Interesting Times - Chapter 21

August 18th, 2169

20:47 SET

Citadel, Presidium

In my experience, there are two things that everybody who goes to a high-class party wants, influence and money, and they all accumulate into power.

No matter what species, in the end, we're all the same.

And I'm no different.

"My secretary will contact you regarding the details, but I'm sure we will find a compromise favorable for both sides," said the Turian in front of me and held out his hand for a shake.

"I sure hope so," I answered and shook it. "At least, there will be less paperwork to go through."

The Turian let out a metallic chuckle. "That's true. For a small colony like ours, the paperwork can take a while to go through. We may be still in Council space but too close to the edge of it. It would take three to four years until my government approved selling half a dozen starfighters, and that's too long. The pirates and slavers around the border are getting bolder by the month, and it won't take long before they consider striking inside Citadel space."

"With the amount of firepower you will have in a short time, they will think twice about hitting your colony. One frigate, two corvettes, and a dozen starfighters will make it too costly for pirates to hit you. They may not be military grade, but I promise they will do their jobs, Mr. Avestus," I responded.

"I know they will. Pirates and slavers are nothing more than cowardly scum. They will run after the first serious push-back, and from the specifications of your Colonial Defense Selection, the frigate alone will be enough to put fear into their hearts. And I must say, Mr. Denebren, for being so new on the galactic stage, you're catching up well. Your ships have still ways to go before catching up with the Turian designs, but in another decade or so, you will be on par with the Asari and Salarians."

I chuckled politely at his attempt at flattery. We both knew that it would take longer to catch up with those two than a decade.

At least where actual military hardware was concerned.

Yet, even our older models could still compete with the other species on the semi-civilian market and make me enough money to finance the development of newer models for the Alliance military. That was one of the reasons why I had the Colonial Defense Selection put together.

It wasn't just an opportunity to make money but also to see how our older models stacked up against those from other species.

From there, my analysts would be able to create prognoses about how our current models would fare in a direct confrontation with the ships of the other species. And with these simulations, we would know where our strengths and weaknesses lay and what we could do better with the next generation.

Furthermore, they will probably see actual combat against pirates and slavers, which would make the analyses only more accurate.

Was it callous to use other people's struggles with pirates and slavers to our advantage?

Perhaps.

But they were getting a good deal on the ships I was selling to them. After all, every ship in my ColDef Selection was a former military ship refitted for the open market.

Every time a frigate, corvette, or starfighter was getting close to the moment when they weren't fit for service in the military anymore, or the cost of refitting them was becoming too high, I bought them.

Actually, it was more like a trade. I got the ships for free, and the Alliance had to pay less for a new starship. But that wasn't important right now.

We stripped them of any military-grade hardware and installed weapons and shields with half as much power as the current military generation had. That way, even if they fell into the wrong hands, they would pose no threat to our military forces.

The idea behind the ColDef Selection was for the smaller colonies further away from military hubs to have the option to arm themselves and to hold back any pirate attack long enough for the nearest patrol to arrive.

Like Mr. Avestus said, pirates were cowards. If something looked well defended, they would only attack if they were desperate.

At first, I had intended to sell them only inside Alliance territory, but after a month, the first offer from a non-human colony came in, and after that, the ball got rolling.

Most of those colonies were at the border of the Citadel space to the Terminus systems, and they felt that the Turian patrols were spread too thin to protect them adequately.

That they didn't even mention the efforts of the Asari and Salarians in this endeavor was pretty telling in my opinion.

Nonetheless, I took that as my cue to expand into the whole Citadel space, and after negotiating with the Citadel Council Administration, my company was allowed to do business with colonies recognized by the Citadel. That took until the end of last month, by the way, longer than I had expected.

What didn't surprise me was that my company was the fourth that got such a permit and that the two Asari and the one Turian companies, which definitely created their own ColDef Selections after ours, got their permits first. Favoritism at its finest.

The only reason I could still compete with them, even if they had a head start, was that the Asari companies sold their ships at a much higher price than I, and their specifications were just barely better than mine. Who wanted to buy a frigate if they could have just that and a dozen starfighters extra?

