Hey folks. Hopefully this is the last one of these for a while….
(Author's notes, I mean. Not chapters. I hope to have those out regularly after this week)
Sorry this is a day or two late, but finals were a hell of a drug and it turns out when you're at home your family expects you to "be around them" and "not retreat into your room like it's a dungeon to write" or whatever. At any rate, at long last, here's chapter 10!
And once again, thank you so much for reading and spending some time in my shabby little corner of the internet.
XXX
"Don't beat yourself up over it, Jilani. Look, next round's on me." Verger got up from the table and went over to the bar.
"I'm bored, not broke," Khalisah muttered, staring at the inch of warm beer left in her glass.
"I'm neither." She could practically hear Verger's smug grin in his tone of voice. He worked for one of those intra-system networks that broadcast low-data streams across basic intranet packets. In the past few days, however, Verger's low-key network had gained exclusive publication rights to what may as well have been the biggest story since the geth attack on the Citadel: Nicole Shepard had come back from the dead. The only vids anyone could find were all filmed by amateurs, and Verger's network wasn't above airing amateur footage. Already viewer traffic on Verger's Citadel local site, Onspot, had tripled, while Westerlund had been left in the dust. And her superiors were still refusing to let her air the footage, claiming that they had standards to maintain.
Yeah, if by 'standards' they mean the original cameraman realized he can charge whatever he wants for the footage of Shepard and they don't want to pay the licensing fees, then sure, they have standards.
"Here's your yellow piss-water," Verger said cheerfully as he clanked the glass on the table in front of her. Khalisah took it gloomily and clacked it against Verger's when he raised his. "Cheers."
"You exist to torment me."
"Nah, you do that to yourself. Hey, wanna see something patently terrifying?" Verger shot her a shit-eating grin completely inappropriate to the subject.
"Please tell me you're not about to show me your dick."
"Ah, there's that famous Al-Jilani charm. C'mere, look at this, I don't want to spread it around…."
"If you don't want something spread around, you probably shouldn't have it playing in Flux."
"You kidding? The bouncer here'd rip anyone running a scanning program inside out."
"Whatever you say," Khalisah said, though she still had very serious doubts. Verger pulled his chair around to her side of the table and projected a very small holoscreen from his omnitool.
"Get a load of this. Just got it in from some amateur with a camera app. Apparently this happened yesterday."
And then he started the reel. At first, Khalisah was wondering why he was showing her footage from some drunken turian's bachelor party, until someone in the background screamed "Holy shit!" and a skycar came crashing onto the balcony. Partiers spilled out onto the balcony and watched as an asari stumbled out of the skycar, while a tall, broad-shouldered figure advanced on her with the deadly persistence of a shark. When she came into view, Khalisah nearly dropped her beer.
"That's—shit." Khalisah knew better than to say her name. If she did that, a dozen scanning programs would be running on Verger's tape, Flux bouncers be damned.
"Yeah, watch this next part," Verger said, still grinning wildly. Khalisah watched in horror and then flinched as Shepard killed the asari by pressing a thumb into her neck. Then the camera cut out. "Apparently at this point our intrepid camera man lost his nerve."
"Wonder why," Khalisah muttered.
"You probably didn't catch it because the crash happens so fast, but—she actually jumped off of the damn car. She was riding on the back of it. Like in a vid or some shit."
"When is this going to air?"
"Somethin' like two hours. Seems like the galaxy's favourite superhero has gone and joined the dark side," Verger declared happily, as though he could think of nothing better.
"That was Tela Vasir. A Spectre. Why isn't this bigger news? Shouldn't you have to show it to the Council first?"
"Ah, shit no." Verger took a quick drink and wiped his lips with the back of his hand. "She did it in the Terminus systems, so technically the Council can do neither jack nor shit. And apparently Vasir was bent, so my impression is the Council wants it all kept quiet…."
"But you did show it to the Council, then," Khalisah pressed him. Verger exhaled sharply and rolled his eyes.
"'Course we did, we don't want an embargo slapped on our ass. You shoulda seen the look on Tevos's face, though, from what I understand it Vasir was an old friend."
"Yeah, she's got a few old friends, all right…." Khalisah murmured. Verger kept on talking shit about Citadel politicians, basking in his newfound glory. It wouldn't last. His network, sleazy as it was, always worked with peaks and valleys. Westerlund News could be more boring, but at least it was stable…..
