"Hello Sir? Are you still there?" The voice of a young woman came through the small comm speaker. "I'm sorry to inform you but the account numbers you are trying to access are deactivated and cannot be recovered due to estate forfeiture. All legal claims had to be made within ten years of dormancy as per regulations. We're sorry for the loss of your relative but the matter is unrecoverable. Is there anything else I can help you with today?"
Jason closed the comm, cutting off the call. He couldn't trust himself to keep calm, just unclenching his fist was hard. It took everything just fighting back the urge to rip the stupid box off the wall. Sitting quietly he turned the sum of hours of effort over in his left hand. One small credit chit of 29 credits from a single burner account that he had recalled the number for. Everything else came with a very final confirmations of nothing.
He pulled himself up, slung his backpack over a shoulder and exited the small stall in a short row of sterile similar sound separated booths. This wonder of service now constituted the sum total of personal banking offerings by United Systems Credit. He was done with them either way. Jason W. didn't exist. No accounts, no records, no credits. Nothing. He had to pretend to be his own fictitious son just to speak a to someone who at least sounded like they had tried to help.
He walked past the queue that still ran out the door, lost in his predicament. He had managed to get one interesting piece of information. He looked at the small credit chit in his hand before slipping it into a pocket. Either not all accounts are equal or this one had been used within the last three years. It wasn't much to go on but it was a start.
His feet led him toward a food market. Fuck knew he needed to eat, he felt hollow. The Asian Fusion buffet looked good - ten credits was a lot; plus one for a terminal booth. Jason offered the chit, getting 18 back and an escort to his seat.
A few plates in and he flicked the extranet terminal on. Mentally ready to face the fray.
An hour later the server checked in, another credit for time.
He'd searched. The massive missing hole of his life and those he knew growing more and more apparent. Barely anything existed in public records of the Alliance's early days at the Citadel. Just terse histories made in mention against the serial chaos that came after. Jason scrolled to current news and backward through the insanity of recent history. The rogue specter.. the Citadel battle.. Geth.. Eden Prime.. Skyllian Verge.. Baterians-. holy crap.. they had left. The Baterians had actually left the Council accords.
Jean had been right.
He looked at the date; she'd been six years early. But she had been right.
It had also hurt the Systems Alliance. Badly.
So much for the power of having influence and the prestige of an embassy.
He tried searching the record for Jean, the Alun.. or the old Alliance Insight teams. Nothing.
His hands hesitated over the keyboard before he slowly typed a name .. a front.. the extranet browser paused while it loaded then presented a site not found. Which simply wasn't true, he checked the address. It had linked him to somewhere. He pulled the meta and traced the host, the hosts' host. The trail burrowed through patent shells and redirects eventually landing on something he was not expecting. A simple golden hexagon in a similarly stylised geometric laurel. He closed and cleared the browser.
"Cerberus.. Fuck." He cursed under his breath.. the incident report of the SSV Geneva had been fresh reading.. what.. a month ago? He fast forwarded mentally and corrected.. a long time ago. The guard dog.. if they were around then maybe their keeper was too.
The rumor of Cerberus was a bad omen back then.. it was one of the reasons he had wanted out of Titan; their once ragtag idealist post-grad dream of an organization that would strive to help humanity as it ventured into the stars. They hadn't been stupid either.. everything was about the narrative in the beginning; the Systems Alliance needed to be good for humanity.. humanity needed to believe in it.
Thats where Titan came into the picture, influence and policy. And it had worked. There were the two founders.. Cronus and Rhea, both were well connected and made up the key the patrons driving the growing engine of what they had forged within the instruments of the Alliance.
It had felt good.. Alun, Jean had himself working under the pseudonyms of Coeus, Phoebe and Crius. So much happened and so fast. Then came Shanxi.. the first contact war.. the galaxy ripped open. Overnight humanity went from reaching for the stars to grasping at them, flailing in the depths of trying to find its place in an established order.
They had tried to continue. Jason had quickly grown wary of morally dubious and questionable assignments that eventually led to an all out argument between him and Cronus on humanity's future role in the galactic context. Cronus wanted an edge. He always needed something to prove a plus one that humanity could have over everyone else. Jason had dared to disagree, arguing for the merits of more collaborative approaches, the galaxy being a collective system needed symbiotic methods if all out conflict was to be avoided. Cronus argued that collaboration would eventually strangle humanity.. good while it lasted but ultimately becoming its own downfall… Jason couldn't help but recognise the pattern.
It had gone downhill pretty fast from there on. The Titans had become victims of their own hubris, unable to formulate a progressive plan without adopting a subversive agenda. By the time he spoke to Rhea on his leaving the organization there were already rumors that other members were leaving to a rumored rival. That was the power of distraction and disillusionment, to Cronus it was their failure to not see his plan. Jason hadn't wanted anymore. He'd ignored Cronus' rants on loyalty and duty and had thrown himself into his Alliance work, and enjoyed it. Persuading Alun and Jean to follow suit. They didn't need to enable the organization they believed in through working for another; the Alliance was enough and it was good to them.
But now, somehow, the Systems Alliance looked like a military organization through and through. This was never the vision. Jason scrolled back in the recent history scrawled down the screen.. stopping at the Baterian break away; Then came Mindor, then raiders hitting colonies in the Skyllian Verge.. Elysium.. Torfan.. everything just escalated again and again. He scrolled forward, the fleets, the bristling war-machine .. the Citadel battle.. Humanity had become a weapon.
He pulled up an image of the massive Geth dreadnought that had attacked the Citadel. Something about it crawled up his spine-
"-Closing in 2 minutes.. that'll be two credits, thank you. Bye."
Fifteen credits.
He was out of time. Jason's memory of the last few days was feeling disjointed but it still hammered home Alun's name drop of Leto, the mere recollection boiled his blood. He had been sent to die for the greed of his former friends who'd blackmailed his actual friends into using him.
That, he could focus on.
He rubbed his temples.. Everything else was flavor.
Jason hurriedly typed in one last directory search to the accompanying sounds of the restaurant pointedly closing in the background.
One result flashed up. Jason memorized the cryptic line and cleared the console. Leaving the restaurant to walk into a dead quiet and dim street.
He had an address. if was off grid and off the net. Now he just needed was time and means - either of which could cost more than everything else.
Jason sighed. He was unsure whether the Alliance that he believed in existed anymore. It certainly didn't look like it. It certainly didn't feel like it either. You couldn't effect change without effort in affecting it first.
It wasn't like anyone was expecting on him, depending on him or needing him. The Titans were gone, one way or another.. even so he'd long ago grown to dislike the Crius he'd been.. perhaps he had to reclaim the idea he'd, now, long ago given up on. Crius died to the old order... Cirius could reclaim something he'd lost.
There was something incredibly freeing about the prospect of reinvention.
That was enough motivation to power him through the lower wards. The rest of the motivation lay in two words and a location: Jenny Elkia, Elysium.
Anagrams were a useful toy. It was worrying that Jean had used her maiden name, but a lot could happen in almost nineteen years; he caught himself and looked around as though to drive the reality back in.. a lot HAD happened. He could only hope that there would eventually be time for more answers than questions.
—*—
Jason watched a grizzled Krogan carefully. The lower ward merchant district was notorious for its plethora of less reputable characters. He erred on giving the benefit of doubt unless circumstances indicated otherwise, but you could never quite be certain.
