Chương 106: Chapter 101
I was fully waiting to hear about the untimely demise of Commander Shepard. When instead the Alarms on my captured base start blaring. Checking my security feeds I see that my base is being raided by Commander Shepard, Ms. he's, and Liara T'soni. Well, them finding me is inevitable, I turn off my alarms and send word to my teams to let them through. There's no reason to get my men killed and risk damaging my base staging a defense I know Shepard will just tear right through.
"Welcome Commander Shepard, Ms.Hess, Dr.T'soni. I can't say I was expecting a visit so soon, what brings you here?" I ask as they enter my chamber. They enter weapons drawn, but I notice some slight confusion at my casual tone.
"You're the Shadow Broker?" Dr. T'Soni speaking up first asks.
"Let me guess you were expecting a Salarian?"
"That's not important you can consider this my resignation I won't be spying for you anymore!" Ms.Hess yells at me.
"Does the commander inspire that much loyalty? Or perhaps you've fallen for him? Either way congratulations. I do love it when a plan comes together especially a last-minute improvisation"
"You had her infiltrate my team to keep tabs on me and gain access to the citadel networks." Shepherd accused
"First, I already had access to those networks. Second, I put her on your path to make sure you didn't get yourself killed, her joining your team was on you two. I only had her intervene after Prvt. Jensen's original replacement was captured."
"Original replacement?" Shepherd asks
"Ashley Williams of the Willams family"
"The hero of Pax?"
"I thought I should make it up to her for having Ms. Hess take her place. Plus you never know when you might need a favor from a hero."
"You still had me sending in reports on all of our missions." Ms. Hess interjected
"Nothing you sent was information I couldn't find on my own. Shepherd is not exactly subtle."
"Wait! This means you knew that Eden Prime would be attacked." Dr. T'soni interrupted.
"Of course, the Batarains are even less subtle than Shepard. "
"I've had enough of this. You can tell us anything you want, but no one would ever take an info broker's word at face value. Especially not an info broker as infamous as you." Shepherd said ceasing all further discussions as the three of them suddenly raised their weapons. Before they could fire, I caught them in a blood biotic stasis. At my strength, a regular stasis would have been enough to hold the three of them, but adding blood bending makes it easier to hold and less likely they'll escape.
"How rude. I expected better of you Commander. However, I see now you still have some trust issues to work through. Very well, I grant the three of you temporary access to my network. Please consult my VI terminal you'll find I have been nothing but truthful." I tell them as I release them from my hold.
After being thoroughly cowed into compliance they followed my instructions and began to comb through my network. As they did I amused myself by watching their shocked and disbelieving grumbles.
After a long wait, they finally broke from their search. "How can we even trust any of this either? You could have doctored your network to support everything you claim. " asked with a hint of anger.
"Commander, if you don't trust me or my information why the fuck are you even here."
"I believe him. I came to end my employment, but it seems like you were telling the truth. You wrote me off the moment Shepard added me to his crew. The reports I did send were ranked as tertiary information. I bet you didn't even read my reports." Ms. Hess admitted with slight annoyance.
"I believe him as well, I don't believe he could or would fabricate so much evidence to support himself without it becoming obvious." Dr. T'soni said.
"Fine, but that doesn't explain all the holes in your story." Shepherd countered.
"Well, that would be, because I don't report on my business. Anyone with enough credits can buy information from my network. My dealings are remote enough that I don't receive any reports about them. The reports I do receive are discarded."
"Ok that makes sense, but what are you doing this all for?" Ms. Hess asked.
"To stop the Reapers of course," I said, smugly enjoying Shepard's calm mask break.
"You know about the Reapers?" He asked incredulously.
"What don't I know about them?"
"How do we stop them?"
"You and I are off to a good start. You stopped them from invading using the back door and a recent Slave revolt destroyed the front door. They don't have any more relay shortcuts, so they have to take the long way and invade like anyone else."
"Well, that explains why the slaves did that." He scoffed. "That's what's already happened what needs to happen next."
"I can think of three things to keep in mind. First are you aware of the Reapers' indoctrination?"
"Yes, I saw what happened with Saren and..." He doesn't finish his ideas realizes Liara is right here. To avoid any awkwardness I cut him off.
"Indoctrination can be much more subtle than you've seen. It's most insidious when you can't tell who is indoctrinated and who isn't. I can give you a hint though. You can't trust the Batarians, beyond the obvious, Sarne wasn't the first to discover a derelict Reaper. The Hegemony has been researching one for centuries. Assume that you can't trust the entire ruling class."
"I don't see myself in a position of peacefully meeting with Batarians anytime soon."
"That would be fine if it was just the Batarians. The Citadel is a giant Reaper construct. The council will not believe you about the Reapers and they may very well work against you. Which leads us to point 2 you need to get people to believe you. I've already taken care of the non-citadel races, but I have no way of convincing the council races."
"If I can't trust the council I'll have to go directly to the Hierarchy, Union, and Republics. Have any convincing proof, because even if they're not indoctrinated they're not going to want to believe me."
"I do. It's your lucky day Dr. T'soni." I say while forwarding her a file.
"Is this real?" She asks in disbelief upon seeing what I sent her.
"What is it Liara?"
"This is the location to a Prothean cryo bunker. If he's claiming what I think he is, then there are still living Prothean's buried on Eden Prime. The excavation is already in progress, because of the first beacon. No one could argue with a live Prothean."
"That should be more than enough proof so what's the third point?"
"The collectors will soon be much more active. They will be kidnapping entire colonies. Their base is on the other side of the omega 4 relay. They need to be stopped."
"Wait who are the collectors?" Shepherd asked.
"The boogymen of the Traverse. They're infamous for buying a lot of slaves that are never seen again" Ms. Hess explained
"They use them as research material for bio-weapons and worse," I added.
"Great, a suicide mission inside a suicide mission. What about ship upgrades? The Citadel fleet didn't stand a chance against even one Reaper."
"It's already taken care of Commander. I just haven't wanted to tip my hand too early."
"What about the Geth?"
"What about them? I told you I would handle the non-citadel races."
"You're going to work with them? Won't they side with the Reapers?"
"I found the Geth can be quite reasonable. Especially after being told first hand what the Reapers have done to the Synthetic life of previous cycles." I told them using my hand to subtly outline some of the more robotics portions of my face. As I did all three of their battle-ready faces morphed into pure shock. They struggled to regain their composure as they realized just what I am.
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