Ferik Shepard was nervous. It had been a while since she and Liara had seen each other, but there hadn't been time to talk when their paths had crossed again. There had been the incident with hacking terminals, then she'd been dragged off after reports of the Collectors hitting another colony.
It wasn't until the Collector base was safely in pieces that Shepard had felt comfortable approaching Liara with the intel the Illusive Man had given her about the Shadow Broker. The look on the asari's face had shaken Shepard's resolve, but not enough to refuse following her former lover through twisted threads that finally ended at the Shadow Broker's base itself.
She was still recovering from fighting the yahg, but her injuries weren't so bad that she couldn't invite Liara up for drinks once the dust settled. They had shared a small kiss after Shepard had done her best to comfort the asari, and a longer kiss after that that left both of them a bit breathless. Still, Ferik had her doubts.
Part of her had toyed with the idea of wearing the black dress that Kasumi had given her for her role in the retrieval of Keiji's greybox, but she had settled on her normal dress around the Normandy. She felt most comfortable in the cargo pants and jacket that most of the crew wore anyway; it was a way for her to remember her roots.
The door hissed open as she finished pouring the second glass of wine; she glanced up and almost dropped the bottle right there. She'd seen Liara in armor, but the dress that the asari had chosen had a shade of indigo that complemented her blue skin perfectly and hugged all the right places. Shepard felt her heart skip a beat and forced the emotion down as she recorked the bottle. Questions first. There was no sense in getting her hopes up this early.
Still, the smile Liara gave her as she ascended the steps had her resolve wavering. She made herself smile back, the mask settling back into place. "Enjoy the tour?"
"Yes. It's a beautiful ship." Liara's eyes wandered around the room, taking in the decorations in the loft. The fishtank hadn't been there before, nor had there been a space hamster peeking out of its enclosure. An impressive collection of model ships also lined the space between a small office and the bedroom beyond. Her eyes lingered on the display of Sovereign before meeting Ferik's. "I saw Joker. He seemed happy to see me."
"That's Joker for you. Two years haven't changed him much," Ferik replied, rubbing the back of her neck.
Liara nodded. "True. He seems to be just the same as he was. I also saw Dr. Chakwas. I'm glad she's doing well."
Ferik kept the smile in place. "She's no worse for wear."
"By the way, I brought you something." Ferik blinked; she'd been so preoccupied with keeping the mask in place that she hadn't noticed the object in Liara's hands until now. She could only watch as Liara held out the gift, offering it. "It took some digging, but I recovered your tags."
Numb fingers closed around the picture frame, bringing it in closer. They were hers alright, the ones she'd been wearing when the Collectors had attacked the Normandy the first time. The mask slipped a bit, enough to show the surprise in her face.
"I...I thought I'd never see these again," she murmured, fingers tracing the outline of the dog tags.
Liara smiled. "You can't get back everything you lose, but sometimes...you get lucky."
And just like that, the mask was back on, though she could feel cracks starting to form in it. For now, she could keep the pain from reaching her face, from showing how much that simple statement had affected her. She placed the dog tags on her desk, letting her hand linger for just a moment. "Yeah. Sometimes..."
Liara moved past her to give her a bit of room, leaning against the fishtank. Ferik looked up to see her former lover studying her closely and struggled to keep the mask from slipping further. Apparently it hadn't worked so well.
"How are you, Shepard? I mean, really, not just what you tell your squad to keep morale up." The ocean eyes found her eyes, looked through them, and the mask shattered. There was no way she could lie now, not caught in that gaze.
"I'm frustrated, Liara. I..." Ferik paused, closing her eyes. "I -died-. I was gone. And then I wake up to the world going to hell around me. I find out that I'm in a Cerberus facility. That two years of my life are gone, a life that I thought I'd lost. But I'm moving. It hurts like hell, but I'm moving."
Then the dam broke, and everything came flooding out. "The Alliance thinks I'm dead. Not something I can blame them on; Jacob said that when Cerberus got me, I was nothing more than meat and tubes. But the Council? They covered it all up, Liara. Every single damn bit of it. The geth were controlled by Saren. Sovereign was just a ship. Your research, my visions...they spat on all of it." Her fist hit the wall, splitting several knuckles, but Ferik was too upset to care. Her body was shaking with the anger that she'd kept pent up inside all this time. All the frustration, the pain, the loss, the agony...
"I died. And then I came back two years later to find out that what I did meant nothing." Her voice had grown quiet, teeth digging into her lip as she tried to stop the tears that were starting to form. "That the hell I went through, that my crew went through, that you went through... I saw you at Ilium, and I thought maybe everything was okay, that it would all be okay. But it wasn't okay. It...you'd moved on, and I hadn't. Everything else I could get through. Reapers, the geth, the Collectors... But losing you on top of everything else-" Her voice caught in her throat.
