A quiet knock on the door, and it was opened after a few minutes of waiting.
"Who are you looking for?"
"Spectre Shepard. Mrs. Marconi?"
"Yes…"
A hint of apprehension touched the woman's voice.
"And Mr. Marconi…"
"Honey, who's there?"
"…ah, he's home."
I nodded, maintaining a polite smile.
"May I come in?"
"O-of course, but what happened, and why do you need my husband?"
"Oh, you're all about to find out."
The woman stepped aside, and I walked in, followed by two people in light armor. I was dressed similarly myself. A few dozen seconds later, I entered the living room where Mr. Marconi was sitting.
"Mr. Marconi…"
I began speaking in an official tone. The man jerked slightly, turned his head toward me, and froze. His eyes widened in shock.
"…you are under arrest."
"This is some kind of mistake…"
He uttered the words in a weak voice.
"You…"
The man's wife appeared in the living room and, hearing my words, froze for a couple of seconds.
"…I'm calling my daughter, she's a lawyer, and I ask you not to take my husband away until she arrives."
"No problem. Jack, put the handcuffs on Mr. Marconi."
"On it."
The girl approached Marconi with a slight twitch and snapped the bracelets on him. He immediately began complaining that they were too tight.
"Chifuyu Orimura… check them."
Jack only snorted contemptuously at my words.
"Tightened strictly according to protocol. Being held for more than two days with this tightness might have some consequences, of course, but…"
She shrugged carelessly.
"…a couple of hours until his daughter arrives and we explain everything to her and his wife won't make a difference."
"You see…"
Only my face was visible behind a transparent visor, and I was smirking casually.
"But it hurts…"
"It hurt for me too…"
Jack couldn't contain herself and spoke in a low, threatening tone.
"…I…"
"Jack, later."
The girl snorted again, and Mr. Marconi froze, not understanding what was happening at all. However, he didn't have to remain in the dark for long. Literally thirty minutes after the call, a flustered young woman burst into the private house.
"I'm here! What happened?"
"Wonderful. Since you, Mrs. Marconi Junior, are here, we can begin. To be honest, many people are being detained right now in connection with the case your husband and father is directly involved in. And some of the arrests are going just like this one…"
I gestured with my hand, as if to say that a calm conversation might not have happened otherwise.
"…and all this is only because you…"
I looked at the scumbag's wife and daughter.
"…are surprisingly decent ladies."
"I would ask you to choose your words carefully."
Marconi's daughter's eyes flashed.
"Oh, I will choose them. But first, Jack, please take off your helmet. And you, Mr. Marconi, tell me—do you recognize this girl?"
"Yeah…"
Jack removed her helmet. Marconi looked at her, not understanding what they wanted from him.
"No… I'm seeing her for the first time in my life."
"Really?"
A growl rumbled in Jack's voice.
"And if I tell you that my name wasn't always Jack? That I chose this name for myself after I escaped from your hands, you piece of shit…"
"I would ask you to stop!"
"And you, when I was still just a child, called me Subject Zero!"
The man flinched and even tried to jump back. Jack, having screamed this, became shrouded in biotic flames. I had to place a hand on her shoulder to keep her from making a mistake.
"What is going on here? Martin? What Subject Zero is she talking about?"
"Honey, I don't know what she's talking about…"
Marconi tried to wiggle off the hook; he didn't realize we wouldn't have come here if we didn't have ironclad evidence.
"You know, not long ago we were at the remains of a complex on Pragia…"
The man flinched, and his daughter, apparently sensing something, frowned deeply but didn't interrupt us.
"And of course, the scumbags working in that scientific complex, where Cerberus monsters performed experiments on children…"
Both women frowned.
"…tried to erase the data before leaving the complex. Except…"
I smirked.
"…we were lucky that the self-destruct system, if there was one, didn't work…"
The man turned pale; evidently, there was one, and he had been counting on it.
"…and the data itself was deleted sloppily. Even after all this time, the data could be recovered."
I extended my omni-tool slightly, and a hologram appeared above it for everyone to see. A younger Marconi standing over a table to which a child was strapped, discussing exactly what he was about to do and what results he wanted to achieve, followed by the work itself. Of course, part of the file was corrupted, but what I was able to show was enough for this scumbag's wife and daughter to look at him with completely different eyes.
"Father… why?"
"My girl, I was young and foolish…"
"And now you're old and foolish."
I cut him off.
"…We've hacked all your correspondence, you see, and you're still maintaining contact with Cerberus, consulting them on potential experiments."
"You had no right!"
"Actually, I did."
I shrugged carelessly.
"I'm not a cop, after all. I'm a Spectre, and this entire operation to detain the surviving scumbags who ruined so many children's lives…"
I shook my head.
