Her nose filling with the stench of ozone, Liara groaned as she tried to get to her feet. She grasped at a nearby railing but her hand, slippery with her own blood, simply slid off and made her fumble momentarily. She tried again, more frantically this time and was able to secure purchase, heaving herself to as she tried to compress the cut on her chest.
Sweat dropping off of her, Liara let out a wet gasp as her legs ached, desperate for respite. She wobbled uncertainly, feeling faint. Her blood was now painting the railing as it dripped down her arm, coloring it a darkish red. Liara winced as she activated the medi-gel application on her suit, feeling her cuts begin to congeal from the insertion of the salve. Despite the stemming of the blood flow, Liara knew that the medi-gel was only barely holding her together as she still had several internal injuries that the substance could not fix on its own. She needed to finish this now before her wounds took their toll.
The grating clanged and Liara spun around in shock. Standing slowly back up, the clone's knees straightened as she recovered from jumping two stories up to land on the next catwalk. A fall like that should have broken bones but the quarian had landed on her feet without injury. Her omni-blade was still engaged but in her free hand, she now held a long knife, much longer than a combat knife but shorter than a saber by half. Her breath hissing quietly from her vocabulator, the clone pounded forward, holding her weapons in front of her.
Liara was still too badly wounded to mount a biotic attack, so all she could do was backpedal wildly as the clone advanced. Sensing fear, the quarian ran forward and lunged with her omni-blade while simultaneously slashing horizontally with her enormous knife. Liara skirted around the omni-blade and threw up a hand to block the quarian's other arm, preventing the knife from decapitating her. Something inside of the asari was grating horribly and she coughed, causing her lungs to put pressure on her ribs which flared from the pain.
Ignoring her definitely cracked rib, Liara pushed past the discomfort and yanked at the clone's arm, spinning her around. The quarian was thrown against the guardrail, bending her back over it. Also affected from her sudden move, Liara sagged against the opposite guardrail, out of breath as her knees buckled underneath her.
The clone was still fresh with energy and rebounded from the blow but Liara still was on the verge of collapsing and needed more time to recharge. Raising the long knife up high, the clone swung downward, intent on cleaving the asari's skull in two. At the last moment, Liara rose and threw her hand into the quarian's stance, deflecting the blow. Unfortunately, the knife only slid a few inches off target and Liara screamed as the knife bit into her scalp and she twisted away in pain. She collapsed to the ground, the movement wrenching the knife out of the clone's grip and sending it clattering on the grating.
Instinctively, Liara kicked out, catching the clone's leg and thumping her to the floor soundly. The quarian grunted as she made contact with the ground, momentarily stunned. Liara, distraught, wiped blood out of her eyes deliriously, her entire vision turning red. The long, ragged cut on her head sluiced her life down her face, coating half of it in a red mask. Liara was shocked to discover that her blood was hot on her face, almost feeling like it was burning her. It stiffened around her features, caking her and cracking whenever she breathed.
"A lucky break," the clone muttered as she got back up. "But the next blow will kill you." She stalked forward, arm outstretched to place the omni-blade through the back of the asari's throat, until everything flashed by in a whirl.
Angrier than she had ever been, Liara had looked up to find the clone's knife sitting right in front of her, out of sight of the quarian. Snatching it up and turning in a blind rage, Liara scythed the blade through the air and it met skin and bone, spraying the ground with blood redder than hers.
The clone yelled in shock as she saw the dripping cut on her arm. Her wide eyes blinked in disbelief behind her mask and Liara twisted the knife in her grip so that she was now holding it backhand.
Watching the clone's reaction, Liara grinned. "Your suit's breached, Tali."
"Do not…" the clone growled, "…call me…" she lowered her stance and rushed forward, "…Tali!"
The two blades of different compositions met briefly and sparked against the other. Liara leaped back and cut down, hoping to expose more of the quarian to the atmosphere, but the clone met every blow with renewed vigor. Spinning in rage, the clone became a whirlwind of orange light as she spun her omni-blade around, looking for a place to make a direct hit.