Fuck me if I ever wanted stable, she thought. She raised a hand to cut off whatever it was Verger was saying. She hadn't been paying attention.
"I'll catch you later."
"Why, what's going on?" Verger said, looking startled. Khalisah pushed herself out of her chair and never looked back. As he spluttered behind her, she called back,
"I have to go figure out how to book passage on a ship to the Terminus systems."
XXX
"Councilors." Otako Solban stood perfectly erect, with his hands clamped behind his back. He wore plain clothes, faded in colour, without any obvious sign of his wealth. His face was common, too, though the wrinkles lining his face made it clear that for a salarian, he was old. No one would look twice at Otako. Not unless they knew better.
"We regret pulling you off of your current assignment, Spectre Solban," Valern said respectfully, inclining his head out of deference. It was well that he did. Otako had been serving as a Spectre since before the start of Valern's career.
"A soft assignment meant to ease me into old age, you mean," Otako said softly. He did not speak rapidly as most old salarians did. He preferred not to act as though he were frightened of what time he had left.
"You resent the assignment?" Sparatus asked.
"Resentment is unprofessional."
"Of course. Nevertheless consider your investigation into the Blue Suns at an end. Your familiarity with the Terminus systems will, however, be useful on your next assignment." Councillor Tevos spoke evenly and looked directly at him, unlike the others. He doubted she was afraid of much, anymore.
"Why did you recall me from the Terminus systems, then? Surely this meeting could have been held over hologram."
"It could have been, but we're calling on you specifically in the hopes that you will be able to display a certain … discretion. As you are aware, many of our agents struggle with that," Tevos said, the briefest grimace of annoyance marring her perfectly composed visage.
"I believe Tela Vasir was infamous for grandiosity," Otako said. Tevos nearly flinched. So they really had been close.
"Yes. She was. And it seems to have cost her. Unfortunately, she was murdered under suspicious circumstances in the Terminus systems, and we technically have no jurisdiction there."
"And what are we doing about that?"
"Unfortunately, it's more complicated. The killer is—"
"Another Spectre. Or at least the ghost of one."
"Yes. And the suspicious circumstances involved—"
"Say no more. The less you know, the better. I will find out what happened to Tela Vasir. And then I will solve the problem of our ghost."
Otako left without being dismissed. He wondered what it was like to come back from the dead. Personally he found the thought distasteful. Death should be, and in his experience had always been, final. As he left, he could not help but think about his own death, which was surely approaching soon. If he were brought back, he thought he would feel cheated. Lives were meant to end once. He wasn't sure the soul could survive the trauma of living again.
XXX
The skycar Liara had taken to follow them had a steering column sticking out of the front console for optional piloting. Nicole's hands were clenched around it as she directed the car away from the scene of Vasir's death. Since the roof had clamped down on the skycar silence had spread between the two of them, neither acknowledging the other. Liara kept looking at her hands, and then at Nicole. Nicole kept driving. Blood slipped down the steering column over her right hand in trails of red and purple. Nicole tried not to notice. Now that the adrenaline had worn off, she could feel a sharp, stinging pain in her knuckles where she'd torn them, but she could ignore pain. Already she could feel her skin prickling, nanomachines accelerating her body's healing.
"There's blood on the wheel," Liara said, finally. Nicole focused on the sky, wondering if she would have to swerve away from a police car. That probably wasn't likely. Vasir would have been the one who had called off the cops for the Darcon Tower hit; she would've wanted a wide area of the city cleared for her. "It could make it hard to drive."
"It's fine," Nicole said through clenched teeth. A small light blinked in the corner of the windshield, giving her the go ahead to raise the skycar's altitude to the next traffic level. There was a dull swooping in her gut as she accelerated the vehicle too quickly.
"Some of the blood is yours," Liara said, very quietly. For a second Nicole glanced at her, but then flinched away. She had expected cold indifference, or worse—rejection. Somehow this was worse.
"There's always some."
"Nicole, this isn't—"
"What, this isn't like me? This is exactly like me, Liara. You know that."
"Not exactly. Nicole, maybe—"
"Maybe what?"