Blue arms encircled her waist, gently turning her to face the asari. "Shepard." Liara placed a hand on her cheek. Those soft blue eyes met Ferik's, holding only acceptance in their depths. It was too much.
Shepard buried her face in the asari's shoulder as the tears came, sobs wracking her form as she clung to her former lover. Her arms had locked around Liara's waist in a crushing hold, but the asari didn't complain; she just stroked back the crimson hair and caressed the Spectre's back, letting her cry.
Ferik wasn't certain how long she wept, breath coming in hitching sobs as everything she'd kept locked up came rushing out. But her hold on Liara's waist eventually loosened as the last of the tears subsided, leaving her feeling empty and hollow. She pulled back a little to breathe and realized that she'd left a rather large wet, snotty spot on Liara's dress.
"I...sorry about your dress," she managed, voice weak and quivering. The asari shook her head, gently wiping away the wet trails the tears had left on the Spectre's cheeks.
"I'm more concerned with how you're doing." Ferik chuckled weakly, rubbing at her nose.
"I feel like I just lost a fight to a krogan."
Liara smiled, leaning forward to place a gentle kiss on her forehead. "How long have you kept these things bottled up?" she murmured, stroking back a few idle strands of Ferik's hair. The Spectre sighed, hanging her head.
"Between the Collectors abducting people, Cerberus sending me running around the galaxy, going to their home base, and then this business with the Shadow Broker..." Ferik closed her eyes, exhaling slowly. "There's been no time. I can't help anyone when I'm like this, so I just bottled it up and kept going."
"There's time now," Liara pointed out. Her hand was still caressing Shepard's back lightly, comfortingly.
Ferik laughed bitterly, raising her head. Her normally bright eyes held nothing but pain. "Time for what, Liara? Regrets? More reminders that I was dead for two years and everyone moved on, and I just need to catch up?" She shook her head. "The Reapers are coming. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but they're coming. Where does that leave time for anything?"
"What if it all ended, Shepard?" The asari's voice was quiet. "What if the Reapers were defeated, and there were no more threats? What then?"
"What about it?" Ferik let go of her, moving farther into the room. Closer to the couch and the glasses of wine she'd poured like a fool, trying to pretend everything was okay. It wasn't okay. Nothing ever would be. She felt like she needed to go start a fight, needed to feel her fist driving into someone else. 'Maybe I'm part krogan,' she mused to herself.
Liara was quiet, leaning against the column at the top of the stairs and just watching her. Ferik took a deep breath, trying to ignore the painful thumping of her heart. What did Liara want, anyway? The kiss after they'd defeated the yahg... It was a fluke, nothing more. As Liara had said, the heat of the moment. A heat that Ferik still felt on the edges of the numbness pervading her, calling to her.
"Liara, I can't answer that question," she finally replied, looking up at the asari. "I've been fighting for so long that I don't know what I'd do with myself. Maybe two years ago, I could have given you a good answer, but now..." She sighed, moving to the far end of the couch and taking a seat. "We've changed. You have the resources of a galaxy at your fingertips and I..." Her voice caught again; she forced herself to keep going. "I'm just a shell of a person. A figurehead. A good soldier that does what she's told and follows the strings that pull her around."
"That's not true." Liara moved down the stairs, closing the distance between the two of them until she stood only a few feet away from the Spectre. "You're more than that."
"How would you know?" Ferik snapped, eyes narrowing. Her nerves were raw and exposed; kindness felt like salt being poured into the wound. "You weren't dead for two years, Liara! You didn't lose everything you'd known!"
"I lost you!" Those three words stung like a slap across the face. Ferik lifted her head to anger clouding the deep blue depths of Liara's eyes. An act put on for her benefit.
"And you found someone else," Ferik retorted bitterly. "You brought me back because the galaxy needed me, and when I came looking for you, we rescued Feron for you. It's not hard to see the way he looks at you, or the way you looked at his picture."
"Dammit, Ferik, it's not like that!" Her voice was rising, the frustration clear. 'Welcome to my life,' the Spectre thought.
"Really, Liara? You expect me to believe that after two years, you didn't just move on?" The numbness was starting to be replaced by a hollow ache in her chest. Pain was making her lash out, bare her teeth at the person that she loved, had never stopped loving... But they were too different now. She was broken, a shadow of her former self. People followed who she had been, not who she was, and she had just gone and removed the masks in front of the person who's acceptance she wanted more than anything. "You can drop the act any time. I don't need your pity."