The Turian company would have been a serious competitor, and they would probably become one in the next year or two, but for now, they only sold starfighters and corvettes outside Hierarchy space. The paperwork needed for that was already enough to keep one occupied for a long time, and from what I've heard, the paperwork for selling an old Turian military frigate outside of Hierarchy space would generate thrice the amount.

Yet, all that didn't hinder my business. It may have been only a month since I got the permit, but my stock was already half-empty. Five frigates, twenty corvettes, and around a hundred starfighters sold in less than a month, I couldn't be happier.

Money and new deals were rolling in, and my reputation was rising.

The latter made me especially happy.

I could walk into any restaurant inside Alliance space, and the moment I dropped my name, I would get one of their best tables, sometimes just entering the establishment was enough.

But here on the Citadel?

My name was nothing more than a bullet point on a list of notable humans. Something I was very eager to change.

Being well known opened more doors, and having a good reputation opened the ones you could use to climb further without leaving your back open to unreliable allies.

And speaking of allies, I spotted how Anita just politely excused herself from a conversation and made her way towards the open bar.

I left Mr. Avestus with a promise of my assistant calling him in the next five days and went towards Anita.

"You seem exhausted," I commented as I leaned against the bar next to Anita.

She huffed in response and regarded me with a dry look.

"Of course, I'm exhausted. I had to listen as the Hanar ambassador moaned about having to secure preaching permits for his people here on the Citadel and how that was a travesty since 'every living being should be educated about the greatness of the Enkindlers'."

She paused for a moment before she started to whisper harshly, the tiredness in her voice giving way to venom.

"Or it could be one of those Batarian assholes their ambassador specifically invited to annoy me."

"As far as I know, Batarians are always annoying assholes," I quipped to lighten her mood.

Apparently, I succeeded since her shoulders dropped, and a small smile played over her lips for a second.

"True, they are," agreed Anita, "but those come from worlds close to the border."

"Ah, I understand. I guess they're not happy with our anti-piracy efforts there?"

"No, they're not. They attempt to veil it as a concern for the stability of the region. Officially, the Batarians are concerned that our efforts in keeping pirate activity low could trigger a retaliation strike from them that could spill over into their territory too."

"As if," I scoffed, "they're probably annoyed that their profits are down and that they can't act with the same impunity as before."

"The same occurred to me. Still, it is stressful playing nice with them all the time when you have to suppress the urge to hit them in the face to shut them up."

"Is there anything I can do to help with making the evening even a bit enjoyable for you?"

My offer of help wasn't just to reduce Anita's workload and allow her to enjoy at least a few minutes of the evening, but it would also give me an in with whoever she planned to talk to as well.

"Vice-Executor Pallin is said to be here this evening," began Anita, and I could already speculate what exactly she wanted from him. While Pallin was only the Vice-Executor and would stay in his position for a few more years if one believed the grapevine, he was still the Vice-Executor and had enough power to approve the employment of humans as C-Sec officers, or at least through him, we could get a foot in the door.

I vaguely remembered that Pallin thought we humans were climbing up the ladder too quickly for his taste without proving that we could handle the responsibilities accompanying it. It could make the negotiations more difficult, but without trying to find out his stance on the subject any plan wouldn't get me far anyway.

"And you want me to talk to him about getting some of our people into the force."

"It is on my agenda for the evening, so if you could take care of that, Oscar, I would be very grateful," said Anita with a smile in my direction.

I just shrugged and signaled the barkeeper to pour me a glass of wine.

"Just to be sure. No restrictions?"

"Getting some of our own on the force isn't that important right now," replied Anita. "While it would make good PR, we can still wait a few more years before breaching the subject again. So don't go and promise something outlandish."

"Me and promising outlandish things?" I gasped. "Dear, you seem to confuse me with someone else."