With a ferocious swing, Liara knocked the omni-blade aside with the knife and with her other hand, landed an open-handed strike on the clone's chest. Something snapped within the quarian, the sound of bones breaking echoed in the chamber, and she coughed, coating the interior of her visor with blood. Desperate to keep the upper hand, Liara threw a punch with her hand containing the knife and the clone flew backwards from a blow to the head, denting her helmet out of shape.
"You…little bitch," the clone wheezed. "You're going to regret that very much."
Liara wiped more of her own blood off of her face as she took the moment to rest, cautious about approaching the clone. The two women clutched at their wounds, one staring at the other in hatred, the other with acceptance. For the longest time, they did not move, both awaiting the other to strike first.
"Whenever you're ready," Liara whispered, praying for the ache in her side to dissipate.
The clone teetered, then charged, barreling over Liara onto the metal supports. The knife that Liara held sunk into the clone's leg as she made contact, but the quarian was too doped up on her combat high to even detect the pain. She straddled Liara, holding her blade to the asari's throat before she raised it up to make the final cut.
Abruptly, there was a slight whistling noise and then a howl of pain. Liara opened her eyes and was surprised to see the clone reeling back, clutching the stump of her left hand, which was now inexplicably gone, cut off at the wrist. A small object lay next to her, oozing blood all over the grating and Liara stared at the severed hand in shock.
But standing to the side of the clone, wielding a bloody knife of his own, was someone whom Liara initially thought was a hallucination, that this outcome was not possible in any way. And yet, the armored figure of Garrus Vakarian stood triumphantly between the two, also breathing heavily, but victorious nonetheless.
The clone hunched over in pain, tightly squeezing her remaining hand around her stump in an effort to cease her suffering. Blood spurted out from the wound and Liara could see a faint knob of chillingly white bone peeking out. The sight disgusted her but it gave Liara the chance she had been waiting for.
Seizing the moment, Liara clenched her teeth and a final blast of biotic energy exploded from her fingertips, impacting precisely on the incapacitated clone. The force was so great that it shattered the quarian's visor, producing shards of the blood-red glass tinkling onto the ground. The clone shrieked in agony, unable to clasp her hand over her face as she was thrown through the air, towards the edge of the platform.
The clone landed awkwardly on the edge of the guardrail, a horrendous snapping sound resounding as the quarian's right arm shattered from it bending at an awkward angle. Moaning in pain, the clone slid down and sagged over the railing, her center of gravity slowly pulling her over the lip.
In a moment of clarity, Liara shot forward and grabbed at the clone's remaining hand as she began to fall, keeping her suspended over the power core. She cried out as the clone dangled, deadweight above the abyss. The quarian's head was tilted downward, most likely passed out from the amount of pressure being exerted on her broken arm.
"Liara!" Garrus yelled. "What-?"
"Garrus, grab hold of me!" Liara shouted. "I can't kill her!"
Flabbergasted, Garrus balked. "There's an easy solution for that: just drop her!"
"No!" Liara screamed as she began to slide. "I don't want to kill her! It's Tali, Garrus! I can't kill Tali!"
Mumbling a curse, Garrus quickly grabbed hold of Liara's leg and positioned himself between two metal posts on the catwalk. He threw his leg against one to provide an anchor and grunted as he kept the asari from joining the quarian over the edge.
Liara's hands clasped around the clone's three fingered one. Numbly, the quarian looked up, blood welling from cuts all over her face and she blinked as she saw the asari trying to save her. Liara's mouth dropped open as she saw the grey face beyond the broken visor. The young features were delicate and smooth, now marred from the cuts to the face, but they showed a youthful side to the woman. The glowing white eyes were full of confusion and tears clung to the edge, threatening to spill. The quarian's mouth was agape, breathing raggedly but it reinforced all of her pain and sadness all at once.
Caught up in the moment, Liara was stunned at the quarian's appearance. Is this what Tali looks like? She...she is prettier than I ever could have imagined.
But gradually, the sorrow in the quarian's eyes hardened and her mouth turned into a snarl as she pushed past the blinding pain to understand that she was being saved by the person she had been trying to kill. Liara gasped at the cruel face, shocked that such a beautiful person could make such an expression of hate. The asari now glanced at the quarian's fist she had in her clutches and stared somberly as a building orange light began to emanate from the palm. The ball of fire grew in intensity, a miniature sun that sparked with fury within, projecting inches away from Liara's face, bathing her with the deadly light.
