Omega 2
It had been a long week.
It was strange to think it had only been a week, Shepard mused. Eden Prime, Jenkins' death, the strange Prothean artefact, and now this. Dragged away from her crew to satisfy the whims of a possibly delusional volus billionaire. Sent more than halfway across the galaxy to accompany a turian Spectre even younger than her species' government. And finally, once they'd actually got to Omega - a barren, hollowed-out asteroid drifting in the depths of the Terminus Systems - after they'd been summoned to Afterlife to speak with the world's self-appointed ruler, now made to wait outside by an elcor bouncer who'd made it very clear that no humans were included on Aria T'Loak's guest list.
She'd been back on the Resolute soon, she told herself. Once Vakarian was finally finished chatting with Omega's asari ruler, they'd be able to find Kumun Shol's contact. Shol's contact would fix whatever that artefact had done to her head, and then she'd be back on board her ship. Then she'd be back where she belonged. The sooner the better, she thought, warily eyeing a trio of batarians as they stalked contemptuously past her.
She wondered what was taking Vakarian so long. The turian mercenary who'd met them shortly after they arrived on Omega hadn't been very talkative. All she knew was that Aria wanted to talk to Vakarian. She didn't know what they were talking about. It won't be long now, she told herself. She wasn't sure she believed it.
At least, apart from the odd salarian doctor earlier, people seemed to be avoiding her. She was getting a few odd looks, of course - humans were even rarer on Omega than they were in Council space - but she was used to odd looks. It took more than looks to bother her.
She kept herself from looking in their direction, but on the periphery of her vision she could see that the trio of batarians had stopped moving and were now just staring in her direction, arguing quietly amongst themselves. Now that was something that bothered her.
Vakarian still hadn't come back out. It had been well over an hour by now. She wondered how much longer she was going to have to wait. She wondered if- then she caught a fragment of the batarians' whispered argument, no more than a single word, but enough to make her freeze. Torfan. Still forcing herself not to looking in their direction, she strained to make out anything else.
"My cousin was on Torfan," she heard, faintly, "I'm telling you, that's ..."
The batarians were far enough away that she couldn't make out everything that they said. But she could hear enough to worry. Enough to risk a glance in their direction.
One of the batarians - the smallest and most junior, to judge from his bearing and lack of obvious rank insignia - was pointing right at her. He'd been the one she heard talking about Torfan, she guessed. The other two seemed unconvinced, but they too were looking in her direction. One of them made eye contact, scowled, and stared at her challengingly.. She looked back at him unblinking. Looking away now would be seen as a sign of weakness. And looking weak in front of batarians was never a good idea.
The batarian staring straight at her was the tallest of three, and the one who seemed the most sceptical. He was also a current or former member of one of their special forces divisions, judging by the black and yellow stripes inscribed over the pale green skin of his forehead. This could be trouble, she thought.
"... an idiot?" she heard him sneer at his smaller companion. She didn't manage to catch the rest, but the whatever was said made the smaller of the batarians flinch backwards, bowing his head in submission.
She almost dared to hope that that was the end of it, but instead the sceptical batarian strode forward to confront her, dragging the other two in his wake behind him. They stopped a few feet away, all three of them looking down at her with all four eyes, heads tilted contemptuously to the side. The leader didn't speak, not to her, but after staring at her wordlessly for several seconds he turned away to address his companions.
"You think this small creature is the Butcher?" he asked them in disbelief, gesturing back at her theatrically. "You think an animal like this could harm even one of our kind?"
Take a step further forward and maybe you'll find out, she thought, trying to keep the emotion from her face. The batarian ignored her, continuing to rant to his companions.
"You think the Butcher would dare show its face on any world in the Terminus systems after what the Hierarchy did on Torfan?"
Her biotic amp was a growing warmth against the back of her neck. These three shouldn't be a problem, she told herself, But if there are many more batarians in the crowds...
"No," the batarian sneered, tilting his head to the right at he turned back to look at her. "This one is just another stupid two-eyed, hairy, ug-"
He froze. None of them had noticed him leave the club, but Vakarian was now standing a foot behind him, weapon raised.
"The thing you can feel pressing on the back of your skull is the barrel of a state-of-the-art HMWP-X pistol," the turian said, the twin tones of his voice oddly gentle, "Strictly reserved for Spectres and other elite Council agents; I'm not exaggerating when I say it's the most powerful hand-cannon in the galaxy.
