July 7th, 2175
21:44
Citadel, Widow-System
Presidium
Human Embassy
The first thing to do during any crisis was not to act rashly. With that, I didn't mean to lie back and do nothing, but I didn't want to jump into action without a clearer picture of the situation. Otherwise, it could happen that one made the situation worse instead of getting it under control.
And this situation was tense and delicate enough without me barging into it without a plan.
Yet I couldn't wait forever, since the situation could take a turn for the worse if those involved didn't remain calm. Furthermore, something like that could happen, and it would take some time before we knew about it, since the incident was millions of light-years away and in a place where reception was so poor that we couldn't establish a clear connection.
Meaning, the situation could have changed into something completely different before any of us here on the Citadel heard the slightest whisper.
And with the other party being who they were, people dying was very much in the cards.
For the first time in a long while, I wished it were the Asari on the other side of the table, especially since they would barge in anyway.
Yet, it was the Turians I had to deal with.
A fact that I have been cursing in my mind for hours now.
The Alliance's relationship with the Turian Hierarchy had been improving with every passing month, as the dozens of joined training maneuvers proved. They were even developing and building a stealth vessel, which I knew to be the Normandy, together. Among the three Council races, the Turians were our best partner, but this situation could set back our efforts for years.
And to top it off, it was about a Prothean ruin, something I saw no real worth in.
Of course, most of the galaxy would disagree with me, even most of the Alliance would do the same.
While I believed that there was far more potential and uses in developing our own technology, particularly towards technological and scientific fields that had nothing to do with it, Prothean tech was still seen as the holy grail.
Not that I didn't see the value in it. The Protheans had thousands of years to develop their technology, and ours was the work of a child in comparison to theirs. Therefore, any working or even non-working Prothean technology was valuable, as it could propel us a hundred years into the future. It may only be related to technology in combination with eezo, but any improvement was worthwhile.
Now, the problem was that the ruins were found by an Alliance team in a system that didn't officially belong to any of the species that called the Citadel home. Yet, it was the closest to a small piece of territory that belonged to the Turian Hierarchy, so a small fleet appeared above the planet where the ruins were and attempted to occupy the ruins while ejecting the Alliance team. The Alliance team didn't take the heavy-handedness of the Turians very well and sent a distress signal. A distress signal that had been answered by a patrol nearby.
Above the planet, both patrol fleets were now in a tense stand-off. And to make it worse, the dossier of the Alliance officer in command of the patrol fleet told about someone with ambition and a slight hot-headedness.
Furthermore, another factor could make the situation even worse. A Hanar colony wasn't too far off, and if they found out, it would gain a religious note, too. The games made light of how the Hanar acted towards the Enkindlers. Their religion was deeply rooted in their society, and sometimes their strong beliefs could turn into zealotry.
Despite the seriousness and uncertainty of the situation, both the Turian ambassador and I wanted to resolve the situation before some Hanar pilgrims arrived in the system and complicated everything.
One factor giving me hope that the situation wouldn't impact our future relationship with the Turians was that my counterpart on the Turian side was the Turian ambassador and not the Turian councilor. This way, the Turian hierarchy made it clear that they valued our military cooperation and did not want this situation to destroy it completely. Nonetheless, it could increase the tension between our two nations, and if that happened, it wouldn't matter if the higher-ups from both sides preached cooperation and trust if the people who had to actually work together didn't trust each other and were actively antagonistic.
Most didn't know since the Councilors were so prominent in the minds of the people, but each of the three Council species had its own embassy and a couple of ambassadors to support their Councilor. Furthermore, the games never mentioned them, but in hindsight, it was logical that they existed. After all, no single person could handle the workload of an ambassador or councilor by themself. We needed a support structure and people who would take some work off us. Otherwise, we would have a burnout in a month at the latest.
The embassy of the Alliance alone had hundreds of staff, ranging from assistants and system administrators to security personnel. And while I didn't know any numbers for the embassies of the Asari, Turians, and the Salarians, I guessed that they were far higher than ours. After all, they had existed for far longer, their territory was larger, and their relationships with each of the species that had been on the Citadel for longer than us were far more extensive.
But back to the matter at hand.
The Turian ambassador, Atia Culvaria, was a calm and collected negotiator, and I was glad to be working with her instead of someone else. Yet, this wasn't the time for firebrands, another reason why I kept Udina busy right now. While Ambassador Culvaria and I would try to push for concessions from the other side, we both knew that this was crisis management, a time when you had to give at times to avoid an undesirable outcome.
