This is the tenth chapter to my series, "The Arrival Has Come". Reviews are welcome and encouraged. The story is set during Mass Effect 3.
*There are some spoilers ahead for ME3.*
As with all disclaimers, I do not own Bioware or Mass Effect, but I certainly wish I did.
See author's note in Chapter Nine for any concerns.
The Arrival Has Come
Chapter Ten: Important
"It's probably not the best time to tell you," said Ashley to Shepard. Bullets whistled past the commander's N7 helmet just as he pulled back from peeking around the corner. He turned his attention back to Ashley, pulse pounding, sweat dripping down his neck, the heat of battle thrumming through his veins. "I talked to James," said the lieutenant, jamming another thermal clip in her Vindicator battle rifle.
Of all the places to talk about their relationship, Ashley had to bring it up while Reaperized asari attacked them with biotic warps and shotguns. The battlefield was not Shepard's choice "determine the relationship" spot, but for two soldiers, it was the next best thing.
"And?" asked Tiberius, cradling Charlotte against his chesptplate and signaling Liara to move up.
"I'll say this: you and I survive this firefight, first round of drinks at the lounge back in Serrice are on me."
Shepard nodded. "Sounds good, LT."
Ashley grinned and jerked her chin over her shoulder. "What do you say we bust some heads, Skipper?"
Shepard watched triumphantly as the Reaper crashed to the planet's surface.
He tapped his earpiece. "Ground Team to Fleet. Casualties?"
"We lost half of the 23rd and most of the 21st Fighter groups," Joker radioed in. "Those Reapers were tough sons of bitches to bring down."
"Joker, lead the Fleet back into Serrice. And good work."
"Will do, Commander."
"Thanks to your efforts, Shepard, Thessia survived the Reaper attack," said the Matriarch standing at a council podium. "We owe you a great debt. With the Reapers on the verge of taking your home planet, we offer you our own fleet to assist and aid you in your campaign."
Tiberius nodded respectfully. "Thank you, Matriarch."
"May the goddess watch over you."
Shepard watched the council of asari Matriarchs depart from the room. After they left, he turned to his companions.
"We leave for Palaven at 0600. Miranda, notify the crew that they have until then to relax."
"Looking for some R and R, Shepard?" asked Miranda, who brought up her omni-tool and punched in a series of commands. The orange tool disappeared after she finished while a smug grin on her face appeared. "With a certain someone?"
"One day I'll get you back," he replied jokingly, referring to the instance when Miranda had instigated a not so secret eavesdropping on Shepard and Ashley's first relationship chat.
"We'll see about that."
Liara, Miranda and Shepard left the room after the Matriarchs. They weren't more than ten meters out the door when a raspy female voice called to Shepard.
"Commander."
He turned quickly, expecting trouble. A familiar blue-skinned asari with red eyes approached the trio. It was when Tiberius noticed the red eyes – the harshness and color that told of krogan ancestry – that he knew whom the woman was.
"Aethyta?"
"Matriarch Aethyta now," she said, giving a little curtsy. "The other crap-for-brains matriarchs finally listened to me once the Reapers entered our orbit. Much like they finally listened to you."
"Aethyta," Liara whispered softly behind Shepard. "From the Shadow Broker's databases… You were…"
Tiberius turned back to Liara, who looked both happy and paralyzed with anger. Aethyta, matriarch and former bartender, was Liara's biological father. Aethyta had hinted at it the first time the commander and the matriarch met, calling Matriarch Benezia, Liara's mother, "a screw up" in a way so passionately that Shepard figured it had to be personal.
Just how personal it went, Shepard hadn't known. Until Liara became the Shadow Broker and had access to the old Broker's data. Video logs from Aethyta's apartment at the Nos Astra spaceport on Ilium showed the newly dubbed Matriarch staring wishfully at a picture of Liara. At that point, Shepard had figured it out. And so had Liara.
"Little Wing…" said Aethyta, taking a few steps toward Liara.
But Liara stepped back.
"I don't know you."
"Give me a chance to explain myself."
"Why?" asked Liara.
Shepard moved to the background, Miranda walking with him, until the two asari were standing there in the corridor talking.
"Because I screwed up. I can't make things right, but I want to make them better."
Liara crossed her arms. "Fine," she said. "But don't hold your breath."
"Meet me at the Violet Sun Club in two hours," said Aethyta.
"Alright."
