Valern said. "But again, unlikely. They would have had little time to do so. Besides, what would their motive be? They are in no position to ally themselves with the humans, so human gratitude would mean little to them. And I doubt they care enough about Saren or Benezia to want to harm either."
"But perhaps they want to distract us all from the fact that it was the geth that carried out the attack," Tevos said, sounding almost hopeful.
"Possibly," Valern repeated. "But the timing still works against that theory. A recording good enough to fool our own people, or STG, would not be easy to create and they had at most a day or so before they had to set this plan in motion. Besides, this distraction would discredit a Spectre, alienating us. That seems rather counter-productive. Besides, the humans were looking into Saren before this quarian appeared. What is our theory then? That the humans and the quarians independently decided to frame the same individual? That they somehow cooperated to do so for unknown reasons? Or that the quarians somehow heard that the humans were going after Saren and decide to capitalize on that within a few days? It just doesn't work out once you consider the ramifications."
"Indeed," Sparatus nodded stiffly. "It is almost a pity. Blaming the quarians, whether justified or not, would solve many problems. At the very least, it would buy as time. But as long as the humans are convinced that their evidence is genuine, we still face the possibility that they will take military action against us. Are we willing to risk that?"
"You're in a better position to answer that question than Valern or I, Sparatus," Tevos sounded more like her usual self. "It has been twenty-five years since the Hierarchy confronted the humans. In terms of current capabilities, how certain are you of victory, if it comes to open warfare?"
"Assuming that the Asari Republics and the Salarian Union support us and that we can conduct the war in whatever way we think is best? We can achieve victory. The humans have increased their military strength since the Relay 314 incident, yes, but not enough that they can successfully fight us if we fully commit ourselves. We now have fighter carriers of our own to counter them in space, which levels the playing field. On top of that, they have not produced dreadnoughts of their own, which arguably puts them at a disadvantage, and our combined fleets outnumber them significantly. Fighting them planetside would be more problematic, but if all we care about is achieving total victory we wouldn't need to. Their ground forces are good, yes, but they cannot stand up to orbital bombardment. The questions you should ask are: How long would it take? How much would it cost? What will our position be versus the Terminus warlords and the batarians when it is all over? With the geth lose in the Galaxy we should probably wonder about them as well."
"And the answers to that?"
Sparatus shook his head. "Assuming that they fight to the end, to the point where we can demand unconditional surrender in the ruins of their homeworld? It would take years; the estimated costs would be in the hundreds of millions of lives with proportional economic damage; and by the time the war was over, we'd no longer be in a position to hold off anyone. We'd have to invite the batarians back in and give them a position on the Council just to stop them from invading us, which they almost certainly would under those circumstances."
"So, our victory wouldn't actually be one."
"No. The humans have a term for this: Mutually Assured Destruction. A strategic situation where open conflict between two factions is guaranteed to be the end for both, no matter how the war proceeds. In this particular instance, our destruction would be delayed, but it would come in the end. Speaking of which, I should also add that the entire estimate is still based on the assumption that there are things that neither we nor the humans would actually be willing to do."
"Such as," Valern asked.
"Such as putting engines on asteroids and dropping them onto garden worlds. Such as deploying biological weapons into atmospheres. Such as saturation bombardments with thermonuclear weapons, rather than mass effect weaponry. To put it frankly, a lot of our analysts are in doubt as to whether those assumptions are true. The humans demonstrated on Torfan that they are at least willing to consider nuclear bombardment as an option and according to the history they shared with us they used nuclear weapons against each other during an early war. What will they do if we start pressing them? And what will we do, when our worlds start burning? The Krogan Rebellions show that people will go to extremes when pushed."
"And if it comes to that?"
Sparatus shook his head and walked over to the window, from where he could look out along the arms of the Citadel.
"We played out the worst-case scenario as a wargame. According to the results, it would go as follows: Our fleet presses through to Arcturus and takes out the USM headquarters. At that point, the humans panic and activate a pre-existing plan, which they almost certainly have. Human ships are dispatched with closed orders on a one-way mission. The Citadel, Palaven, Thessia, Surkesh, they all come under attack. Instead of mass accelerators, they launch nuclear weapons in a desperate attempt at intimidation. At least some of those get through. The initial body count is estimated at half a billion. We retaliate and hit Earth, as well as some of their garden world and terraformed colonies inflicting a similar death toll.
At that point, there would be a short pause in the fighting as both sides try to regroup, but they will not be able to. With such a high death toll, short-term recovery becomes impossible. Hundreds of millions more will starve to death as their support infrastructure breaks down. The humans will be hit harder because many of their older colonies are situated on marginal planets and rely on outside support, but in the end, that is academic. With their civilizations crumbling behind them, military personnel will throw themselves into battle, trying desperately to achieve victory while there is still anything left that's worth fighting for. All restraints will be thrown off and a tide of destruction marches in both directions. By then the body count will be in the billions.