Zol, or that was his stated name, of Killing Curiosities turned the pistol over in his hands. The Krogan's store was down an alley off of the main market square. Set into the wall with a bonafide windowed storefront that even showcased various relics and collectors items of varying degrees of lethality. What had caught Jason's eye, beyond the trade prospect,was a small sign scratched in bad Kelish runes reading 'hlep watned'.
"Not bad." The item was turned over again, and an eyepiece donned for uncharacteristically detailed inspection. The deep graveled tone of the Krogan's voice hardly carried in the noise from the bustling space outside. "Old, for humans. Rosenkov. Tough to come by, decent grade, heavy caliber.. still got an internal heatsink.. very desirable. The power source was what got these in the end.. I'm surprised you found a working one." He looked up curiously, ".. or recently used one. I'll give you two hundred."
Jason scoffed. "Please, if I wanted spare change I'd go to that Salarian."
The Krogan looked amused and affronted. "Zink? You wouldn't get fifty. He'd scrap it. "
"But you wouldn't." Jason cast his eyes over the sprawling and carefully tended collection of weapons and oddities. The krogan even had a partially restored Kirzon, a massive flamethrower from the pre-humanity Rachni wars.. banned on more worlds than most would care to count. Although if one of these was ever pointed your way you'd probably be wasting your last thoughts bothering with the legality of your murder. "I came here because I know a collector when I see one."
Jason mugged as confidently as he could muster. Frankly, he needed the credits, any credits. A couple of hundred should see him through a few days to get his bearings or a job.
The door binged as another Krogan stumped into the shop, shoving past Jason and dumping a heavy parcel on the counter. "Move ape."
Zol ignored the newcomer who glared his way.
"Three hundred. There's not many buyers for-". He was interrupted by the brown armor clad Krogan who whipped back a heavy tarp from what could be described as a minigun suffused with horrific death.
"Returns. Now."
Zol paused, nodding a curt apology as he carefully put the pistol down on a neatly set out cloth. He placed two hands on the counter before facing the interrupter. "You're interrupting. I don't do returns without a record of purchase. All sales are final."
The last word was matched by the charging squeee of a shotgun pointed very much in Zol's direction.
The merchant didn't flinch. "No returns."
"Not negotiating." The newcomer bared two rows of yellow teeth.
Jason looked between the old Krogan in his heavy yellow hard plate armor and the newcomer in drab brown. Noting the disheveled and scarred state of this new krogan's armor and gear. Various wounds were still fresh. Nothing about him intimated any expectation of him not getting his way. Possibly fresh off a fight that Jason suspected he'd walked away from.. but not well. If pushed right the Krogan was a hair from pulling the trigger with hell to caring for the consequences.
"Listen, old lizard. This piece of junk just cost me half my squad."
Zol eyed up the Krogan carefully. "I can see that. I also didn't sell it to you."
The shotgun clicked. A double shot primed to raise the stakes from point blank dangerous to lethal.
"Who did you sell it to? I know this sort of shit is yours." The Krogan half shouted to end in a growl. "I want a name."
"Trades are private, runt." The elder Krogan matched the glare. "Don't come crying to me when you have your tail handed to you-"
Jason anticipated the shot. The wild bloodlust in the other Krogan's eyes flashed rabid. In a movement he soon questioned along with many other stupid life choices, Jason grabbed and pushed the barrel up; redirecting the heavy discharge into the wall behind the merchant in a shower of debris.
For a moment the sounds from the ward dipped quiet in ear splitting ringing before returning to a greater hubbub of activity; glossing over an apparently entirely normal occurrence.
Two beady red eyes snapped slightly down to meet Jason's own blue.
"You're dead, human." He spat, then wrenched hard to pull the weapon away. The movement was intended to break Jason's hold, possibly stagger him forward and make an easy target for a swift point blank execution.
Jason hadn't expected to maintain the grip.
The Krogan hadn't either.
The overforce of the Krogan's brute strength threw the lighter human across the interior of the shop. The extra mass whipped the shotgun from the Krogan's grasp before Jason had let it slip. Jason slammed back first into a display case; an erupting crash of intricate survival and hunting knives falling around him. An adjacent heavy glass cabinet cracking in the collateral impact and collapsed its shelves in a shower of sheaves.
The clatter of the shotgun skidding across the floor and the sound of the settling of the shelves was rounded off with the heavy click of a weapon.
The Krogan turned toward the innocuous sound, his eyes widening and crossing as they tried to focus near his snout where the tip of the enormous barrel squared at his head.
"Take it elsewhere, runt." Zol's yellow eye peered around the ginormous weapon resting on his shoulder and firmly in his grip. "Name?"
The Krogan's beady eye's flicked between the minigun and the door. Zol shook his head. "Payment for damages. Name, runt?"
The Krogan looked trapped but put up a snarl in defense.
"Gnarl."
"Right. Gnarl. Get out of my shop."
Zol tracked him out, finger on the trigger. Only taking it off once the self proclaimed Gnarl was hightailing it down the market hall.
"He'll be back-" Jason shifted, extracting himself amidst the tinkle of more razor sharp things he was keen on being at the receiving end of.
"He will try." Zol stamped to the store front to peer down the alley. Turning round in his steel yellow armor to eye up Jason who was inspecting the various tatters of his attire.
"You're comfortable with death in your near future, human?"
Jason looked up. "It feels a lot load more mundane than it did a few days ago."
"Got a quad on you. But what you did.." the Krogan waved a stubby arm dismissively. "Was stupid."
"He was about to shoot you." Jason added, a little incensed.
"Far from the first time. Not the last.", the Krogan shrugged and padded back to stow the weapon back under the counter. "Why are you here, human?"
"Trade." Jason's response earned him a quizzical look from the old Krogan. He held the stare for a moment before relenting. "Look, I just need the credits."
"Truth suits you better." Zol nodded. "I respect that." The yellow eyes watched Jason carefully. "Deal is off."
"Bullshit." Jason held the sharp gaze of the grizzled merchant.
The Krogan laughed a deep belly laugh. "You'll dive from a varren den into a thresher pit?" The rhetoric glinted in his amused eyes. He picked up the pistol, flourished it expertly and offered it hilt first back to Jason. "You're gonna need it after sticking your tail into that runt's business."
Jason stared at the weapon. He'd certainly put more than a foot in it. A sinking feeling sat in the pit of his stomach. "I still need the credits."
The krogan hummed under his breath and poked at the console behind the counter. "This thing he returned I sold to a merc with a serious vendetta.." He glanced at the black mass of steel tubes and added, "A dead merc. Pity."
"What's this to me?"
"Hire purchase. An invention of your kind! Balances and damages have got to be claimed if the deal isn't done. On a one off like this..", the multi barreled monster clinked to a scaly finger, "-plus damages I reckon I'm short about twenty grand. Quarians have gotten pricey. You collect, I'll split 90:10."
Jason didn't break eye contact.
"60:40"
Zol leaned forward. "You got anything to back that up?"
Jason grinned. "Have you got a workbench?"
What Jason had assumed was merely a shop in an alley hollow tuned out to be far more. Past the innocuous entrance into the back room, and what Zol occasionally called home, was a small warehouse. Keepers apparently had expanded it as space had become more precious for the shocking volume of weaponry and equipment the Krogan had amassed. The space was divided - rather chaotically - in two. Mounds of stuff that could only gratuitously be called equipment climbed up the farthest walls; the otherside was painstakingly neat with floor to ceiling shelves, labeled, cataloged and graded from standard to extremely eclectic weaponry. All in various states of function.
