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Chapter 4: The Spectre
=SF=
Part 3
20:55, 4 September 2176
Council private rooms
Citadel Tower
The Citadel
Councilor Tevos fell back into her own comfortable armchair and sighed as the smart little thing started vibrating and massaging her back. She wasn't going to admit it to anyone, but she was getting too old to deal with this shit. It wasn't like she was a maiden any more – Tevos had been a Matriarch for all too long already, even if she did her best not to show it.
Her brief moment of rest was rudely interrupted by the door sliding open and admitting her colleagues. First strode in the still level headed and no-nonsense Kirik, who was continuing to be as unflappable as ever even after four years on the job, followed by the new addition to the Triumvirate who was supposed to run the galaxy – a lively, cheerful Ilreth. The new Councilor was a bit young, even for someone of his short-lived species, but he came with the support of the STG and Salarian fleet along with just enough Dalatrasses to make him a viable candidate.
He was already known as an out of the box thinker – something that would prove useful when dealing with the Alliance – the newest and most acute source of new experiences and headaches for Tevos.
"I've been getting briefed those past few weeks." Ilreth started babbling the moment the door sealed behind his back. "Need to ask! Are you two insane?!" The Salarian's eyes blinked rapidly as they jumped from Tevos to Kirik and back.
The Turian glanced at his companion and barked a warbling laugh. "Told you." He waved at Tevos and headed towards the small, but well stocked bar built in the far wall, next to a large aquarium containing various Thessian fishes.
"The mess at Elysium, right?" The Asari sighed. Tevos knew she was due to a headache shortly. "It was necessary. Someone else would have pushed the Alliance and their pet butchers of XCOM." She gave the Salarian a pointed look. "Either to test them or from sheer stupidity. It wouldn't matter."
"STG wouldn't have gotten it wrong." Ilreth frowned. "Someone else might have."
Knowing Salarians, Tevos was sure that many, many possibilities were rapid firing in that fast brain of his. Idly she wondered how long would it take for the job to drive him to drink. Kirik had held for three years – the longest a Turian managed to stay reasonably sober on this job in the last century.
On average, the Salarians weren't as fortunate.
"Tell that to the Batarians or the various Terminus idiots. I'm pretty sure the Hierarchy had a few low level ops in place too." Tevos turned her gaze towards her Turian counterpart and took a sip from her Eezo rich drink.
"Alas sanity prevailed." Kirik turned around with a glass of his own and gave her a classic Turian shrug. "The powers that be back home decided to play it straight."
"The stealth frigate project?" Ilreth glared daggers at the Turian Councilor, which was understandable. For ages, stealth, espionage and other skullduggery had been the Salarians as a whole and STG's in particular, specialty. Before the Humans came to the stage, the small yet advanced Salarian fleet boasted the only known stealth frigates and even handful of cruisers.
"Fedorian is determined to push his plans for closer cooperation with the Humans through." Kirik nodded. "He and most of our leadership believe this to be a prudent course of action."
"You agree." Tevos groaned.
"Of course." The Turian saluted her with his drink. "Increased military cooperation and at least limited R&D exchange is the idea." Kirik looked damn pleased with himself.
Tevos cursed quietly.
"Trend concerning." Ilreth started droning. "If successful, it will shatter the balance of power within Citadel space."
Kirik's mandibles twitched in amusement as he tasted his drink and waved the Salarian to continue.
"Turian vast fleets and standing armies balanced by smaller yet more advanced Asari and Salarian navies. The backing of the Asari Republic's economic power insured a millennia of stability."
"True and very much irrelevant." Kirik sat his spiky posterior on a nearby chair.
"While technologically ascendant Hierarchy financed by the Volus clans would be a threat to the status quo, it doesn't matter. The balance of power already shattered by emergence of Humanity and its advanced technology."
That very thought made Tevos giggle, earning her a weird look from Kirik and a surprised one from Ilreth. The balance went out of the airlock the moment Humanity crawled from their corner of the galaxy – everyone smart enough already knew that. Only a miracle and then admiral Fedorian being in charge of the Turian part of the first contact allowed for common sense and cool heads to prevail – in the process avoiding a war that would have been a bloodbath for everyone involved.
It also shattered the cozy position of the Asari as galactic leaders, which nowadays was an illusion thanks to the Alliance deciding to mostly keep to itself.
Ironically, Tevos found herself in a novel position. Instead of working behind the scenes to assure Asari primacy as she did for the most of her century and a half as a Councilor – by subtly sabotaging the Turian and Salarian positions, she had to do her best to carefully upset the balance and bring the Council at something resembling technological parity with the Alliance.
It was vital to do so while the sane humans were in charge. Speaking of them…
"We digress." Ilreth shook his head. "This Council and my esteemed predecessor's brainstorm." The Salarian glared at his two counterparts.
"As I said, sooner or later a confrontation was inevitable. Too little is known about Human tech, besides being more advanced that ours. They have done a splendid job of keeping the relevant things under wraps and what little we did learn is of grave concern." Tevos drained her cup. "The Batarians are arrogant fools who may very well believe that they can take on the Alliance and at least eke out a stalemate thus forcing our hands. The Terminus loons – they had been probing the humans for years and generally getting their heads handled to them despite occasional and very temporal successes. Like Mindoir."
"Instead you nudged things up that an even wore example would be engineered." Ilreth was derisive. "Mindoir was a colossal headache for the STG."
