"Police brutality? Intimidating a suspect? Tampering with evidence?" The datapad clattered onto the desk.
"You forgot damaging C-sec property." Garrus responded with a dry chuckle.
Executor Pallin made a noise in his subharmonics that was halfway between a growl and a groan.
"You've always bent the rules Vakarian, but you're going too far now."
"Somehow, I don't think I've been going far enough." Garrus said crisply, ignoring the look that the executor was giving him. He'd expected Jatasa to notify their boss quickly, but this had been fast, even for her. Is that what its like, being a good turian? Following the book so closely you get near nearsighted?
"This is your last warning Officer. Your activities are bordering on vigilantism. Do things by the book or don't do them at all."
"The book needs to be rewritten." Garrus said derisively, feeling his hackles rise. What the executor had just said was something his father always quoted from a manual. Have they been talking?
Pallin made a rumbling noise in the back of his throat and leaned forward, folding his arms on the desktop. "I've been lenient because of your personal contribution in taking down Saren Arterius, but don't think I won't lock you up if you cross the line again. Too many infractions this month, far too many."
The air in the room suddenly felt much heavier, bearing down on him like a living thing while he stared at the executor coolly. Garrus's blue eyes were hard, glazed with a cold frustration. There were a dozen arguments stewing in his throat. But then he realized that he'd said them all before. There wasn't anything else he could say. And then he knew exactly what he needed to do. When he did, it was like a weight lifted off of his chest. Garrus let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding and pushed a button on his omni-tool.
"Don't worry; I'm not your problem anymore."
A second later his C-sec identification chip popped out. He threw it. The badge skipped across Pallin's desk as Garrus turned to leave.
"And where are you going to go?" the executor intoned roughly.
"Somewhere I can actually make a difference." Garrus replied curtly as the door shut behind him.
He'd just committed career suicide. But he was okay with it because he was free. Completely. No more red tape, no more reports to be filed. It was time to take justice, real justice into his own hands. And he knew exactly where he needed to start.
The name was a flame dancing on the tip of his tongue, a needle in the back of his mind.
Omega.
"You quit the force?! What the fuck Vakarian?"
A sigh that was so low it was almost a grumble worked its way out of Garrus's throat. "Do we have to do this now, Jatasa?" Spirits, she moves fast.
She'd come to his apartment within hours of his resignation, interrupting him in the middle of packing. Granted, it wasn't going to take him long to finish as he lived military, but still. He could feel her eyes wandering over his apartment, looking at the single cot, extranet terminal and his gun collection. He'd never needed much, preferring to save his money when he could and helping to pay for his mother's medical bills. A pained look pulled at his face for a moment, but he banished it. This wouldn't be the first time he dropped off the radar. His family would just have to deal with it. Or his father and sister would. With her Corpalis Syndrome his mother barely recognized his face anymore. His gaze was drawn back to Jatasa and he realized she'd been speaking the whole time.
"Well?" she said curtly, hands on her hips.
"It's just something I need to do. I need to make a difference." he responded after a tense moment.
"That's why we joined C-Sec." she shot back. Garrus shook his head slowly.
"C-Sec doesn't cut it anymore."
Jatasa threw her hands up and took a couple steps towards him, jabbing his chest with a talon. "Will you listen to yourself?! Spirits what is wrong with you? You work with a Spectre for a couple months and..."
"You had to be there. He cut in wryly, trying to ignore the annoyance growing in his stomach.
"You're taking the easy road Vakarian." she said softer, perhaps picking up on his discomfort.
He supposed that in another life, he'd be a captain in the turian military by now, married to a fine woman like Jatasa, and settling down on Palaven. That his father would be proud of him.
"Nothing's ever easy." he replied with a shrug.