"Don't get too much time back here. Except for projects." Zol informed as they walked along, "Had the odd Quarian for a couple'a years. A Salerian, once.. blew himself up trying to retrofit a sonic lance with a Turian fusion core." He chuckled, "Keepers found most of the bits eventually."
He glossed over two whole sections that were purely ancient Krogan parts. "-Never know when you need'em."
And proceeded to the hidden rear where a large workbench occupied an inset in the far back wall; Invisible behind the maze and mounds.
It was.. quaint.
Jason picked over it under the watchful gaze of the Krogan. He nodded to himself as he checked the basics. Pretty much anything part or tool was probably in the piles and boxes that were stacked around. A few pieces of a former project were gathering dust on the bench.
"What's this?" Jason picked up a casing fragment for something akin to an assault rifle. The deep hue was familiar.
Zol looked over at it as he hefted the minigun onto the table. "Last guy's project before he dashed off back to the flotilla. Said these were a treasure trove. Never saw it, the things tend to frag themselves if used by anything but a Geth."
"Geth. The rogue Quarian AI's?"
"They die if you put enough holes in them. That's all that mattered." Zol turned to Jason and patted the workbench. "Show your mettle, you'll get your cut. No one ever called me unfair.. but one warning, human; don't screw with me or you'll wish the runt had found his mark." He turned and started walking away. "If it's shelved it's got a price, everything else.. I don't care."
Jason rubbed his forehead as the Krogan vanished back to the distant front of the store. Wondering what the fuck he'd gotten himself into. A bit of exploration found a few crates of
water. He settled in infront of the stricken weapon to work on breaking it down to rebuild. Setting his mind free while his hands kept themselves busy.
Geth? He knew almost nothing about the Geth beyond a few hauntingly familiar extranet pics. He kept glancing at the blue-purple metal. He knew where he had seen it now.. he could place the part in the still memory of the troopers like a reverse parts diagram, pieces collapsing back into place just before the assault rifles swung in his direction.
Jason blinked.
It was a good number of hours in. He wiped sweat from his brow with an ill effective arm. The heat under the bench lamps was not helped by leathers he'd dug out along with a plasma torch. Actual leathers (that he really didn't want to know the origin of); and he looked more like someone in an ancient blacksmithy than a twenty second century space station.
Jason pulled off the heavy gloves as he worked through the last few structural repairs. Almost every part was custom or severely modified. The barrels were even rifelled.. possibly repurposed from heavy caliber sniper rifles. He cursed as he fumbled with one arm down deep in the vicious contraption that was once more reassembling a heavy mass driver minigun. Eventually ripping out a long cracked and burnt interconnect, he stared at it before scrounging through crates to find an armored high voltage lead to replace the thinner shredded one. It was done. He flicked the fusion core switch to que the low thrum of something stupidly overpowered, overbuilt and, now, overhauled. He felt tired but focused and satisfied.
He looked around.
There had to be somewhere to test it.
The old Krogan grinned toothily as he lowered the smoldering weapon and rested it on a waiting crate that pinged and crackled in protest. Jason stood arms folded as he watched Zol and the carnage from a few steps back. On the far wall the remnants of a haphazardly assembled humanoid mannequin of various armor pieces slowly settled into a resting pile of perforated scrap.
"Good?" Jason asked.
The Krogan grunted as he carefully pulled a cloth out and cleaned some oil off his hands. "Impressive. It may actually be better, Human."
"Whoever designed that never learned the word: overengineered. Do I get paid?"
Zol shook his head. "For a half job? No."
Jason scowled. Zol turned. "You still got to collect. I've set up the contact for a meeting. Night cycle starts soon. Cleanup."
"I need gear."
Zol waved him off. "Not my problem, human."
"You want me to collect a debt, right? I just walk into some ex mercenary's club house in a shirt and say Hi? I don't like the idea of being an errand runner, let alone a stupidly unprepared one." He nodded to the crate. "Meet me halfway on this."
Zol studied Jason for a few seconds. "Finish your bargain and then we can talk." He nodded to the massive piles of scrap and general storage crates. "I said before.. I don't care what becomes of those. You have three hours." And left, not paying Jason any more attention.
Jason closed and rubbed his eyes. It felt like he hadn't slept in days. Truth was he didn't actually know when he had last slept. He wandered back to the secluded workspace and tried to take stock; pulling the folded hood out of his small backpack and stared at it. Three hours.. Jason pulled the hood over, the plates locking back to form the helmet.
"HUD. Time delta?" He prompted. The milliseconds delay feeling like an age.
{HUD: +18 galactic standard hours from last invocation.}
He did some muzzy mental arithmetic.. nearly 21 Earth hours. Standard time was only beginning to be adopted, presumably it was now the norm.
"Release." He pulled the hood off and tossed it back into the bag. He stared at the workbench and surroundings. A hell of a lot of work had got done, he briefly tidied up relishing a hint of pride in his thoughts. He'd lost almost a day.
He scratched through some of the boxes on the workbench. The Quarian who had worked here before certainly had a lot of small projects.. whole boxes of sorted parts; Jason rummaged through. Air purifiers, repair and patch kits, door locks, half a cleaning bot, a broken terminal and what he was hoping for.. various omnitool parts. He rummaged through, nothing looked whole. Jason picked the least damaged remnants and worked through a tear down. Marveling at how far tech had come. An hour and a half later he was surrounded in partially disassembled piles of electronics; pulling micro emitters from the old terminal and cannibalizing anything that looked at least remotely serviceable. A light vambrace from one of the piles could be hollowed for circuitry along with a micro battery from a broken visor. The contraption eventually sputtered to life on the workbench. The dim interface flickering slightly as the old holoemitters struggled to retain their focus.
Jason picked it up and slipped it over his left arm, using a few straps to secure it under his sleeve. Feeling it didn't impede movements much he turned it over a few times to get a sense for the adaptive interface. Opening the settings to increase the brightness when the display grew to a radiant white and a shock ran up his arm-
"Ow.. Fuck."
The holo briefly went dark before slowly flickering back to a dim glow. "Huh.."
He pulled it off and picked through the fault.. a small eruption of sparks blinding him in another shock that made the bench lights flicker. He stared at the fault for a minute before just adding some insulated padding and left it.
Jason waded into the piles of general scrap, tossing out potentially salvageable pieces of armor. He had maybe an hour, budgeting for some travel time.
He stepped back and stared at the pile. The pieces came together in his mind in a plan that felt perfectly enabling. Other than the fact that a shrinking part of him was wondering how it felt normal. He'd always seen through to solutions, but this was more like seeing the potential of them and then constructing them from the inside out.
Jason closed his eyes.. It felt like he had a headache. He couldn't not see the exploded assembly accrete. Fatigue was really starting to hang on him. A best guess on when he'd last slept was over two days ago. He was getting hungry again.. he could deal with that. Hunger had long ago become a tool, it could be put off while he had focus. But that was where fatigue was catching up with him.
He pushed on piecing together something at least approaching a usable set of light gear that could go over his clothes. A little ballistic cloth wrap, some light ceramic plates and a lot of dark brown straps .. and he could almost pass for a severely lost and poor adventurer with zero regard for athletics.
He pulled on some black composite gloves and cleaned up a pair of brown bracers, presumably leather or some replica. He flinched as his left wrist hurt while he bucked the left bracer over the vambrace; giving up to just leave the metal exposed. Symmetry was overrated anyway. He shrugged to himself; function over form… the engineer's curse. He rummaged through a few last boxes and pulled out something long and grey.. a cloak. He added it to the collection to hide a multitude of sins.