"Maybe you should let me finish talking," Liara snapped, with a chilling authority that sent a jolt down Nicole's spine. "I was saying, maybe now isn't the time. You're—I can't imagine what you must be going through right now, Nicole."
"Your contact might not appreciate my need to adjust."
"You think I'm not thinking about that? For a year I've been haunted by the thought of what the Broker might have done to Feron—what he may be doing to Feron! But wanting to save Feron doesn't mean I want to just throw you back into the fire!"
"I can handle it." Nicole could feel her chest tightening as this conversation went on, restricting her throat.
"Of course you can handle it, Nicole, you're a—a super soldier!" Liara flung out a hand in frustration as she found the right word. "But you're also a person, one I happen to care about very much! You threw yourself on that skycar! I never should have told you to go get that data, what was I thinking?"
"You were thinking about the mission."
"Y'klat!" Nicole nearly jumped—she'd never heard Liara swear before, and it was seriously taboo in Siin. Nicole stopped herself from saying the equivalent of 'bless you', since it was technically meant to shame the offending party. "Forget the mission, I should be thinking about you!"
Nicole didn't know what to say to that. She couldn't bear to look at Liara's face, but she knew that Liara was distressed, her features finally free from the cold control she must have learned in the past two years. Nicole had been trained to absorb the details of her peripheral vision without thinking about it. She hated that.
"Nicole—please promise me you won't run off and get yourself killed. Nothing is worth that."
She brought the skycar into the docking bay in Liara's apartment. A message running across the bottom of the windshield told Nicole that the car's automated parking procedure was being initiated; it must have been Liara's personal vehicle.
"You should get your things and come quickly back to the car. We need to get on the Normandy before the police come to investigate."
"What, you think one of the foremost information brokers on Illium doesn't have the police in her pocket?" Liara asked, almost managing to sound casual. "I doubt they'll come here."
"Still. We shouldn't waste time."
Liara spared her one last look before she left the car. Nicole expected the tightness winding in her chest to start to fade as Liara left, but it didn't. As she stared at the steering column, its black leather stained with dripping rivulets of red and purple blood, she had to fight the urge to scream. Everything Liara had said had made sense. But something in Nicole's brain was tying itself in knots, making it impossible to think, driving everything out of her thoughts but the trails of blood on the steering wheel.
XXX
They didn't say anything until they made it back to the Normandy, standing in the airlock. Liara was holding a duffel bag in one hand, her forearms straining to carry the weight. Nicole finally managed to say something.
"Let me carry that."
"Nicole, don't be ridiculous, I'm—"
"Not the super soldier. Give me the bag, I can carry it." Nicole held out a hand.
"Okay." The duffel bag weighed barely anything in her hand, though she could detect the weight. Nicole found herself wondering if Miranda had done that—programmed her nerves to detect slight changes in weight despite being orders of magnitude stronger than a human should have been. It was unsettling, thinking about the intimacy that would have required. She tried to forget it. Then the docking bay door opened to reveal the airlock.
Unfortunately, Miranda was standing in it.
"Commander. I tried to get in contact with a Broker agent, but none would speak to me. By now they know the Normandy is yours, and that—"
"When." Nicole's voice was flat, commanding. The tone was one Gabreau had given her.
"Beg pardon?"
"When did you check with the Broker agents?" Nicole hissed, through clenched teeth.
"The moment you directed me to," Miranda replied, sounding startled. Of course she did.
"That was before my … disagreement with Tela Vasir. The Broker already knew I was connected to you, knew about the Normandy. He's already had us black-listed."
"Well, he is the Shadow Broker," Miranda muttered. "May I ask what this is about?"
"You may. When I ask you up to my quarters. In the meantime, you're going to show Liara to all the spare chambers, and she's going to pick one." Nicole held out the duffel bag for Miranda. "Carry this." To her surprise, Miranda accepted the bag without so much as a sniff of disdain, and didn't seem bothered by the weight. Instead, Miranda nodded professionally.
"Of course. Ms. T'Soni, if you'll follow me?"
Nicole watched Miranda and Liara enter the ship together, and felt a strange stab of anger. But as they turned towards the elevator, Liara looked over one shoulder and cocked an eyebrow at Miranda, and mouthed "Is she for real?" She even smiled, though Nicole was sure it was just a show for her benefit. Still, it worked, and Nicole felt some of the anxiety in her chest dripping away.