Right now, we had our technicians working together to establish a connection to the Rishtar-System, the system where the Prothean ruins were found, which kept cutting out every few minutes and transmitted only a few words of each sentence.
In the meantime, Ambassador Culvaria and I had sent messages to patrol fleets in the vicinity that we could reach, to travel to the Rishtar-System and take control of the situation, and to give the order to avert any armed altercation. Nobody wanted a second Shanxi.
"Sir?" asked Miranda, stepping up behind me and trying to get my attention.
"Yes, what is it?" I asked without turning away from the report of the latest try to establish a clear connection to the Rishtar-System.
"We got a message from Tavita Nessa'a, the Asari in charge of the Council's department of Prothean Archaeology, co-signed by the Asari Councilor. She wants a meeting with you and Ambassador Culvaria as fast as possible. A meeting she wants tomorrow at eleven."
This time, while I usually tried to comport myself with decorum, I didn't hold back from cursing loudly. Loud and offensive enough that everyone in the room turned towards me with wide eyes. Even Miranda took a step back with wide eyes after witnessing me acting out of character.
Looking around, I asked with a raised eyebrow: "What? There are situations where even I have to curse. Contrary to popular opinion, I have a temper, too, and I am not a block of ice. It simply takes some time or a special occasion to rouse it enough that it boils over."
"Sorry, sir," came the voice of one of the system administrators. "You just surprised us. We didn't expect to hear something like that from you... well... at all."
"Well, now you have," I drawled. "And now, please get back to work," and before I even finished, people turned back to their workstations, some with a grin on their faces.
"Is everything alright, sir?" asked Miranda, a hint of genuine concern creeping into her voice.
"Yes, yes, it is," I replied without turning to her. I let out a heavy sigh and started to massage the bridge of my nose. "No, I lied. Everything is not alright."
I knew from the moment the words "Prothean Ruin" came up that the Asari, who dominated the Department for Prothean Archeaology, would involve themselves, but I had hoped that Calvaria and I could at least get the situation under control before that happened. Normally, I would refuse the meeting or flat-out ignore the message since it came at an inopportune time, and because of the presumptuousness of Department-Head Nessa'a to think that she had the power to order two ambassadors to come to her for a meeting, since, despite her position, she was lower in the pecking order than Calvaria and me.
Yet, the message had been co-signed by Tevos, the Asari Councilor, which made the situation far more complicated. But right now, I didn't have the patience or inclination to sit down and discuss what should happen with the Prothean ruin without probably starting to scream at Nessa'a within the first five minutes.
Ignoring Miranda for a moment, I walked over to one of the communication officers and said: "Get me a secure line to the Turian embassy. I want to talk to Ambassador Calvaria."
"Yes, sir," came the quick reply, before he added: "I will inform you when the connection is established, or if they say that it is not possible at the moment."
"Good man," I said, and gave him a slap on the back.
"What do you hope to accomplish by talking to her?" asked Miranda, who had followed me.
"Hopefully, getting us more time, Yvonne," I answered, my head turning for a moment to look at her before turning back toward the communication officer's screen, which displayed that a connection with the Turian embassy's comm-center had been established. "I guess she got the same message as me, and is probably as unwilling as I to entertain the thought of going to this meeting before the situation is under our control. And even if someone else got the message to divide the tasks among the Turians, Calvaria is clever enough to know that it would be unwise to have her counterpart distracted by trivialities during this time."
"And what could you do together?"
"One, she could get their Councilor to counter Tevos. The Asari Councilor's support of this meeting is the actual problem. Without her, Nessa'a doesn't have the power or the influence to compel us to come to this meeting. And even if the Turian Councilor is doing nothing, the second option would still be on the table. We could agree to send our assistants with the clear directive to tell Nessa'a that we are currently busy, that we know nothing about the ruin itself, and that we are unwilling to discuss anything until we are sure that there will still be ruins to explore after the situation is solved."
"You would send me there?" asked Miranda as if she couldn't believe the trust I was giving her. I rolled my eyes, thankful that she couldn't see them. The matter had nothing to do with trust. I would send her with clear instructions, and if she deviated from them, she would be fired without much thought, which would put a stop to Cerberus' efforts to have someone close to me. So, I trusted in her competence and self-interest, factors which were far more reliable than trust.
Yet, she didn't have to know my thoughts, so I replied: "Of course. If I didn't trust you, I wouldn't ask you to bring me my coffee. You could poison it when I am not looking, after all."