Of course, it hadn't been as easy as simply hopping on the next shuttle there. He'd cleaned out his accounts, sold what little he had, ended the lease on his apartment early, stocked up on medi-gel, thermal clips, rations and had let proprietor of Rodam Expeditions convince him into buying a new sniper rifle. However, he had to admit that the Mantis was a finely crafted gun, even if did use thermal clips. It had all seemed like a grand adventure at first, almost like he was going on a vacation. When he had finally gotten to Omega, he'd barely been there for a day and had stopped a mugging on a whim, leaving the would-be thief unconscious in the gutter.
And by the Spirits, it had felt good.
He'd even attempted to gain an audience with Aria T'loak, the self-proclaimed pirate queen of Omega and the closest thing the station of eight million people had to a higher authority; he'd been turned down by her bodyguards on account of his requests for information by virtue of not being interesting enough. One of the bartenders had been easy enough to bribe though, and he had still found out the things he needed to know. Thralog was small-time as far as the players on Omega were concerned, but he still had more men working for him than Garrus could handle all at once. It was astounding, really, that someone like Thralog could traffic drugs all the way to the citadel, supplying all the pushers in an entire ward by himself and his organization was barely a blip on the radar in Omega's underworld.
It was a different place.
Garrus reveled in it. Omega. The heart of darkness. The end point. The null. The gangrenous wound whose existence the civilized parts of the galaxy tried to ignore. A sprawling metropolis with no law, no capital punishment. No red tape. On the Citadel, the scum hid in the shadows, scurrying away like the vermin they were when the light was shined on them. On Omega, it was nigh impossible to walk a block without stepping on something. Here, there were innocent people just trying to get by and the scum that preyed on them. But here, there were no rules to stop him from helping the former and dealing with the latter permanently. There was only one rule that everyone agreed with, and that was not to fuck with Aria, but Garrus had no intention of breaking it. Not yet at any rate. Not until he'd cut Kishpaugh's supply off at the source. The only problem was that he'd been on Omega for three weeks, living out of a cheap motel, and he had yet to cut the problem off at the source. Thralog was hard to get to.
Granted, he'd killed several members of the organization in surprise attacks; sniping from rooftops when they were loading crates into the back of a shuttle had netted him four, and taking out street dealers across the district had brought the total up to nine; he was even pretty sure he's narrowed down where their main hub of operations was, but that hadn't brought him any closer to the leader. He had them on alert which was good, though it meant that they were being more cautious. It had taken hours of recon and one laughably easy interrogation, but he knew where the next big shipment was being loaded. More intriguing, there had been messages, not just about moving product, but about dealing with the "other" problem. Garrus assumed they were talking about him, but as far he knew, they'd never even caught a glimpse of him. The ones he'd taken out had never seen him coming and thus far, he'd never had to leave wherever he perched. He doubted it'd be different this time either.
Garrus sighed and surveyed the room around him. He was in Afterlife's lower level, chewing on something that was supposed to be a burgat steak, but tasted more like leather that had been left out in the sun too long. Thralog's people were going to be meeting in a warehouse near the outskirts of the Kima district the following day, so he had a little bit of free time, though considering the quality of the steak, he might as well have posted up on the rooftop across from the warehouse a day early and eaten some military rations. He pushed the plate away with a grimace, wishing he had some gawi sauce to drown in it in. Then many it'd be more edible. A moment later, his ruminations about shitty bar food were interrupted by a by a sudden altercation a table by the rear entrance.
A krogan had stood up and slammed meaty hands down on the table in front of him, the loud boom garnering attention. "Hey, hey now big fella, I won that hand fair and square." A turian at the same table said, flailing his arms about. "What're a few credits between friends anyhow?" Garrus noted that the other turian bore violet clan markings from Aephus on his cheeks and mandibles, a colony known for its shipyards, but that was all he had time to register before his view became nothing but the krogan's armored back.
"We are not friends." The krogan rumbled, grabbing the turian by the shoulders and slamming him up against the wall. "And you are a cheat." The turian babbled something incomprehensibly, before pulling something out of his pocket and jamming it against the krogan's neck. A sharp tang filled the air, one that Garrus could almost taste. The krogan reared back with a howl, dropping the turian, who was holding a small device that sparked with electricity.
