12/06/12 - I cleaned things up a bit... Hooray...?

Hey prospective reders! Hope this finds you all well. This started out as a character experiment to exercise long dormant writing muscles. I thought I might as well throw it up here for others who might get some enjoyment out of it-or something! For those who are less inclined, this will be a story that features a romantic relationship between two women. New to this whole thing, so be sure to let me know if I'm messin' up somewhere.

Disclaimer: (I seriously wonder how necessary these are...): I very obviously do not own any of these characters apart from the ones I have created. Mass Effect belongs to Bioware and EA. I am just borrowing their IP for shits and giggles, and do not intend to profit from it in any way beyond getting my writing rocks off.


Miranda Lawson, in a gesture that would have earned her the belt from one of the many tutors her father had hired for her cultivation, sat slumped against the cold sterility of her desk. She stared through the amber holographic display, with a characteristically emotionless expression, at the angles a particular set of floor panels several feet before her.

Minutes passed, and she had not moved in the slightest, save for the slow methodical manner in which she wrung her hands in her lap. Squeezing her fingers through the sophisticated material of her suit.

The heart beat of the Normandy-always comforting for those who spent long periods aboard a vessel-and the steady feed of the ships' perpetual status readout on one of her other displays to her right... they were just the right set of variables to set her mind adrift.

'What do I say...?'

A text cursor blinked on the display before her-seemingly caught in the same rhythmic hum of her surroundings.

Wrenching her gaze from the far corner of the room, her eyes flickered briefly to the clock before refocusing once more on the holographic document that had been sitting untouched for the past hour-and-a-half.

"0237 HRS..." she whispered aloud.

"The mission to determine the nature, and origin of a possible machine, or AI related threat to the safety of humanity, and the citizens of the Council Territories, was thoroughly conducted by Commander Alaina Madison Shepard. This investigation, and the appropriation of related resources, was brought to a successful resolution by Commander Shepard, and her crew."

"...Just like that...?" She huffed, and sat back against her chair.

She'd done things. She'd brutally ended the lives of hundreds-did all of them deserve it? Impossible to say. She'd spent all of the best years of her life being culled like a thoroughbred. She had orchestrated countless acts of meticulous cruelty, with vicious precision. They were her 9th symphonies; Her exquisite piano concertos.

"The ends justify the means. They always will." She was surprised to hear how rote it felt. How defeated. She sniffed, and shook her head "Look at me... waxing philosophical."

She had led an incredible life already, and at such a young age. Few could make the claims she could and have the experience to back it up. She couldn't see any value in it... Not now. But to take away every moment of Alaina's unwavering dedication to everyone who had the pleasure of knowing her. To take away the every drop of blood, sweat, and unshed tears. To relegate her incalculable triumphs against the single greatest-by orders of magnitude-threat to all life. To take all those moments where we thought, "This is it. This is where we are going to die." Not one infinitesimal space of willpower, and integrity was left unexplored.

"Hell, we clawed at every desperate thread with everything we had."

Could any of that be encapsulated in a narrative report? She wanted to pour out months of vitriol into this report; throw it in their faces. But she knew she couldn't write. She couldn't articulate words, or make them beautiful. All she had to draw from was standard operating procedure: "The subject was neutralized upon the use of lethal force."

"I suppose I can always fall back on a career of drafting up legal documents..." she said ruefully, then inclined her head slightly, "Annnnd I'm speaking to myself now... Phenomenal..."

She leaned forward and kneaded her temples. There was no help for it; she was exhausted in ways she never thought she'd feel again since her tenure with the Illusive Man. Heaving a weary sigh, she bent down to frisk her bottom desk-drawer. She pulled out a small amber bottle, and placed it roughly in front of her while she pushed the drawer closed with her foot. Delicate fingers stripped the flimsy seal from the bottle. She took a long drag from the bottle, fidgeting nervously with the cap in her off hand. She stifled a gag, coughed, then raised the bottle, "To Shepard..."