Once she was back in her quarters, she sent a message for Garrus to come up and visit her in her quarters. While she waited for him she peeled back the glove of her combat mesh and ran her knuckles under hot water in her sink, watching the blood trickle down her hands. Mechanically she picked out shards of glass and metal, watching the jagged little shapes trickle away in a stream of water and blood. She was so absorbed that she didn't realize Garrus was pinging her door until the fifth time. When she was done she held up her hand and looked at it. The cuts were already starting to scab over; all of the metal had been pushed out of her skin. That had been why it'd washed away so easily.
"Come in." She toweled off her hand and nearly put the ruined glove back on, before she thought better of it. When she left the bathroom Garrus was already standing in the doorway, bandages wrapped tightly around his mandibles. "You healing okay?"
"Yeah, I'm doing fine. How about you?" Garrus asked, gesturing towards her hand.
"Just a scratch. You going to be ready for ground time soon?"
"Chakwas says to give it a week. And she uses this very alarming tone when she does so, so I figure I should listen." Garrus shot her a grin, and then winced. "Ow. She also said that was probably going to keep happening for about a month."
"What do you think about this ship?" Nicole asked, as she walked over to the slit in the wall where her clothes were. She retrieved a fresh glove and pulled it onto her hand. She wondered if she would have any new scars on her fingers.
"Well, the food's not exactly gourmet," Garrus shrugged. "And your weapons system is outdated. Other than that, I haven't seen much of her."
"I need you to try and see more. We can't trust anyone on this ship, Garrus."
"I know."
"We can't really trust that there's no one listening right now. But I'm going to gamble that they're more scared of what will happen if I find out they're listening than they are curious about what they'll miss out on if they don't." Nicole took a breath. Somehow saying what she meant to say was worse than just knowing about it. But she couldn't keep living with it. "They tried to put a chip in my head."
"What?! Nico—Commander, are you serious?"
"Call me Nicole."
"I'll call you the Primarch of Earth if that'll make you happy!" Garrus blurted hysterically, his mandibles working wildly. He winced , but didn't stop talking. "What—what was it?"
"A listening device. Very crude. I had it taken out."
"Palaven's blistered hide," Garrus gasped, taking a seat at the table in Nicole's lounge. "I thought—no wonder you're so pissed off. I mean—shit."
"You're not wrong. I'm very pissed off," Nicole admitted, taking the seat opposite him. "You know the other doctor, in the science lab? The one who was your primary surgeon?"
"Yeah, I thought it was weird that he wasn't the one monitoring my condition. Shit—is he a part of it?"
"No. He's a recent addition to the crew, like you. He's the one who found the chip and took it out of my head. So I trust him. I might need to hit the ground soon. With Liara. I need you to watch Dr. Solus if and when I'm gone. Make sure no one makes a move on him."
"You think they would?"
"No. But there are only three people I trust on this ship. I'm not leaving either of them up to chance." Garrus took a moment to absorb her words, then let out a light wheeze that could have been a painful chuckle.
"So who's watching me?"
"Dr. Solus. I won't need to tell him. He's used to this kind of thing."
"So I watch his back, he watches mine?" Garrus rubbed the back of his neck. "Maybe I should get to know this guy."
"He's an interesting conversation partner. More interesting than me." Nicole looked at the door. "You should go. I need to talk to Miranda. No need to inflict her company on both of us."
Somewhat hesitantly, Garrus got up and walked towards the door. But before he left he shook his head.
"Spirits. How did they spend so much money bringing you back without realizing how stupid an idea it would be to try and control you?"
Nicole was looking at the new glove. It matched seamlessly to the seal on her upper arm, as though it were a part of her original mesh.
"Arrogance will do that."
It wasn't long that Garrus had left before Miranda was at the door, responding to Nicole's summons. Nicole beckoned her in.
"Commander, Ms. T'Soni says that she's analyzing the data you retrieved, and that she should have a location soon." If Miranda found this set of information mystifying, she didn't betray it.
"Doctor. You should call her 'Doctor.'"
"Of course, my apologies."
"You really mean that, don't you?" Nicole asked. Miranda didn't step forward from the doorway. Nicole could practically feel Miranda's mind working, evaluating. Trying to figure out what it was Nicole wanted. Did she already know? "You respect the title. The work that went into it."