The batarian's eyes twitched, and he lifted his hands slowly up to his sides, empty palms visible, a traditional batarian gesture of submission. If Vakarian noticed, he didn't react. He kept speaking in the same even, slightly-too-calm tones.
"It's designed for soldiers who expect to be trading shots with krogan battlemasters or asari commandos, firing at distance through heavy armour and kinetic barriers", he said. "At this range it would blow your head into so many pieces your soul wouldn't be able to find your eye sockets. So what you need to ask yourself is: 'what can I do to keep the nice turian holding this weapon from pulling the trigger?' Any guesses?"
All four of the batarian's eyes were wide open, Shepard saw, his lower-left eyelid twitching rapidly. His companions stepped back, carefully, looking at their leader for guidance. He didn't seem keen on fighting.
"Now, hold on, sir," he said, nervously, "There's no need for any trouble here. We didn't know this animal was yours, that's al-"
"That's odd," interrupted Vakarian, thoughtfully, "My translator must be glitching. I could have sworn you just referred to an officer of the Hierarchy military as an 'animal', but … there's no way a smart batarian like you would be that stupid, is there?"
How many human officers are there in the Hierarchy? thought Shepard, distantly. How many of them didn't serve on Torfan? If Vakarian kept on like this, it was surely only a matter of time before the batarians realised that she actually was the person they'd accused her of being, or at least the next best thing. Then either they'd have to die or they'd live to spread the news across Omega. The Butcher of Torfan, she thought bitterly, Wandering around the Terminus Systems like an idiot.
"You know nobody on Omega cares if you're some big-shot Council Spectre, right?" One of the other two batarians asked, warily. "You're in the Terminus Systems now. Council law doesn't mean anything out here."
Vakarian nodded, at that, mandibles flexing slightly. "That's true enough," he said reasonably. "There's only one law on Omega. Of course, that cuts more than one way: I don't need to be a Spectre to get away with shooting your friend in broad daylight. And, while we're on that topic …"
He motioned towards the other two batarians with his free hand, talons open wide apart, waving them forward.
"I get nervous when I think people might be thinking of sneaking up behind me," he said, apologetically. "And when I get nervous, well, I might do something you'd regret."
"Look, turian," blustered the smallest batarian, "We don't want any trouble. Just take your animal and-"
Vakarian sighed theatrically, but his hands stayed steady.
"She's a human," he said, voice still calm but mandibles twitching, "Not an animal. And she has a name. It's-"
Well, this it… Shepard readied herself to throw up a barrier.
"Annoyed," rumbled the voice of the elcor bouncer, booming unexpectedly close. "This area is for queueing, not fighting. And none of you are getting in to Afterlife tonight."
Vakarian's weapon was back in its holster almost before the elcor had finished speaking. Shepard didn't even see it move.
"No fighting here," he said, "Just giving my batarian friends here a helpful lesson on inter-species etiquette."
"He threatened us!" protested one of the smaller batarians. Shepard spotted Vakarian looking at her and rolled her eyes theatrically. She didn't need translation software to know what the elcor thought about that complaint.
"Bluntly," the eclor said, bass voice rumbling low and calm, "I don't care."
"Maybe your boss would be a little more interested," one of the batarians spat back. "Or have the Council annexed Omega without telling anyone?"
"Matter-of-factly: Aria won't care either," the elcor said. "Helpful suggestion: go away."
"Well, maybe we'll give Aria a reason to care," the tall batarian suggested, moving to join his companions on the other side of the promenade from Shepard and Vakarian.
He was a lot more confident in himself without a gun to his head, Shepard noted.
"With barely constrained menace," the elcor rumbled, close enough to the batarian that the four-eyed alien had to look up to maintain eye contact, "Try it."
Time seemed to slow down for a moment; the batarian weighing his chances. He was ex-special forces, he had back-up, both with weapons drawn, and the elcor bouncer was slow-moving and unarmed. It seemed pretty clear to Shepard that the batarians didn't have a chance. Elcor were not to be trifled with.
The batarian must have reached the same conclusion, as he shook his head, muttered under his breath and stalked away, companions at his heels.
"... so, Vakarian," she asked, once she was sure the batarians were out of earshot. "Was any of that actually true?"
The turian shook his head. "You really think the Council would let me play with any of the good stuff?" he asked ruefully. "Sometimes I'm surprised they don't expect me to pay for my own weapons."
