It was something of an irony to Grayson that the skills he had learned while working for Cerberus — espionage and assassination — were proving so useful in carving out a new life for himself as a mercenary on Omega. He had been trained to kill aliens; now he was working for one.

“We’re wasting time,” Sanak grumbled, setting his sniper rifle to the side. He tugged at his combat suit as he shifted to find a more comfortable position behind the stacked crates that were concealing Grayson and him from view.

Grayson kept his own weapon trained on the ship on the far side of the loading bay. He was acutely aware of how careful his batarian partner was to not make any physical contact with him as he rummaged around.

“We wait for Liselle’s report,” he said flatly.

The batarian had turned his head to glare with all four eyes at the man crouched beside him. He blinked the uppermost pair, but the lower set remained still as stone.

“You always want to wait, human,” Sanak snarled. “It’s a sign of weakness.”

“It’s a sign of intelligence,” Grayson snapped back. “That’s why I’m in charge.”

Sanak knew only one way to deal with problems: charge into them headfirst. It made working with him difficult at times. His general dislike of humans — and Grayson’s deeply ingrained mistrust of batarians — didn’t help matters.

The two species had a checkered history. Humanity had expanded quickly after bursting onto the galactic scene, pushing the batarians out of the Skyllian Verge. The batarians had retaliated with violence, triggering a war between the two cultures — a war the batarians had lost. Now they were outcasts and pariahs in the civilized worlds of Council space — hardly ever seen, regarded with suspicion and mistrust.