"Yes, I do. May I come in?"
"Might as well. It's your ship."
"It's your ship, Commander," Miranda said, though she didn't hesitate to enter Nicole's quarters. She took Garrus's seat, sliding down into it as though it were the easiest thing in the world. She laid her hands palms-down onto her lap, sitting serenely. "We merely built it."
"I don't own anything with a Cerberus logo on it. I figured you'd know that about me."
"I wasn't the one in charge of designing the ship. Or its logos," Miranda added, leaning forward without realizing it.
"You're stronger than you look," Nicole said. Miranda barely even started at the change of topic.
"I've had more than the usual genetic modification."
"Join the club," Nicole said wryly. Miranda responded with the slightest smile, almost a smirk—but for once, Nicole thought it might have been real.
"Well, whereas your modification was multi-stage and, if you'll forgive the bluntness, recklessly aggressive, mine occurred in the womb. I was designed to be the 'perfect woman.'" Miranda's nose wrinkled. "As a consequence, I couldn't have anything so unflattering as visible musculature."
"Not like me." Nicole couldn't help but feel aware of the way her jacket was tight around her arms and shoulders, unflattering. She shoved the thought away.
"No, not like you," Miranda agreed. "I understand why you hate me."
"I wouldn't call it hate. Professional distrust. To be honest I haven't thought of you as a person enough to hate you." Nicole tapped the shaved side of her head, where the scar from Mordin's surgery was. "One of the things your people did to me. Takes me a while to see people as people. Guess that's in your psych profile."
"Then ... I understand why you can't see me as a person."
"Really, that's quite lucky." Nicole brought up her omnitool and scanned through some images. When she was done she projected one onto the table. "Not seeing you as a person is helping me be more rational right now."
Projected onto the table in streams of orange light was a small chip, barely the size of a thumbnail. A perfect replica of the one Mordin had taken from her brain. She watched Miranda's reaction very carefully. She expected there to be nothing—but instead Miranda's eyebrows raised, just slightly, as though involuntarily. She could have been acting. Or not. It was impossible to tell.
"What's this?"
"You've never seen it before?"
"What, some kind of tech component? I might have seen one like it."
"This one was taken from my brain by Dr. Solus."
This time, Miranda really did have no reaction, as though she had been frozen. After a very long while, she opened her mouth, and closed it again. Nicole was almost deriving a cruel pleasure from Miranda's plight, but she was starting to suspect it was actually genuine. Or that it at least could have been.
"I—I have no idea how that could have gotten there, Shepard! I—Shepard, I've seen your psych profile inside and out, there is no universe where I would be dumb enough to even begin to suggest that we try and tamper with your head! I don't fancy the thought that my last sight would be the tip of your knife!"
"You'll notice I haven't killed you."
"Shepard, believe me, I—I did not sanction the addition of anything to your brain! In fact, when we found out your brain had only suffered minimal damage, the only thing we did was use the nanites to rejuvenate your tissue, I swear to you! One of the first mission mandates I laid out was that we avoid any direct modifications to your brain—well apart from the fact that you'd kill anyone who tried, we didn't dare risk altering your brain structure!"
"Let's say I believe you didn't put it in there. That leaves the considerable question of who did. And who else would have access?"
"Only a few. Wilson—the man you killed at the Lazarus base. A couple other surgeons—I can track them down, have them interrogated—"
"They could have operated without your awareness?"
"I wouldn't have thought so. But I was wrong." Miranda stared at her hands, for the first time failing to meet Nicole's eyes. "Wilson would have had the best chance to access your—your body."
"And I guess we can't question him. My fault." Nicole looked at Miranda until the woman finally remembered herself and met Nicole's gaze. Her face was as composed as ever, but cold fury was somehow radiating out of her face from the tight lines at the corners of her mouth. "Though Wilson is a convenient scapegoat in a universe where you were dumb enough to tamper with my head. Why should I believe you?"
Miranda started to talk, then stopped herself. She closed her eyes and took a breath, and when she opened them again there was a strange expression on her face, one Nicole hadn't seen before. It either wasn't an act, or a new part of a very elaborate act. She almost looked sorry.