She wondered if Vakarian realised how close they'd come to a fight. She wasn't sure how much of her one-sided argument with the batarians he'd overheard. She knew he'd read her service files, but she didn't know how much of them he remembered, or if realised the significance of Torfan to batarians, the risk she was taking on Omega. She couldn't think of a way to ask without sounding ungrateful.
"Get anything out of this Aria T'Loak?" she asked instead. "You were in there a while."
Vakarian scowled, mandibles flexing and teeth bared. "I spent most of that time waiting," he said. "Aria was making a point. We only actually spoke for a couple of minutes."
He frowned thoughtfully, putting a taloned hand to his chin thoughtfully.
"Come to think of it," he said "I suspect her main reason for speaking to me at all was to see whether I could help her track down a missing asari maiden. Not the asari we're looking for, somebody else who's apparently gone missing on Omega recently. I couldn't, of course, and she lost interest pretty quickly after that."
"Anything else?" she asked.
"Well, uh," he frowned "As I was leaving, she told me to remember I wasn't in Council space anymore and that I should avoid shooting anybody dead on the Promenade."
And five minutes later you were pointing a gun at a stranger right outside Afterlife, Shepard thought. I guess Aria wasn't the only one who wanted to make a point.
"... alone here, our brothers and sisters on Earth. In our hubris, we thought to abandon the lands of our ancestors, to spread like a plague among the stars …"
Minutes later, not far from the lights and eager queues outside Afterlife, they found themselves in a dirty alleyway, A small group of onlookers - mostly vorcha, she thought - had gathered around a raggedly-dressed human man, who ranted and shouted at them with a hoarse, desperate voice. Vorcha would listen to anything if they thought they might get to eat it afterwards.
Shepard wondered what series of events could have brought the man here, to Omega. Had he started out as a prospector, one of the few humans reckless enough to head out to seek their fortune in the Terminus systems after the Second Blitz? Or had he been one of the unlucky ones who'd been captured by the batarians during the early days of the war?
"Now Earth drifts silently in the unbroken darkness," the human exclaimed, working himself to a frenzied pitch. "Lost to us forever. Our families left behind on Earth, gone from the galaxy; punished for the sins and errors of our ancestors. Lost to the void of eternity."
He paused, longer than a more polished speaker would have done, long enough that some of the crowd began to disperse, thinking that the show was over.
"But perhaps you think we were saved?" he asked, suddenly. "No. Not one of us will know salvation. We are all guilty. We have all been judged. This is no purgatory: this is hell."
The preacher looked around the small crowd, eyes darting feverishly from one person to the next. His eyes lit up when he saw Vakarian.
"This is hell," he repeated, lifting a trembling arm to point towards the turian, "And all the devils are here."
"I don't know what a 'devil' is," whispered Vakarian later, after the man had fallen silent again and the crowd had begun to break up. "But I'm guessing that's not a compliment."
"It's a human religious thing," Shepard said, awkwardly. "A bit like spirits, but … not. You'd probably have to ask an expert." Or anybody other than me, she thought. Like human politics, human religion was something she'd rather not discuss with the Spectre.
They walked in silence for a few paces, or as close to silence as could be found on Omega. All around them the bustle of Omega continued: nightclubs, gambling dens and vorcha fighting pits touted for business; black market merchants called out to passersby with promises of special offers on weapons, and on secrets, and on red sand, and on slaves.
"My father would have hated this place," said Vakarian abruptly. "The crime, the chaos."
The turian looked around He shook his head. "I hate this place."
Privately, Shepard decided she'd seen enough to hate it herself. This was an old world - long dead civilisations had been mining the rock while humanity was still coming to grips with the concept of stone tools. The mining had been so extensive that all Omega's resources had been depleted long before even the turians discovered the Citadel. Still, Omega continued to offer something to its many, ever-changing residents. The world was a haven for pirates, smugglers and mercenary gangs. It offered the illusive hope of a fresh start for people whose lives had taken one wrong turning too many. Freedom from the laws of other worlds, from the very concept of galactic law.
There's only one rule on Omega, Shepard thought. The strong prey on the weak, and the weak suffer.
"I don't think you've mentioned your father before," she said to break the silence. "What did he do?"
"Citadel Security," said Vakarian. "Maintaining order at the very heart of Council space. He didn't approve when I was offered Spectre training. He thought the early Council had made a mistake when it started the Spectre programme. Told me that Spectres had too much power and no real responsibility. I actually think he expected me to follow him into C-Sec. Maybe I would have, but ..." he trailed off.