Her eyes had dropped to the ground; the only warning she got was the swishing of the dress as it moved closer before the asari's hands dug into the sides of her jaw, hauling her upwards. She started to say something, but her voice died as blue lips crushed themselves against hers, stealing her breath.
Ferik found herself gasping for air when the kiss finally broke, unable to fight back as Liara dragged her to the bed and pushed her down, straddling her hips. A bit of anger surged up in her, defiant and hot. "I don't need a pi-"
"Shut up." The asari's voice was hard and angry, and Ferik's gaze was instinctively drawn to her eyes. Storm clouds swirled in those oceans, mirroring the frustration and anguish the Spectre had felt.
"You think I came up here out of pity?" Nails dug into the Spectre's shoulders, making Shepard wince. "Ferik, you were dead for two years, but I had to live through those two years. I had to live through giving your body to Cerberus and praying to the Goddess that they could bring you back." Liara's hands tightened in her uniform, and the Spectre realized the asari on top of her was shaking as she had been.
"Liara..."
"No, Ferik. You honestly thought that I would have moved on that easily, that I could just forget about you like so many others did?" Tears were starting to fall from her cheeks onto the Spectre's face. "I risked everything to get you back from the Shadow Broker. I left a good friend of mine behind to be tortured for two years. I gave you to Cerberus...not because I thought the galaxy needed you, but because I couldn't let you go."
Something clicked inside Ferik's mind, making the ache in her chest unbearable. She leaned up, moving one of the palms pressing against her shoulders as she did so, and used her freed hand to pull the asari down into a deep kiss. She felt Liara stiffen slightly, starting to pull away, and locked her other arm around the slender blue waist, trapping her.
Then Liara was kissing her back hungrily, two years of pain and anguish and loneliness surging to the forefront. They had both been in pieces without the other one, each hiding it behind their own assortment of masks. But those masks had started to crack the more time they spent around each other, and now the facades were gone, brought down by the feelings they had for each other.
Hands clutched at each other, seeking out clasps and zippers and buttons with little regard for keeping the clothing in one piece. It had been too long since they had given into their desires; nails scraped across newly bared skin as they peeled back the layers keeping them isolated. There was no ceremony to it, no delicate grace, just clothing being tossed aside as the two explored each other fully.
It wasn't until their undergarments had been kicked off the bed that their eyes met, a wild forest flooded by stormy seas that had turned pure black. The feeling of their minds brushing against one another set nerves on fire and spurred them onto further heights as they sought to become one, joined together in mutual bliss.
When the building tension finally broke at its peak, it sent mirrored waves of almost painful pleasure ricocheting through them, their cries drowned out by the pure ecstasy flooding through their systems. They pressed against each other, two people clinging to each other in the aftermath of a storm, unwilling to let go for fear of losing the other one yet again.
It was a long time before Ferik finally broke the silence. Having Liara in her arms again was a dream come true, but not if she was just going to lose her again. "Liara?"
The asari lifted her head from where it had been nestled on Ferik's chest, eyes back to their brilliant blue. "Yes?"
"What happens now?" It was a question that had to be asked, as much as the Spectre didn't want to interrupt the happiness she felt blossoming within her. If it had to end, better to end it now.
Liara pushed herself up to look into Ferik's eyes, their minds still brushing against one another. "What did you want to happen?"
"I..." Ferik closed her eyes briefly, arm tightening around Liara's waist. "If the Reapers were no longer a threat..." She opened her eyes, meeting Liara's gaze. "I think I'd like something like this. Marriage. Old age. Lots of little blue children."
Liara blinked owlishly as Ferik's statement sunk in. A blush colored her cheeks as she chuckled sheepishly, gently shoving the Spectre's shoulder. "You can't mean that."
"I do." The Spectre leaned forward, resting her forehead against the asari's and looking into her eyes. "I was ripped away from you once, and I died with the thoughts of things I'd never do echoing in my head. I don't want to do that again." She stroked Liara's cheek lightly.
A hand came up to cover Ferik's, fingers interlacing and squeezing. "Nor do I. But..." Liara chewed on her lower lip. "The Reapers are coming, Shepard. And when they get here, you'll go leaping into battle like you always do." Her nose brushed Shepard's. "If we're going to try this...I need to know you're always coming back."
The Spectre managed a smile as she returned the squeeze. "If death itself can't keep me away, what chance do the Reapers have?" Her lips brushed against the asari's, feeling the soft breath as Liara exhaled at the touch. "Besides... I have something amazing to come back to."