The voice of the resident shop owner cut through his distraction. Zol appeared through the shelf maze in his difficult to miss yellow hard plate. "Better get moving, Human." His yellow eyes worked over Jason's effort. "You got all that from there?" His head cocking toward the chaos of clutter.
"Yep." Jason nodded. He stood to feel out the full kit.. it was light enough. He'd at least managed to get decent military lace ups from the good Doctor's stores.
The Krogan lifted his arm and pulled up his omni tool display. Raising a scaly eyebrow before tapping something and flicking it off the screen.
Jason's forearm buzzed. He lifted it to watch in fascination as the holo flickered to life in a thin and faint orange display. The projection wrapped over his wrist and hovered a few centimeters above his forearm. He tapped an indicator revealing a terse message from Zol:
..details..
Asari contact.
Outstanding balance, 22,000
Every credit. Non neg.
-Z
::Forwarded content below::
—
Yertoi Square, Zakera.
Terminal. 18.50. Don't be late
-K
Jason closed his palm, vanishing the display.
Zol was already halfway to the exit as he called back. "Every credit, Human."
—*—
Walking the late streets of the surface level ward was strange. The dull orange glow of the lights and the cool blue black of the skyline stuck with the dim blue grey of the skyscrapers was eerily quiet. The Citadel had changed.. was changed.. is changed. Jason's head hurt if he dwelt on it for long.
New evidence of security was everywhere; reporting stations, cameras, even the odd patrol. Every route back toward the Presidium seemed to aggregate toward a C-Sec checkpoint. He had wondered how he hadn't noticed them before but then remembered the keepers tunnel he'd had entered through was ward side. There wasn't any direct public path to the ring anymore. Why? well.. he didn't really need to guess; his gaze constantly got drawn up through the piercing skyline and to the distant warm glow of the other four wards far above. Where, on -maybe.. he tried to recall.. Tayseri ward?- a massive wound kilometers long was gouged like a black scar into the far cityscape. Whole districts were dark.. gone. He'd frozen when he'd first seen it; no one else seemed bothered by the mundanity of the damage anymore. And it wasn't just that which was different, hundreds of small things that probably shouldn't matter but together made the whole seem alien. More holos, more trees, more stores, more people..
There certainly were a lot more humans around. From the endless holo-boards you'd think C-Sec was full of them. Humans were now represented in every echelon of society; rowdy mates out from a bar crawl, prim cut socialites stepping from a skycar outside a club.. beggars pleading for alms outside a boarded up store. Gods, there was even a human councilor. How the hell had that happened? He'd never met Ambassador Goyle, but everyone knew of her. This Anderson seemed to carry on her no political nonsense line.. not an enviable job given the nature of being front and center of the literal fount of political BS. The few images of Councilor Anderson at the prior day's memorial captured a man very definitely not buying the line being sold; but putting on the required solidarity with his peers. It gave Jason a tincture of hope and dread as he walked. If people at the top were struggling with shaping the narrative, what did it say about humanity's future?
He'd made it to the plaza a bit early. The character of the outer ward districts was more relaxed than the Presidium. The hexagonal space blended into a few shops and businesses between radial alleys while an open cafe occupied one side with a few dimly lit front of house tables. The center of the plaza set with a simple raised garden and an Avena terminal.
Jason stood at the station, staring at the holo screen the VI had provided; he flicked through the public records of the Citadel's who's who; Councillor Anderson. A massively decorated war hero-
"Excuse me-". A Volus interrupted. "Others need the- console too. Thank you."
Jason looked around at the few passing wanderers and the queue of one. He raised an eyebrow. The Volus'z hardsuit squeaked as the helmet tuned to mock his query.
Jason glanced at his arm.
18.49
"Almost done..". He flicked to the directory listings on the Avena panel and forwarded the searches to the-his omni. "I really don't have- all day-, human."
Jason raised his hands in acquiescence, "Done, all yours." he closed the console and stepped to the side, looking around the dim space.
The hard-suit turned around a few tens of seconds later, the Volus prodding him in the side. "Could you go
Away?- I have my- own business to- attend to-. I'm sure you have- somewhere else- to be." The statement sounded more like a question to Jason's mind.
Jason looked to a bench a few paces away vaguely in the direction of Zakera Point. He'd made barely three paces before a conversation started behind him.
"Hello- dear- I've missed you today-"
"My name is Avena. How may I be of assistance?"
"Oh, I'm sure you- missed- me too-"
…
Jason rolled his eyes as he passed beyond ear shot.
"Don't mind Treb." A female voice spoke out from Jason's left. Making him turn in surprise. A lone Asari was sitting at a dim table at the edge of the path. The rest of the cafe was quiet, except for patronage visible in the bright interior.
She closed something she was reading on a pad, and placed the device carefully on the table. "He's a bit possessive and dislikes his schedule being broken." She waved a hand, adding the aside , "For those who know."
The Asari watched the Volus for a second before smiling to herself and continuing. "Everyone has their vices."
She leaned back in her seat, drink in hand, looking a still mildly taken aback Jason up and down. "You're Z's rep? The big guy normally does his own dirty work. What do you owe him?"
Jason felt a little affronted. "Helping out." He stated.
She smirked. "Really? Not his style." She'd sensed a hook and dug in. "What hole did he find you in?"
"I'm here for his business, not your interrogation." Jason half growled as he spun round a chair and mounted it. "He's owed. That's what matters. What's your terms?"
The Asari stared at Jason through the shadow, a glint in her eyes. "Kessera."
"Pardon?"
"My name." She placed her glass down and matched his stare. "Not going for civilities? Very well. My father is your client. Roktur. He's dead."
The matter of fact statement sounded cold but there was a fire behind the Asari's eyes. Jason didn't let a muscle move; letting Kessera continue in her time. "He was hunting down the trash that killed my sister. She was a better soul than me, took after my mother. Dad tracked down the bastards to a Blood Pack forward cell near the industrial cargo ports. He wasn't impressed. CSec wasn't bothered, too far from their precious hub for them to care and journalists are a dime a dozen. There's only so many times you can hear how the Blood Pack are banned in council space before you take matters into better hands. Dad bent old Zol's ear and last I heard the old fart was marching his tail down to some forgotten warehouse. Imagine my surprise when I got a message from my mother of all people that dad had snuffed it.. old krogan die hard. From Zol's message it sounds like he went how he'd want to. I'm down two family members to the same ka'paks."
Jason watched her carefully. "You want something first."
"Glad you're awake." Her smile was predatory. "I see why Z sent you." Kessera took another pull from her drink. "Closure. Blood Pack don't deal.. Mom wants a burial for insurance. I want justice. Get me those and Zol will have his credits."
Kessera tapped the pad on the table. "All you need." She downed the last of her drink, stood and walked away without looking back.
Jason picked up the pad, copied it and wiped it. Processing the mental dump as he walked down the dim alley.
He pulled up his omni, opening a map search and overlaying the pad content to highlight three possible locations
Jason shook his head at the general insanity of what he was doing, pulled up the hood and vanished down a dim alley.
—*—
The three small locations Kessera had provided were dark unnavigable destinations; buildings that somehow got entirely surrounded by newer constructions. Their existence was barely registered on maps unless you noticed the small gaps between the chaos of sprawling development. If you didn't know they were there you'd be forgiven for assuming there simply wasn't a small decrepit three story building abutting modern industries on all sides.
