Thanks for the reviews!
Jack the Stalker: Thanks!
MEleeSmasher: You'll just have to wait and see ;)
GrimKid98: Don't worry, it isn't a very high risk of a zombie apocalypse. After all, there's are at least 2 other apocalypses that could happen too, and they also deserve their time to shine. And anyway, don't the Brethren Moons count as life? And it's not like they're liable to eat the Geth either if those also count as 'alive'. :D
...given the setup for the Reapers in this story, they might not qualify. Or the might. It depends on how you define it I suppose.
Chapter 2.2: Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
"Come on then, we've spent here long enough," Kasumi Goto said as she pushed away from her seat. "Let's go somewhere more secure, I've got this thing about discussing jobs where people can listen in."
"Oh?" Jack asked as he got up, too.
"Someone might hear what we're planning and decide to copy us," Kasumi explained. "I can't stand copycats."
"If you attempt to betray us, I will make you die slowly," Alma told her while tightly holding her Teddy Bear.
Zaeed nodded. "I've never heard that one before." He then grunted as he got out of the booth as well.
Jack grinned. "We're gonna get along great."
Kasumi laughed as she started walking towards the exit. "I can tell! Come on, slowpokes!"
Zaeed leaned against the booth's seating until Jack and Alma started following Kasumi. Then he took place in the rear of the group.
Jack felt Alma nudge him with psychic force as they neared the exit. He looked down at her. She was focused on the front wall of the bar. "There is a stationary group just outside. One of them is a strong psychic."
Jack frowned. "Well, I guess we're going to see how well our new friends handle a fight."
"Better than you, boy," Zaeed said from right behind.
Jack shrugged. "You'll get your chance."
Kasumi opened the door and walked through without pausing, crying out, "Hey there! Long time, no see!"
Jack heard the flanged, metallic voice from outside as it replied. "It's been a while since you and your partners left me for dead on Tungel."
He saw Kasumi shrug easily, not at all intimidated. "You're the one that wanted to kill us in the explosion and I say turnabout is fair play."
"Who's your friend?" Jack asked as he and Alma walked through the doorway and into a half circle of heavily armed Turian soldiers and robots. Their armor was white with bright blue highlights, but Jack could tell that they were professional soldiers despite the brightly colored armor. By his count there were eight identically armored solders and twenty-four bipedal assault drones armed with missile launchers and laser cannons. At the head of the half circle was a Turian in bone white heavy powered armor with actually glowing blue highlights. The armor was equipped with shoulder mounted cannons and he carried LMGs almost as big as Jack in each hand. Fortunately they were casually aimed at the floor at the moment, but Jack knew that they could be brought to bear on a moment's notice.
"I," the heavily armed leader said, "am Saren Arterius, Citadel Specter and the reason the Ob'enn Empire no longer exists."
"He used a psychic superweapon to drive insane everyone in in the Tause system, their home, after killing their leadership."
"They annoyed me," Saren explained.
Jack looked at Alma. "We've got real luck in finding the right sort of people."
"They seem to find us," Alma agreed.
"We're going to eat, and discuss your next job," Saren stated.
"Well, since you're paying," Zaeed said, apparently dismissing Saren's retinue.
Kasumi perked up. "And I know just the place, it's a super fancy and expensive Turanic restaurant, but I hear it's to die for."
"Do you want to find out?" Saren growled.
"Yep!"
"Mmmm, this is delicious!" Kasumi exclaimed. "I'm so glad you decided to pay for this!"
"I know!" Jack agreed. "And it's so reasonably priced too, only a thousand credits per person for this appetizer!"
Saren growled, crushing his steel cup in his power gauntlet. All of his still armed-and-armored retinue shifted uncomfortably as they pause in eating their shares of the sautéed vegetable dish. The entire group was seated on durable cushions around a low table, the center of which was a grill where the dishes were deposited on either dough or slices of either meat or a Turanic spud.
The assault drones targeted a nearby Drell patron when he stood too fast. The Drell froze in fear before slowly edging towards the exit, while the robots watched him.
"What do you wish to hire us for?" Alma asked before she used her right hand to eat slices of a citrus-like fruit wrapped in a thin slice of spiced meat. Her other hand was holding her Teddy Bear.
Saren sighed and nodded. "I wanted to hire you and Jack, here. What do you know about Aria?"
Jack shrugged as he grabbed more food. "Not much, you Alma?"
"She is the Queen of Omega, while she does not control the largest force in the Terminus, she does control Omega which is at a major hub of the relay network for the Terminus and she has the third largest fleet. She is the most influential person in the Terminus after the Shadow Broker."
Saren nodded. "Yes, she knows about almost everything that goes on or through here, and she helps Armacham and others collect test subjects and slaves."
Alma growled, her aura send waves of anger and nausea through everyone sitting at the table.
Jack put his hand on her shoulder and she hugged the Teddy Bear to her chest.
He looked at Kasumi, who nodded. "She's in deep with Armacham, they've provided her with an army of Replica to help her police Omega." Kasumi slyly glanced at Saren. "You're here for the auction, aren't you?"
"She is selling a stolen Prothean artifact, is facilitating slavers and is in league with the Patriarchy, a known terrorist group."
Zaeed grunted. "That's a guddamn lie and you know it, she's keeping that old warlord locked up."
Jack looked around in confusion. "The Patriarchy? What about them?"
Kasumi smirked knowingly and explained, "The Patriarchy are old school Krogan led by their four thousand year old Patriarch, a tough old bastard who survived and kept his faction together after the Turians bombed the Krogan worlds into the stone age. He and his people are the single largest faction of the Krogan and want a return to the 'good old days' of galaxy wide war for Krogan supremacy and a revocation of the Subugation. They're hard core and if you see any Krogan decorated in skulls and screaming about blood gods and skull thrones it's probably one of them or one of the Blood Pack."
