"John, I'm sorry, but you have to die!"
With those exact words, Liara T'Soni burst into my office and immediately found herself staring down the barrel of a pistol held by Rila.
"Hey, hey… I'm not being serious…"
Liara T'Soni shook her head.
"Not serious?"
Rila tilted her head slightly.
"And why should I believe you?"
"Well… because it would hurt me if something happened to John?"
While Liara T'Soni was answering, I stood up from behind the desk, walked around it, and carefully placed a hand on the pistol, pressing down slightly to lower it.
"Sister, there's no need to react so sharply. I don't know the reason for Liara T'Soni's outburst, but believe me, she won't harm me."
"Brother, power changes people, and you've given her a lot of power… So I can't be sure she's still on your side."
I only shook my head at my sister's words.
"That's enough, besides, you forgot to take the pistol off safety."
"Huh?"
A moment of confusion, but it was enough for me to carefully take the pistol from the girl and place it on the desk.
"Just kidding."
"Tsk…"
The girl library jerked her shoulder, showing she was displeased with my behavior.
"Liara T'Soni?"
"Anyway, before I get blasted with biotics, let me explain. The Illusive Man contacted the Shadow Broker—that is, me—and offered to sell me information about you. Except I doubt he has even a grain of info that I don't already have. So I told him I had enough information to draw my own conclusions."
"Wait…"
I stopped Liara T'Soni.
"…The Illusive Man reached out directly? That doesn't sound like that secretive paranoid."
"No, his representative, but does it matter?"
Liara T'Soni pouted slightly.
"I embellished the situation a bit to make the story sound more epic."
"Fine, and what happened next?"
"And then they offered me money to eliminate you! And you wouldn't believe how much they're offering!"
Liara T'Soni walked to the desk and, taking the tablet lying on it, typed a figure with nine zeros into the calculator.
"Are you serious right now?"
Rila stared at the number in surprise.
"Yep."
Liara T'Soni nodded enthusiastically.
"Brother, maybe you really should… you know?"
My sister tilted her head.
"No, not for real, but say we fake a news report that an attempt was made on your life, and then you can lead everything from this office like the Illusive Man?"
"Hmm…"
I actually considered the proposal, as getting that kind of money would be nice. Especially considering it could be spent on buying useful things or expanding the shelters.
"John?"
Liara T'Soni looked at me with slight confusion.
"I'm thinking maybe we really should arrange something like that? With that kind of money, we could expand the shelter for another hundred thousand sentients."
Liara T'Soni also frowned slightly.
"No, but if we need liquid assets that badly, we can redirect our salvage teams. The Illusive Man has a couple of shelters I found out about completely by accident. We can pick them clean."
I sighed.
"We could… but only the most reliable ones."
Nodding in agreement, I closed my eyes.
"If the Illusive Man has decided to kill me, then let's land a few more blows on his bases. Let Cerberus start falling apart."
** Some time later. **
"John, I can't take this anymore…"
Aria T'Loak contacted me and spoke in a weary voice, in which a hint of a plea for help could be heard.
"You're the one who decided to pull this off."
"Yes, I did… and I even made a deal with that Garrus Vakarian of yours… but these psychos… they're as dumb as bricks! Except bricks are actually useful! At least you can use a brick to build something, but these…"
She shook her head.
"And what do you want from me? I already told you—drop everything and move to your own resort… but no, you're still sitting it out on Omega for some reason. You could have been living the high life by now."
"You know exactly why I'm doing this."
Irritation flared in her voice.
"I know, just as I know it's far from the only way to seize control of these factions—or at least the parts of them based on Omega. Но you decided to play at intrigue, acting like a fool who doesn't realize a conspiracy is being hatched against her."
"Are you just going to keep grumbling?"
Aria T'Loak elegantly arched an eyebrow.
"Yes, I'm going to keep grumbling, or do you want me to do something?"
I repeated my question, and Aria T'Loak began to look very displeased.
"Alright, alright…"
Waving my hand, I didn't make her beg for help.
"…I'll fly out to Omega on the first available flight."
"You have the SSV Normandy under your ass, joker…"
Despite her attempt to look displeased, gratitude could be heard in her voice.
"I know. Just as I know you can wait a week or two, because right now additional equipment is being installed on the SSV Normandy—not strictly necessary for operation, but highly desirable for comfort and speed in performing various tasks."