Liara had all the time she needed to do what was necessary to avoid the tech blast, but her fingers felt glued to the quarian somehow, as if she was physically unable to kill the clone outright, even if it meant her death too. She locked eyes with her, as if she was silently confirming that this was the path the quarian had chosen. The white eyes held no hesitation, no regrets, but just blind rage.
Garrus then had the fortitude to glance over and he gasped as he saw the clone about to unleash her tech attack in Liara's face. Yelling frantically, he jerked Liara's leg back and she slid back over the grating, but the quarian's fingers finally slipped out of her grip from the sudden movement.
Liara stared emptily down, watching the clone fall for what seemed like an eternity. The clone did not utter a word the entire time, finally disappearing as she fell into the blinding light from the suppressed element zero core. The maze of electric bolts consumed the quarian whole, producing a plume of smoke and Liara knew right then that the clone was dead.
Garrus soon joined her in looking over the edge and he breathed out in relief. He looked at Liara's half-bloodied face and gave a tiny chuckle. "Spirits, Liara, you look terrible. Had I known you would have had your hands full with the clone, I should've stayed with you the entire time."
Groaning, Liara just touched her face numbly, wincing as her glove still came away red from the cuts welling on her face. "She wasn't Tali after all," she whispered. "The Tali I know never hated a person without purpose. This one was just a vessel of rage."
"Probably for the best that it's dead," Garrus mused as he helped Liara to her feet. "Did my distraction work out for you at all?"
"You mean the power diversion?" Liara said as she limped forward. "It got the clone away from Shepard, which was all that…oh, Goddess! I almost forgot about Shepard!"
"Ah, don't worry about it," Garrus said as he draped one of Liara's arms over his shoulders. "He was doing fine when I passed by him a few minutes ago. He's in good spirits, considering all that he's been through."
"Okay…" Liara nodded. "But after we meet up with him, you need to go find Tali." She clutched at her rib with a grimace. "I'm not stubborn enough to deny that I'm too banged up to continue. She's still alone out there and we haven't seen Grevel at all. I'm worried about her, Garrus."
"I don't know," Garrus said thoughtfully. "If you've ever seen Tali want something very badly, she is going to fight like hell to get it."
"I realize that perfectly, but what if Grevel can match Tali's best?"
Something cold was flitting across her face. It was wet and fluffy, which made Tali tremble. She had never felt such an extreme sensation before and the intensity of the cold wind seemed to suck all of the breath out of her lungs.
The tears around her eyes were stiffening, starting to freeze, and her nose was starting to run. Sniffling as she tried not to think of Shepard, Tali pushed aside the pieces of her shattered visor and gently unclasped the seals of her mask, letting it fall to the ground so that she would not be surrounded by pieces of broken glass. She dazedly slipped her hood down and also removed the rear portion of her helmet, knowing that it was too late for her to be restricted now. She tore the vacuum tubes off from the helmet and dropped it down before she plucked her knife back up from the ground and steadily got to her feet.
I'm sorry, John. I'm so, so sorry. All I wanted was to see you one last time.
Her black hair whipped everywhere from the wind, some of it flying into her eyes. They hid the few tears that had made it past Tali's defenses and she felt her face turn hot, despite the freezing cold. Through the fluttering strands, she could see Grevel still standing across from her, having retrieved her own knife while Tali had been lying on the ground.
"What will you do now, Tali'Zorah?" Grevel asked. "Will you lie down and die, or will you continue to fight?"
Tali brushed her hair out of her face, her skin feeling bone dry from the snow hurtling against her face. She shook, feeling her arms prickle from the cold, and she could smell the crisp air flowing through her nostrils. She took a deep breath of the subzero atmosphere before she found a reserve of heat and let it spread throughout her, keeping her extremities warm.
I thought I could hold my own.
"I don't have any choice," Tali replied. "I'm dead either way, right?"
"It would certainly appear that way."
"Then I won't hold back," Tali growled as she sprinted at Grevel at full speed, the fastest she had ever run in her life.