Liara and Aethyta parted ways, Liara rejoining Miranda and Shepard. The three of them walked without speaking to the elevator. Once inside, Liara asked, "Isn't that where you and Ashley are meeting?"
Tiberius stood outside the Violet Sun staring up at the sign.
"You gonna be okay, Commander?" Jacob asked.
"Of course he will be," Kasumi answered confidently for Tiberius. Then she paused for a moment. "You will be okay, right?"
"It's no big deal, you know, meeting the woman who threw him literally to the dogs on Horizon," said Joker. He shrugged nonchalantly. "No big deal."
"All this relationship shit bores me to death." Jack sighed heavily. "All your 'warm and fuzzies'," she said, making quotes with two fingers, "make me want to puke. Zaeed, let's go find a shitty bar and get into a fight with some squints."
"As long as we make bets on who wins, darling," the mercenary replied, following after Subject Zero as she trudged off to go wreak havoc.
Tiberius continued to stare up at the sign. It all boiled down to this. Just like it had Horizon. Hopefully this time he'd have some better lines to pitch. He adjusted the collar of his uniform and cracked his knuckles.
"Go get 'em, pigboy," Garrus encouraged, clapping the commander on the back.
"It's cowboy, you idiot," said Vega.
Shepard heard the slap on the back of Vega's head from Garrus's claw and the dejected "Hey!" from the lieutenant.
Despite the heavy hit Thessia had taken during the Reaper's brief attack, most of Serrice had managed to stay together. The districts that had taken the brunt of the hit were being worked on, but the spaceport where the club was located was still intact.
Inside the Violet Sun, warm air blasted Shepard's face. Warm air and the smell of smoke, bodies, and alcohol. While the Violet Sun was not the most refined club at Serrice's spaceport, it was nicer than Afterlife on Omega and had a reputation of getting crazy once the lights went down. Violet lights illuminated the walls and cast a bluish haze over the lounge. Odd shaped chairs were scattered over the upper deck with low white tables in between. In the middle of the room was a color-coded dance floor. Three human men, two asari and a drunken krogan swayed together out on the floor to a slow bump-and-grind beat.
Each of the three bartenders was a different race: one human, one salarian, and one asari. The bar was crowded with all kinds of people, mainly upper class with shiny outfits and sleek suits. A batarian male was hitting on an asari with suggestive one-liners while a human woman dressed to impress sat on a drell's lap laughing drunkenly at something he had said.
Over in the corner of the room near the dance floor, Shepard spotted Liara sitting with Matriarch Aethyta at a corner booth. They were deep in conversation, their glasses of ice brandy untouched.
And sitting not far away was Lieutenant Ashley Williams. Outfitted in her Alliance uniform, dangling a glass mug of amber liquid in her fingers, Shepard realized that this was the woman he had been missing for years.
She stared at the dance floor, watching the people. As Shepard pressed through the tight-knit crowd of club-goers, he caught a glimpse of the straining muscles in her arms as she lifted the mug to her lips and took a sip of her beverage. The muscles trailed up into her shoulders, and from her shoulders, there was the long space of her neck, and lower, spreading downwards, her breasts…
Shepard's mouth went dry. How would he be able to speak? Shit, shit, shit, he cursed over and over. He hadn't even thought about what he was going to say…
"Hey, wanna dance?" asked a human male that walked up to Ashley, eyeing her brazenly. He offered his hand, but Ashley shook her head.
Tiberius pressed harder to get to her before the guy could try anything more. Jealousy crept up over him like a coiled tiger, ready to pounce, should Ash accept the man's invitation. He cracked his knuckles as he got closer.
"No, I'm meeting someone," Ash replied.
"Come on, just one dance."
"I said no. Back off."
The guy lifted his hands. "Shit. Well sorrrryyyy," he said, accenting the apology, drawing it out.
"Good. Now run along." She pushed her hand out as if she were shooing away an animal. The guy did a double take, but continued on his way towards the bar to pick up another woman.
Finally, Tiberius reached the chairs where Ashley sat.
"Hey."
She looked up at him.
God, he felt like an idiot. Watching the way she looked at him, he realized he should've fought harder to hold on to her at Horizon.
"It's about time," she snipped, placing her attention in her glass as she took another sip from the liquid.
Tiberius stood there, unsure if she was teasing or being serious. Ashley snickered and shook her head. Then she drew out a long, laughing sigh and said, "Lighten up, Skipper. You just saved a planet, and pretty much an entire race. You can let your guard down for five minutes."
