Mass Effect: The Complete Novels 4-Book Bundle (84 page)
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Authors: Drew Karpyshyn,William C. Dietz
“I’ve got another proposal you might want to consider.”
She raised a curious eyebrow. “What are you talking about?”
“Can we talk in private?”
“Back in a minute, Nick,” Kahlee said, patting the young man’s hand as she got up.
“Whatever,” he grumbled, though she didn’t seem to notice his suddenly surly attitude.
Anderson led her out into the hall, then into a nearby patient room that was currently empty.
“Shut the door,” he said once Kahlee was inside.
“Sounds serious,” she said, complying.
“I checked with some old friends inside Alliance Intel,” he told her. “No sign of Kai Leng or Cerberus.”
“Like cockroaches when the lights come on,” Kahlee noted. “You think they’ll come after us?”
“I doubt it. There’s nothing for them to gain. Besides,
we’re too high-profile. Cockroaches like to stay in the dark corners.”
“So what are your plans now?” she asked.
“I’m heading back to the Citadel in a few hours,” he told her. “I need to take Grayson’s body with me.”
“Do you think this will finally convince the Council the Reapers are real?”
“You saw the research. You tell me.”
“Doubtful,” she admitted. “The technology inside him may have been based on Reaper designs, but it’s got Cerberus’s fingerprints all over it. And there’s no way to know who or what was controlling him. Not anymore. They’ll probably just put all the blame on the Illusive Man.”
“I may not be able to get the Council to listen to me, but there are people I can turn to … both in and outside the Alliance. We can’t ignore this anymore; something has to be done to try and stop the Reapers.”
“You want my permission to study him,” she said softly as the realization of what he was asking dawned on her. “You want to conduct autopsies. Take him apart and see what you can learn about their technology.”
“This isn’t the same as what Cerberus was doing,” he insisted. “I don’t condone what they did to him in any way. But they were right about one thing: the Reapers are coming, and we have to find a way to fight them.
“I promise he’ll be treated with respect and dignity,” he assured her. “But there are things we have to know.”
“I understand,” she said softly.
“There’s more,” Anderson continued. “I want you to come with me. You’re the most brilliant scientist in Alliance space. If we have any hope of figuring this out, we need you.”
He paused to give weight to his words before continuing. “I need you.”
“You’re asking me to leave the Ascension Project?”
“I know you love these kids. And you’re doing good work here. But nothing is more important than this.”
She mulled it over in silence for a few moments, then nodded her acceptance.
“It’s what Grayson would have wanted.”
“It has to be what you want, too,” Anderson insisted. “Don’t do this out of guilt.”
“It’s not guilt,” she said. “I spoke to them through Grayson. The Reapers, I mean. They kept talking about a cycle. They said our extinction was inevitable. I’m not going to sit on the sidelines and let that happen.”
“I’m glad,” he said, reaching out to take her wrist, then pulling her close. “I didn’t want to lose you again.”
He held her head in his hands, then leaned in and gave her a long, deep kiss on the lips.
“Better not let Nick catch you doing that,” Kahlee said with a soft laugh when he was done. “He’ll bounce you off every wall in the station.”
The Illusive Man sat in his chair, staring out the window at the brilliant blue sun the station was orbiting. It was a suitably stunning, and perfectly nondescript, background for the call he was expecting.
Occasionally he would take a sip from the whiskey rocks in his right hand, or pull a long, slow drag on the cigarette in his left. He was thinking about everything Kai Leng had told him, and what the implications were both for humanity and for Cerberus.
He knew enough about Admiral David Anderson to know he wasn’t going to ignore this. Finally someone other than Cerberus was going to start doing something about the Reapers. That didn’t mean the Illusive Man was simply going to step aside, however.
Working with Anderson probably wasn’t an option. Not in the immediate future, anyway, though he wasn’t willing to rule it out entirely. But for the time being he needed to make sure his own work continued, even as he tried to rebuild his fallen empire.
And that meant smoothing things over with Aria T’Loak. He couldn’t afford a war with her, and she had something he needed.
He had just finished his cigarette and started another
when he heard the soft
beep
indicating an incoming message. He spun his chair to face the holo-pad.
“Accept call,” he said.
A flickering, three-dimensional image of Omega’s Pirate Queen materialized in the center of the room. She was alone, seated in the same room she had called him from the last time they had spoken.
“I’m not very happy with Cerberus right now,” she declared, skipping the formalities and getting right down to business. “You didn’t warn me what Grayson had become.”
“It wouldn’t have been a problem if you hadn’t tried to take him alive,” the Illusive Man countered. “You’re the one who reneged on the deal.”
“I’ve heard Cerberus has suffered some rather serious setbacks of late,” she said, changing topics in a blatant effort to rattle him.
