Chapter One Hundred And Nineteen

Freedom's Progress. Terminus Systems

"They must really want this Veetor guy back" I commented

The small quarian vessel came in for a landing and again I found myself feeling impressed by its crew who had agreed to land and pick up their comrade despite my massive badass cruiser and its escort being in orbit. I imagined that most of the natives of this universe would have turned tail and run upon seeing a vessel that they might label as a super-dreadnought.

As for Veetor, if that was his name, he'd been treated well enough by us despite the low tolerance most Imperials have for aliens, even the mostly harmless ones of this galaxy, who were down right cuddly when compared to what they had back in the 40k galaxy.

While the Inquisitor had not joined us for these opening talks I assumed that she would be monitoring them and carefully observing both my actions as well as those of the aliens.

"And returning him to them will be a good way to start our talks" said my wife.

Yes this was all part of the plan to destroy the geth and to ensure that the quarian migrant fleet was too busy resettling their people to interfere with the expedition. The migrant fleet needed to be occupied as it had the sheer numbers to challenge the expedition in space and allied with the Citadel Council races they'd be a threat. The Council could lure the quarians over to their side with the promise of a new home world so I would try to offer something even better.

To ensure that the quarians saw us as kindred spirits rather than potential enemies I intended to tell them all about the AI uprising that helped to bring down the Human Federation that predated the Imperium. Granted the Eldar murderfucking a chaos god into existence over thousands of years and a rapid increase in the birth rate of human psykers played a role as well, but there was no need to mention any of that.

So as to ensure that no one panicked I'd kept my honour guard on the small side and the colony's leaders were happy to let me handle this matter since Dany and I had won them over with lots of laser weapons. Recently I'd even gotten them to buy a few laser cannons, the kind they armed fighter planes with in the Fallout Universe, and having those made them feel better about my people building and manning a couple of fortresses on this planet.

It didn't take much longer for a squad of quarian troops to come down the ramp of their spacecraft. They were armed but didn't have any weapons in their hands, not that this mattered much as I had snipers keeping a close eye on the aliens in case they didn't anything naughty.

"I am Tali'Zorah vas Neema" introduced their leader

It took some effort to keep myself calm and not get all giddy as Tali was one of my favourite fictional characters of all time. I managed to keep a level head and not make myself look like a fool as I was no novice at this sort of thing.

"I am Captain Thrax of The Enduring Triumph head of the Noble House of Thrax" I replied "And this is my wife, Princess Daenerys of House Thrax".

If they had any reaction to our titles they hid it well.

"We've come to pick up one of our own," said a member of Tali's crew.

I assumed that Veetor must have signalled his people when the attack began.

"He's here" I said as I waved the alien forward "He's a little shook up after the attack".

Thankfully none of my people had decided to perform the cleanse the alien act while here. They knew to be on their best behaviour when meeting new people.

"Now that you have your friend back, would you be willing to listen to a proposal?" asked Dany.

Tali walked over to us after making sure that Veetor was safe onboard the vessel she commanded for this mission.

"I'm listening," she said.

So far so good.

"It's about the geth," Dany said.

While I didn't know if my psykers power would allow me to influence an alien mind that didn't stop me from trying and I should at least sense her curiosity.

"We want to help you defeat them and reclaim your home world," I added.

To say that she was surprised would be an understatement.

"What why?" she asked.

We had our reasons which I'd discussed at length with many of my allies and subjects.

"The AI are a threat to us all" I explained "And while my ships are powerful we don't know enough about the geth and their defences to be sure we can overwhelm without help".

Dany now had something to say.

"Even if we could smash their fleets with your aid we don't have a force powerful enough to conquer the worlds under geth control" she told Tali'Zorah "and you can't defeat them alone or you would have done so by now".

Using my omni-tool I sent the alien a few files, enough to give their admiralty board an idea of what my cruiser could do without giving away the kind of details that would led to anyone finding a big weakness or copying our tech, this somewhat common information in the 40k galaxy, at least to someone of my rank. I didn't bother to send them any data on the esort vessels since they were more vunrable and they weren't mind to share info about. Besides I didn't want them knowing by now much my crusier outgunned the other Imperial ships.

"Our ancestors waged war against the AI who rebelled against us and we were nearly destroyed before the conflcit ended" I told the aliens "I rather not allow that to happen again".

I could sense her confusion.

"Humans have never faced an AI rebellion" stated Tali'Zorah.

"Not in this universe" I said.

Now she was really confused.

"Perhaps you should take our offer to your superiors and along with the files" suggested Dany "We can discuss further details with them later".

Tali might be the daughter of an admiral, but she didn't have the authority to make any deals with us, she was simply the messenger. To that end we let her go flying back to her people.