I enjoyed my vacation a little more than I intended. So this chapter is arriving at an usual time. Hope you all had wonderful holiday and a great new year! If you read my other stories, those will be updated soon as well. This is the second to the last chapter, with this story closing I feel a little sad to say goodbye to Millie. Won't keep you guys waiting very long for last chapter (at most a week). Enjoy!

When it Rains in Omega VII

There were worse ways to end a first love. Shepard knew this, having read novels on it in her spare time. She turned to the window of the clinic, book in hand. The sky in Omega never changed—it was impossible, considering that it was a floating asteroid. But walking up to the window, looking up at the same sky whether it was the night or day cycle still made her think—maybe impossible things could happen, maybe it could rain in Omega—and she didn't want to be the fool who missed witnessing a miracle.

She put the book down and grabbed her shoes. The lack of exercise was starting to get to her and her—sickness—or whatever it was that was wrong with her getting worse, stronger even.

Maybe it was time to tell someone. Sparing a glance at the office door, she debated going to the doc.

Instead, she opened and slid out the window.

In the Gozu District, the tallest building was an empty apartment complex. She raced towards it without hesitation, her hood sliding off her head as she leapt over a staircase. Mordin might yell at her for leaving, right when he thought she was being so obedient, but now—out here—

She stood with her arms on her sides, over the ledge of the roof. The wind was strong and it tousled her hair and pulled at her hoodie. From her vantage point, she spotted the taller buildings of Tuhi, saw the lights coming from establishments like Afterlife and Bluefire. Her senses were assaulted by the sight of multitude of rooms from distant apartments, the clotheslines with barely dried laundry, the stench of smoke and metal, the dark pulse beneath the asphalt and steel. This side of Omega, the view of the stars that sank into the bed of the mundane, the unbound, the terrible—all this was hers.

Nothing could take that away from her. Not even the migraine or her broken heart.

She hated being a teenager. No one seemed to want to take her seriously.

Omega hadn't changed. Not since she was born here, with only a cross pendant she never touched hanging on her neck and the Christian name Emilia—the sole reminder that her parents existed at all. Of her drell friend who had gone missing and left no traces for her to follow and an unfounded attraction to a tourist turian she never asked for—all these she could lose but not this view.

Not even to the strangers who followed her to the roof.

She turned slowly to face four people—the one who took point was dark-skinned, a smile full of white teeth, an almost kind expression but the wrinkles on his forehead and the gravity of his presence gave him away: former marine or law enforcement, dishonest, likely dangerous. Tourists always gave themselves away in the most obvious ways.

They also liked blocking exits and making trouble in already troublesome places.

"We're not here to hurt you." He pointed his pistol up, hands open in surrender. His companion didn't have their guns out but they were armed.

"What else are you gonna accomplish when you burn someone's home down?"She tilted her chin up, her short hair dancing in the wind didn't deter from how sharp and refreshed she felt. She smirked when he couldn't hide how pale he became. "I'm sixteen. Not the vorcha shit you stepped on while you were climbing up here."

She studied their uniforms, armor of black and white, with an emblem of an orange hexagon. Well, that wasn't an emblem she liked to see or even saw often. The man cleared his throat. About to open his mouth but the companion beside him aimed her pistol. She was startlingly beautiful, but the snarl on her face didn't do her justice. Opposed to the dark-skinned man, she was more sleek lines and lean muscle — had a posh life maybe? Self-trained? Likely anal retentive, overconfident — naggy. Shepard would bet a bowl of ice cream that the girl didn't have one scar despite living a currently dangerous life.

"Miranda—" He began.

"We don't have time for this, Taylor." This Miranda turned back to her, eyes sharp. "You're the information courier around here who works for Feron. We want answers."

"To what?"

"The Shadow Broker's location."

Shepard sighed. "Listen, sister," Miranda glared even harder at the term. Not that Shepard could understand why. "Maybe you don't know the concept of what it means to be a messenger—but I'd like to point out that even the Broker's operatives don't know where he buys his coffee. What would I know?"

They tensed visibly, and in Taylor's case, with a twinge of nervousness. All of them were highly strung except for the one called Miranda. She tossed her dark hair back and aimed her gun steadily. "Don't try that bluff, kid. You're Shepard. You're not just any information courier—you work for Feron."