"…is under the patronage of my corps. Which means we have the right to shoot you without a word if we don't like the way you look at your fingernails, let alone the hacking. By the way, I should thank you. Thanks to hacking you, we were able to send teams to several Cerberus complexes that are conducting inhumane experiments on Asari and Krogan."
After a few seconds of silence, I decided to continue.
"Be thankful that your wife and daughter knew nothing and are generally law-abiding citizens, because thanks to that, there won't be a public trial for you. You've already been sentenced in absentia to a very long term—and not in prison, no… you'll be working at a mining station for the rest of your days."
"This is illegal…"
He tried to look at his daughter as he said this, but she was still reeling from what she had seen and simply looked away.
"I am a Spectre, and I am the law."
I said this with a slight smirk.
"But some of your colleagues, who dragged their loved ones into this or other dirty business, weren't so lucky. Their hearings will be public; they and their families will be disgraced so thoroughly that they'll be pariahs even among pirates."
The man looked at me with fear in his eyes.
"However, ruining the life of your Tanechka, who donates money from every paycheck to charities and helps the poor, taking only a percentage of the settlement or nothing at all… And your wife, a law-abiding citizen working at a cinema candy shop…"
I made it clear through my demeanor that I didn't want to do that.
"That would be too cruel."
"As far as I'm concerned, it's just right…"
Jack said this in a slightly angry voice.
"…so that scumbags like him understand exactly what kind of trouble they brought upon their family, trouble that will destroy them. You're just too kind…"
"Of course, of course…"
Both women of the Marconi family cast a glance at Jack… but there was so much mixed into it that it was impossible to tell what there was more or less of.
"I'm too kind, and I simply don't want to breed hatred where it can be avoided. Anyway, here…"
I handed two copies of a laminated document to the scumbag's daughter.
"Um… confirmation that there are no claims against us?"
"Well, I don't think your employers are idiots, and they'll discover the note in your personal files about Martin Marconi being convicted very quickly. But they might miss the note stating that there are no claims against you."
I smiled somewhat apologetically.
"So you're being provided with an official document that allows you to show an employer or any other sentient being that they are wrong."
Tatiana smiled weakly.
"If only anyone actually took that into account…"
There was a hint of resignation in her voice.
"…Father… this… you didn't feel sorry for the children… at least based on that recording we were shown…"
The words were very difficult for her.
"Но did you at least consider, while you were doing all this, that if it ever came out, our lives would be ruined once electronic marks appeared in our documents?"
She shook her head.
"It will be hard for us to get jobs as seventh assistants to the fifth deputy floor-washers."
"I did everything for the good of humanity…"
The man smirked somewhat maliciously, revealing his true personality.
"…and I would do it all again. Except I'd take more serious security measures. So that monsters like you…"
His gaze fixed on Jack.
"…couldn't escape."
The scumbag's wife covered her mouth with her hands.
"Anyway, you see for yourselves that this creature is utterly repulsive and unrepentant."
"We…"
Tatiana swallowed.
"…you know, I earn decent money and I can try to pay at least part of the compensation to the victims."
"What the fuck do I need your money for?"
Jack couldn't hold back and even raised her voice slightly.
"I just want all of them to either die or suffer until the end of their days."
"Don't worry…"
I looked intently at the women.
"…my corporation has founded a fund to help those lucky enough to have escaped. By the way, if you do have problems, you can contact New Life Corporation; they'll help you with employment."
"Thank you."
Tatiana gave me a weak smile.
"And we're taking him away."
Chifuyu Orimura, Jack, and I carefully boxed him in and led him outside, making sure no one realized what was happening. Of course, people would find out soon enough, but…
* Side View *
"We have a problem!"
A young woman, a brunette with chocolate-colored skin, burst into the Illusive Man's office, clearly in a state of extreme panic.
"Hope, what else could have happened?"
"The Spectres, cooperating with Asari huntresses and Turian Blackwatch, have raided thirteen of our scientific complexes. Almost all surviving staff from the Pragia project have been arrested, and those who escaped that fate are now at other facilities and have been declared wanted for illegal experiments on children."
The Illusive Man frowned.
"Thirteen complexes?"
"Yes, and apparently, we need to evacuate at least fifty more!"
"Fifty?"
"Yes, mentions of those fifty can be found in these thirteen.
"Fuck… who?"
"Unknown…"
The girl shook her head.
"…but it's known that a certain Jack has appeared in Spectre Shepard's company, who, according to unconfirmed reports, is Subject Zero from that project."
"Bitch… Shepard needs to be eliminated… he's creating too many problems."
"Should I start developing a plan?"
"Oh, I don't think that's necessary… I'll leak the info on Shepard to the Shadow Broker; he seemed very keen on getting better acquainted with this Spectre…"
An anticipatory smirk appeared on the Illusive Man's lips.
***
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