"And he's currently a hostage of Aria," Zaeed added. "If he were free, he'd probably throw the entire Terminus into war, trying to carve out an empire so he can get revenge on the Citadel." Zaeed narrowed his eyes at Saren. "You want him getting free, don't you?"
"Oh, and he probably knows that the Asari councilor is getting blackmailed by Aria and if he moves against her, then Tevos is out," Kasumi continued, grinning now.
Saren shrugged. "I don't want war for the Citadel, if thet's what you are implying."
"No," Kasumi agreed, a vulpine grin spread wide now, "you want to drag everyone else into war and shake the Citadel out of its complacency, don't you? You've always supported direct, aggressive policy and now's a great chance for you to enact it with a reasonable excuse."
Jack frowned. "Why would Humanity get dragged into that war? Especially since you don't expect the Patriarch to win, and I didn't think the Batarians counted as being in the Terminus either."
"The Batarian Hegemony is aggressive and imperialistic, it would likely use the chaos to start expanding into others' territory," Alma explained.
Kasumi nodded. "But that's only if Aria gets taken care of and the Patriarch is able to rally his people."
"I, of course, wouldn't want to release such a dangerous terrorist if I had the opportunity to capture him," Saren said, leaning back slightly.
"But with all of the chaos of an attack on Aria to recover your whatsit, you need some dangerous mercs to capture him for you, right?" Jack asked.
Saren nodded. "Exactly."
"Is it safe to discuss this here if the point of hiring us is discretion?" Alma asked.
Kasumi spoke up, still grinning. "Don't worry, there's a reason I picked this place, and a reason it is one of those places that invests in unobtrusive customer privacy." She gestured up to the ceiling and around. "This place uses low level mass effect fields to interfere with sound waves carrying through the air. If you've been hearing a low hum, that's them. And of course that's not even getting into the place's other anti-eavesdropping methods or the ones that me, Zaeed and birdman here all deployed as soon as we arrived." Kasumi paused before grinning mischievously. "And of course me and Zaeed don't really care if it gets out or not and Saren knows this."
"Timely completion of the mission is more important than discretion, anyway" Zaren supplied.
"He's got tenure," Kasumi explained, to which Saren snorted.
Alma nodded.
Jack clapped his hands before rubbing them together. "So? What do you say to helping Saren here with his political agenda and starting an intra-galactic war?"
Alma looked from Jack to Saren. "How much does it pay?"
Saren's mandibles twitched and spread. "One hundred thousand."
"For each of us."
"Deal," he agreed with his mandibles spread in a Turian grin.
"Cheapskate," Zaeed grunted, causing Alma to scowl in realization.
Saren chuckled. "I'm efficient."
"So, what's the plan?" Jack interrupted before Alma could say anything. Alma huffed and settled back.
"Well," Kasumi said, "Saren usually goes for the brute force approach of killing everything in or near his way."
Saren nodded. "It gets results."
"Most actions do, birdman," Kasumi agreed. "So he'll be blowing down the front door. I'll do tech support, and Zaeed and you will keep Alma from getting ventilated while she shows us why there were no survivors on Pragia."
"Pragia?" Jack asked.
"It was the planet the facility was on," Alma explained.
"Oh, thanks." Jack hummed for a moment before grinning himself. "If we're going through the front door, then I have a REV8 mech that could help make introductions."
Saren and Zaeed both nodded at the same time. "A solid heavy powered armor," Zaeed commented.
"It is," Saren agreed.
"It's a mech," Jack growled.
"Sure it is," Kasumi agreed as she ruffled his hair which caused Alma and Jack to shoot her a glare. Seeing their glares, she grinned back at them. "Shall we get your mech? We've got an auction to crash."
Zaeed sighed. "Can we finish eating first? There are a few more dishes that Saren was going to buy for me."
"Like dessert? I think this cutie here could use some ice cream," Kasumi said gesturing at the still glaring Alma.
"I'd like some too," Jack said before there was a screech as Saren's gauntlets clawed through the table.
"And I guess he'll be buying a new table too!"
With the necromorphic agents released throughout the station, four Blue Suns strike teams of eight each were sent out in order to track down the two targets and strike when they are vulnerable. They'd had to wait for the psionic-biological agents to be released before heading out in order to avoid attracting undue attention to Umbrella's movements.
The Regional Director for the Omega Sector may not have cared about Omega, but he did care about himself, and the possibility of retaliation by one of the soon-to-be injured parties. Therefore, Saneguy decided to maximize the chaos and minimize his chances of future complications by sending another four strike teams to eliminate Aria. Her death would break any fragile peace that might survive the impending violence and help secure his own escape as the petty thugs and warlords on and near Omega fought for the scraps left over.
He did not discount the possibility that if Aria's death was confirmed soon after the appearance of the necromorphs, one of the less intelligent, if such a thing could be said of them, warlords attacking the station in order to 'restore order' or another blatant power grab. It would backfire horribly for anyone who tried, but his superiors didn't care about that and neither did he.
While he was aware of Saren's rather blatant plan to attacking the Afterlife during the auction, her death was not assured, nor was Saren's. If Saren died, then he could expect a reward from the Board. At least, he hoped so. Then again it might just be another multi-billion credit bonus and not a better posting. It was worth a shot at least. It wasn't like Saren could fight all the way to him before he escaped anyway.
Then he received a report that one of the Blue Suns soldiers from the first group had killed a pedestrian and started a firefight just a section away from the main entrance to the Umbrella headquarters. He groaned and shook his head. At least the group headed after Aria hadn't gotten into trouble yet.
A/N: And here's the mission. I wonder what Aria's thinking...
Up next is chapter 2.3: Spoilin' For a Fight.