In two seconds flat, she had closed the distance between her enemy, her knife beginning to travel upward from her hip. She envisioned slicing Grevel open from groin to sternum, watching her blue guts slide out in a steaming pile on the snow. Grevel pushed off on a foot and evaded the deadly blow, but Tali continued to raise her arm up and the knife raked across Grevel's forearm, opening up yet another wound.
Grevel roared and Tali yelled in response, spittle flying from her mouth. The turian swung her arm and it clocked Tali firmly on the side of the head but she dug her feet in the ground and did her damnedest not to go down. A tiny trail of blood began to trickle down the back of the quarian's head but Tali gritted her teeth, sparks flying from her eyes.
Lunging forward to try and spear Tali through the throat, Grevel jolted in place as Tali quickly activated her tech drone between them. Grevel had built up so much momentum that she destabilized the drone as she shot past it, but its deactivation triggered a reflexive electric shock that flashed through Grevel, causing her to sink to her knees, her armor smoking.
Tali raced forward and threw herself at Grevel, hooking her arms around the turian's neck. With her knife, she began to viciously saw at the neck plating of the turian's mask, cutting through hydraulic lines and sensitive electronics. Grevel was still too stunned to properly react but at the sound of Tali's knife biting through a gas hose, the turian finally snapped out of her paralysis and bodily threw Tali over her head, screaming obscenities.
But Tali had already done her work. She had cut through the electronics that controlled the lenses of the mask as well as the voice box. It also was now sagging at an angle to the side a bit. Frustrated, blind, and out of options, Grevel hooked her free hand around the bottom lip of her mask and tugged hard, ripping out the last remaining wires and hoses that attached the mask to her neck. With a grunt of disgust, she threw the mask away and it clattered off a nearby ledge, useless to the owner now.
Tali's breath caught in her throat as the livid turian stared back at her. The mandible-less and scarred face bared its teeth in hate, drool dripping down the exposed jaw. The tiny cybernetics lining Grevel's forehead winked on and off, and the turian's bloodshot left eye never left Tali, fixated on her face, the veils having been lifted for the both of them.
The unpainted face of the turian breathed in the air for a bit, the cold seemingly not even fazing her before she growled menacingly. "And now we're even, Tali'Zorah," the shockingly faint voice uttered.
Grevel's voice, unfiltered from the mask, was low and husky, distinctively feminine, but deathly quiet as if she had not been speaking for years. Tali reasoned that the mask must have amplified Grevel's damage vocal cords by artificially increasing the volume while simultaneously changing the pitch. Even so, she was not prepared for the hideous mercenary to be so deathly quiet in real life.
"No," Tali spat. "We are not close to even, you bitch. Not after what you've done to me. We will be even only after I'm standing over your corpse on the ground."
Watching Tali, Grevel lowered her eyes and lifted her mouth as best she could into what was an unmistakable smile, the first one Tali had seen the turian actually give. "A true warrior…" Grevel rasped.
With a scream, both of them rushed toward the other at the same time, blades at the ready. Tali, at the last moment, dropped to her knees and used the decreased friction to slide on the snow while she slashed at Grevel's side. Ignoring her new cuts, Grevel kicked Tali in the small of her back, propelling her forward harshly. She moved forward and slammed her feet on the ground, trying to crush the quarian's skull, but Tali was too quick as she rolled to a safe place, standing up when she was out of reach.
Frustrated at her inability to touch the quarian with her own knife, Grevel sheathed her weapon and lowered her head before she bodily executed a running tackle, throwing her fists out to catch Tali around her center of mass, causing them to roll down a nearby slope in a heap.
Panicked, Tali sliced her knife down across Grevel's face but the turian pushed past the pain. In a last-ditch effort, Tali stabbed Grevel in the shoulder blade but the turian twisted in mid-roll, the knife sticking in Grevel's flesh. The turian did not even seem to detect these wounds and abruptly threw a fist down in a hammer motion as the two of them skirted dangerously close to the edge of a nearby cliff. Tali shrieked as her collarbone snapped, Grevel's fist having caught it perfectly on the downswing.