Well, she hadn't realized she'd garnered a reputation. Feron was high up there in the Broker's good books—but Shepard couldn't say for sure if he knew where the Broker was—no one was supposed to.

Except, as Miranda had accused, Shepard did, sort of — she wasn't supposed to know but people tended to look down on the runners, most of them couldn't read or didn't have an education. But Shepard was self-trained and sometimes she read too. Some inductive reasoning pinpointed a few possible places the Shadow Broker could be. No promise in terms of accuracy but it was a damn good lead—better than some vague guesses.

But like hell she would answer them. Mainly on principle because it would be bad for business and Feron was a fair businessman. Shepard wouldn't ever compromise that.

All about her, the wind still blew. She stepped back, sure that if all else failed she wouldn't get caught. If it came down to getting captured, being forced to confess, and likely dying in vain then there was plan B.

Fucking hell though, if she knew she would actually die today she would have ate Cheez Menace one last time.

Taylor, the one taking point, saw through her. His hands suddenly grew blue with biotics. "Come on, girl. Don't let this escalate any more than it should. Just tell us what you know and we'll walk away."

"I don't think I'm crass enough to tattle." She took a step back. They took a step forward. "And I know that if I let you take me anywhere it would be in a body bag. But fuck that too. I want to die on my own terms."

"Shepard! Don't do anything rash!"

She smiled. "At least I can say it's been a good day."

When she was learning parkour, she had been one of the smaller kids. And because she was afraid that she'd never measure up to the older ones, she trained twice as hard and twice as long. Now, she'd outlived all of them and had used all she learned to make a career out of it. She done things that defied the limits of the human body—scaled up walls with her bare hands and by the strength of her feet, jumped across buildings of near-impossible distances, landed unscathed from great heights. Training prepared her for nearly everything.

What training never prepared her for was a fall that was 21 stories high.

Taylor and Miranda both tried to catch her with their biotics but she was falling—down, down— faster than they could have caught her. Omega was different, if not more hellish, than she would have liked as she descended. Still, even this view she could count as hers as well. At least hell was a familiar place.

She faced this reality too calmly, even for her. But she remembered what she thought when she met Garrus, even as he was dying and struggling and trying to survive. This was just another day in Omega. Someone died before they ever really want to.

But Garrus got up. And he didn't give a shit if he was going to bleed out before help ever came. He faced what could have been the last few minutes of his life. Rage, she read somewhere before and that is what he did, rage against the dying of the light.

Fuck this shit. She wasn't gonna die in silence.

She roared. Her body was closing in to kiss asphalt and steel. At least if someone heard they could take her corpse to the doctor and Feron would at least give her some kind of burial. So she roared, hands stretched, reaching—

She felt it in her chest, a fire, a fury. Then it encased her arms, then her hands— shooting out of her with a force that had her defying gravity. Springing her up, she noted the cables that stretched between buildings. With the natural forces pulling her back down it was painful to stretch out her hand again but she did with another roar. Power drew out of her hand again but it missed the cable by a mile and she cussed.

Instead, it went for the window instead— expecting to be pulled toward it, she yowled as she was propelled back instead, a force so strong that all the wind was punched out of her; crashing into the neighboring apartment window, rolling when instincts took over to right herself. Back first, she slammed against a wall—hitting the back of her head. She saw black, then white, and hazy images before she finally came to. She heard the noise from a television, the crunch of glass when she tried to put some weight on her hands.

Her heart was slamming against her chest, she felt like she was going to puke and then some too. But Christ she was alive. Fucking hell, she was supposed to die but she was fucking alive.

She stood up, legs still feeling like jelly and she went down again. The world spun and she turned to the side and wretched violently. But it was the best puke in her entire life because fuck, she was still alive.

And biotic. Shit. How did that happen? She looked down at her hands, laughing. Oh, Garrus was in for story if she saw him any time soon. Feron too if the asshole wasn't still MIA.

Something stirred beside her and she turned to find a little boy, mouth open wide and the holo of his television unit glowing with violent cartoons. Suddenly, she remembered why she had fallen in the first place—and cursed Cerberus— and forced herself up, limbs and back cracking. She needed to move, who knew if Cerberus would attempt to find her body and find nothing there.