I threw my arms out dramatically, barely missing the wineglass in the hand of the barkeeper who gave me the stink eye for the almost accident. With a quick smile, I apologized and took the glass off her hands. The Asari just rolled her eyes, mumbled something under her breath, and went towards the other end of the bar to serve another guest.

"After that display, I'm more concerned about you making a fool out of yourself. But as I said, it's not that important right now, so go, knock yourself out."

She didn't look at me as she waved me away with her hand, but I could see how the corner of her lip twitched upwards.

"I will, my lady," I declared with a short bow and a hand on my heart, "as soon as I see the Vice-Executor, I will leave until then," I got up from my bow, relaxed against the bar, and took a sip of my wine, "I will continue to enjoy your presence."

The twitch of her lips changed into a genuine smile, and I considered my good deed for the day done. Anita truly deserved to relax and enjoy a bit of the evening after all the hard work she was put through day after day.

It wasn't easy to establish relations with more than half a dozen different governments in the span of a few years, and her assistant was likely to burn the same bridges she had painstakingly created. Last I heard, Udina got into a shouting match with a representative of a banking clan of the Volus over interest rates.

Thankfully, it did happen behind closed doors, so it didn't impact our public image, but it still showed a worrying tendency. Such outbursts, while useful in the right situation, were only acceptable when our position here on the Citadel was more secured.

I didn't worry too much about Udina, though, since I was sure that Anita was keeping him on the short leash for now.

I was more worried about another topic.

"There was another access try at the facility on Benning. We found the infiltrator before he could gain access to anything important, but it shows a worrying trend," I whispered, my voice losing all of its previous playfulness.

In response, Anita clenched her hand harder around the body of her wineglass. Her knuckles turned white, and for a moment, I was concerned that she would break the glass in her hand before she forced herself to relax.

"Do we know who was behind it?" she asked, bringing up the glass to take a sip.

"No, we don't," I admitted. "The infiltrator was human and nothing more than a hired hand. The money came from anonymous sources that we're still trying to track down, but if it is like the other attempts, we won't have much luck with that."

In the last few months, the attempts to infiltrate and steal the blueprints and any information about the DR drive had tripled. It was like someone was getting desperate to figure out our secrets.

There had even been an attempted kidnapping of Takahashi when he visited our testing facility on Terra Nova! Thankfully it failed, but Takahashi agreed with my suggestion that he would remain on Reach for the foreseeable future, at least, until we found out who organized the attempt. Besides, it seemed like I had to clean house once again if someone was daring to leak Takahashi's travel plans to outside sources.

I had made a show of tearing apart a few divisions in search of the culprit finding the rat had more to do with luck than anything else, but I didn't even need to use my fall-guy to get the other rats to relax.

The only reason why I had made such a large spectacle out of my hunt for the traitor was that his capture got the other potential traitors to let their guards down while my security team went over my employees with a fine comb and with the help of the AIS.

I didn't even need to ask Andrew or send in a request for help before the AIS offered their help. Takahashi was classified as a VSA, a Very Special Asset, and thus his survival and remaining on the Alliance's side was paramount.

By the way, I was considered only a Special Asset. Apparently, creating a completely new way to travel between star systems independent of the Mass Relays and Eezo was more important than having enough money to make it possible.

"That is... unfortunate," commented Anita, a scowl appearing on her face.

"Nothing we can do that changes that," I said lightly. "Besides, whoever got their hands on the package extracted from the Athena shipyard won't be happy for long. They only got a small part of the picture, and we left them a small present inside the code."

Anita looked at me with a raised eyebrow, silently questioning why I was saying that to her in a place where we would be most certainly under observation by the STG and other assorted spy agencies. I sent back a challenging grin, uncaring of her unasked question. In response, she rolled her eyes, figuring out that I dropped that tidbit of information intentionally. Whoever stole the information package would probably hear about the comment I just made, and would search the code package for any hidden trap up and down. They would never find anything since there was nothing to find, but they shouldn't know that. They would waste precious time searching for a virus that didn't exist, and anything that could delay others figuring out the DR drive was a plus in my book.