Even for a turian, it was a bad idea to pick a fight with a krogan. Alone. He admired the other turian's bravery though, and noted that the krogan was wearing blood pack colors. That automatically put him on Garrus's shitlist. Whether the turian was cheating or not, the krogan was afflicted with one of Omega's largest three criminal syndicates. With a sigh that belied the spark of glee flickering in his heart, Garrus leapt into action, steak forgotten, and got behind the krogan, firmly kicking the mercenary in the quad.
The krogan grunted in pain and dropped to his knees, allowing the other turian to crack him across the head with a chair, dazing him enough that he didn't try to rise again. "Thank the spirits he's been drinking ryncol for the past two hours, or that would have been a lot harder." He muttered, before extending a hand in Garrus's direction. "Thanks for the assist."
"Not a problem." Garrus replied coolly.
"Sidonis. Lantar Sidonis. You?" Garrus grasped the other turian's talons with his and gave him a nod of affirmation. "Garrus Vakarian."
"Well Garrus, I think I owe you a drink for saving my a-."
"What the hell is this?" an unfamiliar voice growled. Garrus turned to see another blood pack krogan tromping towards them, flanked by a trio of vorcha. None of them looked very pleased, though vorcha –always- looked angry, the krogan was clearly annoyed. Big too. Garrus thought idly. Maybe eight feet tall, the hump on his back adding to his girth. Dark brown crest on his forehead above reptilian eyes wide with anger.
"Nothing, nothing at all. I just had a little disagreement with your friend there…" Sidonis began, waving his hands pleadingly.
"Nobody insults the blood pack like that. And definitely not some stupid turians!" the krogan sneered, the vorcha behind him hissing their agreement. "I'm gonna pou-" Garrus cut him off by punching him directly in the throat. He could see where this was going, and he had no qualms about playing dirty. It the best way to deal with krogan strength and size.
"Oh great," Sidonis murmured stoically. "I've always wanted to die in a bar fight."
The blood pack mercenary stumbled back a step or two and coughed, fixing one baleful eye on Garrus. "Not bad, turian. You've got some guts, I'll give you that. Let's see how you like wearing them!" He turned to the vorcha standing around him. "What are you idiots waiting for? Get them!" But Garrus had been anticipating an order like that as well, and he tackled the lead vorcha to the ground, pummeling him mercilessly in the face. There was a yell to his left and he saw the other two wrestle Sidonis to the ground, the krogran roaring and picking up a table.
Then a blast rent the air and all six of the combatants paused.
When Garrus looked up from the vorcha he was on top of, he saw the salarian bartender leveling a shotgun at them, backed by half a dozen security guards, mostly turian and batarian. "This is Aria's club." One of them growled. "No fighting. No killing. Unless she's the one doing it." He added with an evil grin. "You gents can see yourselves out now, or you can leave in bodybags."
"I'm blood pack!" the krogan protested the vorcha with him hissed and mumbled.
""And if you'd like to continue being a patron here, you'll shut up." The bartender spat.
"Bah!" the krogan grumbled before turning to Garrus. "This isn't over turian. You watch yourself."
Garrus offered the krogan a sloppy salute and helped Sidonis up off the floor.
"You two get outta here." The bartender said flatly, pointing at Garrus and Sidonis. "Damn newcomers think you own the place."
"Guess that means I don't have to pay for that steak." Garrus muttered under his breath. Sidonis hooted, slapping Garrus on the back as they made their way out of the club.
"You didn't have to do that, you know." Sidonis said once they'd turned the corner. "I mean, not that I don't appreciate the help. You saved my ass." He shrugged. "But I mean, this is Omega. Gotta be careful who you piss off and who you trust." Sidonis continued, giving him a wary look.
"Is this not the face of a trustworthy turian?" Garrus quipped.
