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Prologue 1: A Conversation
The Sisters
02-19-2180
Lohse Outskirts, Ontarom, Newtown System, Kepler Verge
Monstrous Thonal moved far faster than any normal moon should have moved against the night sky. Humans were fools to settle Ontarom. The matriarchs had told them as much when they began settling this rock. But humans had their quirks, they wanted Ontarom, so they settled it. Within my lifetime, if I lived to be a matriarch, this world would suffer a cataclysmic collision with Thonal. I shook my head at the thought.
For all my time spent on Earth, humans still astounded me. To think they had only come into the galactic community twenty years ago. Now look at them. Parading around the galaxy and crowing about not being shown the respect their race deserved. Still, their culture is fascinating to me.
But human culture is not why I've come to Lohse. No. It's time to pay an old friend a visit. That woman was supposed to stay out of conflict with her crest to the sand. Yet the events of the Shetland Incident last year meant she couldn't keep the seas at bay.
I was here to make sure she understood what her expulsion had meant sixty years ago, in case she had forgotten. Athame knew that Jona didn't forget. That unstable woman would not be happy to hear how my one-time Sister had helped the sailors.
Sighing, I took my sniper rifle off my back and placed it on the rock ledge in front of me. While the angle wasn't ideal, I had both the front and back of her bar in my sights. Relaxing my body, I looked through the scope. I needed to get a feel for the distances.
I immediately tensed as the end of a very large barrel was pressed against my crest. I instinctually flared my biotics to throw the person who had somehow crept up on me.
"Now, now. None of that." That voice. Athame's ass! "Turn over, slowly." I rolled onto my back as instructed and met with exactly who I thought it was.
"Aiels T'Doran," I said coldly.
"Daresa U'Rona. How the fuck did you find me?" Her scars gave her face an abhorrent look. The punishment for her failure that got us both kicked out of the Eclipse so long ago.
I narrowed my eyes at the tip of her sniper rifle. "I thought you'd still be carrying around Tuila?"
"She broke," Aiels said through gritted teeth. "Don't try to change the subject, Daresa. How did you fucking find me?"
"A cook told me." I'll let her make the connection. It's much easier to deal with someone when they actively have to think about what is going on in a situation.
"A cook?" The rifle barrel lowered a little and her eyes became distant. "No…," she said breathily.
"You know who I'm talking about."
"He's a good kid," something grim passed across her face and her eyes narrowed. "What in Athame's holy fucking name did you do to him?"
Despite the unspoken threat I actually let out a laugh. "I told him bluntly that he needed to tell me exactly what the disfigured asari who helped his crew on Ontarom looked like. You don't need to get as protective as a matron about it. I knew the young boy before you did."
"Why are you here Daresa?"
"Making sure it was really you."
"Fuck that. You knew it was me as soon as that ape told you what I looked like." She pressed the barrel of the gun onto my forehead. "Why are you here Daresa? I'm not going to ask again."
"Touchy, aren't we?" The barrel pressed a little harder into my skin. "Fine! I need your help."
It was Aiels turn to laugh now. The laugh reminded me of earlier times sitting around a bar with wine bottles strewn about. When Aiels had been the most beautiful asari I had ever seen. The laugh was so incongruous with what she looked like now it was quite jarring. The large smile that split her face and the scars were equally unsettling.
"What does Daresa U'Rona need with my help?"
"I need to catch a murderer." The barrel was pulled away from my head again but remained pointing at me.
"If I remember correctly, and I like to think I am, that was your specialty when we were Sisters. Has your time on Earth made you forget?"
I refused to let her goad me so I decide to throw her off balance. "If I recognized your description, how long before Jona hears the same? You were supposed to disappear and...what did she say 60 years ago?"
Aiels glared at me. "To never show my formerly pretty little face anywhere near the Terminus again."
"I don't believe she'll find the Traverse very far away from her. I'll take you with me to help you."
