Chapter Ten: Safety is a Lie

Zane was kneeling on a rooftop across from the building he was staring at. It was a fancy apartment and was nearly as tall as the Dantius Towers. Luckily Zane only had to deal with the upper floors. Mainly the second-to-last and last floor. Which instead of being like most hotels it didn't have large balconies. But rather, they were more like office floors with larges window panes holding who knew what. The second-to-last floor held much of the guards the target had for protection and the last floor held more guards, the data, and the target…a Handler for the Shadow Broker.

Zane doubted it was his Handler from two years ago, Handler was more like a rank or position with the Shadow Broker rather than a codename. This would serve Liara well if he pulled it off. The Handler was a major part of the well-oiled machine of the Shadow Broker. And if he was dealt with then it would take a long time for a replacement to fix the damage caused. Especially if Zane caused a lot of havoc.

Shepard and the others had no idea Zane was doing this. As far as they were concerned he was on shore leave while they helped Miranda with her sister. And Zane was confident in Shepard's abilities to see that through with his team. Tali and Garrus were with him on the mission and their tech expertise plus Garrus' experience with Eclipse would help immensely.

Zane smiled as he had music begin to play in his ears as he got to work. He rose from his kneeling position and walked to a box-like object. He scanned it with his omni-tool and the sides slammed down and a large harpoon gun revealed itself.

"This is going to suck." Zane said to himself as he aimed the gun high towards the tower's roof. He pulled hard on the trigger and watched the harpoon with a cable attached zoom passed the dark skies. Far below were the skycars he now feared so he didn't have to worry about civilians seeing him and getting hurt.

He walked towards the cable and pulled out a hook to keep him on it. He placed the hook on the cable and secured it. He flipped up his hood and mask and cracked his neck and fingers. The fear and nervousness he always got before a Reaper mission returning. And now the added fear of falling showed up.

"Here goes nothing." He said and ran off the edge of the building he was on. He rushed passed the large gap between his building and the target building. As he neared the building he pressed two commands on his omni-tool. The first cut off the power to the target floors. And the second one activated a visor he had since his time as the Reaper. The visor gave him night vision and saw very little use. A flash of white was all he saw for a moment and then he could see clearly. He was nearing the top floor but Liara's research told him the glass was resistant to heat, lasers, and even explosions. But one window panel on the second floor had yet to be upgraded with this "special" glass. He slammed against his hooked cable and a mechanism activated.

The cable split in two and he went from ziplining to roping across the gape. He threw his feet in front of him and slammed against the glass. The window he slammed into didn't even budge but he knew where to go. He shifted to the right and was careful to be silent so guards inside wouldn't hear him. He made it to the specified panel and activated his omni-blade. The searing hot blade easily cutting into the glass panel. He made a large circle and kicked it into the building. The panel made a *thump* sound and he swung in. The city lights outside casting a genuinely gloomy feeling into the room and the floor as a whole. He unhooked himself from the cable and pulled out his M4. He scanned the room-which looked like a meeting room- and saw no hostiles and made his way towards the hallway. He knew this whole floor was covered with Shadow Broker mercs and had effectively made sure that the hotel staff could not access the top floors. But he had a plan for the mercs that didn't require him to essentially go room to room checking each corner for mercs. Zane reached into his pocket and pulled out a small cylinder object. The top had several dials and ominous red lights that faintly shined. He placed this charge in the room and turned the dial as far as it could go. He then slowly went towards the door to exit the room.

"Damn generator. Of all the days…" A guard could be heard saying outside the room. The sound of footsteps approaching was heard as well. Zane was quick to back away into the shadows and pull out his Carnefix. A single guard walked through the door and passed him. Zane gently kicked the door closed and immediately launched his omni-blade deep into the back of the guard's throat. He choked and sputtered but not for long as he soon died grasping his throat.

Zane scanned the body with his eyes and noticed his weapons were silenced.

"Probably to hide executions." He deduced and knew mercs in the employ of the Shadow Broker were also hitmen for hire. He bent down and grabbed a pistol with a silencer on it. It was a phalanx but he had no use for it he already had one in his collection he simply needed the silencer. Thankfully silencers in the Mass Effect universe were interchangeable. He screwed the silencer onto his Carnefix and began to make his way towards the door once more. He didn't hear movement and slowly opened the door.