"I've avoided mentioning my own genetic enhancement because your psych profile tells me that you'd hate the thought of me trying to act like there's anything in common between us. But the truth is, I wouldn't have anything put in your head because I can't help but think about how my father had me engineered to be what he thought was perfect. How I can't feel proud about my accomplishments without wondering if he programmed that pride into me. How I can't—" Miranda's composure snapped in an instant and she looked away momentarily. "I wouldn't do that to someone. Someone I spent two years trying to bring back from the dead. You can believe that I'm some sort of frigid bitch who could read through pages about how a little girl was tortured by a monster without feeling some kind of empathy, or you can believe that I'm a human being. If you believe the former I suppose you'll say this is a part of an act, and you'll kill me now."
"I bet you'd put up a pretty good fight."
"Well I'd make you work for it, at least." Miranda permitted herself half a smile. Nicole's face didn't change.
"You want to prove to me that I can trust you?"
"I'm not foolish enough to think that will be easy. But I do want to prove to you that we can work together."
"Good. Then here's your first chance. Liara's looking for the Shadow Broker, and she's going to be able to find him soon. When she does, we're going. Just me, you, and her. Your only job is to make sure that nothing happens to Liara. Do that and I might be able to start to trust you."
"This may delay our mission by days—weeks. I know Dr. T'Soni is important to you, but—"
Nicole exhaled sharply. She was actually laughing, but Miranda must have interpreted it as a threat, from the way her back stiffened.
"You know, I think you might actually be telling the truth. You're right. Dr. T'Soni is extremely important to me. She's the most important person on this ship. What does your psych profile I'd do for the people I care about, again?" Miranda hesitated again before she answered.
"We—didn't have much data about that."
"Of course you wouldn't. Here's a suggestion: make sure you don't find out."
Before Miranda could see herself out, Nicole's comms flared into life. Nicole heard that old, familiar sound, a soft inhale of breath at the beginning of a comms-link that always came as Liara composed herself.
"Nicole, I've analyzed the data. The Broker's located on a planet in the Sowilo System. Hagalaz is the most likely target."
"I'll have Joker plot a course. You should get ready for groundside combat." Nicole hesitated. "Miranda will be coming with us. Is that okay?"
"Of course."
Nicole closed the comms before Liara could say anything else. She needed to be alone. With a quick jerk of her head, she indicated that Miranda should leave. Of course Miranda complied instantly, wordlessly. She was so goddamn good at knowing exactly what to do. Nicole almost hated her for that, if she couldn't immediately see how childish it was. Instead she reclined back on her bed, staring at the ceiling. She sent a message through her omnitool to Joker, ordering him to plot a course. Shortly after that he indicated their travel time to Hagalaz—seventeen hours. It was a short travel time, expedited by a lucky confluence of mass relay positioning. But it was still seventeen hours. Too long to spend alone on the ship.
But she had to be alone.
Some morbid impulse led her to access the files Miranda had given her. The ones on herself. She flipped through the medical files, the records of genetic mutilation, the training exercises, the murders, the murders, every goddamn murder until she was back to the first one.
Batarian. Gunshot between eyes and to stomach. Died from gunshot between eyes. Three lines. Three sentences were the only thing that had separated her from an early grave. From the same grave as her brother. Suddenly her eyes were burning, threatening to betray her control, until she clenched her teeth and forced it to stop. The file recounting her first kill blinked softly in the air, and before she knew what she was doing she was ripping her omnitool off of her wrist, throwing it against one wall. She thrust her fists into her eyes and felt the beginning of tears behind her eyes, but she stopped them, submerged herself beneath the subjugating will of a lifetime of training, forcing herself to stop. Her breath came in short, painful heaves, but she was starting to get back under control. She opened up her eyes.
The omnitool had skidded along the floor and into the dip in the floor that separated the lounge from the rest of her quarters. In faded orange light the lines blinked against the floor, like a footprint in the sand. Batarian. Gunshot between eyes and to stomach. Died from gunshot between eyes.
"St-turn off," she stuttered, choking back the emotion in her voice. Her omnitool's voice recognition, so tightly tuned, so ready to receive perfect enunciation—because she'd made it that way—didn't understand the command. Instead it flipped to the next lines in the file.
Brother, Ryan Shepard. Dead in batarian attack. Defending patients, unsuccessfully. He was the first to die in the medical camp.
He was the first to die.