With a kick, Grevel shoved the wounded Tali away from her and the quarian quickly felt the sensation of nothing on her lower torso. Realizing what that meant, she dug her hands into the ground and hooked them around an anchored boulder as her legs swayed over the cliff, an abrupt terminus to the ground that she had previously been standing on.
The pain from Tali's collarbone was so intense that she nearly let go, on the verge of tumbling down the rocky incline to her death. Tears streamed down her face and she cried out in despair as she felt her fingers began to slip off of the slick rock. Inch by inch, they slid more and more until Tali was certain that she was about to let go, until a hand snaked down from above and wrapped itself around her neck.
Tali gagged as the three fingers holding her throat constricted, lifting her up from the cliff. She pounded her fists uselessly on the armored arm, fighting to break the grip that had been set. Spluttering, Tali coughed weakly as Grevel stepped back from the cliff, suspending the quarian in the air as she easily held her aloft.
Grevel rotated her wrist, examining Tali's face very carefully as she watched the quarian begin to lose consciousness. Her breath frosting in the chill air, Grevel squeezed tighter and watched as Tali's frantic blows steadily became weaker as she rapidly lost consciousness. Her struggling was ceasing and Grevel laughed.
"You put up an admirable fight, Tali'Zorah," Grevel panted. "But you had to know that it was always going to end this way. Your hate was not nearly enough."
Still being choked in the turian's tremendous grip, Tali let out a strangled string of noises, her eyelids drooping heavily.
"A final word, Tali? Spit it out, then. I wouldn't want your death to be any less tragic than it already is."
Opening her eyes again, Tali wheezed as she tried to inhale, her nostrils flaring. Barely moving her jaw, she spat out, "You…talk…too…much."
Clenching her left fist and opening it again, the electrodes in Tali's gauntlet flared to life from her preset movement. Grevel stared in horror as the electricity sparked blue in the white blizzard and screamed when Tali clamped her hand on the turian's wrist.
Consumed with energy, both Grevel and Tali shrieked as the lightning danced from one person to the other. Grevel dropped Tali as she began twitching and Tali convulsed on the ground, simultaneously coughing from her windpipe suddenly becoming unrestricted. Her enviro-suit was not electric-proof and she spasmed uncontrollably as the smell of cooking flesh filled the air. However, she managed to switch the gauntlet off by clenching her hand into a fist and sighed in relief as the pain faded, the cold cooling her wounds.
Groaning, Tali attempted to sit back up, but a shadow fell upon her and pushed her onto her back, causing her to sink into the snow. Grevel raised an arm, blotting out the sun above, and shot it down towards the quarian. Tali barely had time to see the knife in Grevel's fist and shot her arms out to halt the trajectory of the blow, her actions stopping the knife mere inches from her chest.
Tali whimpered as her collarbone ached, the stress grating on the damaged nerves. Grevel could see the fear in Tali's eyes and snarled, fighting with the quarian to bring the knife down. The turian was much stronger and slowly but surely, the wicked point began to continue downward, traveling inch by inch towards Tali's chest.
"No!" Tali moaned, the muscles of her arms aching. "No…please! No!"
Grevel, for once, did not respond with a taunt. Rather, she grunted and pushed harder, agonizingly bending Tali's elbows back. The blade was only three inches away from Tali now. Melted snow dripped off of the black surface but both combatants were drenched in hot sweat and blood.
"Please, don't!" Tali begged, her eyes helplessly watching fate play out in front of her. "Please…please…"
Tali felt like her arms were going to snap off as she pushed with all her strength. She could feel every cord, every bruise, every solitary fiber in her body. And all were screaming for mercy. She began to hyperventilate as the knife brushed the tip of her suit, starting to fray the fabric from its ridged edges.
A feeling of peace strangely came over Tali, and she wondered serenely into the cloudy sky. Snowflakes fell on her face, the feeling cold and wet but it made her feel very alive in that moment. She saw her breath mist into the air and watched it mingle with the snow, finding it to be very beautiful.
Her gaze drifted back down and spotted the angry face of Grevel, mouth in a snarl as she fought to push her blade down. However, Tali's eyes flickered to the right a bit and spotted something sticking out of Grevel's shoulder. It looked suspiciously like a hilt and blue blood dripped freely off of it, making Tali ponder where it had-
My knife, Tali realized in shock, the answer lying right in front of her.