"But?" she asked.
"He was visiting Kahje a few years ago," Vakarian replied quietly. "Chasing up reports of a drell assassin operating on the Citadel."
The turian sighed. "That was when Kahje fell off the network. We still don't know what happened to him."
The sudden disappearance of Kahje, the hanar homeworld - barely a decade after the loss of Earth - had sent shockwaves through the galactic community. Unlike humanity, the hanar and their clients the drell had been part of galactic civilisation for centuries. They had lived and traded on many worlds, a small but integral part of Citadel space. But, just like Earth, one day the mass relay near Kahje had simply vanished from the network and all communication with the planet had ceased.
"After that," said Vakarian slowly. "It didn't seem right to keep pretending not to notice that something very worrying was happening. Hard to imagine joining C-Sec and worrying about traffic violations when planets were going missing."
What had happened to Kahje had prompted a wave of religious hysteria among the remaining hanar. Most of them were convinced - or at least claimed to be convinced - that this was all the work of the ancient species they knew as the Enkindlers. This was the name the hanar gave to the people who, the hanar claimed, had uplifted their species millenia ago. The people of the lost civilisation that the rest of the galaxy knew as the Protheans.
And who knows, she thought, maybe they were right. Still, after all this time, nobody had come close to solving the mystery. Mass relays just didn't stop working, after all. Everyone could agree on that. Most of the surviving hanar had begun travelling back to Kahje the long way: strictly FTL, no mass relays involved. If any of them had made it to Kahje yet, they hadn't reported back to the rest of the galaxy. So either they hadn't made it back - but surely some of them would have by now - or something had stopped them from contacting the rest of the galaxy. Whatever had caused Kahje to vanish from the network now stopped anyone who travelled there from returning to reveal the planet's fate.
Just like Terra Firma, Shepard thought to herself. The largest of the unofficial and unsanctioned human attempts to travel the long road to Earth had met with the same fate as all the others: promises, expectation, delays, and then … nothing. Silence.
At least the disappearance of Kahje had convinced those sceptics in Council space who had speculated - publicly as well as privately - that humanity's talk of 'Earth' was nothing more than a primitive species' myth or fancy. Something had happened to the hanar homeworld; probably the same thing that had happened to Earth. And although in the years since nothing similar had happened again, it was, perhaps, only a matter of time.
"I'm sorry," Shepard said weakly, aware it was too late, aware that it wasn't enough. "My parents … well, you've read my files. You know they died on Mindoir."
She paused, not sure what to say next. She still wasn't sure if she should be treating Vakarian as a superior or a junior officer. He was a Spectre, somebody who could give orders to generals or admirals in the name of the Citadel Council. But as a Spectre he was also outside the usual chain of command, and sometimes he just seemed incredibly young. The sort of junior officer who needed some quiet reassuring words now and then before he forgot what he was supposed to be doing.
If I were a turian, she thought, I wouldn't being having this problem. Turians, born and raised in the Hierarchy, knew where they belonged, where others belonged in relation to them. It was a familiar frustration. She never seemed to know what to say or how to act when it mattered.
"I sometimes think it would be worse if I could still remember them," she said quietly, surprising herself.
She hadn't said that to anybody else in a long time. Not while sober, anyway. She glanced at him, half-expecting to see a disapproving or disappointed look on his face. It didn't feel like the sort of thing you were supposed to admit. He looked thoughtful, instead.
"Maybe. I think about my father a lot. What he'd do, what he'd say. I still talk to him, sometimes," the turian said. "It's stupid, but…"
"It helps," she nodded. It did. She'd done the same thing, when she was younger. Not since her first few missions as an auxiliary though; not since Jacob Taylor. These days she had other deaths to reproach herself for.
Her thoughts drifted back to the hanar.
The disappearance of Kahje had marked the end of the hanar's presence as a significant player in galactic politics. There were still hanar to be found on most worlds, of course, just as there were humans or quarians or vorcha. But there was no organised hanar government, no hanar presence on the Citadel.
She couldn't help but think of the vision she'd seen when she touched the beacon. Images of destruction and death on a scale she still struggled to comprehend. Is that what happened to Kahje? she wondered, Is that what happened to Earth?
"Vakarian," she said, "Do you think-"
Her stomach chose that moment to rumble so loudly that for a moment she was sure the turian could hear it.