What Jason had also figured out the hard way was that there were no ways in. Not through the immediate neighbors, nor any hints of unmarked alleys or gaps between the buildings.
So he just walked straight into the first few adjacent buildings like he was meant to be there. There was no security to speak of nor any access control.
Thankfully most of the places were 24hr operations with skeleton night crews so wandering through the mostly open storage spaces had attracted zero attention. In a moment of forethought he'd grabbed a foreman's overcoat from a hook. This got him past two distant encounters with the avoidance more on the worker's part than his. He had made it to the roof of one of the adjacent warehouses and was peering into the deep between four sprawling roofs. It was then a hint movement on the opposite rooftop caught his eye but it vanished before he could focus on it. This happened a few more times. Enough to convince him that he wasn't entirely alone. Although, he had made no attempt to conceal his presence and actions. Hopefully workers were a common presence on top of their buildings … he didn't buy the thought either.
The third location was definitely it.
There was fresher trash and markings on the low roof, more of the windows were intact and all of them closed or haphazardly boarded. Even the hint of a light in a few. What was still missing was any means of entry.
Jason waved a greeting to a rapidly disappearing cargo worker before rounding a corner away from the port docs and discarded the overcoat into a bin.
This looked promising. The alley was a deep chasm between monstrous buildings. Ending in a deep shadow. He made his way down to what looked like a dead end. A descending stair to a door.. an unlocked door.
Perfect.
Jason picked his way down silently, triggering the green chevron after checking the alley was still quiet behind him.
He pulled out his pistol and readied it as the door slid open to a wide and very dark corridor beyond.
The last thing he thought before the door slid closed with the accompanying dark was that this was a particularly stupid idea. Seconds later hell broke loose. Several somethings piled into him from the dark, tackling him to the ground in a snarl of limbs and claws.
—*—
"You're awake. Don't labor on pretense. I've known humans long enough."
The impatient tone of a female voice cut through Jason's forming thoughts.
He coughed and shifted, noting his right side felt like it had been hit by a bus; the small movement made with the anticipation of the stab of a broken rib, or six. His right arm ached to the bone.
"What are you doing here?" The authoritative voice continued ahead of the small sound of a scraping chair and the sense of movement and shadow.
Jason blinked to try to get his eyes to adapt in the dim and decrepit space. A split shaft of white light through a broken window was all that lit the abandoned room. The air smelled of old dirt and rust and blood. Jason tried to move, immediately stopped when his hands caught in their restraints behind his back; his legs similarly bound to the hard chair that fell over with him. He cursed as he landed, head cracking on the debris strewn floor.
A weapon clicked. Footsteps approached and two hands roughly righted him and the chair with a grunt.
A stern Asari stepped round in front of him, arms folded in annoyance. Her black neck to toe attire was skin tight; only hints of subtle armor pads caught in the little light to flow seamlessly up with her figure to where her scowl set face was marked with two dark framing tattoos spearing from jaw to her temples. The imposing visage melded seamlessly with the hints of a bandolier and discrete occupied weapon holsters all shaping a figure held in stance of hard trained and perfected lethality.
"What are you doing here? Last time I ask."
Jason coughed again. He really did feel like shit.
The Asari watched Jason for a few seconds then activated her. omnitool and held it against his aching temple.
Jason winced and tried to turn away from the sharp orange light
"Hold still." The Asari grabbed Jason's head to stop his sudden movement. His grimace fading to unexpected relief as the pain and headache subsided.
She let go, wiping something dark red off her hand from his hair.
"Who the fuck are you-?" Jason started before the diminishing headache opened the floodgate of recollection that hit him like a train. He looked straight up into the Asari's stern eyes. "-Holy crap.. did I-"
"-Walk straight into a pack of three hunting Vorcha like an utter idiot - yes." The Asari turned to dragging a chair closer and dropped down on it with a weapon idly in hand. "You're unbelievably stupid and lucky to be alive. Although looking at the state of you I'll leave the last part for later judgment." The weapon in her hand rested easily in her hip, present and totally not a threat.
"Vorcha?", Jason frowned in incomprehension as he watched the weapon carefully… it wasn't a threat, right?
The Asari watched Jason carefully as she slowly asked, "How exactly did you kill them? The last idiot who went down there was a Krogan who was heavier armed than you. "
Jason hesitated. The blur of seconds unwound in memory. Sight had been useless in the fresh darkness as the door had closed behind, then, he remembered, the tackle, firing the weapon into something that snarled and gurgled before the next pounced on him in a whirl of arms. The ripping scratch of claws dragging over armor plates giving away to teeth as it lunged, clamping down on his arm in a hundred needles that sunk to bone. Jason remembered the shock of pain and the terrifying calm that flowed. The moment of rage had burned deep. He'd rammed the panicking thing to the ground with everything he had. Ripping it off in a shower of warm droplets as the pistol found its mark once more. Then swinging the hilt down on the last scrabbling assailant, deflecting another tackle to turn it to a grapple. His left notching a leathery neck in the crook of his arm that clamped on hard as bony fingers tore at the metal vambrace while he'd landed hard on his back. His right hand whipping the muzzle round to press on the skull and pull the trigger. Leaving silence. And a warmth that dripped over his neck and shoulder. He'd pushed the dead weight off and staggered up when the door had opened, the space bursting into light.
Jason winced as the recollection of the flash felt like it had just happened again; it had knocked him out cold. The slow motion explosion replaying in his mind.
"You.. you fucking threw a grenade at me." His tone between surprise and anger.
"You were hit with a warp detonation." The Asari snapped back, correcting him matter-of-factly. "Frankly, I was expecting to find vermin and a meal, or a corpse. And I was the one doing my job-"
Jason defensively interrupted her, "-throwing fucking biotic explosions-."
Biotics were a terrifying enigma that had turned many sciences upside down; it even being reported as feasible for humans to develop the biological faculties with in utero exposure to eezo.. aside from everyone else the exposure killed. The dawning realization sunk in that human biotics were probably now almost definitely the proverbial wild; which left him torn between the distraction of fascination the seething ire of being on the receiving side of something he didn't understand but felt he should.
The Asari leaned in closer, possibly sensing his displeasure. Her blue features etched in the steely and uncompromising confidence of a superior position. Her biotics flared. "-I don't care who you think you are. I'm here on Specter business. I get to decide what is appropriate or necessary. That was appropriate." She then waved a hand in distaste. "This.. is necessary. I was not expecting much to be in one piece, never mind alive and-", she looked Jason over curiously, "merely superficially wounded-"
"-Superficial? Bugger off." Jason shifted uncomfortably in his seat, a lot of him ached. He tried to lean forward when the back of his mind finally informed the front that his hands were cuffed behind the chair. His efforts came to a jarring halt. "Why am I cuffed? You can't detain me without cause or a warrant-"
"-Specter. Remember? And it's for your safety."
Jason stared at the Asari. "My safety?" He repeated.
"Yes. While I decide whether you're an idiot or an accomplice of this operation."
Jason closed his eyes as he contemplated his situation. "I'm not with any operation.. I was looking for a client's family member who may have had a recent run in with a merc group cell somewhere around here, Bloodpack.. heard of them?"
The Asari scoffed. "You humans. Always getting involved somewhere along the way.." She pulled out her pistol and used it to gesture toward a large covered object at the far side of the room. "There is no cell.. there is no Bloodpack presence on the Citadel-"
Jason's adapting eyes could just make out the hint of a brown armored limb visible at the base of the heavy tarp. A very krogan sized heap.
