Chapter 7: Departure
Nolta put the last item in the heavy-duty rucksack Tokus had given him. The canvas-bag had a plethora of pouches, loops and secret compartments that could hold enough equipment to outfit a small army. Most of the things that filled the bag were re-useable nutrient paste tubes, but a few metal bricks to serve as clips as well as a few medigel tubes and suit-patches filled out the itinerary.
The bare essentials, he thought to himself. The pilgrim regarded the small credit chit that he'd been given by the captain. Tokus was nothing if not generous.
"You ready?" Kala's query caught him off-guard and Nolta found his hand on the butt of his sidearm before realizing the young woman was standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame. A wry smile shone across her mouth.
"Not ef y' keep doing that." He lifted himself from behind the table and swung the rucksack over his shoulder. "What're you brengen'?"
Kala pulled a similar bag from her shoulders and held it open, exposing a pair of combat knives, a weeks' worth of MRE's, and a few personal effects. "Just the basics."
She flashed a blindingly white smile and took his arm. "C'mon, let's go."
Nolta once again cursed himself for being unable to refuse to take her along. It was unfair to both of them, but try as he might, he just couldn't summon the willpower to tell her no. He tried again to summon the resolve, but his strength failed at the sight of her brilliant smile. One. More. Time. "Kala, y' realize thes'll never werk. We're not the same species, not even the same amino base. I can't even kess you wethout resken' m' life."
The light in her eyes dimmed slightly for a moment before returning with a renewed vigor. "It'll work. Nothing worth having is ever easy."
The pilgrim stopped for a minute. He'd heard those words before. "What?"
"We can make it work."
"Ne, after that."
"Nothing worth having is ever easy?"
"Aye. Someone said that t' me back on th' fleet, b'fore I left. Can't remember who et was." Somehow, he didn't feel so bad about bringing her along now.
XxXxX
The speeder that the batarian rider gang had brought in for repairs sat in the back of the chop-shop, serving mostly as a scrap piece. Whenever a part in another vehicle needed to be replacement, Rikka would bolt over to the speeder and check it for the necessary component. A vehicle of that size could only house so many parts, however, and the quarian's brief sojourns to the vehicle became less frequent as she would recall having taken a given piece from the machine earlier.
It was on one of these brief 'expeditions' that she found the speeder's memory core. It wasn't the piece she needed, but piqued her interest enough to draw her back to it during her break. After removing the core, Rikka sat down in her favorite corner of the shop and set to work deciphering the memory stored aboard the unit. Most of the data pertained to 'hideouts' and gang territories, things that Rikka took note of as places to avoid. A funny thought, considering that this was Omega.
There were a series of files, however, that caught her eye. Several maps detailed the layout of the station, but the majority of these were in some way linked with the 'Afterlife' bar from which Omega's 'queen' ran her operations. Aria T'Loak, one of the few people on the station that Krovak Torr mentioned by name. She was also one of the few people he bothered to hate.
She looked at the data for a few more minutes before cutting her break short to return to work. The newest machine in the garage was a state-of-the-art vehicle that she'd gone to the scrap speeder to acquire a new repulsor coil for. Rikka took the part and swapped it out before giving the system a test run. A gentle blue light bathed the ground beneath the craft and it lifted a solid meter above the garage floor. The tech powered the system down and the speeder softly floated back to the metal bulkhead.
The shop was quiet as she proceeded to run diagnostics and tests on the other systems to ensure that everything was in working order. No sooner had she finished than the thought of the speeder data reemerged in her mind. A pensive frown pulled at the corners of her mouth. Why would a simple batarian rider gang be involved in anything dealing with Aria? They had shown themselves arrogant and rash, but even a group of young batarian males would have better sense than to challenge the ruthless asari.
The quarian let her eyes scan the shop, searching to see if there were any other tasks that required her attention. Seeing none, she ambled over to the work schedule and maintenance logs to see if she could find something she'd overlooked. Nothing. Had Torr been there, she would have asked him for an assignment. As it was, he was out receiving a shipment from one of his suppliers or some such. Solomon had gone with him, leaving Rikka alone with nothing to do.
She returned to the memory core and began flipping through the documents again.
XxXxX
Tokus bid the young couple farewell at the Bachjret ward's primary docking complex. The turian had secured another transport run from his friend Serk, with instructions for the pilot to ferry the two to their chosen destination. Nolta had originally intended to stay on the Citadel for a few weeks to look for work. A brief discussion with Tokus had proven sufficient to dissuade him.
"The Citadel's expensive enough when you know the cheap places to stay. Any money you make working will get sucked up by lodging and food. You won't be able to set aside a single credit for your journey."
Nolta stepped into Serk's freighter, a well-kept, humble vehicle with few notable additions other than a miniaturized accelerator cannon for defense against light fighters. The weapon had only been used once, and then only against a wayward asteroid. The craft bore only the necessary registration markings and its name, leaving the exterior a bleak, gray-white shell.