Many steps could be heard approaching and Zane shut the door behind him and activated his cloak. A squad of mercs passed him with one turning towards an adjacent door.

"I'll check the kitchen." This merc said as he opened the door. Zane was fast to run at him with the silenced weapon out. He shot the back of the merc's head several times, blood exploding out of the man's skull. As the merc's body slumped to the ground Zane grabbed it and dragged it into the darkness with him. Zane looked around the room and saw it was a good spot to place another charge and did so. Repeating the process as before.

"Two more should do it." He thought and made his way out of the darkness. As he approached, a door opened while he was out in the open. And his cloak had yet to recharge.

"Luke, you…in…here. Oh, spirits." A Turian asked beside a human female. Zane had to act quickly he ran at the duo and began to open fire. "Get back up!" The Turian told the female and was about to raise his rifle but Zane had already closed the gap. He grabbed the Avenger the Turian held and spun it out of the merc's grasp and threw it at the female. The rifle hit the back of her head hard and she fell and had to shake the strike off.

"Atton?" She asked, her voice groggy. A concussion was likely from the force of the strike.

"Jess!" The Turian yelled out followed by Zane delivering an elbow into his face. The Turian recoiled giving Zane time to stab the Turian in the chest. The merc gasped and then began to wheeze for air as he fell to his back. Zane looked down at the pained grey eyes of the Turian and felt nothing for him. As the Turian tried to regain lost blood and air Zane made his way to the groggy and hurt female. He kicked her onto her back and had to say she was quite the looker. Her hair was the color of midnight and her eyes were darkened by the room but were clearly brown. Her pale skin shining in the dim lit room. She was a new merc and probably joined with the Turian and the human he killed when he entered this room. Come to think of it, they had a similar face structure and hair color.

"Must've been cousins or siblings." He thought.

"Atton…I'm scared." She said as she looked at the faceless face of the Reaper. Zane gave no words of comfort when he quickly took his pistol and shot her in the forehead.

"No…Jess." The Turian whispered in pain as he reached out to her dead body. Zane quietly walked to the Turian and looked down at him and pointed the pistol at his skull. The Turian looked up at him his purple markings were visible with his ash-colored carapace. Crisp grey eyes of hate looking at him. But they held a sort of mix of sadness and happiness that it would all be over soon.

"May you find your happiness in the next life." Were the only words he gave before pulling the trigger. Zane reloaded his weapon and made his way out of the room quickly and quietly. The apparent confusion from the lights going out allowing him to have that small fight with no one noticing.

He snuck into another room that looked like a barracks of some sort and noticed several sleeping mercs. He quietly placed a charge in the room and moved on. He was careful to dodge more guards and patrols as he made his way down the hall. He went to the room closest to the elevator. This seemed to be a data center of sorts. It may have contained the info Liara needed but Zane had no way to be sure and wasn't willing to risk a failed mission for it. The Handler would have his own private data log on a separate generator and power system then the rest of the building. And this data center was essentially useless for the moment thanks to the lack of power. Besides, he didn't have the equipment to hack into it and download every bit of data from the data stores.

Two guards patrolled the cold room seemingly checking to see if any power could be restored to the links.

"Nope bad one here too. You know where those three newbies went?" One asked the other.

"No idea but when they get back I will shove my boot so far up their asses it will give a new meaning to sock puppets." He said causing the duo laugh as they went about their boring business. Zane snuck behind them as they walked beside each other. He was quick to kick the back of one's leg this merc fell to one leg grasping it.

"Shit!" He yelled and looked up to see his squadmate's head impaled by an omni-blade. He looked further and saw a gun barrel and all he saw last was a silent flash before darkness overcame him as well.

Zane put his tools away and grabbed his fourth and final charge and set it on a link in the middle of the room. Afterwards, he then went to the elevator. A tile could be opened on the ceiling and he pushed it and popped it off revealing the path to the top floor. It wasn't a long climb and wouldn't take him much time to get there. He was more worried about any surprises when he opened the door to the final floor.