".. or active within Council space." She finished. "Should you have any concerns, take it up with CSec. Official enforcement aside.. I don't really have any reason to detain you-" She looked Jason over carefully, tapping her pistol on her chin.
Jason let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding. He tracked the pistol as it wandered the room slowly. "-Other than threads..". She continued, her blue features grew stern. "I don't like threads. Or unknowns. They tend to become problems. I'm also not too keen on interference with my business, even unwitting interference. I put a bullet through the last idiot who was about to break my investigation, it got me the ear-", she glanced at the covered corpse, "-and the information I needed to crack the cell's operation here.. then you pitch up and kick off an early mop up." She looked thoughtful. "It certainly would be more convenient if you died. It'd give credibility to weeding out local contacts of these vermin.."
Jason's brow furrowed as he realized that the Asari was not intimating any intention to undo his restraints.
"What-", he started but stalled as the muzzle locked in a disturbingly steady bead toward his forehead.
…
Jason didn't break his glare.
She was still watching him.
"Are you expecting me to beg?"
The blue woman's eyes narrowed. Her eyes dropping a few degrees. He immediately knew her intent.. headshot was a perfect murder, heart.. well that could be made to look like an accident, a bleed out.
The Asari was lost in her creative narrative, ".. Brave soul, who died of his wounds."
Jason took his chance. If he'd waited the split second it tools for the weapon to sink it would make it too late; and, quite frankly, he wasn't keen to die.
He dived to the left, hoping to hell that physics would be on his side for a few seconds.
The bound chair turned the jerked movement into a tumbling roll just as a blast and rush told him the weapon had fired, the start of ringing sonic shock to his right ear told him it'd gone where he'd hoped, over his shoulder. But there wasn't time to think; he had to be ready this time. He twisted to catch his weight on his legs as the capsizing chair gave way, the new injection of momentum spinning him round. A shout of surprise and clatter as the legs of the long abused furniture struck the Asari behind him. Jason stole the still fresh moment to continue through the rotation and ram the metal chair to the ground, closing the arc with everything he could muster. His weight and force breaking the old welds from their purchases and sending the larger bits of the chair scattering away across the room..
Jason rolled up. He was free of the chair but his hands were still bound behind him.
The Asari was quickly recovering from the physical assault. An ethereal blue glow around her rapidly ticked critical concern boxes in Jason's situational risk assessment.
"Fu-" he barely managed before the Asari was suddenly ramming into him in a charging blur of speed that flung him backward. A thunderous cascade of receding rusty walls and a waterfall of dust and debris hammered past as he careened backward and then suddenly down in a shock of free fall as the floor ran out. Landing a level below with a thud that knocked the little remaining breath out of him.
Footsteps ticked closer from somewhere above. Jason opened his eyes, staring up through the hole of a missing floor and quickly dismissing the internal questions on how he wasn't a red smeer as the Asari looked down from above. Her curiosity turned to a scowl when she saw him move.
Jason scrambled up as the Asari lept down.
He really was screwed.
Jason managed to roll out the way before the Asari slammed into the floor, making the old building shudder. He sprinted into the small Labyrinth of the building; completely unaware of any direction or plan. Away way good enough. A thought applied as blue orbs slammed into the walls and frames around him as he sprinted.
The previous occupants had gutted most of the superstructure of the building; maybe for scrap or for recreation, but what still stood wasn't taking the wild assaults well. Jason dodged as a ceiling collapsed down a corridor he hoped would lead to an exit. He cursed as another orb slammed into a pillar nearby, making the metal groan and twist.
He stared at it briefly and then at the ceiling in disbelief as the pillar buckled and the ceiling crashed down inch with a ripping groan. He stalled before bolting, enough to glimpse his stalking huntress apparently set on killing him. The Asari was panting from the patent effort of whatever she was doing with the biotics.
Perhaps he could tire her out. The building's groans didn't give him much hope.
Jason sprinted down the corridor and skidded to a halt; struck by the sudden panic in realizing the tee junction ended in a dead end of two collapsed doorways. The structure was making odd noises that pinged ominous prickles down his spine.
Jason spun around just as the blue glow rounded the far end. The Asari was a dark shape in the curling glow of an iridescent sphere of dark energy.
Jason looked around desperately, It wasn't like he had a great many options. A large part of him was regretting the escape attempt but the other option was already being dead.
"Look.. can we talk about this?", Jason chanced, "I made mistakes, you made.. mistakes. I just want to-"
He ducked as a massive warp fizzed past his head and rammed into a bucking wall behind him. Unfortunately another stuck him in the chest sending him backward into a pillar. He just caught a smirk of triumph on the Asari's shadowed face.
Rust rained down. Worst of all was the feeling like his ribcage was being sawn at. He caught himself as his back collided with a pillar that rang and vibrated like a tuning fork, the frequency rocketing up till it swelled and swallowed the chaotic biotic punch in his torso in a weird sensation that felt like the warp moved through him.
"..gods.." he gasped as he stepped to the side to catch himself. A hand brushing over the scoured ceramic plate over what felt like a deep wound.
"No barriers.. interesting." The Asari ticked closer but was still a good ten meters away. "That does make it easier."
The pillar groaned and cracked. Jason dived forward to dodge a falling torrent of debris as it and the corridor segment collapsed.
"I just want to talk. Dammit." Jason shouted over the chaos toward the pursuant Asari. "This whole fucking place is going to come down!"
"You will die first.." The Asari paced forward, beads of perspiration ran down her forehead. and a glow in each hand that she brought together in a howl of effort and wash of blue that threatened to bow the walls around her.
The building wasn't having it.
The rumble had started in an oscillation that made the floor and ceiling ripple like waves on water.
Jason sprang up, ignoring the pain in his chest and sprinted forward. He didn't know why he sprinted toward the Asari who was undoubtedly about to kill him. It just made better sense than waiting.
The Asari's own dawning surprise at the imminent collapse kicked her from her focus; breaking her concentration on the deepening black orb as her own instilled turned her focus to an instinctual sphere of a biotic barrier. The incomplete orb sprang free prematurely to ricochet into a support beam that suddenly had its center body devoured.
Jason didn't hesitate, ducking just enough as he ran into her shoulder first to bowl her over.
The pointed effort in an attempt to use the distraction to disarm her. Her own barrier tingled as he ran through it without breaking pace, meeting the Asari dead center with everything he could muster. She folded with the blow, collapsing her barrier in a small shock wave that resonated with the surrounding chaos as the floor collapsed. The rest of the building started coming down swiftly behind it.
Jason managed to land almost on his feet. He staggered to a kneel as a massive ceiling panel slid down at an angle to meet him squarely on the back, luckily not crushing him. He grunted under the instinctual effort to brace. Realizing his folly when the crashing sounds slowly came to rest. He was pinned with the encumbering weight; supporting the precarious and long angled panel as the last remnants of the collapse slowly darkened the hollow to black. The last glimpse before the dark fell was the prone blue figure lying next to him on the ground.
He cursed inwardly.
A moment passed before two sparks of blue flickered in the deadened dark as the cinderous tinkles stopped. Jason could feel his muscles were rapidly tiring. He tried to relax his hold, only resulting in the growing burden sinking lower; soliciting the purest regret. He sensed light and tried to blink away a few beads of perspiration when his eyes met those of a very awake and very angry Asari staring up at him with a pistol once again pointed at him.
"Kill me.. and you die too." He managed.