And then it stopped working. The training they'd beat into her mind, into her body, into her soul, it finally unwound itself and there was nothing left inside her any more, nothing but a howling, screaming child, and tears were burning their way out of her eyes against her will, and her scar was burning against her skin, and the lines wouldn't go away.
Brother, Ryan Shepard. Dead in batarian attack. Defending patients, unsuccessfully. He was the first to die in the medical camp.
"Stop it! Just fucking stop it!" One of her hands was balled in a fist, and it was shaking, and she didn't know what to do with it until she realized she had driven it straight through the thin metal table in her lounge. She'd cleaved the thing in half, sharp jagged edges threatening to cut through the combat mesh on her left hand. Somehow seeing the broken table, warped and bent around the point where her fist had struck through the steel and pinched it into a tear, managed to make the storm in her head go still. She extracted her hand. It didn't even hurt; the twisted metal hadn't broken her skin. Her scar hadn't even start to split open.
As she regained control of her breathing, she surveyed the damage to the lounge. She checked the time against the clock in her head and realized that it had been three minutes. Only sixteen hours, fifty-seven minutes to go.
She opened the dossier again. Attached at the end were a number of academic articles, mostly on genetic alteration, cloning, and behavioural control. They appeared to be recent additions, though none of them were surprising to her—except one. When she read the title, her mind froze, reading and rereading the glowing line of text projected in the air until her eyes blurred, until the words became like a prayer, a curse, a chant.
The Decoupling of the Human Genome, by Dr. Ryan Shepard.
XXX
The walls of her new quarters were curved, matching the contours of the Normandy's hull. A large, ovular window looked out into space along the wall, though it was shuttered with metal panels. After Miranda had left, she'd set up her information processor—a series of blocky supercomputing components that correlated data and checked them for trends and patterns against an impossibly vast sea of information. While it worked, she had surveyed her temporary living quarters. They were spartan, undecorated with even a bed to sleep on; thinking back to her time on the first Normandy, she couldn't help but smile and reflect that she'd grown too used to all her creature comforts. Becoming the most successful information broker on Illium not associated with the Shadow Broker hadn't been easy, but she couldn't remember the last time she hadn't had a soft pillow.
She glanced at the duffel bag she'd hastily packed at her apartment; she hadn't brought any pillows. Somehow, she thought wryly, that had seemed inappropriate. The only thing in her bag aside from her gear was a suit of collapsible armour, not as heavy or as durable as Alliance-standard fare, but considerably easier to assemble and move around. She'd bought it thinking of Nicole; it was manufactured by the same company that made her combat mesh. They specialized in what they called "discreet personal protection." That had almost made her laugh once, though she hadn't really been able to at the time.
Now Nicole was actually here, back on the ship, and she found she couldn't face the thought of seeing her. But she couldn't face any other thoughts, either. She knew she should have been thinking about Feron, about the possibility of saving him, about what condition he might be in after a year at the Shadow Broker's mercy. He was somewhere out there, among the stars. She should be looking for him.
But she couldn't get her thoughts to leave this ship. She couldn't forget the sight of Nicole's hand, torn and bloodstained, the sight of her thumb breaking through Tela Vasir's throat like a piece of bubble wrap. She remembered watching Nicole die, remembered the moment when the signal from her suit vitals had ceased to transmit. She remembered being evacuated by Alliance personnel, who had assured her that the universe would remember Nicole's sacrifice. Her sacrifice? For what? Pointless shakedown runs on geth sites because the Council and the Alliance were too cowardly to accept the future that Nicole had warned them about?
She's been sacrificing since she was ten years old. And they had turned their backs on her. Assumed that her last sacrifice was merely the last in a long series of tragedies. The only ones who had been willing to believe, the only ones who had been willing to hope, the only ones who had wanted Nicole back like she had, were the ones who had done everything to her. Because they wanted a return on their investment.
And I gave her back to them. And then I left her alone.
"Open portside viewing window," Liara said, quietly. The shutters slid back quietly, revealing the universe to her in neat segments. She laid a hand against the glass and looked out, wondering for a moment what would happen if the glass just vanished. If she were sucked out into space, the way Nicole had been. She wouldn't die immediately, but she would suffocate before she froze. She rubbed her fingers along the glass. Such a small thing, to be the only barrier between her and death. Between her and the vast sea of nothing.