Instead of taking the direct path and using the front door he decided a nearby duct would work just as well. He pulled out his pistol and shot out the gate and hopped to it from the cable and climbed in. It was a tight fit but Zane made do. He managed to be silent as he hovered over the halls of the last floor. When he found a suitable spot, he descended to the ground.

"The fuck?" He heard behind him and turned around. There stood another guard weapon pointed at him. Zane spun around as the guard began to fire at him. Zane shot his pistol at the guard. Their shots both missed but no doubt they alarmed the rest of the floor.

Angry, Zane ran at the guard and leaped at him his foot outstretched. His foot landed on the guard's face and took the man down. Quickly, Zane took his pistol and finished the guard with a single round to the head and put his pistol away.

"Time for the fun part." He said and grabbed his M4 with a smirk. A small team of guards bashed the door open and began to fire into the blackness. With the flickering of flashes from their weapons, Zane ran to a table and knocked it over. Their bullets chewing the table to almost nothingness quickly. He activated cryo rounds and peered from the disappearing cover and began to fire. The crackling of his weapon being the only sound before guards began to freeze on sight. He walked to the frozen men and women and his sonic-tool appeared on his arm pulsing angrily. And with a single punch to each of the frozen targets, they broke apart into ice particles and chunks.

In the darkness, Zane stalked the halls careful to not give away his exact position. He heard the sound of footsteps and quickly rounded the corner as he crouched to a knee. He then began to open fire. The squad was caught completely off guard and like the squad, before them, they were frozen before shattering into tiny pieces.

He continued to walk down a hall and heard more footsteps. These were then before and he waited. A squad ran passed him but Zane grabbed a hold of a straggler. He stabbed the merc in the back and his blade kept the merc still as Zane began to shoot the merc squad in the back. When they had all died Zane pushed the merc off his omni-blade. The merc fell down bleeding from a no doubt fatal wound. Zane however, couldn't take chances and quickly put a bullet through the merc's head. He reloaded his M4 then moved on.

Zane saw a lone door on the far side of the hall he stood in and made his way to the dark door. He reached to open it but thought against it. He upgraded his rifle to use incendiary rounds, aimed his rifle at the side of the door and fired -about chest high- and did the same for the other side. The bullets burned a hole through the wall and into the room. And then pressed a button to open the door. The door opened and he saw two guards on the ground their chests bleeding as they died slow deaths. He ended their misery quickly by shooting them in the head as he passed them.

"Gotcha!" A Turian yelled prematurely and Zane raised his omni-tool, his overload program ready to fire. He cast the upgraded overload at the man rising from behind the desk. The lightning rushed from his omni-tool to the Turian and brought the man to his knees. Zane kept it cast on him keeping him down as the Reaper walked to him.

He was a well-dressed Turian who had a visor across his eyes that was the color of green. The desk had many hard drives and computers on it with many more datapads. The pads contained information pertaining to many different things. Merc movements, Organization happenings, and information about different people. Liara, Shepard, Garrus, and the rest of the Normandy being the most notable. There was even a datapad for Nassana Dantius.

Zane kicked the pistol the Turian held out of his grasp and ended the electric submission of the man. Before the Turian could rise, Zane, grabbed him by the throat and slammed him onto the desk. He looked at the man's eyes and let the silence of the room seep in.

"Your stash. Where is it?" He asked.

"Downstairs…" The Turian began and Zane began to clutch the throat even harder.

"I am no fool unless you are. Your stash where is it? I won't be nice a second time." He threatened.

"Behind you." The Handler sputtered. Zane rose the man up and grabbed him by the back of the neck. Zane saw a picture on the wall and threw it off to reveal an eye scanner. He was in no mood to wait and grabbed the Turian's visor and ripped it off his head.

"Ahh!" The Handler yelled.

"Shut up." Zane said and slammed the man into the eye scanner. After a few seconds, an adjacent wall opened to reveal a small room. The walls replaced by large data stores. Zane cuffed the Turian and pulled out a pistol and shot the Turian's leg from behind the knee.

"Ah!" The Handler yelled and Zane threw him down to the ground.

"Can't have you running." Zane deadpanned and walked into the room. He quickly began downloading as much info as he could. The Handler's private servers carried a lot less -but much more valuable- information then the data drives downstairs. And Zane wanted it all.