“The stories of our demise are greatly exaggerated,” he assured her, borrowing a quote from one of his favorite literary figures.
“I lost a lot of good people because of you,” Aria told him. “I don’t forget something like that.”
“A war doesn’t help either one of us,” he countered. “I thought you were smart enough to know that.”
“Is that why you called me? To sue for peace?”
“I have a business deal.”
She laughed.
“What makes you think I’ll say yes after the way the last one turned out?”
“This one won’t cost you anything. No risk. Only reward. It’s a deal you can’t pass up.”
“I’m listening.”
“I want the research files from the station where you attacked the turians.”
“That was your lab originally, wasn’t it? You used me to get revenge on them.”
“I think we used each other. What about those files?”
“Why should I turn them over to you? Maybe I’ll just keep them for myself.”
“So keep the originals for yourself. Just send me a copy.”
“Were these experiments really what I think they were?” she asked.
“I don’t know what you think they were,” the Illusive Man replied evasively.
“What’s your offer?”
“Send me the files and I’ll give you three million. One up front, two on final delivery.”
“Three million, and I can keep the originals?”
“All I want is the data,” he assured her. “But I’ll know if you hold anything back. If you want to get paid, you send everything.”
“You really believe in this, don’t you,” she said. “The Reapers. Galactic extinction. You don’t think it’s some crazy story.”
“Let’s just say I’m not willing to take that chance.”
“I’ll send you the files,” Aria agreed. “You’ll have them by tomorrow.”
“I’ll put the down payment into your account tonight. Same as last time?”
“The same,” she said with a coy smile. “Unlike you, I don’t care if people know what I’m up to.”
Before he could reply, she disconnected the call. He
laughed in spite of himself, amused at how important to her it was to get the last word.
He spun his chair to face the viewing port and pulled out a cigarette. He’d half-finished it when one of his assistants arrived to slip a glass into his hand before quickly removing herself from the room.
As he sipped his drink and smoked his cigarette, the Illusive Man’s gaze shifted from the glowing blue star to the cold black curtain behind it. One thought kept running through his head, over and over.
The Reapers are out there somewhere. And they’re coming
.
Mass Effect: Deception
is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the prodcts of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
A Del Rey eBook Edition
Copyright © 2012 EA International (Studio & Publishing) Ltd. Mass Effect, Mass Effect logo, BioWare and BioWare logo are trademarks of EA International (Studio & Publishing) Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Published in the United States by Del Rey, an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
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EY
is a registered trademark and the Del Rey colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
eISBN: 978-0-345-52645-8
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v3.1
For my dearest Marjorie
First a salute to Drew Karpyshyn for the excellent novels that preceded this one and made
Mass Effect: Deception
possible.
Plus many thanks to Casey Hudson, Mac Walters, and Tricia Pasternak for their advice and guidance.
O
N
T
HE
P
LANET
K
HAR’SHAN
Many weeks of effort had been required to track the object from the point where it had been stolen to the batarian homeworld and the ancient city of Thondu. There were lots of things Kai Leng didn’t like about the place, including the crowded streets, the asymmetrical architecture, and the food. But most of all he didn’t like the batarians themselves. Not because so many of them were pirates, slavers, but because they were aliens and therefore a threat to the human race. That made him an extremist, not to mention a racist, and that was fine with Leng.
The auction house was located off one of Thondu’s serpentine streets. A flight of stairs led up to the front door. Because of an injury sustained during a recent and especially difficult mission, Leng was using a cane as he mounted the steps one at a time. Having passed through a pair of open doors he entered a generously proportioned lobby where he was confronted by a security checkpoint and two batarians. Each alien had four eyes, all eight of which stared at the human with open suspicion.
Leng offered the invitation to the guard on the right who passed it in front of a scanner. The electronic document was real, having been purchased from a local businessman at considerable expense, and the batarian nodded respectfully. “You can enter, but the handgun stays here. And leave the cane too.”
“No problem,” Leng replied, as he gave both items to the second guard. “Take good care of them.”
“You can pick ’em up on your way out,” the other guard growled, as he placed both the pistol and the cane on a table loaded with weapons collected from other guests.
At that point Leng was ordered to empty his pockets onto a tray. The effort produced three coins, a pill box, and a stylus. The first guard eyed the collection, uttered a grunt, and motioned toward a metal frame. “Please step through the metal detector.”
Not having set off any flashing lights or buzzers, Leng was allowed to recover his belongings and proceed to the room beyond. It wasn’t that large, and didn’t need to be, since only a limited number of people were wealthy enough to buy the type of merchandise the auction house specialized in. With nothing else to look at all eyes were on Leng as he made his way to the front of the room and took a seat next to an elderly turian.