Nolta noted that, despite it mediocre appearance, the vessel looked better than most found in the fleet. By virtue of their constant repairs, additions and modifications, most of the ships in the flotilla looked more like flying heaps of scrap metal than anything else. The Mekanag, at least, bore a smooth hull, comprised of only a few separate plates.
The quarian took one last look at the Citadel before stepping inside the freighter's familiar interior and sitting down across from Kala.
Serk stood in the middle of the room between the two. Nolta quickly realized that the turian's black tattoos almost exactly matched those that adorned Tokus' face. "Welcome to the Mekanag. She's not the most impressive ship to look at, but she does well enough for a private trader like myself. Tokus asked me to give you two the best seat in the house. Not that I kept those from you guys last time." He stifled a small laugh.
"He really picked a good time of year to ask me to do this, don't get a whole lot of commissions in my neck of the woods right now. I usually just prowl around the galaxy for the best jobs for a while until the tourist season heats back up. So, have you chosen a destination?"
Nolta gave a sharp nod. There were tons of possible places. They could return to Korlus and try to find a drive core, search for scrap out in one of the many orbital ship graveyards, or they could go to his fallback plan. Eezo was always a precious commodity in the fleet, and Nolta realized its significance even more acutely in light of his gift. "Caleston. We'll start weth Caleston."
Both Kala and Serk's eyes widened.
"Caleston? Why there? There's nothing there but independent eezo miners trying to muscle in on E.A.E.'s stuff."
Nolta gave a confident nod. "Exactly."
Serk shrugged and made his way up to the cockpit. Kala flashed a questioning look at her companion. "What do you mean, 'exactly'?"
"I've been doin' lots o' research about the planets en that area o' space, Caleston's got the most eezo of all of 'm. Plenty o' endependant miners too, perfect for m' to get en, earn some o' th' stuff fer the fleet and fenesh m' pelgremage."
Kala bit her lip. She hadn't really considered exactly what they'd be doing on the journey, or for that matter, its conclusion. Looking back now, her decision to accompany him seemed foolish. In the end, though, her words in their earlier conversation rang through her head. "Nothing worth having is ever easy."
"Yer worried eh?"
She nodded, then offered a faint smile and took Nolta's hands in her own.
"Me too," his thick accent rolled from behind the faceplate. "Me too."
XxXxX
Aria was pleasant enough, at least, as pleasant as a dictator in perpetuity could be. The asari had proven especially accommodating when she learned where the data she'd been trying to track for three months had disappeared to.
"You found it where exactly?" T'Loak's smooth voice flowed from her tongue as though the quarian sitting uncomfortably next to her were an old friend.
"A, uh, batarian rider gang. They had it in their speeder." Rikka was still obviously nervous.
"And you stole it from them?" Aria grinned.
How did one answer that question safely? "Well…"
"It's okay, hon, this is Omega, nothing is sacred here." The asari's words were meant to sooth, but Rikka found herself bristling. "So, how does…" Aria pursed her lips in thought. "...15,000 sound?"
The quarian's breath nearly caught in her throat. "Fif-… …fifteen thousand!" She squeaked.
"That data's worth quite a bit in the right places. I'd rather my security not have to seal off half of the bar." A warm smile graced the Matron's lips.
"I, uh, yes. Fifteen sounds fair." The pilgrim attempted to maintain a degree of composure. Fifteen thousand credits would be a significant pilgrimage gift on its own.
xXx
Rikka'Nall nar Tugara made her way back to Torr's machine shop in a daze, the credit chit tucked neatly away in a secret pouch in her suit. Torr had given her permission to keep or sell any of the rider gang's speeder parts as she'd seen fit, she'd decided to use the parts to supplement the krogan's business. The money was rightly hers, but she still felt an obligation to him somehow.
After reaching the machine shop, Rikka drew the chit and added its sum to her personal account. After a few more minutes of thought, she deducted five thousand from the chit and added it to the chop shop's register. Torr had been good to her, she'd cushion her departure in a few days (wherever she'd be going) with a 'small' gift to the krogan.
Author's Note:
Don't expect any updates for the story for a few weeks minimum. Awakening's revision is likely to consume all of my writing energies until I deem it complete.
Choosing a location for Nolta to go to was exceedingly difficult. I scoured the codex for a planet with suitable 'accommodations' that the quarian would be able to afford. In the end, the one that best suited his persona (in terms of being singularly driven) was indeed Caleston: a largely uninhabited planet with several small, private eezo mining establishments, providing him with an opportunity to procure exactly the kind of gift the fleet could use. I has sad-face, though. The next chapter or two are going to deal with some pretty heavy/serious issues, near slave-labor and such.