"You are a dead man you hear me! A dead man!" Zane laughed at him as the Handler tried to threaten him.

"Says you and so many others and like them…you will be under the ground in no time." He said silently and let silence rule the room for a time. He was tapping his foot to the beat to the music he was listening to as he downloaded the data.

"No one steals from the Broker and gets away with it." The Handler swore.

"You're still talking? I should've shot your throat. Want me to correct that?" And again, the man was silent.

"Whose paying you huh?" Zane was silent. "Organization?" He tried and got nothing. "That fuckwit Berkard?"

"Who the hell was that?"

"Liara T'soni?" He said and without thinking. Zane cracked his neck. "Ah…yes her, that Asari bitch. She has been a pain for a long time. The Observer is watching right now and you don't even…"

"You mean Nyxeris?" The Handler stuttered. "Yea I know about her and I told Liara about her before I came here. Liara doesn't even know I haven't completed the mission. Nyxeris is probably dead by now. There are advantages to being in the Broker's employ once upon a time." Zane said.

"Wait…I know you. I've heard of you. You're supposed to be on the Citadel. The Reaper, some want-to-be vigilante."

"I wouldn't call myself a 'want-to-be.'" Zane said with a smile.

"Liara still isn't safe. You know we have eyes everywhere." The data stopped downloading after the last bits of data was successfully transferred. Zane charged up his overload again and smashed his fist through the console and let the sparks fly. The data drives sparking and soon shutting down with smoke coming from their frames.

Zane turned and walked up to the scared and wounded Turian and kicked the man in the face and pointed his pistol at The Handler's head. His eyes shooting daggers at Zane. Blood running out of the Turian's mouth and teeth beside his face.

"As do I and she is perfectly safe now." The Reaper said and was ready to pull the trigger.

"She will never be safe…safety is a lie as you and I know all too well." And then Zane finally shut him up for the last time with a pull of the trigger.

Zane walked to the elevator and restored power via his omni-tool. He called the elevator and got in before descending. When he passed several floors, he pressed another button the building shook for a moment and Zane smirked. The rumbling of explosions echoed throughout the building and would provide a good distraction for him to leave undetected.

"Another mission complete." He said as the elevator stopped. He walked out quickly but not suspiciously and pulled down his mask and hood. People were confused about the rumbling of the building and it was the perfect cover for him to escape amidst the confusion.

Zane opened his omni-tool and scanned the newly downloaded information. He was looking for a location and soon found it. He called for a cab to meet him and got ready for the surprise meeting.

…

Tali thought it was sweet of Shepard to have Miranda see her sister before they left. The hell Miranda went through to get this far could not be explained. Betrayal, excitement, a time limit. The bosh'tet deserved to say her goodbyes to her sister after all that.

"Well isn't that cute." She heard a voice say and besides her was Zane. He was sitting on a railing and his hunched figured looked like he was tired…very tired. Unlike the rest of the crew, he didn't get rest before Miranda's mission and instead he disappeared. He had said he was taking a shore leave but she didn't believe him.

"Zane I'll be honest. I didn't figure you for the sappy reunion type." Garrus said.

"What? Oh, no I was talking about the redhead back in the corner." He said pointing to a lonely girl in the back she looked to be in her mid to late twenties waiting for her shuttle. Her hair was a dark red color and was too much of a perfect dark scarlet color to not have been dyed. Her pale skin shined in the dark corner. Tali heard Garrus laugh. It only angered her more.

"Fair enough." The Turian said.

"But seriously it was nice of Shepard to let Miranda meet her sister in person. As someone who lives in the shadows, it can be a lonely place." He said and let the statement trail as Shepard and Miranda returned.

"Oh, hi Zane." Shepard said as they approached.

"Shepard, Miranda nice to see you." Zane replied and then got on his omni-tool reading something. Tali saw his eyes nearly glued to the screen as he absorbed the words silently.

"Where were you?" She asked him and he pried his eyes from the screen.

"Admittedly I was working." He simply replied and judging by the way he was tired and hadn't slept she figured it wasn't him working but instead the Reaper. She could only feel sorry for whoever evoked that level of wrath.