The Asari looked around, presumably assessing the predicament. She glared at him and dropped the pistol, Jason's pistol - he noted - on the ground next to her; tantalizingly beneath him yet inaccessible. A curious test.
A complaint broke her lips as she grabbed her left leg to try free it from the crush of debris.
"I am stuck."
"Ditto.."
The Asari looked at Jason in incomprehension.
Jason rolled his eyes. "It means 'the same'"
"You are human are you?"
Jason blinked in comprehension. "Yes. Last I checked."
"In my experience Humans die more easily."
Jason glowered at the Asari. "Do you kill humans frequently?"
She shot a glare at Jason. "Perhaps I need more practice."
"Could you put aside killing me for a.. moment, if it can wait..."
"The job is over, all this sees to that.." The Asari scowled.
"Brilliant." Jason gritted his teeth. "Then call for bloody help. I can't hold this forever. And we're royally fucked when I give out.. call.. for.. help..."
"Don't talk t-"
"Look lady.. you brought this building down.. If choice mattered.. then I certainly wouldn't be here.. stopping the both of us from being a splat .. of colored paintwork. In fact.. I could care even less after being pointedly.. nearly murdered..by you.. three times. Shove the pride, ma'am, I don't care.. Get help or we will both die… preferably before this neat little pocket.. of air runs out of oxygen.."
The orange glow of an omni tool filled the space. A little torch light remained after she had typed out a message.
Jason grasped for distraction. "Do you have a name?"
The Asari seemed to weigh him up. "Tela Vasir. Council special reconnaissance and tactics."
"Why are you.. a specter, chasing down mercs and getting involved? I thought specters were above that.. sort of thing."
"Not really any particular business of yours." She started before seeming to reconsider. ".. an enforcement assignment. Not all specter work is high profile."
"But you get to kill civilians if it suits you, right?" Jason spat.
The specter shot another annoyed glance. "The job requires we do what is necessary for the task at hand-"
"And a krogan seeking revenge is just collateral?"
"The old one? He came down here with a minigun, took out more than half the cell in barely minutes. Vorcha are bad but nothing deserves to have that many holes in it.. the cell's lieutenant was about to take him down anyway. I took the chance to ingratiate myself to them.. it got me the names I needed to finish the investigation. What's it to you?"
"Clearly more than it is to you." Jason sighed. "The old Krogan's daughter was killed by this lot, the family wants closure."
The specter looked at Jason and shrugged any empathy off. "A bad way to go, not my problem. It was going to happen either way. Me killing him just ment the vermin weren't allowed to eat the corpse."
Jason looked up. "Where is he now? The body."
"Cold storage warehouse, a block over, Hubward."
Tela sat up and rubbed her leg.
"Numb?" Jason queried.
"Yes.."
Jason struggled internally for a second before relenting to the moral dilemma. "Damn it.. okay, I'm going to try push. See if you can free it.."
A few panting seconds later Tela had both legs free and was massaged the feeling back into her foot. Jason sank down to a low knee. The small space shrunk along with the exhausted effort.
"Can you.. undo these cuffs?"
The small restraints clinked to the ground with an appreciative thanks.
Tela shuffled into a cross legged seat adjacent to face Jason, a question knotted into her features.
Jason sighed. "Out with it.."
"You are tiring."
Jason snorted. "Just a static load.. I now know what.. a support beam feels like." He chuckled making debris cascade down in the dim.
"You're deflecting."
"A necessary mental tactic."
"Do you have a name? An employer?"
Jason frowned, the Asari wasn't going to relent in her line of thought. "..yes I do, and I don't. For you, I don't." The load shifted, Jason gritted his teeth. "How long?"
Tela quickly tapped her omnitool. "Minutes… maybe."
"Can you.. biotic this?"
She looked at him curiously. "That's not how it works."
"You didn't hesitate throwing fucking warps.. only minutes ago.."
She glared at Jason then reached up and placed two palms on the plate. A blue glow wrapping around her as a furrow ran across her forehead. The furrow deepened as the glow intensified.
Sweat was beading in on crests when Tela finally relented. "No. The field needs to be too large."
A different look entered her eyes as she looked between the mass and Jason.
She prodded her omnitool. "This should have crushed you-"
"I'm a stubborn human."
The Asari flared in biotic blue. "You misunderstand me."
"What relevance is it?" Jason snapped back. "It's called leverage.. basic trig and force. Don't attribute the bloody obvious to mystery."
He was flagging fast. Whatever had got him this far was running out and his patience with it.
"I cannot assist directly, but I can initiate a basic meld to fortify your .. stubbornness with my own." The Asari's features set sternly as she resolved her action unilaterally and reached out to him.
"Don't." Jason instantly snapped with an unbidden glare.
She looked taken aback. "I was just going to-"
"I know, and No." He locked eyes with her, aware of his sudden irrationality but utterly caught off guard by its urgency. The Asari had already backed off by the time he blinked away the moment of confusion.
"How did you do that?" Tela was watching him very carefully.
"Do what?"
"Your eyes-"
Jason huffed. "What about them?"
A sound from above made them both look toward a break in the dark where a shaft of light cut into the void. Jason felt the weight shift with the grinding snap of steel being pulled away. The noise was intense, rattling over every word and thought.
An unfamiliar face peered into the void. The spiked fringes of a Turian with a white face tattoo stuck out against the welcome light.
"Oh. You're not dead." The statement was made in observation of fact rather than in any pleasure. ".. and a human? Double rates, Vasir."
It turned out that little love was lost between the CSec captain and the Specter. A hate - hate relationship that was barely offset by the mutual benefit of having a contact in a useful place.
The rescue was thoroughly executed, in true Turian efficacy to ensure a future mutual favor in return; evidenced by the small army of CSec resources at obvious force on the site.
Vasir didn't take it too well, she was clearly not one for indebtedness. A fact the Turian captain relished every moment of.
Jason tried to keep his head down. Watching for a moment to disappear, it never came. By the time he was shuffled toward separate aircars it was obvious that a ride to CSec was non negotiable. Even Vasir, who Jason strongly suspected was not above exercising privilege to avoid spectacle, was unable to avoid the very public invitation. While Tela was certainly annoyed by the gratuitous imposition of CSec's domain authority she was not inconvenienced by it.. Jason, however, was.
As they lifted off the aircars veered in starkly different directions. Vasir up and toward the station Presidium, Jason ward side. This development didn't bode well and went about as poorly as Jason had expected. His stop turned out to be a low nondescript building nestled in the mid ward. The officer who manhandled him into the building was the same who'd greeted them. The short journey from the roof was quiet and without any encounter or hint of anyone else even manning the location. Jason was unceremoniously led into a room and left, the door clicking red behind the Turian and the soon departing hum of the aircar.
For the second time in the day Jason sat on a chair with his hands cuffed. This time, at least, his hands were in front of him. The cell room appeared to have been converted from an office section. The room was roughly hewn through two small rooms by removing the separating wall. The first door was closed and locked, the second doorway was haphazardly sealed with an energy barrier. He'd been left alone after an unceremonious escort through the quiet halls that showed only the barest hints of occasional use. Four hours in, he was getting annoyed.
Jason glanced at his omni tool. The dim chrono showing the time while the annoying cuffs limited movement.
He was sure that omni cuffs were meant to interfere with omni tools; a point of intrigue if he ever met the old Krogan's former Quarian employee. He'd stood from the narrow chair and examined the barrier for the umpteenth time. Right at the edge of the field the small scanner on the display flicked from the usual broken static fuzz he'd accepted as a broken feature to a 20m active scan radius. Jason pulled away to watch the display fade back to noise. "Power.." he mumbled to himself, and held it close to the field again.