"And do you think Ambassador Calvaria will agree to any of those options?"
Seeing the change on the comm officer's screen and his signal that the connection was established while holding out a pair of headphones, I said: "Well, we will see now."
Taking the headphones that went snugly over my ears and muffled the room's noise, I activated the microphone function on my onmi-tool before giving a nod to open the connection.
On the screen, the picture of a Turian woman appeared, her face painted with a vivid red, displaying her affiliation with her clan. She had light blue eyes that seemed to lightly glow. The first time, I had thought that it looked like she was being a victim of Reaper influence, but after a meeting in person, I knew that she didn't have the slightest technological replacements. She was a hundred percent organic, something that no Reaper victim displayed.
"Good to see you, Ambassador Denebren. I was about to call you, too. I suppose you got the message as well?" said Calvaria, and while it was usually more difficult to recognize a Turian's mood over a screen without being able to listen to their sub-vocals, this time it was easy. The tone she used when she mentioned the message was the same as the one I used. She was absolutely not enthused.
"Good to see you, too, Ambassador Calvaria. And yes, that is the reason why I called. Am I right in the assumption that this meeting is coming at an inopportune time for you, too?"
"You would be right about that. The message was sent to me personally, and as such, Nessa'a probably expects me to come. If the situation at hand weren't so serious, I would love to meet with her and have a chat."
The way she said "chat" had me thinking that, instead of it being a discussion between two equals, it would be a slaughter where Calvaria would verbally crush Nessa'a until the Asari would run back into Asari-controlled space and never come back out until Calvaria died of old age. I would have loved to witness something like that and even paid money for it.
I gave her a crooked smile, conveying my thoughts on the matter. "I think I can say with certainty that neither of us is going to appear at this meeting in person?"
"You can," replied Calvaria. "I am going to send one of my assistants. Probably the youngest one. That should tell her exactly what I think about her demands for a meeting."
"Sadly, I think sending one of our janitors isn't possible. It would be rather cruel to the poor man to expose him to our dear department head. And I would rather avoid a rebellion among our facility staff. Otherwise, nothing will get done around here."
Hearing my reply, Calvaria snorted. "A fate most of us try to avoid." The humor left her face when she continued: "But let us get back to the matter at hand."
Somewhere from outside the screen, Calvaria was handed a datapad. She looked down on it for a moment before looking back at me and saying: "I just got confirmation that Councilor Sparatus has talked with Councilor Tevos. He expressed his opinion that until the situation is under our absolute control and no unforeseen accidents happen, any discussion about some ruin can wait, especially since nobody knows anything about them other than that they exist. On the account of laymen, I add."
"Making it possible that this whole situation happened because somebody mistook a very old pirate base for some Prothean ruin. It would be shameful to have one's name associated with the situation if something happened over nothing."
"I believe that is exactly how the councilor spun the story. And with Councilor Tevos currently being in a precarious situation with the Salarians, she decided to withdraw her support from Nessa'a."
I raised my eyebrow at Clavaria's words. "A precarious situation, you say? I have heard no such thing. Care to tell me more?"
"And you will not hear a thing," Calvaria replied, showing me a smile with too many teeth to not be predatory in nature. "At least, as long as she and the Salarian Councilor come to an agreement. Which they will. They have done this often enough, and whenever she is pushed into a corner, Tevos will decide to protect her reputation."
"Your experience or the experience of the Turian embassy?"
"Both."
"Well, if you don't want to tell me, it is alright. Maybe I will find out by myself or not. Probably not that important, too," I said, trying to make Calvaria give up a comment that I could use to decide if it was useful to investigate or not.
Yet, Calvaria simply looked at me with a calm expression, betraying not the slightest hint.
Understanding that I wouldn't get the slightest hint about anything, I turned the conversation toward more practical topics. "Have you got any new information about the situation? Have any attempts to communicate with your patrol fleet at least been partially successful? I will tell you now that we have nothing new to add, and our fastest response team is still half a day away."
"Nothing concrete," admitted Calvaria with evident regret. "But thanks to our communications officer managing to clear up the message we received from the patrol fleet, it seems like they haven't begun shooting at each other just yet. At the same time, I have to add that the message is several hours old, and as such, I can't guarantee that the situation hasn't changed in the meantime. At least, I have some other news. Not about the situation in the Rishtar-System, but connected to it. Our response team found out why we have such difficulty in establishing a stable connection to any of the ships there."