"I see," she said, and I was sure she saw through my thinly veiled plot. It wasn't a thought-out plan in the first place, more of a spur-of-the-moment plan, but I was sure just the possibility of it being true would halt the analysis of the package for a few days.

"Before I forget it, do you remember Alec?"

"Alec?" I repeated, trying to remember who she was talking about. "Do you mean Commander Alec Ryder of the N7 forces?"

"It's actually Major Ryder now. He's my new military liaison. It seems like he has found a new passion in programming and development. I don't know how far he will go in his pursuit, and if it's something the Alliance can support, but if it's needed, do you think I can send him your way?"

It took me a moment to understand what Anita was implying without outright saying it, but if I remembered correctly, Ryder was looking into developing an evolving AI in the games. An AI that was connected closely to the user and learned side-by-side with him.

Of course, that was completely illegal inside Citadel Space, and while there were a few ways to research AI legally, it was considered almost impossible to get a permit.

For future references, I had looked up who got those permits, and found out it had been three Asari Matriarchs, and five Salarian researchers over the course of five hundred years. And I never found out how exactly they got those permits. It would take a few years and a lot more influence than I currently had to get one of those permits, and even then the outcome was uncertain. As long as the permit was acquired on the down low by people more interested in personal favors and money there would be no problems, but if someone more closely to the higher echelons of the government got wind of it and ran to his or her superiors with the information then the whole thing would get more complicated. If the Council knew before I got the permit signed, then there would probably be no permit at all. They would use their favorite excuse of humanity not being ready for such a responsibility and block any attempts in acquiring one. But if I got one beforehand, then they couldn't just take back their permission without looking like idiots for granting it in the first place.

Yet, that was still far off in the future, so I shelved the thought concerning AI research for now and concentrated on the mass of guests, searching for one particular person.

Finding him, in one of the corners of the room, his back to the wall, watching the other guests, I decided that now was the time to approach him.

I emptied my glass and put it on the counter before I turned toward Anita.

"If it gets too hot for the Alliance, send him my way. I have some practice in handling hot potatoes. Now if you could excuse me, I just found the target of the mission you gave me," I said and winked at her.

With an eye roll, she dismissed me, and I weaved through the party guest towards the other side of the room. After a few close calls of almost bumping into someone later, I arrived at the other side of the room, and Vice-Executors Pallin's eyes fixated on me as I drew closer to him.

I raised my hand in greeting with a polite smile, and even from where I stood, I could hear him sigh.

"Vice-Executor Pallin, I didn't expect to meet you here," I greeted as I came close. The Vice-Executor pushed himself away from the wall and gave me a smile, or the attempt of one. I couldn't really tell if he was smiling or grimacing, perhaps a combination of both.

"I didn't expect this, too, but Executor Vanir told me that C-Sec should be present at this party for more than just security purposes."

"And I guess nobody other than you were available for this duty?"

"Executor Vanit thought it would be educational for me if I had more exposure to events like these before I take over her position."

"Oh, is that now confirmed?" I asked interested. "I've heard rumors but nothing concrete."

"Yes, I've become the designated successor when Executor Vanir leaves the force in a few years."

"Any reason for that?" I inquired.

"That is private," answered Pallin with a scowl, ending my line of inquiry effectively.

"I understand," I said, closing the topic... for now. Who knew if the information could be useful somewhere down the line.

"Was there something you need, Mr. Denebren?" asked Pallin, his posture showing me that he wanted the conversation with me to end quickly. Not that I would end it. I was very good at ignoring such cues when it suited me.

"You know me, Vice-Executor?" I asked instead, genuinely surprised that he knew my name and could match my face to it.

"I make it a habit to remember the faces of people who can influence the political landscape here on the Citadel. And while humans generally don't have a lot of influence, it's changing fast, and I don't like it. Your stance on employing other species got some eyes on you, and I'm sure I will see you more often than not when those same eyes turn hostile, and you need the protection of C-Sec."

"To me, it seems like you know exactly what's going to happen to me. Should I be concerned?"