And what a headache that mess was – a minor colony, outside of Alliance space that was hit by pirates. The outlaws managed to trash what little infrastructure there was. Then they proceeded to kill – because it turned out that capturing humans alive turned out to be a very hard thing – most of the inhabitants and took some gravely wounded ones and children as slaves.
Then an Alliance patrol turned up and either blew up or disabled every raider in system, before liberating the survivors. That had been a very close call for various reasons. The Alliance as a whole was up in arms and launched multiple punitive raids in Terminus space, leaving no survivors or witnesses.
It took a lot of political capital, bribes and handling some Eezo know how and theoretical research to the Humans to make that mess go away.
That was something that all the Councilors knew. So Tevos was well aware where Ilreth was coming from. This time things were going to escalate, perhaps out of control.
Tevos hoped it was going to be worth it in the end.
"We're aware of the dangers." She finally stated.
"Really? I'll take you on your word for now, Tevos. What exactly is the Council hoping to gain from this fiasco in progress?"
"Many things." Kirik answered. "While the Hierarchy is playing the straight man, we're pursuing another course of action. First, we need answers – a read into the Alliance's capabilities."
"That's obvious. Not all by any means." Ilreth impatiently interrupted.
"True. Call it a preemptive strike. An accident between the Hegemony and Alliance was going to happen sooner rather than later. With some subtle hints, covert and deniable support, we made sure that this confrontation would be on our terms."
"So we would be in a position to observe the Alliance in action."
"We had more than a few military veterans on Elysium on perfectly legitimate business in the period when the attack was expected to happen. Needless to say, none of them knows that we pulled strings to get them there – everyone has a very real reason to visit that colony." The Turian explained. "That gave us some first hand accounts of Alliance ground forces – even if they were caught off guard." He continued.
"Further and more importantly, this gives us an opportunity to offer our assistance – both in providing intelligence and cadres experienced with the Terminus when the Humans come in seeking blood. It took a lot of bargaining to ensure that the Alliance and even XCOM allows a limited number of Specters and high ranking CSEC operatives as advisers and observers."
"They will be kept away from anything sensitive." Ilreth grumbled.
"That's a given. Still we'll finally see the Alliance navy in action. We're also using them to clean up a lot of the pirates and sent a message both to the Terminus and Hegemony." Kirik looked all too pleased at the thought of pirates dying screaming.
The Hierarchy had wanted to go in and clean up the Terminus space for centuries and only skillful maneuvers by the Asari and Salarian Councilors had avoided that particular war.
"How do you keep this getting back to us?" Ilreth sounded genuinely interested for the first time.
"There are only two Specters who are aware of the op and executed it. Their reputation and skill is beyond reproach and they won't be caught alive if something goes wrong."
"You're sure of that?" Ilreth asked.
"They did volunteer." Kirik gave a meaningful nod.
"Ah. That project."
The Turian glared at their colleague, to Tevos' grim amusement. There probably were just a handful things not related to humanity that the STG didn't know. Fortunately a certain secret on Thessia was one of them.
"There's another angle too – Torfan." Kirik continued after finishing his drink in a one go.
"The pirate fortress?" Ilreth inquired.
"It's a damn fortress all right. One that we would have taken out if not for certain meddling." Kirik gave Tevos a disapproving look, which she bore stoically.
Doing so simply wasn't worth it the increased tensions with the Hegemony and Terminus.
Torfan was a pirate, slaver and smuggler heaven, which operated with the Batarians tactic support. There was no other way the "upstanding free spirits" operating there had so much supposedly scraped Hegemony hardware.
Incidentally, the fleet that hit Elysium was supposed to go there with the spoils. That was something that the Alliance was going to discover sooner or later – a virtual guarantee once people familiar with the Terminus scum started aiding them.
"That's almost commendable." Ilreth stated after a long pause to process the latest bomb dropped in his lap. "What if they don't stop there?"
"Our analysts all but guarantee that the Alliance won't start a war unless they perceive us as an existential threat. Not when they're scared of the possibility that the Ethereals would return one day. The Humans won't risk weakening themselves in an all out conflict with us or even the Batarians. Too much to lose for dubious gains at best." Tevos stated.
Ilreth stared at her, then muttered something too fast and quiet for the Asari to understand. Not that she needed – it was clearly a curse of some kind.
"The Alliance parliament faces elections late next year. If the current party wants to keep their position and thus the peace..." The Salarian glared daggers at his counterparts, "They might be forced into a war no one apparently wants. Do I need to spell you what will happen if one of the other major human parties gains majority?"
"Hostile isolationism. I very much doubt that the humans would let the loons in charge and then follow them into a conflict with us."
"That might be enough if the Batarians provoke them. Or… Have you considered that the current parliament might go for an out of proportion response to guarantee their re-election next year?" Ilreth grumbled.
"That's..." Tevos trailed off. She had seen the estimates of human political reaction if either the Batarians or a Terminus warlord provoked them. With both the Alliance and XCOM trying to push for a modern, not xenophobic image, anything but a proportional response was deemed highly unlikely. Yet… How much did the Council truly knew about the inner workings of the Alliance?
"I think another unofficial chat with Ambassador Udina is in order." Tevos muttered.
"That might be for the best." Ilreth nodded and headed for the bar.
Damn, on the third day? This was some kind of a record even for the Salarian Councilors.
"Is there any other operation in progress that I need to know about?" Ilreth snipped.
Tevos looked at Kirik, who shrugged. There was nothing else going on that the Salarian might find objectionable.
Right?