Jason Hough - Mass Effect - Nexus Uprising

The salarian straightened, hand flattening on the panel beside him. “What would you have done?” he snapped. His voice trembled. “What could you, oh great security director, have done different that would have brought back order?”

Sloane shook her head. “I was already there, Tann. Talking it through, trying to bring Calix to… who knows. We’ll never know, will we?” The finger she jabbed at Tann could have been a razor blade for the way he flinched. “ Somebody sicced the krogan army on us before we’d gotten that far.”

Addison shook her head. “They weren’t supposed to go in shooting.”

“Untrue,” Morda cut in, a sudden surge of danger in her growled interruption. “We were told to go, and I quote the skinny sand-rat, ‘whatever it takes to secure the mission.’ Do not dare to cast the blame for this on us.”

Tann sighed loudly. “Of course a krogan would assume that means ‘kill everyone.’”

Kesh threw out a hand so fast that it collided with Morda’s armored chest and sent an echoed thud through the rest of the crowd. Sloane tensed. While every security person reached quickly for his or her weapon, the clan leader let Kesh’s hand stop her knee-jerk forward momentum.

“We will have words,” she promised. “Rest assured on that.” But Tann just shook his head in that way that suggested he had better things to think about. Smug bastard. The full force of his attention shifted once again to Sloane.

“Regardless, you broke all the regulations of your office,” he said. “You killed members of the Nakmor clan—”

“They came at us guns blazing!”

“That you were there to witness it speaks volumes concerning your own loyalties, does it not?”

Sloane’s fists clenched. “I was trying to negotiate, you puffed-up fish-bait.”

“Against orders,” Tann reminded her, and Sloane didn’t have a counter for that. She had gone against his request to wait. But then, had she waited, would the krogan have murdered them all?

Her lip curled. “I regret none of my choices.” “And you will be held accountable for them,” he assured her. “Consequences.”

Sloane didn’t expect anything less. The real question was, what did he have planned?

“First, however,” he continued, shifting his attention to the rest, “we handle Calix Corvannis’s accomplices.”

Nnebron’s jaw tightened. “You can—”

“Shut it,” Sloane snapped.

The man’s fists clenched, but he jerked his chin and amended whatever he was going to say. “We fought. We lost. What now?”

Well, he wouldn’t win any diplomatic awards, but Sloane appreciated the brevity.

Tann and Addison exchanged a glance.

Never good.

“You have two options,” Addison said.

Tann nodded. “Option one grants you something of your initial desire. The urge to do things your way,” he continued. Nnebron’s dark eyebrows lifted.

One of Sloane’s did the same.

“We are prepared to offer you a fleet of shuttles.” Addison folded her arms, studying the crew. “Fueled and stocked with supplies. You can take your unsatisfied crew and set out on your own.”

“Are you serious?” Nnebron asked.

“Yes.”

“Exile?” Irida said, forcing her way to the front. Sloane bit back a sharp curse as more weapons primed, focused now on the asari.

“Fadeer, don’t be so quick to get killed.” She turned to Tann, eyeing him warily. “It’s a non-offer.”

Irida shot her a sneer. “Meaning what?”

Sloane could see it in Tann’s face. The game he was playing. “Meaning he knows we won’t agree,” she said, never taking her eyes off his. “It makes him look generous and fair, all the while knowing we won’t go.”

“Why not?” Irida asked, still too consumed with anger to see it.

“Because it will be no small thing,” Kesh interjected, “to be exiled to the wastes of the Scourge. You heard it already. The nearest planets are inhospitable.”

That quieted things.

“There is a second option,” Tann added.

“Spit it out.” Sloane was losing patience. Fast. Tann, for all his smug superiority, seemed to know his time was limited. He clapped his long, knobbly hands and spoke with a bit of a flourish.

“Return to cryostasis,” he said, “until the Nexus is repaired and fully operational.”

“What?”

“No way…”

Some of the rebels stirred, forcing firearms to lift with renewed aim in the hands of the security team. Sloane shot Talini a hard look. The asari’s reassuring nod was so slight, she wasn’t sure it meant anything at all. But nobody opened fire, and that was something.

“There’s no way,” Nnebron said, his voice rising an octave. He took a step forward that put him within reach of Sloane. She braced, just in case. “You’ve been trying to get us to sleep since you first decided we were too much trouble!”

“How do we know you’d even let us out,” Irida added hotly. “We’re easier to handle cold, right?”

“He won’t,” a woman said. “They’ll never let us out.”

“No way.”

Sloane let out a long, slow breath. It didn’t do anything to ease the thunder of her heartbeat in her chest.

Tann studied them all. “So,” he said slowly, drawing the word out. “You’re choosing exile?”

“Hell, yes!” Nnebron shouted, fist in the air.

Sloane closed her eyes.

“It’s better than a frozen eternity, forgotten in the Nexus’s logs,” Irida added.

“We can take care of ourselves!”

“At least we can trust each other .”

Addison’s gaze sought Sloane. She couldn’t avoid the other woman’s stare when she opened her eyes, and in that stare, she found apology. Worry.

Anger.

Yeah, well… Sloane only had to deal with one of those.

The salarian shrugged, and turned his attention to her. “Amazing,” he said, sounding genuinely bemused. “You’re going to lose everything for a bunch of exiles.”

“Tann!” Addison’s shocked cry of warning came just a hair too late.

Sloane’s smile was as toothy as Morda’s. Ignoring her team, ignoring Talini’s sudden hiss of her name, Sloane closed the gap and let loose a right hook that she’d been dying to deliver for weeks.

Salarian bones were fine, but tough. The impact jarred her arm to the shoulder, but only because it caused Tann to spin with the momentum. The salarian squawked in a mixed-up bag of pain and alarm, and lost his breath when his ribs collided with the edge of the console.

Kesh’s broad palm slapped her own face. It was almost as loud as the cheers and jeers from the rebels.

Miraculously, not one security member opened fire.

Addison swore fluently—an act that earned a bit of Sloane’s grudging respect—and bent to keep Tann from falling over entirely.

“Fuck you,” Sloane growled from between gritted teeth. She shook out her hand. “And fuck this station and fuck your classist bullshit. You get the grim little hell you’ve turned this into. We choose exile.”

There was a moment of silence. A breath held.

Tann’s fingers cradled his jaw, eyes wide and furious and—yes, Sloane noted, a little afraid. Good. But it was Addison who made the final call.

“Fine.” She glared up at Sloane. “You’ll have your shuttles. Spender will see to the supplies.” The briefest pause. A beat. “I wish you the best. I really do.”

“Yeah. Well…” Sloane turned, caught Talini’s eye and tipped her head in thanks. “Bet we’ll find somewhere to shack up long before you all get your heads out of somebody ’s cloaca.”