Shepard chuckled uneasily and took a seat across from her. He forced himself to peel his eyes away from the chain clasped around her neck that led south to regions he remembered very well, and back to Ash's face.
"What're you drinking?" he asked with a nod.
"Earth-brewed beer. I'm not much of one for those fancy asari cocktails," she replied, swirling the contents of the glass mug.
Shepard had figured so. A waitress came over and asked for Shepard's order.
"I'll have what she's having," he said.
The waitress brought up her omni-tool and charged the amount to Ashley's tab and then headed back to the bar to pick up Shepard's drink.
"You talked to James," said Shepard, digging for a place to start this conversation. "And I assume that it went fairly well, otherwise we wouldn't be here."
"Yeah, it did." Ashley leaned back in her chair and held the mug in her hand.
Shepard caught another eyeful of her frontal assets and had to stop himself from gawking again.
"See something you like, Skipper?"
Oh yeah… he thought.
"Maybe," said Shepard, dancing around the subject.
Ashley quirked an eyebrow playfully, then leaned forward to set her glass down on the table. She sat back and folded her hands in her lap.
"Anyways, yes, I talked to James."
"How'd it go?" asked Shepard, appreciating the change in subject.
"It went pretty well. He wasn't happy, but he understood. Told him that we were just friends. He tried to fight it first, but I think her finally got the message."
"How'd you manage that?"
"I just told the truth."
"And what was that exactly?"
"Your drink, sir."
The waitress held out a tray with Shepard's beer on it. He saw Ashley shake her head with a chuckle and then glare at the intruding waitress. Shepard took his beer, thanked the woman and then looked back at Ashley.
"I told him that he wasn't you."
Shepard leaned forward, setting his glass on the table in front of him, uncrossing his leg and looking at Ashley.
"And you meant it?" he asked her.
"I said what I meant, Skipper." She leaned forward and only the low table holding their drinks separated them. Ashley opened her mouth again and spoke:
"Though the hills be held shadows, and the sea a dark wonder,
And this day draw a veil over all deeds passed over,
Yet their hands shall not tremble, their feet shall not falter:
The void shall not weary, the fear shall not alter
These lips and these eyes of the loved and the lover."
Tiberius replied, smirk on his lips, "'At the touch of love everyone becomes a poet.'"
"Since when did you start reciting lines?"
"Since I picked it up from you."
"Should've known I'd rub off you. Who said that?"
"Plato.
"He certainly knew it would be true of people like me," she said with a light laugh.
"Ash," said Tiberius. His hand reached towards hers. At first, her fingers were limp and cold, providing no reassurance that what he was doing was something she wanted. But then she tightened her battle-callused hand on his. Warmth returned to her fingers and pressed down upon Shepard, making him ready to suffocate. But if this would be the death he died, sitting in a club holding hands with Ashley, it would be a death he wouldn't mind dying.
Shepard continued to grin. "I'm sorry about Horizon. I'd hoped you moved on, but I also hoped you hadn't. And for the record, I'm glad you didn't. I'm sorry I didn't contact you earlier. I'm sorry that we're just finding our feet again at a time when we are probably going to die."
"I forgive you, Skipper. I told you, I already forgave you."
Shepard tightened his grip on her hand and she squeezed back.
They spent the next few hours reminiscing about their adventures on the SR-1, swapping stories about their alien teammates and talking about what happened during the year after Horizon until they met again on Earth. Ashley told Tiberius about her mom and how she was doing, how her youngest sister Sarah was off to university and thinking about joining the marines once she graduated. They talked about Kaidan and his sacrifice and honored his memory with a toast.
As time went on, the club became louder and more and more people filled the place. Before long, Ashley and Shepard couldn't hear each other because of the music and the shouting of the attendees. In an impulsive fit of wanting to touch the body that he had been denied for so long, he grabbed her hand and pulled her to the crowded dance floor.
"T…" she said hesitantly.
"Lighten up, Lieutenant," he replied, quoting her from earlier in their meeting. "You just helped save a planet and spouted poetry to me. You can let your guard down for five minutes."
They settled into a space somewhere near the middle between two asari and a human-salarian couple. Ashley rolled her eyes and slid her arms around Shepard's neck. A wolfish smile brightened her face when the commander's hands went to her waist. He pulled her in against him, holding her closely, and let the music guide his rhythm.