The batarians will get caught up in it as both sides try to eliminate them before they can take advantage. Terminus warlords and pirates will enter our space, scavaging what is left of our worlds, but that will only draw them in as well and the Terminus goes up in flames. That will draw in the quarians and possibly the geth. As resupply and repairs become impossible, the fleet movements will come to a halt. Fighting will increasingly be done by irregular forces, using improvised weaponry. We have more commercial ships, the human ships are bigger, no one knows where the balance would end up. As cargo ships are drawn into the fighting, the last remnant of an infrastructure in space disappears. That's when organised warfare stops."
"And in the end?" The look on Tevos' face told Sparatus she already knew.
"In the end, civilization as we know it will have ceased to exist. Tens of billions die planetside for lack of food, medical supplies, or because their worlds have simply become uninhabitable, That's where we stopped the simulation. There is no way of telling if any of our species would ever recover or we would go the way of the protheans. Honestly, by that stage, I'm not even sure it matters. Certainly, none of us would be alive to see it."
His talon twitched in the turion equivalent of a shrug. "That is the absolute worst-case scenario. I'm not saying it's likely. Unfortunately, the fact that the possibility exists would hamper any attempt at a decisive campaign. We would end up trying to fight a war while constantly second-guessing ourselves and holding back from any move that would push the humans to desperation. Most likely they would end up doing the same. That complicates matters. Under those circumstances, what the humans call 'limited warfare', we could end up with a stalemate that lasts decades while attrition wears us all down, and then we come back to my original scenario. Yes, in the long run, we could win this, simply because of strength in numbers, but the cost would be enormous and we would end up weakened, perhaps beyond recovery."
"So, we have to come up with a solution that keeps the humans from doing something foolish, while at the same time avoiding anything that causes Saren and Benezia to go into hiding. And, all of this without speaking directly with the human ambassador." Tevos shook her head. "I sympathize with him. It is, indeed, a balancing act."
"And one we have to perform quickly," Valern said. "Thanks to this Shepard's rampage, the news is spreading fast. People are demanding answers."
-0-0-0-
Human embassy
"Congratulations, Shepard. You're moving up in the world."
Shepard raised an eyebrow.
"You get to speak to the Citadel Council in person. Not only do they want to hear about the events on Eden Prime, but they would also like some explanations for what the media are now calling 'The Battle for Chora's Den'."
"I see." Shepard shrugged. "I suppose it was inevitable. But how do I get to the Council unseen? If you meeting them in private is enough to set off suspicion, what are Saren, or this Benezia, going to think when some mid-level human officer gets a private audience?"
"Oh, there will be nothing private about this, Commander," Udina said grimly. "You misunderstood me. This will not be a private audience. You're going to make your report in public. The big audience chamber no less."
"Wait, what?" Shepard gaped at him for a moment. "But that would put the Council on the spot, just like you said. Either they agree with us and Saren goes into hiding, or they don't believe us, and we're looking at a possible war."
"Exactly, Commander."
-0-0-0-
C-Sec Headquarters
"This, Detective Vakarian, is an official summons to appear before the Council where you will have the opportunity to explain why you not only allowed a human and a krogan to launch an assault on a nightclub but actively participated in a gunfight that left a score of people dead. Apparently, the Councillors are actually interested in hearing your excuses. I am not."
Executor Palin looked up from his monitor for the first time. "You may consider yourself placed on administrative leave until such time that our internal investigation into your conduct has been concluded. At which time, I have no doubt that your leave of absence will become permanent. You can go now." He turned back to his display.
Garrus hesitated, then decided it was not worth the effort to try and argue his case. He turned around and left. It was not as though it was unexpected. The best he could hope for was that Councillor Sparatus would formally sanction his activities, at which point any internal C-Sec investigation automatically became a dead-end. Under the circumstances, it seemed the least that the Councillor could do, but then again, with politicians, there were no guarantees.
As he left C-Sec headquarters, someone fell in step beside him.
"Let's keep walking, Detective."
Garrus glanced aside.
"What is this, Quentius? I'm not in the mood for more politics."
"I'm sure you're not, Vakarian. Unfortunately, as Councillor Sparatus personal assistant, I cannot avoid politics. And today, neither can you. There are a few things you should be aware of before you testify, tomorrow morning."
-0-0-0-
Flux, upper Wards
It was late, but Flux never closed, which was a good thing, especially for someone who desperately needed a drink.
"They're insane," Anderson said with absolute conviction. "The whole point of this was to keep it a secret. Instead, Udina just got the call. He, Shepard, that quarian, they all have to show up in the audience chamber first thing tomorrow morning. There will be cameras from the news, and any number of live witnesses. Saren and Benezia will know within the hour."