The immediate area was quiet, more than quiet.. abandoned. He scanned for electronic signatures.. there was nothing, not even a camera or listening device in range.
He decided four hours was enough. Jason pressed the metal of the vambrace against the energy barrier, closed his eyes and tapped the brightness control. The sharp flash of blue light gave way as the small barrier did. He stepped through into the unlit corridor, shaking off the sparking cuffs while the barrier projector behind hummed and reset a few seconds later. Sealing the doorway once more.
If this was a proper stationing he'd probably just broken enough rules on custody and confinement to actually warrant his arrest. Something in his gut told him that wasnt an immediate concern. He glanced at the resetting omnitool display wondering if there was any accumulative damage for that sort of overload.. hopefully something repairable.
He looked around. There was nothing CSec about the largely empty space. A couple of tables, some organizational remnants of meeting spaces. A few datapads were scattered across an old reception area. He picked up one that was dated months back..
—
S.B.
Escalating BP activity. Beachhead operations. Monitoring. Illicit trade, shipping, contraband. Minor political jobs. Send me any records of known operations directives or agents.
L.
—
L.
Activity is sanctioned. Do not intervene.
S.B
—
S.B.
This isn't the agreement.
L.
—
L.
The terms still stand.
Do not intervene. BP asset may prove valuable.
S.B.
—
Jason frowned and picked up another datapad that was on the floor. It was heavily scuffed and well used. The power button took a little coaxing to blink the screen to life.
A journal. He flicked through the last entries and quickly worked backward.
The owner of this was a journalist. They thought they were on to a corruption ring.. he paged back.. CSec.. No, he corrected and referred to the similar annotations on B.S. and L. Who was G? Half the writing was in a shorthand that begged for context. He jumped to the last entry that was a video log. The pale blue face of a young Asari appeared on the screen, the view half looking up as she was walking through a noisy industrial district. She looked disheveled and hurried.
"I've confirmation that L. is going to meet G. at the warehouse. I'm on my way there now. Thank the goddess the camera's powercell held out.. that evidence should be enough to implicate him but I need a direct confrontation to tie him to the mercenary cell-"
The Asari looked familiar. Jason left the audio playing in the background and scrolled back a few tens of page entries where he'd seen a link to an extranet data store.
"-I know he suspects something, I've seen G. skulking around my sister's offices. I know L. is on to me.. it was only a matter of time till one of G.'s goons picked up my trail. Kes, you were right, this is too deep.. this is my last chance to expose L. and get CSec on side."
Jason opened his omnitool and scanned the link and password to open an empty share folder. He flicked back to the video catching the last few rustles as it was stuffed into a shoulder sling still recording but heavily muffled to indiscernibility. He skipped ahead.. 10 minutes, then 30.. an hour. The view shook and rustled as the sound opened up and the device was lifted up from a prone position; briefly glimpsing a blue arm on a dirty floor.
The view turned over. Jason hit pause. A Turian. The white face marking was still very fresh in his memory given it was the last person he'd seen.
The video ended. Perhaps it was a misplaced sense of justice, the lingering day's events or the sense of attributable responsibility.. or somehow all of it together ran down his sensibilities like a nail on a chalkboard. Now he was embroiled in some sort of deadly chess game. There were a lot more datapads.. but a lingering urgency tugged at his priorities. He'd been brought here and essentially abandoned; presumably unimportant enough to be left and dealt with later.
Jason scrolled back and turned the video over to try to place the few glimpses of the background. A quick search and he found 'Remote Worlds' .. a cargo handling company, located ten or so blocks from his current location. He slipped the pad into an inner pocket and picked his way out of the building and into the dead quiet of the early morning.
—*—
"Kessera?" Jason cocked his head in surprise as the front door to the shipping company slid open.
The Asari didn't break form. "And you are?"
Jason pushed the shallow cowl of the half cloak back. "Zol's proxy.. what are you doing here?"
She looked momentarily surprised. "I own this place, Family business. Why are you here? Have you got my father's corpse?"
Jason shook his head. "I can point you toward it.. but..". He looked around seeing a dingy alley that looked about right. "You failed to mention to me your sister was killed.. here."
The Asari's face darkened. "I didn't send you to find my sister."
"..no, no you didn't." Jason idly took in the various buildings around. "I reckon there's a little more to this than you let on."
"Don't let your little brain get all knotted in things that don't concern you human.. Zol's debts aside, people die asking after things that don't involve them."
Jason's eyes snapped back at the non-threat. "I'll keep it to business then, shall I?"
"You do that." Kessera turned and stepped back in the doorway. "Don't come here again, human. I prefer not mixing personal and business matters."
The door shut and locked. Jason frowned at it in deep thought. He looked up to a small third storey corner balcony on the adjacent street side that overlooked most of the ways in and out. A quick climb and a leap down and he had a small gray palm-sized half-sphere in his pocket. A camera.. now offline with a dead powercell but an intact storage card.
Jason slipped quietly back to the lower wards and the sanctuary of the workbench at Zol's shop. The old Krogan acknowledged him with a nod as he passed.
He'd scanned the camera's storage with his omnitool finding it full with recorded video. A small trace log showed the same remote file share location as an upload target which he checked again, noting that the log confirmed successful transfers.. weeks ago.
The very first video was the messy fingers over view and lens mangling of the young Asari carefully installing it in the dead quiet of a night. Skipping ahead weeks he paused at a.. the.. Turian entering the warehouse. Ahead more.. The blood pack krogan, Gnarl, made a brief appearance, meeting Kessera, which didn't look like it went well. He rewound and played it back again. Nothing was quite as it looked. A lot of business seemed to be going on in general, but very little cargo-wares ever moved. A furrow crossed his brow when another familiar Asari visited the business alone in day hours.. Tela Vasir.
A long search later he stopped at the fatal altercation, the young Asari running from the warehouse into the alley with the Turan in pursuit. The Turian and the Krogan leaving the alley to the warehouse where a half obscured Asari was waiting at the door; Kessera by the stance.
What would link a CSec officer, a merc, a business owner and a Specter… Jason stared into nothing for a minute before grabbing his gear and starting for the exit, he stalled and ran back to grab the hood from his backpack and pulled it over. The hard plates locked in place.
{HUD: online..}
Jason pulled the cowl over and ran into the quiet storefront. "Zol?"
The old Krogan turned from his repacking efforts. A scaly brow raising at Jason's appearance. "I know that is not from my stores.."
Jason was briefly nonplussed, "This is mine.. it can wait.. Zol, who is S.B.?"
"What rock've you been living under?" The old krogan crossed his arms and leaned back, eyeing up Jason; the old lizard's gaze not missing the dirt, scuffs and recent blood stains. "It depends what you're asking for, he's a broker or an informant."
"Of course.." Jason cursed inwardly. A few more puzzle pieces fit into place. "Information is power-"
"-and influence. Nothing is free.", The Krogan shook his head and gave Jason a long look. "Keep your nose out of business with him unless you have a particular hatred for your own life. I got some perspective in old age. I don't deal."
"Does he have a name?"
"The Shadow Broker."
"Why would he play off his own assets?"
Zol thought for a moment. "If it's a game, then he will only play if there is a net gain."
Jason paced and stopped mid step.
.. What if they weren't all his assets..
He sprinted out of the shop.
The Krogan rolled his eyes as he watched Jason disappear. "Humans.."