She held it in the air for a few moments after she spoke, as if waiting for herself to say something more, but it slowly fell to her lap. Her words hung in the gently thrumming air of her cabin. She heaved another sigh; none of this was finishing her report.

"Who gives a shit...?"

Alaina... she had never not given a shit. It was her giving a shit that protected the lives of an entire galaxy. And true, they had all helped. They were all instrumental. Every one of them facilitated a vital role.

'That's right. We facilitate.' She took another long pull.

Every gamble she took, and every catastrophic risk she had taken; it had all paid off so far. Garrus, Tali, Grunt, Legion, Moreau, the Salarian-they all paid off. Hell, even "Fucking-psychotic Jack" had paid off.

Alaina had paid off...

She had been swept up in all the changes Alaina brings about out of everything she does. The savior of mankind: a woman. For Miranda, that idea grew ever more fitting to her. She had given two-years of her life to bring the commander back. Shook her head at every turn, rolled her eyes at every allocation of obscene sums of money. Every concession, every measure that could be taken to bring this woman back to life had been taken. "I was so petulant. It wasn't until Alaina had risked her own life to help me I that I finally-truly-believed the right thing had been done. That every credit, every effort had been unequivocally, undeniably... worth it.''

Alaina would wink and say it was for "social currency." She "needed our hearts far more than she needed our minds, or our muscle." That that was just a convenient excuse, Miranda knew she just loved all of them.

Miranda bit her lip at that thought, looking down at the cap she was still fiddling with. She took another swig.

"I thought she was such a..." Miranda didn't finish. She just shook her head.

Love. How stupid is that? That was what she had that no one else did. It wasn't because she was a leader, it wasn't because she had been a marine, or that she was human. It wasn't that she was a good shot, or in incredible biotic, or Anderson's golden-child-or even the fact that she was the first SPECTRE. All of those things were just a paltry reflection of her ability to love. It was so sappy. It was so ridiculous. Miranda thought they were following someone with the emotional maturity of a ten-year old the first six weeks she led them.

"Fast forward five months..." Another drag from the bottle. She was no drinker-not by any means-but the bottle was starting to feel noticeably lighter. She swiveled her desk chair towards the window to her right, and let her eyes un-focus against the rippling cherenkov radiation-the "wake"-that formed around the ship during FTL.

Humans saw her as the greatest hero of their time. Turians were jealous and threatened by her. Asari found her to be a particularly convoluted liability. Salarians; a reckless bully. Krogan beat their chests like gorillas, having admiration only for her "fighting" prowess. None of those things were correct. It really was just her love; her incredible capacity for empathy. Miranda confronted her about this several weeks prior, just when the hour seemed darkest. Alaina just said, "It's the only real light we have in the darkness. Everything else is just cold machinery."

She wasn't a soldier, she was just a caring person. It was profound to think of how perfect a fit that type of person was for the situation they were in now. How uncanny to think of all the tiny variables that made her who she was, that made people recognize-however small-some piece of that potential, and raise her up through the ranks. From one stage of opportunity, to the next. An immaculate series of happenstance that led to Anderson's recommendation.

"'Course... It probably helps that she's an incredibly beautiful woman..."

She knew it was a lie to say that Miranda wasn't jealous of her for some time. Having no equal in intelligence, or looks, or combat prowess until Shepard came into the picture... Miranda would sit at her desk for hours after completing a mission, frustratedly stabbing away at her terminal trying to write her report to the Illusive Man, while obsessing over Alaina. Jealously aware of the looks she got from Jacob-hell any man on the ship, and even a few women. Trying to rationalize the commanders' laundry-list of achievements against her own. An inferiority complex was something Miranda had no experience with how to handle.

Her lips thinned, and she swiveled around from the window to once again face her desk. The passage of time can only be measured by arbitrary numbers aboard a vessel. Bright and artificial within the Normandy's crew quarters, perpetual blackness beyond it's hull. Landing on a planet enveloped in a red dusk, the next moment a moon in the same system is bathed in the midday light of a binary star system.