"Actually, Vakarian," she said, "Would you mind if stop to eat something?"
The turian looked startled for a moment. She guessed he'd been thinking about his father. He shook his head slowly, returning his attention to the present.
"Huh," he said. "Come to think of it I can't remember seeing you eat. Not since..." He paused, thoughtfully.
"I ate on the Citadel," she said, a little more defensively than she'd intended.
"Spirits, Shepard, that was yesterday," he said. "You haven't eaten since then?"
He looked appalled; just as Komarov had done months ago the first time she realised that the infamous Butcher of Torfan had a habit of skipping meals. She hoped Talitha was doing okay without her. She hoped all the crew were. I'll be back soon, she told herself.
"I thought biotics were supposed to eat more calories than the rest of us." said Vakarian. From the tone of his voice, he obviously knew that they were.
"We are," she admitted anyway. "I just … forgot. Normally I get one of the crew to remind me, but..."
"Well," said Vakarian, "At least that's one problem I can solve today."
He looked around. They'd been walking through Omega's back alleys without giving much thought to their route, eyes scanning automatically for potential threats but minds not fully engaged on their surroundings.. Not the smartest thing to do on Omega. But now they'd emerged in what seemed to be a slightly more affluent area; the streets were just a little cleaner, the shop-fronts just a little better maintained. Maybe this is a good place to start looking for Shol's contact, she thought.
"I wonder if there's anywhere nearby that sells decent dextro-food", Vakarian mused.
"Okay, you win Vakarian," she said, "We'll get something to eat. But then we need to find this asari and see if she can fix whatever that artefact did to me."
And if she can't, then … Well, that was something she'd deal with if she had to. One way or another.
They ended up buying food from a quarian street vendor. Shepard wondered what he was doing out here. Strange place to go on a Pilgrimage. She thought it might be rude to ask though, so she stayed quiet. Shepard rather liked the quarians, or so she'd decided when she was younger. She admired them, anyway, in a strange way.
Like humanity, the quarians had lost their home world, and like humanity they were dismissed and looked down on by the Council and most of the galaxy. They were survivors though: they were tough, disciplined. She doubted humanity would have coped as well if it hadn't been for the intervention of the Hierarchy. She doubted it very much.
Vakarian had brightened considerably when the quarian announced that he specialised in Galatana-style turian cuisine. Shepard recognised the name of Galatana Colony from the histories of the Unification Wars she'd studied as a teenager, but her lectures had neglected to mention anything about the food. Which is just as well, she told herself, Seeing that it's all dextro and I can't eat any of it.
Shepard ended up with something grey and cold and tentacled that was apparently an asari delicacy. Staring at it suspiciously didn't make it seem any more edible. At least Vakarian's happy.
She'd always hated other people watching her eat. She had done for as long as she could remember, even before she'd started living with turians. Or she thought, anyway: it had been a long time.
Not being a turian didn't help of course. Turians had evolved from predators, and ate like it, ripping apart their food with teeth and talons and swallowing the small pieces whole. Humans had evolved from something with flat teeth for eating plants, so had to chew. It made her feel self-conscious, awkwardly aware of just how much time she was spending with her mouth closed and full of bits of food.
She watched Vakarian from the corner of her eyes as they ate. Or rather while he ate and she picked and prodded at the congealing mess on her plate and wished, not for the first time in her life, that eating levo didn't mean people assumed you wanted to eat like an asari.
Like most turians, Vakarian ate with surprising delicacy. If she'd tried to eat like that - grabbing at the skewered meat with flat teeth and stubby fingers - she'd have ended up splashing sauce and juices everywhere. She'd learn that lesson from experience, though at least to her teenage self's credit she'd had the sense to experiment in her own room with the door firmly locked. But somehow turians made it work.
An unfamiliar salarian wandered up to their table while they were finishing. He didn't say anything until Vakarian set his plate down and looked at him curiously.
"Oh, hello friends." he said then, too brightly. Shepard looked at him warily. If we're lucky, he's just here to try to sell us something.
"My name's Ish," he continued, unprompted. "I hear you have a problem I can help you out with."
"And who did you hear that from, exactly?" asked Vakarian.
The salarian didn't answer, but looked thoughtfully at the remains on the turian's plate instead.
"Galatanan espetinho?" the salarian asked. "Careful, friend. Too much of that is bad for you, I hear."