"Laugh if you want, but I'm being serious. Never know when someone's going to come collecting a debt." He said darkly, looking off into the distance. Garrus made a mental note of that as Sidonis turned back to face him. "But you're right. Most people wouldn't stick their necks out for a total stranger. So why did you? What's your story? You don't look like you're from around here." Lantar asked curiously.
"Am I that obvious?" Garrus replied blinking innocently. Sidonis chuckled.
"It's the way you carry yourself. The way you've been scanning the streets around us while we walk." Garrus's eyes rose in surprise. "Yeah, I noticed." Sidonis said with a snicker. "If that stick was wedged any farther up your ass you wouldn't be able to walk. I'm guessing you just got out of the military."
Garrus smiled ruefully.
"Something like that."
The other turian smirked and gave Garrus a lazy salute. "Wow. You're really slumming it then." Garrus shrugged.
"It felt like the right thing to do; besides, that krogan was Blood Pack. Criminals like that need to be taken down a peg."
"So what," Sidonis said questioningly. "You're just some kind of…wandering do-gooder, just walking up to people and solving their problems?"
"Well, when you say it like that it sounds stupid." Garrus replied with a lop-sided grin. "But that's the gist of it. On Omega, all I have to do is point and shoot to find a criminal. It makes things easier."
Sidonis snorted ruefully. "It's never that black and white."
Garrus cocked his head sideways at Sidonis. "Sounds like you have some experience in that area." Sidionis shrugged.
"Sometimes I swear this place is alive, digging its claws into your skin and whispering into your ear. Before you know it, you're doing things you never thought you'd do. Let's just say that Omega changes people and leave it at that." That faraway look entered his eyes again, and Garrus wondered mildly what he was thinking about. Sidonis only appeared to be in his early twenties. A bit young to be world-weary, but he talked like a war veteran.
"Well, what about you Sidonis? What's your story. You don't strike me as the mercenary type."
"Ah, well, I just got fired from my job at Omega First, so I was in the mood to celebrate." Sidonis said with a wave of his hand. Garrus ran a search on the company as soon as Sidonis mentioned it, watching the information scroll by on his visor. Omega First was a legitimate security contractor; or at least as legitimate as one could get on the station, actually providing security. They didn't deal drugs, smuggle weapons or people, but they tended to respect the gangs and stayed out of their territory. Interesting.
"What was that all about anyway?" Garrus asked, jerking a finger behind them in the direction of Afterlife.
"Oh him?" Sidonis said with contempt. "Sore loser. Convinced himself I was cheating at cards." He said with a note of regret. "And now I'm broke on top of that. My winnings are back there on the floor of the club."
Garrus nodded with understanding, before rubbing his chin in thought. Had it really been three weeks since the last time he'd interacted with something beyond killing them or ordering food? And was he really considering this? What was wrong with him?
"Well, you know," Garrus blurted before he could convince himself not to. "Us wandering do-gooders could always use someone to watch our backs.
Sidonis stopped walking and stared at him curiously. "You offering me a job? That's a pretty unconventional way to go about it."
"My life's been nothing but unconventional since…" Garrus said with a throaty chuckle before stopping himself and clearing his throat. "It's been unconventional for a while now. I used to be in law enforcement, wanted to do more." It was vague, but Sidonis was right. It paid to be cautious, especially when he didn't know how everything on Omega worked yet.
"But now you're here and what, you want to fight crime on Omega? The lawless space station? The one run by gang lords? Seems like a fool's errand."
Garrus shook his head. "Nothing's ever easy. But nothing's impossible either. A friend taught me that. I –we could do something about that Sidonis. Make those bastards think twice before murdering anyone in the streets."
Sidonis chuckled and clapped a hand to Garrus's back. "Oh, so now there's a we? I haven't agreed to anything yet remember?" The pair started walking again. "That's a real noble idea you got there, but news flash? There's like eight million people living on this station. Not to mention all the people that pass through on business. You figure at least a fourth of them are actively doing something illegal this very second. We could trip over a criminal just crossing the street. But tangling the gangs that run this station? It'll end with our heads on sticks, and I don't know about you, but I'm pretty attached to mine."