"Oh, absolutely," Vickers nodded. "In fact, by now they probably know that Shepard will be testifying before the Council. But remember what I said, Saren was going to find out that you were on to him anyway. By now, I'm sure he is aware the Shepard hit Chora's Den and took out Fist. That's enough to warn him anyway. The only question remaining is whether he'll go into hiding."
"Which probably depends on whether the Council believes us. So, it might actually be best to pretend we don't have any evidence."
"Maybe, but that might look suspicious, too. After all, if you don't have any evidence, why did Shepard go after Fist in the first place? There has to be some connection and it cannot just be that you personally hate Saren. At the very least you have to show something from Eden Prime that put you on Saren's trail."
"Which won't be enough to convince the Council," Anderson sighed. "Which is good in that it will probably not force Saren underground, but neither will we get the opportunity to hunt him down in Citadel Space, so we'll be facing a riot back home. Still the same Catch-22. Why did they have to force this public meeting?"
"What did you expect? Shepard has left a trail of bodies all over the Citadel. The Council has to do something in public, or everyone will want to know why. Anyway," Vickers drained her glass and typed an order for a new drink into the table's haptic display. "I just had a long discussion with the consort. Apparently, things are a bit more complicated than they seem."
-0-0-0-
Human embassy
"They want me to do what?"
"I'm sure you heard me the first time, Commander."
"Yes, I did. I just-" Shepard looked from Udina to Anderson. "I just cannot decide if there's method to their madness or not. I mean, it could work, I suppose. At least, in the short run and assuming that we can pull it off convincingly. But still, we're talking about a level of cooperation here that's unheard of. I mean, has this ever even been attempted?"
"A few times," Udina said dryly while giving Anderson a quick look. "It usually doesn't work very well."
"And with this much hanging in the balance, they want to give it another try. Or I should say, they want me to give it another try."
"No, they don't want you to try. They want you to make it work." Udina snorted. "Are you looking for sympathy, Commander? I'm the one who has to persuade Earth to go along with this, while Captain Anderson gets the joyful experience of persuading his superiors at Arcturus HQ to fall in line.
-0-0-0-
The Presidium Tower. The next day.
There were a lot of eyes on the small group as they made their way across the large open hall toward the audience area.
"What's with all the staircases," Shepard asked. "Seriously, we just went up hundreds of meters by elevator and now they make us climb stairs."
"It impresses people with the power of the Council," Udina answered. "Think of it as their throne room and you get the idea."
"And it would make for a nice defensive position," Williams muttered. "Seriously, ma'am, look at the angles down those stairs. If anyone tries to attack the Councillors, they get funnelled into this kill-zone as they try to climb the stairs."
"And then they get a little surprise at the end," Udina snorted. "Don't you ever watch the news, Williams? The Councillors are never in this hall in person. They appear as holograms. A further reminder of how far above it all they are."
"Ridiculous posturing," Shepard shook her head. "If you have real power, you don't have to play games like this. Let me guess, the holograms are bigger than life as well?"
"Of course, Commander. Of course."
By now they were one level up from where the elevator had stopped. At the top of the stairs, Shepard could see Detective Vakarian waiting. It looked like all the players for their little drama were in place.
"Commander Shepard?" The voice was soft and only slightly distorted by translation. Shepard turned and saw an asari, dressed inconspicuously, standing at the foot of the next flight of stairs.
"Yes?"
"I have a message for you, Commander."
Shepard's eyes narrowed slightly. "Have we met before?"
She smiled. "Only briefly, Commander. I'm in the employ of a friend of yours."
"A friend? Ah, yes. Now I remember, Nelyna isn't it? I didn't recognize you in this outfit. The Consort considers me a friend? I am honoured."
"As you should be, Commander. But that is another matter. She told me to relay a message. Commander, there will be a great deal of interest in this meeting. The 'Butcher of Torfan' appearing before the Council? That's a show nobody wants to miss." She held up her hand to stop Shepard from interrupting. "Commander, the Consort asked me to say that when the time comes, the people must have their show. They must see the 'Butcher'. Not you. They must see the 'Butcher'."
She turned and walked away.
"What the hell was that about?" Captain Anderson said.
"I'm not sure." Shepard shook her head. "But I suspect we're about to find out."
A/N
Sparatus spreading joy and fun wherever he goes. But he is right. This is a real possibility if you take warfare to the extreme. The more advanced a society, the more dependent it is on a complicated infrastructure. If enough of that gets destroyed, you get a domino effect. And in this case, both sides have already proven that they are willing to go to extremes. Humans used nukes against Torfan (and each other), and, of course, the Council has historically used bioweapons against the krogan.