Too much of anything is bad for you, thought Shepard irritably, still forcing herself to finish eating. That's what 'too much' means.
"Too much of anything is bad for you," replied Vakarian equably, as if echoing her thoughts. "What was it that you wanted to tell us?"
"Word on the street is that you're looking for an asari," the salarian said. "A very particular asari."
The salarian - Ish, Shepard reminded herself - didn't seem comfortable standing out in the open. He fidgeted nervously, blinking more than he should have done. First impressions could be misleading, but she'd decided that she didn't trust him.
"You're saying you know where we can find Doctor T-"
"Not so loud, friends," hissed the salarian, eyes darting left and right. "She has spies everywhere."
"She?" said Shepard, finally victorious in her battle with the thing the asari had decided to call food. "You mean Aria T'Loak?"
"I'd never say a bad word about Aria," the salarian protested, too loudly and too quickly.
Well, of course not, thought Shepard drily, She has spies everywhere, after all. She really didn't trust the salarian, but they needed a lead. And it looked like this was a lead. Of sorts.
"The doctor you're looking for, the asari, she's waiting for you," the salarian said, eyes darting nervously from side to side. "She sent me to find you."
"Why you?" asked Vakarian bluntly.
"I'm in the information business" the salarian said carefully. "Nothing untoward, of course. Nothing that would involve violence or, ah, tampering with electronic security protocols. Just trading certain interesting tidbits I come across with various interested parties."
"You mean you sell other people's poorly guarded secrets to the highest bidder and don't stick around long enough to see the consequences," said Shepard.
"We all have to earn a living, my friend," replied the salarian a little stiffly. "The point is that the doctor knows that I'm somebody who can be relied on. We've worked together in the past."
Why would an expert on Prothean artefacts need to deal with someone like you? She didn't say anything out loud, but let the doubt show plainly on her face. The salarian didn't seem put off. In truth, as soon as she'd stopped talking to him, he lost all interest in her, turning back to address Vakarian instead.
"She's lying low in one of the outer districts," he said. "I spoke to her just a few hours ago. She's been waiting for you for some time."
"Well," said Vakarian slowly, the tone of his voice showing he shared Shepard's doubts about their new friend. "I guess we don't want to disappoint her."
The district they arrived in following Ish's directions was not what Shepard expected. It was run down, badly lit, and the buildings - mostly warehouses and storage units - seemed old and badly in need of maintenance. It was hard for her to believe that anybody lived here by choice; harder still to believe that a visiting asari would choose to stay here.
Shepard was aware, at least in theory, that there had to be poor asari. It was a logical possibility, at least, just like smart vorcha or brave salarians. But somehow all asari she'd ever met projected the impression of wealth and affluence, not necessarily of excessive riches but certainly confident self-sufficiency. Nobody who had to live in this district, even for a short few days, could give that impression.
The salarian's directions had led them to a unremarkable building; a motel, to judge by the badly illuminated sign over the front door. The decor was as shabby and run-down as everything else in the district. And I thought planets smelled bad, she thought, wrinkling her nose in distaste.
"Room 47," said Vakarian, checking his visor for the last of Ish's directions.
The door wasn't locked, and the asari waiting for them in the gloom of the dark motel room was younger than Shepard had expected. She was lying on a sofa that had clearly seen better days, staring at the door through half-closed eyes.
And - once Vakarian threw the lights on, bathing the room in a bright neon glow - she was also very clearly dead. Shepard wasn't an expert in asari physiology, but she knew that living asari tended to keep most of their blood on the inside.
"Doctor Thanoptis, I presume," said Vakarian. He looked intently at the body, crouching down to inspect it. His father had been in C-Sec, he'd told her earlier. She wondered if a part of him didn't regret not following him into that career.
"This looks like krogan work," he said, grimly. "Look: her spinal cord's been cut with a serrated blade, just below the neck. This is the sort of ritual execution the krogan used to kill captured asari prisoners during the Rebellions."
He looked at Shepard. Crouching, she realised he was almost at her eye level. He looked worried.
"More importantly," he said, "Given the state of the body, she's been dead for at least a day. Maybe even longer."
"So she probably wasn't chatting to our salarian friend any time in the last few hours?" said Shepard, feeling her amp warming up as she spoke. That salarian is going to pay.
Vakarian nodded. "Looks like our friend Ish set us up. We need to move. Now."
They made it two blocks before they ran into the ambush.