Shepard and Ashley moved together as one and he couldn't help but think of the night before Ilos. He remembered the tension that had been building between them for so long, and finally on that night, how they had broken the tension. Ashley wanted to tease him, but Tiberius was not in the mood.
"You'll learn…" she'd told him.
He did, eventually. That month they had before his death…
Ashley turned in his arms so her back was to his chest. She brought one hand up to his neck, letting the other fall to his hand on her waist. Her movements became agonizingly slow, and Shepard would have been content to just let her dance in front of him, or even to just watch her. But they moved together in unison and Tiberius couldn't help himself…
His fingers traced along her jaw line on the opposite side of her head, tips burying in the tresses of her hair. He pulled her face back to his and kissed her.
It was the kiss he'd been waiting for. For three years he'd been thinking about it. Her lips were hot against his and her mouth tasted like beer and cheap lip balm. Every nerve in his body caught fire, every sensation heightened, and all he wanted was her.
They broke away breathlessly to stare at each other for a moment.
"Get a room," a turian grumbled as he walked by, an asari leading him off the dance floor.
"Do you wanna get out of here?" asked Tiberius.
"More than you know, Skipper."
The couple pushed their way through the crowd of dancers off the dance floor. At the exit, Ashley grabbed Shepard's hand, pushing her fingers through his, and they walked together out of the club, their drinks forgotten. Back outside, the Thessian air was cool and inviting. It provided relief for one area of difficulty, but not for another. Able to breathe, but unable to think about anything else but wanting Ashley, the fog of suffocation lifted.
They made it to an elevator leading up to the Normandy's docking bay. Inside the close confines of the room, Shepard pushed Ashley up against the metal surface. Before she could protest, his burning lips were against hers. His hands dipped beneath her ass and he squeezed, meanwhile grinding their hips together. Firm muscle moved beneath his fingers. A suppressed moan left Ashley's throat. Her fingers pried at his shoulder blades for a grip as he deepened the kiss, sticking his tongue into her mouth and daring her own to give chase. A high, not unlike the high of battle, pumped through him.
The elevator bell dinged and the doors opened.
"I suppose we should get out of here," Shepard whispered, breaking their lips apart and drawing her out of the elevator with him.
She scowled at him. "Not. Fair."
Shepard gave an innocent shrug, a smile, and then wrapped an arm around her waist as they walked towards the docking bay and to the Normandy. The lights in the CIC were low and no one was in their chairs, having already turned in for the night or gone out to celebrate their first victory over the Reapers. It made it easier for Ashley and Tiberius to creep towards the elevator.
Mashing his thumb against the first floor button while Ashley ran her hands over his chest proved to be a difficult feat for Shepard. First he pressed the third floor button, then the second, and then finally made it to the first. The elevator jerked before lifting upwards to the captain's cabin.
Hands and arms tangled as they stumbled into the room. Ashley threw Shepard playfully up against the aquarium. A school of lazy yellow fish jerked backwards. Tiberius sunk his hands into the lieutenant's hair and held her to him. At the end of the kiss, she bit him and backed away from him towards his desk. She pushed a stack of papers to the side and jumped up on the surface before seductively motioning for him to come hither.
Tiberius advanced like a predator, pushing her legs apart and settling in between them while devouring her mouth. Her boots hooked around his legs and she drew him in even further. He groaned into the kiss.
"Someone a little anxious?" Ashley asked, raking her fingers over his scalp.
Shepard's lips drifted down to the column of her neck.
"You could say that…"
He bit her earlobe and she pulled him in tighter.
"Sorry to interrupt, Commander," said EDI.
Shepard and Ashley broke away from each other, nearly wetting themselves when EDI's display lit up in the corner of the room.
"Jesus, EDI!" Tiberius exclaimed.
"I apologize for the inconvenience, Shepard, but there is a message on your omni-tool from the Hierarchy of Palaven. It just came in."
"Can it wait?"
"The Hierarchy demands to speak with you right now, so no, it cannot."
"What the fu…" Shepard shook his head. Between the massive problem in his pants and the pressure from being at the galaxy's beck and call, he was certain he'd die from the frustration. "Goddamn it," he whispered, resting his head on Ashley's shoulder and tapping the top of his desk with his fists.
Ashley laughed and rubbed his back reassuringly. "It's alright, Skipper. We can resume these recreational exercises another time."
He straightened. "I guess we'll have to. EDI, set up the link. Whatever the Hierarchy wants, it better be damned important."
Ashley's poem – "Love Is Enough" by William Morris