"Hey kid," She limped forward before crashing. Crap, she was exhausted. Must have been the biotics coupled with the relief that she managed to escape hell somehow.

The kid quivered. Holding on to his toy robot even tighter, he gulped before replying. "Y-yeah?"

She cleared her throat. "Maybe you can give your big sister a glass of water and a cookie from your stash, yeah? I'm starved."


She returned to the doc's clinic 7 days later.

As Cerberus's name suggested, they were like dogs when they were in pursuit. They never did cross paths again but their people were everywhere. She was just barely one step ahead at all times. If she didn't know Omega so well, she wouldn't have gotten enough rest to finally lose them. Only now, she smelled like the armpits of a sweaty batarian. Also, with lack of anything substantial to eat than a bite here and there, she knew she could eat a krogan if someone made them palatable.

She sent a short message to Mordin on the first day — after that kid gave her that exquisite chocolate chip cookie — and then immediately killed her omni-tool after using up her omni-gels. Any gear was shed for fear of getting tracked— a special kind of paranoia instilled in every Omega dweller. She also borrowed a few of the kid's mom clothes, his name being something like Gregory which she changed to Gear (and he liked it from the smile on his face—for good reason, because how archaic was Gregory, right). Shedding her own clothes in plain sight of Gear (really, his day was just as exciting as hers), she pulled up a pair of loose shorts and a mandarin collared jacket before she raced out of the building and crawled through the ducts of the next one.

She had lost the dogs by day four when she used one of those secret paths Aria didn't want anyone to know about. Then she hid and crawled for three more days till she was a mere click away from the Gozu Clinic. She had a feeling the place was compromised at first but nothing stirred from as far as three clicks away or even any sign of surveillance. Shepard could only assume that it was pure coincidence that they found her the first time and they wouldn't have if she hadn't given in to her wanderlust.

She rolled her eyes, another thing for the doc to glare at her for. Perfect. But, since she used that biotic blast she didn't feel anymore nausea or migraines. Maybe it was a little late for her to be exhibiting any signs but—hell, she was biotic. Who cared about how or when, right?

So seven days later she stole back into the clinic with the stealth and speed of a street cat. She made her way back into the clinic: tired, smelly, hungry but breathing.

She expected to find Mordin, angry, and she could tell because his usually messy office was clean and clutter free. "Finally, Shepard. Would yell but too relieved." He exhaled deeply. "Glad you're safe. Smell vile, however. Will grab disinfectants and potent deodorizers."

She smirked. "Hey to you too, doc."

She looked about the room and her eyes widened. Who she wasn't expecting was Feron, pacing like a caged lion from one end of the room to the other until he spotted her. He sighed, pausing. "Finally, kid."

Relief flooded into her system and she smiled sweetly, approaching him. "You fucker."

He laughed when he reached out to give her a hug. "You reckless little shit. Where the hell have you been? And why do you smell like you bathed in krogan piss?"

"Where have I been? How about you? You've been gone for almost half a year in case you didn't notice."

He stepped back, scratching the back of his head. "A lot of things happened but—all clear now though. Everything is fixed for you. We can go now, in fact."

"Fixed for me?" She took a step back, arms crossing over her chest. "Go now? Where?"

On the desk beside them, Feron threw the datapads onto the table. "These are your essentials. We kept your name as is but we fabricated some stuff here and there." He grabbed her by the arms, smile in place as he shook her a bit. "Let's live in Ilium. I met a—girl. We can go there. As a family."

"What?" She bared her teeth at him, her grip tightened around his forearm. "Is that all you've been doing in Ilium? Getting fucking hitched when I got chased around by Cerberus?"

Feron shook his head. "You'll be safer there. We'll be safer there—you, me, Liara. You need to meet her, Millie. She's fantastic!"

"I don't care what she is."

"Don't say that." Feron shook her again. "You don't have to be a courier anymore—you can find a real job, get a real education. You can live a normal life, away from crime and danger. You can live with a family."

She reeled from confusion to relief and just more confusion. Then anger, vicious familiar anger.

Stomach growling, heart racing, and feet smelling she replied the only way she could:

"Hell no."