"Fine…"
Aria T'Loak sighed.
"…I'll wait."
"By the way, you're keeping a few biotic girls close to you, right?"
"Don't you start lecturing me, okay?"
"Is Matriarch Benezia nagging you?"
"Yeah…"
Aria T'Loak sighed again, but there was warmth in her voice.
"…she's acting like we've been married for two hundred years."
"Well, then propose to her."
"What?!"
Aria T'Loak stared at me in shock.
"Oh, come on, everyone who knows you well enough knows you're together. And everyone wonders why the hell you haven't tied the knot yet."
"John, you're pushing it…"
Aria T'Loak tried to frown menacingly, but I could clearly see on the screen how an uncharacteristic blush crept onto her cheeks.
"Got it, I won't bring it up for the next couple of months, and then I'll poke Matriarch Benezia about it; maybe at least she'll be brave enough to finally take a step forward."
"Don't you dare!"
"Well, then take matters into your own hands finally! After all, you're already a Matriarch! You both already have wonderful daughters, so…"
"Shut up."
Steel clanged in her voice, but the blush, which had grown even deeper, gave her away completely.
"No, you're both going to get it from me; I'll knock you both out and lock you in a room in a bunker on some remote planet."
I shook my head.
"John…"
"Yeah, I get it, I get it, you little purple bunny."
The connection cut out.
"Prepare the ship for departure?"
"Yes…"
I answered EDI, who had asked the question.
"…but the ship needs to be finished, so offer the Quarians who are currently resting on Bali after their shifts triple pay if they agree to come in and finish installing all the planned equipment as soon as possible."
"I'll handle everything."
"Thanks, what would I do without you?"
In the relatively short time she had been acting as my assistant, my workload had decreased significantly, and the work itself was being performed at a much higher level. So the question, while rhetorical, showed that I truly valued what EDI was doing for me.
"You'd suffer."
The answer came instantly.
"I honestly don't understand how you managed all this without me. And at an acceptable level, too…"
Surprise could be heard in EDI's voice.
"You barely even used VIs; you preferred to sort through everything manually!"
I didn't comment, just smiled faintly.
"Anyway, I've contacted the best workers; if they don't respond in ten minutes, I'll call the next ones. But they will respond."
"I don't doubt it."
I nodded in agreement.
"Quarians are the most hardworking people in our galaxy. At first, they didn't even want to take overtime pay. And the way they worked…"
I shook my head.
"…now they're just workaholics who take a full day off once every two weeks. But before, getting them to leave even once a month was a problem. And still, if they hear that help is needed, they immediately run to work."
"Well, that's not surprising."
EDI's avatar shrugged.
"You gave their people such a chance to repair the Migrant Fleet that they're still afraid they'll wake up tomorrow morning and it'll all just be a dream."
"I understand that…"
I sighed.
"…I just don't understand how an entire race could be brought to such a state."
"Organics…"
It was said with clear dissatisfaction.
"…no, you're different, of course, and…"
"I'm the same."
I gave a strained smile.
"I'm making a very large profit from all this. It just so happens that I can make this profit by helping the Quarians. If it were impossible to combine the two, then I… well, maybe I'd send a little financial aid, but I certainly wouldn't be employing so many Quarians."
"Well, I can only say that everyone I messaged has already responded. And by the way, many could have made a similar profit. But only you actually did it. And believe me, the Quarians don't care that you're profiting off them, because you've done more for them than perhaps even the admirals."
I sighed.
"Don't overpraise me."
"Yeah…"
** Side View **
"Please, come in…"
EDI stepped aside, letting a group of twenty Quarians onto the ship. They looked at her with slight distrust and gazed around the ship in awe.
"We will divide you into four groups of five; new equipment needs to be installed in four locations. Please accept the information about the equipment and their installation points on your omni-tools."
The Quarians didn't answer her, but she hadn't expected them to. Quarians despise AI, and even though they don't know she's an AI—believing her to be an extremely advanced VI loaded into a mobile platform—their contempt is no less for it.
"How much time do we have for the work?"
"The set deadline is two days."
The Quarians nodded and headed to their work areas. The ship was magnificent, of course, and there were many interesting technologies on it, but they didn't want to let Shepard down. So the work had to be finished in twenty-four hours. They decided this without even speaking…
***
Read the story months before public release — early chapters are on my Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Granulan