"That's why it won't just be the two of us." Garrus countered. "That's why we'll put together a team." He said with earnestness, the plan taking shape in his head as he thought about the crew that Shepard had pulled together. By rights, a disgruntled turian cop, a krogan bounty hunter, an asari archeologist and a quarian kid on her pilgrimage shouldn't have worked so well with the crew of a human military ship. But by the spirits, Shepard had made it work. She'd found a way to cut right to the core of a person and show them how much their help was needed; had been able to show them how to do better. Be better. Do what Shepard would have done. That was his first mistake, thinking he could do this on his own, no, he needed a team.
"We make waves. Start small, pick a district and find out who needs hurting. Prove we can get things done, and people; good people—will start lining up to join us."
Sidonis blew out a sigh and stared at him warily. "Man, did you practice that speech in a mirror or something?" Still, he seemed to be turning the idea over in his head. "You really think we could make a difference doing something like that?"
"Wouldn't be my first time." Garrus nodded. The younger turian dropped his gaze to the ground and ruminated. What are the odds that we're the only two people fed up with the way of things on this station?
"I assume you've got a starting point?"
"Yes," Garrus said carefully. "A red sand supplier whose dealers have been selling to kids."
"Is it personal?"
"No, it's justice." Garrus said with conviction. To his surprise, and slight embarrassment, Sidonis laughed.
"Spirits, you sound like one of those crappy holo-vids from the sixties. The ones about the relay three-fourteen incident."
"The humans call it the first contact war." Garrus said, managing to sound mildly affronted. Sidonis ignored the comment and brooded on his offer instead.
"You're making sense. I don't know if it'll work, but you're making sense."
"Something tells me that you were tired of being a security guard anyway. Tired of the gangs walking all over the people on this station." Garrus prodded. "You've been on this station longer than I have. You've seen how dark it can get, you said it yourself. Where's the harm in trying to make it a better place? If not for strangers, then for the people you care about?" It was a gamble adding that last question, but he hadn't been a detective for nothing. The faraway look entered Sidonis's eyes again. It was the look of a man who'd lost someone. The look of a man who'd lost a part of himself over time. But learning to read people had been a large part of his training, and he could tell that Sidonis had a good heart.
The kid just needed some guidance.
"Besides, I already know you can handle yourself in a fight." There was silence between them for a moment and then the other turian raised a glass.
"Ah, what the hell. I'm in. You just got to promise me you're not going to get me killed." Sidonis said airily. "I was bored of cheating mercs out of their credits anyhow." A cheeky grin stole over his face. "Hey, I said the krogan had convinced himself I was cheating. I never said he wasn't right."
Garrus stared at him in amusement. It seemed that there was more than one way to stick it to Omega's underworld. There was a joy in his chest; he hadn't expected it to be so easy to convince someone to work with him. Maybe Shepard had rubbed off on him more than he'd thought.
"So, how are you planning to pay me, anyway? Idealism is not an accepted currency in most places."
"Well," Garrus paused for a moment, not having thought much farther ahead than putting bullets in the people that needed it. Then he thought about the way that Shepard had meticulously checked the pockets of every terrorist, mercenary and gang member that had tried to kill them, stripped geth units for salvage and hacked every safe they came across with Spectre authority in order to keep funding their missions.
"You keep what you kill." He replied sardonically after a moment. "The people we're going after won't need money when we're through with them, and it's not like there's any authority to turn it into."
Sidonis punched him lightly on the shoulder with a whoop. "It's a start. I don't expect to get rich doing this, but a man's got to eat." He rubbed his hands together. "Alright, let's say you've convinced me to do this because of the noble ideals and not the promise of credits. You're going to have to tell me more about this druglord…"