Her terminal clearly indicated that it was 0343 hours. She chewed her lip, thinking she might be a little tipsy. Suddenly a bolt of awareness, cushioned by the drink, scored up her neck. She had completely gotten lost in thought, and entirely distracted from what transpired-what had taken place a mere four hours ago:

"We completed the mission... No one died... No one..."

Alaina had likely long since retired. The entire crew where probably in the middle of the best sleep they'd had in months. Dreams of family; husbands and wives they were certain they had to say goodbye to, now suddenly back in their future. Children, and perhaps some simple agricultural unit back at an idyllic settlement.

Miranda suddenly felt very alone. Who could she see, or talk to? Oriana? Spring the trap? Bring her fathers hammer down upon them both? The very notion was asinine. Who hear understood anything about her? Who here even liked her? She chuckled ruefully, realizing that she and Jack probably shared more in common with each other than to any of the other crew members.

'I'm just as pathological and psychotic as she is. Only difference is I haven't shaved my head, and gotten some tattoos...' She felt her ego lash out, but she knew the truth was undeniable.

She took another drag of whiskey-this time long. Her eyes watered as she fingered the bottle in her lap, refusing to show that the harsh drink affected her in any way. Even in complete solitude...

"Fuck it."

She stood up, but then immediately had to catch herself on the recliner as she wobbled on her feet. She stashed the bottle under her desk, and took a moment to regain her composure. Maybe now she'd actually sleep tonight.

Her delicate hands quickly stripped herself of her suit; shaking it out, and hanging it within her wardrobe. She unclasped her bra, and threw it into the laundry chute, then turned around to lift a plain silk robe from a hanger. Lights automatically dimmed accordingly to her preferences, the metallic panel to her wardrobe quietly hissed shut, and became indistinguishable from the walls of the room.

Collapsing onto her bed, she neglected the pristine duvet she had insisted upon all those months ago; Instead she drew a pillow to her, and snaked her arms around it. She looked out again across her room to the window looking out into space. Beyond the boarders of the galaxy, somewhere out there in the ancient dark, the colossal Reapers hung suspended in the vast blackness. Waiting.

Or perhaps it had already begun. Perhaps a multitude of evil lights have suddenly sprung to life, and they were hurtling inwards towards the galaxy-faster, of course, than the very light they produced-to systematically eradicate all life. Trillions of lives. Trillions of dreams. Trillions of petty hopes...

And yet, time and the universe moved steadily onward. Even the Reaper cycle that had apparently gone on for millions of years, was but an inconsequential event. Both the length of time and even the scale of this grand revolution of genocide was unimaginably insignificant compared to the scale of the universe. It had been around for billions of years, and will continue to exist for trillions, and trillions of years longer. What civilizations, who perhaps thrived in distant galaxies like? Two star crossed lovers might perhaps gaze up at the sky from some incalculably distant world; they're gaze may pass over the Milky Way Galaxy and it would only appear as a blurred mote of light amongst billions. The distances were so great that the light from the millions of years of Reaper cycles hasn't even reached them yet. Perhaps throughout that entire species existence-from its humble beginnings to a thriving empire-would eventually succumb to time before even a glimmer of our light reaches them. They would remain forever, and utterly unaware of the stories of trillions of peoples lives that lived out on that one little speck. A mote that faced an enemy so great, yet at the same time so infinitesimal held at bay by one solitary life. If any of them were to survive in the end, it would be a story preserved for the entire history of all the peoples of Council Space-and perhaps beyond. A story that two star-crossed lovers on a distant world will never know about as they hold each other and gaze out at infinity.

Miranda squeezed the pillow to her body, and felt more alone than she ever had in her entire life. For the first time she could remember since she was a young girl, she wanted someone to be with her in this moment. Someone to hold her and tell her that there's nothing for it but to embrace the infinite darkness; for they had each other and that would be all that mattered...

Miranda hadn't cried in twenty-eight years.