"Well, that sounds interesting," I said with actual interest. "The reason has to be something outside the system itself, otherwise your team would have already made contact."
"You're right about that. One of the systems between the Citadel and the Rishtar-Systems is currently experiencing a solar flare with extreme solar winds blowing through it. Sadly, it is also the system the Citadel uses as a network pathway for our communication systems to that part of discovered space."
"Making it difficult at best and impossible at worst to get a message through," I finished for her. "And let me guess, there is no other network pathway for us to use."
"That is not correct," replied Calvaria, but I could already hear from her tone that my remark wasn't too far off. "But the alternatives are not true solutions either. While it is true that there are alternatives, they are connected via minor nodes, meaning the bandwidth is not as good and often overburdened by the local communications."
"And if it is minor nodes we are talking about," I added, "we also can't be sure if they are properly maintained. As far as I know, some local authorities don't take their duties too seriously and instead put the subsidies from the Citadel for their maintenance into their own pockets."
"Yeah, that. Furthermore, there is also the question of whether they are secure enough."
I thought about the question for a moment before shaking my head. "I believe that is one question we can ignore for now. We are not sending any secret or critical information. Only telling them to stand down and wait for the response teams we sent. If we don't say anything about the reason why we want them to stand down, it shouldn't be a problem. After all, they know the reason. Our main concern right now should be to keep everyone from shooting at each other."
"And if some opportunistic pirates arrive in the system, our two people at least have a way to release some pent-up tension," said Calvaria before adding: "As long as they don't decide to simply continue shooting with each other as the new practice targets."
"A problem that could very well happen if their blood is up," I commented and got a nod from Calvaria.
"Anyway, I believe we have discussed the most pressing topics. The department head will have to deal with having our assistants telling her that our time is too valuable to be wasted on matters that can wait until we know if the Prothean ruin is worth more than a few antiques that will disappear in the vaults of some eccentric collectors. Do you have anything to add?"
"Nothing special. I will look into the matter of sending some messages via secondary relays. Maybe there are some that are exclusive to Alliance. I have to look it up since I don't know of any off the top of my head. At least, it will keep me busy while waiting for the response team to arrive. Furthermore, the message may arrive there before the team, and we will have to think about what happens if that solar storm continues on. We will have to find an alternative if we don't want to send a ship from one end of the storm to the other every time we want to talk."
Calvaria agreed with my idea and promised to look into whether the Turian military or other organizations connected to the Hierarchy had any private networks in the area they could use before we said farewell to each other and closed the connection.
I put the headset down and turned around towards the exit of the comm center. While I walked toward the door, I gave Miranda a signal to follow me.
"I believe you at least listened to half of the conversation, Yvonne? And it should have been enough for you to get the gist of it?"
"Yes, sir," replied Miranda while walking only a step behind to my left, the perfect position to either defend me or stab a knife in my back, "I got it."
"Good, then you will know that you will meet with Department Head Nessa'a tomorrow in my name, just like we talked about before."
"Do you want me to relay anything in particular?"
"No, nothing," I said before stopping for a brief moment, which almost got Miranda to walk into my back. Continuing, I changed my mind and said instead: "Be your usual charming self. Be polite, courteous, tell her that you are sorry, and that it is just a bad time for something like that. And I would be very thankful if you also manage to convey everything in a manner that tells her there will be consequences for trying to reach beyond her station. Do you think you can manage that?"
Miranda was silent for a minute as I led us toward a secure room from where I could make a highly encrypted call to someone as far away as the Arcturus system, but after some time, she opened her mouth to reply: "It should be doable. I can manage that, I just have to take inspiration from someone I really dislike. He always had an air of condescension and a manner of talking that screamed that he thought that he was better than everyone else."
"Well, that could be a lot of people I know," I laughed. "Is it anyone I know?"
Mirand answered with a laugh, one that I knew was faked: "No, probably not. The galaxy is a big place, and you can't have met everyone who acts this way. There are far too many of them."
"Very well," I said before arriving at the secure room and stopping at the door to enter my password. "I believe that is the point where we have to part ways for a moment. Please wait for me at my office and gather every document we have for the upcoming renegotiations about the trade of banned food products. Just because we can't organize any meetings in case the situation abruptly changes, doesn't mean we have no work."
"Yes, sir. They will be ready when you are finished," said Miranda, and turned around just as the door accepted my code and opened.
I looked into the dark room and said while entering: "Well, time to get Andrew to play the messenger. Because I know that bastard has probably some communication nodes over there that nobody but him knows about."