I totally misjudged that last phrase. "Help me?" Her hands gripped the sniper rifle as her eyes widened. "Like you fucking helped me when that psychotic bitch threatened to tear my crest off with her mind? Like you helped me when she…" Biotic energy rippled across her forearms. It was the only warning I had.
"NO!" I threw her back with my own biotics before she could do anything rash. Rashness had gotten her in trouble in the first place.
Aiels staggered backward, allowing me to scramble onto my hands and knees before she punched me in the side of the head with a biotically charged blow. I hadn't been in a real brawl in a long time. The smile came naturally to my face. This was going to be fun.
I let her rear back her arm for another strike before lashing out with my own fist and punching her fist dead on. The sharp biotic crack sent us both flying back. This time I quickly scrambled to my feet and saw that Aiels had lost her grip on her sniper rifle, the sole reason for the punch I threw. Athame's ass, my hand hurt for taking that risk.
Aiels' whole body flared purple as her anger fed her biotics. But I knew this fight was totally in my control. Aiels had never been a strong biotic. I, on the other hand, always had been. Aiels took the lead in our violent dance.
She dashed at me and reared back for another biotically charged punch. A step before reaching me, I focused a biotic throw at her waist and sent her off balance. The punch sailed wide and to my left. I deftly stepped towards the off-balance woman and delivered a punch directly to her stomach. She let out a grunt as my fist connected. I let my own biotics flare up as I jumped on top of her prone form and held her down.
"Yield!" I yelled at her.
Her eyes narrowed at the command. I was flung through the air and landed on my back 15 feet away. That throw hurt like a bitch. Maybe I had to recalculate my odds? Still, sixty years hadn't been enough for her to get that kind of mastery of her biotics...had it? I propped myself up on my elbow and looked back. Aiels was still laying on her back.
So I had been right. It was the last act of a desperate woman. No, a girl. Her moniker was very apt. Staggering to my feet I trudged over to where my former Sister lay on her back, exhausted. I placed my boot on her chest lightly.
"Yield." A soft purple light briefly appeared on her hand before it went out on its own. "You're facing biotic exhaustion Aiels. Yield and I'll get you something to eat."
Aiels' eyes closed a single tear trickled down the side of her face. I took my foot off of her chest and sat down beside her. Opening a pocket on my pants I pulled out a ration bar, unwrapped it, and put it on her chest. After she had eaten the bar, she pulled herself together and sat on the ground across from me.
I decided to ease us back into our previous conversation. "That was quite the biotic display, Aiels."
"Stop calling me that." So we weren't going to ease into anything tonight, apparently. "That maiden died sixty years ago."
"I'm not calling you The Girl. You're still my Ai- Sister." Well that potential slip up may have cost me what I came here for.
"The Girl is who I am, Daresa. We aren't Sisters anymore, remember? Jona made that fact very clear."
I remembered. And the memory brought back Aiels' horrified cries as Jona made her look at her disfigured face. I shook the memory from my head. "Aiels, why did you help Deckard?"
"You know why," she said as she picked a pebble off the ground and flung it away from her.
"Slavers? That's the only reason?"
"Is there any other reason?"
Wait, what did Deckard say? Aiels had stuck with them...with one of them. Oh shit Aiels. "What was her name?"
Silence greeted my question.
"Aiels, I'm sorry."
"Her name was Wendy Kolthani. And I…" Aiels trailed off. She threw another rock into the night.
"Aiels, I need your help. I need to stop someone who hurt the people I cared for as well." It was now or never. Either I could convince her of the mission or I was left without my right hand.
"No." She dusted off her pants and stood up.
"No?" I stood up myself as she began to walk back to pick up her sniper rifle. "That's it? Just no?"
"Just no," and she picked up her rifle and began to trek back down the hillside.
"I'm offering you a ride off this rock!" I called out to her. "Athame's ass, Aiels!" But she didn't stop again. Looks like this was going to take a bit more work than I thought it would.
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