"I've seen it often enough before. You're rising up in the world, and fast at that. Something that can be said about your whole species. Many people get jealous when that happens and try to take out their competition by any means necessary. This may not be Omega, but don't hold onto the illusion that there won't be any 'direct' approaches to get you out of the picture."

"I'll take your warning to heart," I said and ignored his mumbled comment of 'Sure' while mentally making a note to get someone to check my defenses against assassination attempts at my office and apartment.

"But there is something I wanted to talk to you about," I continued, and I could basically see how Pallin held back from saying 'Finally' and rolling his eyes. He knew that I didn't come over just to make idle conversation. Talking with an experienced C-Sec officer could be interesting when they started to talk about cases they encountered, but Pallin wasn't known for being a good conversationalist.

"It's about humanity taking some of the responsibility for keeping the galaxy safe. We want to do our part in making this station a safe place for everyone."

"As I've told your embassy many times, this is a decision the Council has to make. And if they believe it is too early for humanity, then there is nothing I can do to change their decision," Pallin said with a long-suffering sigh. I got the feeling that he had this conversation many times before, and that he was already dreading the many times it would come after this.

"I know it's the Council's decision, and they have their reasons to believe we're not ready for the responsibility that comes with C-Sec," I conciliated. "But we still want to show that the trust the Council already has placed in us isn't misplaced. To do that, I had an idea that would need your approval."

"Then let's hear your idea, see if it's any good."

"Instead of allowing humans to apply for C-Sec in general, why not just employ a handful of trained policemen and officers? To see if they can handle the requirements of the job. If we don't know which qualifications we lack to work effectively as C-Sec officers, how can anyone expect that we're magically ready for the job when the Council allows humans on the force."

"So you basically want a test group," summarized Pallin.

"That is correct. That way, we can learn what our officers lack, and C-Sec will get a better picture of how humans can fit into it without a sudden influx of human applicants."

Pallin was silent for a moment. He kept staring into my eyes, but there was no heat behind it. Instead, it felt like it was some habit of his to unnerve a suspect while he thought things over.

"Your idea... has some merit behind it," said Pallin slowly, as if he couldn't believe that he arrived at this conclusion.

"How exactly would the selection process go? I imagine the embassy would get involved in it?"

"Only partly," I answered, hoping that Anita wouldn't be too angry with me when I told her about this. On the other hand, she did tell me I had a free hand on how to handle it, and I didn't do or offered anything over the top to get to this point. "Of course, the embassy would provide you with the files of potential recruits, a small pool of candidates that you could choose from. Let's say, for example, twenty officers and five detectives? Twenty-five in total, all partnered with more experienced officers and detectives to observe and guide them."

"The number is too large for a first attempt, but that's probably something that Executor Vanir and your embassy will decide. What's more important is how we would proceed if any of them need to be disciplined. I don't want C-Sec to become more of a political playground than it already is."

"I can probably convince Ambassador Goyle to give you a free hand for any disciplinary action you have to take. As long as it is by the books, I can't imagine that she has any objections."

That was a blatant lie on my part. Anita would have plenty of objections, but as long as she didn't air them in front of Pallin or Executor Vanir, everything would be peachy.

And personally, I thought that C-Sec should take care of that. While it would certainly damage our image if an officer of this first generation got fired, the fact that we would let C-Sec handle it without any interference from our side would go a long way with Pallin, the future Executor. And that was something far more important than any short-term damage to our image.

"I see," said Pallin slowly. "I'll have to talk with Executor Vanir about it, but I believe the idea has merit, and she will see it that way too. Please inform your ambassador to expect a call concerning the details. A good evening to you."

And without much further ado, Pallin left me, and probably the party, as well.

I stood there for a minute not quite realizing that Pallin had left so abruptly, and I couldn't hold back the sigh that escaped me at the thought that I would now have to search for Anita and explain what kind of promises I gave without consulting her about them beforehand.

Somehow I knew that she would get a few concessions out of me for the Alliance and herself, even if I accomplished what she wanted me to do.

Yet there was one thing I could do before I faced the music.

Getting a drink.