Abruptly, Tali's grip slackened and Grevel fell heavily down on the quarian. There was an infinitesimally long second where nothing happened and then the most painful sensation Tali had ever experienced ripped through her. The agony was like nothing she had every experienced and she could not even utter a word for her breath had been drawn out of her. She could feel her blood spurting out from the wound, her own heartbeat tearing her apart. The cold knife felt like ice within her in contrast to the magma pulsating within, a final well of energy for her to tap into.
Kill her! Kill her now!
Driven by all her terror and rage, with blood streaming down her front, Tali sat up and quickly yanked the knife out of Grevel's shoulder, to the turian's astonishment. Quickly, Grevel pulled her own knife out of the quarian's body to strike again but Tali didn't even feel the pain that time. Instead, Tali's arm became a blur as she sliced the knife through air, moving so fast that she seemed to split time itself. There was a brief moment of resistance and Tali suddenly became drenched in a warm substance, making her gag. Despite the fire in her chest from the stab wound, she rolled away from Grevel and looked over when she had gotten to safety.
Grevel gagged, her eyes clenched shut in pain, as she grasped at her slashed neck. The turian's blood spat forth in a steady beat and Tali could see wet muscle and ragged tubes from the deep cut in Grevel's throat. The snow steadily turned blue below Grevel and blood spewed out of her mouth, something inside her hemorrhaging. Within moments, Grevel became splattered with gore and Tali could only watch in astonishment, her own wound feeling like a smolder in comparison.
But Tali's eyes dropped to the ground, as she had uncovered something when she had rolled away and scraped off the loose layer of snow. With desperate fingers, she grabbed at Grevel's suppressed pistol and lifted it up, shaking the slush off of it. Less than two meters away, Grevel spotted Tali holding the pistol and her eyes widened in horror.
Retching up blood, Grevel barely had enough time to choke out, "Ta…li…" before the quarian pulled the trigger. The pistol report was surprisingly quiet, the open air swallowing up the noise as soon as it sounded. There was only a slight kick to the gun, the feeling a bit anticlimactic.
Grevel's head exploded as the high-powered bullet hit her directly in the forehead. The top of the turian's head flew off as her skull shattered into a million pieces, allowing her brains to geyser into the air. The remaining pulp splattered in waves around the turian's body, and the headless corpse finally collapsed to leak blood onto the ground.
The pistol tumbled out of Tali's grip and she let out a deep sob in relief. The stab wound in her chest throbbed and she held her hands over it, an unexpected paralysis coming over her. She took one final look at Grevel's body before exhaustion came over her and she flopped down on her back, weakly coughing.
Flecks of blood appeared on her lips but she felt too tired to do anything about them. The snow was clinging to her hair and chilling the back of her neck. Her chest still felt like an eruption was continuously ongoing and she whimpered as she kept her blood-stained hands glued over the deep wound.
She stared up into the sky thoughtfully, wondering if an infection or the knife would claim her first. She disregarded such macabre thoughts in favor of ones with Shepard. She pictured his smiling face from the last time they had laid in bed together, remembering the sensation of closeness and love from his tender embrace. She wanted to desperately feel that again, for every second he was with her, she felt complete, whole.
She would have liked to have done so much more.
"I'm…sorry…" Tali whispered, feeling at peace from the gentle snow upon her skin.
Despite the coldness, Tali felt sleepy. Her eyelids fluttered and she looked up at the sky a little bit more. She wondered if she was imagining the whiteness growing in intensity, or that it was merely her own imagination playing tricks with her vision. Whatever the reason, it felt to Tali like a warm blanket had been thrown over her and that she was carefully being bundled for a nice long rest.
With a final, conscious breath, Tali drifted away.
A/N: Whoo! That was a hard chapter to write. I've got some traveling in the days ahead so the next chapter might be a little bit delayed. (Key word: might)
I'm also going to make an important announcement in the next week or so within this story so keep your eyes peeled for whatever it might entail. You never know, you might find the news exciting or disappointing.