There was a chirping at her door. Surprised, she turned around.
"Who is it?"
"Your favourite ex-cop," said a familiar voice. Liara signaled for the door to open, and Garrus walked in, ducking beneath the low door. More than the first Normandy, this one had been built solely to accommodate humans. "Thought I'd drop by and say hello."
"Hello, Garrus." Even though the side of his face was covered in bandages, Liara still couldn't help but thinking of him as an over-enthusiastic teenager who had perhaps gotten into a schoolyard fight. But those bandages covered more than just bruises.
"Been a long time. Heard you switched professions." Garrus jerked his head in the direction of Liara's information processing gear.
"After what happened, archaeology seemed like an inefficient use of my time."
"I guess so. Bet you'd still perk up if we stumbled on some old Prothean ruin, though." Garrus went to flex one of his mandibles, then stopped himself with a wince. Half out of pity, Liara favoured him with a smile.
"Probably."
They fell quiet for a moment. Liara wondered if Garrus knew how much she knew about him; about Archangel, about his squad, about how he had been surrounded by mercenary gangs. Liara had nearly wanted to hire her own mercenaries to help spring him out, but Garrus had managed to ensure every single mercenary company on Omega wanted nothing to do with saving Archangel's life. In the end, it had taken Nicole to save him. It always seemed to take her, when the impossible had to happen.
"Have you seen her?"
"Of course I have," Liara said, a little too quickly. Garrus grimaced sympathetically, though he was constrained by his wounds.
"I know. I meant, since you arrived on the ship. She needs you, Liara."
"I don't think Nicole needs anyone," Liara said, as tactfully as she could. "I think what she needs right now is to be alone."
"You believe that?" Garrus snapped, surprising her. "You know her better than I do and we both know what it'll mean for her to be alone right now. I know what it meant when I was alone. When I was on Omega, when all those mercenaries were coming to kill me, they started blurring together. I started thinking about my father, and my sister, and—and all the people I'd never get to see again. About how I was going to die, and I was going to be alone, and soon I'd just be a bunch of splattered turian cells on an apartment wall. I was alone. And I started thinking it was hopeless. That maybe I deserved to die. It was just the worst things in my head, over and over again, repeating until the world was blurring around me and it was all I could to do fire one more shot, one more—" Garrus inhaled, and stopped himself. He shook his head and looked back at her.
"I barely felt like myself, Liara. Until I saw her climbing over that barricade. Until Nicole Shepard came to save me. I thought—maybe I wanted to believe—that I could do that for her. That I could help her see it's not just her and the ghosts in her own head. But I'm not the one she needs. You are. Even if she doesn't realize it."
For a while they just stayed there, stewing in the silence between them. Before long, her information processors sent a message to her omnitool, containing a readout of data. She glanced down at it. It seemed surprising that so much she had searched for over the past two years could be compressed down to a couple of lines: Sowilo System. Likely candidates: Hagalaz, Ansuz. She forwarded the message to Nicole. When she was done, she looked up. Garrus was still there.
"Seventeen hours. That sounds like plenty of time, to me." She must have been muttering beneath her breath.
"You're ... you're right." Liara closed her eyes and bowed her head. "You're right."
"Well, every now and again I'm bound to be. I'll see you soon, Liara." Garrus cracked a grin, and as he left, he added, almost as an afterthought, "You know, apparently I have to get to know the crazy salarian doctor while you and Nicole are off tangling with Broker agents. Any advice from our resident information broker on how I should, uh, make small talk?"
"Sorry," Liara said, managing a small smile, "I'm afraid my experience with crazy salarian doctors is limited."
"Well, it's your girlfriend who put me up to it you know. You just look after her." He vanished behind the doorway before she had a chance to respond. She wished people wouldn't do that. She'd had too many truncated goodbyes.
But Garrus wasn't gone forever. And he wasn't the only one.
XXX
…so the problem becomes the selection of individual traits which may be passed on. It turns out it is easy enough to determine how a given gene may be modified for optimal performance (Harrison & Raff, 2063), but doing so in piecemeal fashion is considerably more difficult; using some sort of graded scale introduces a series of complications (see GRAPH 46). As indicated in GRAPH 47, attempts to "partially" activate a gene sample (Experiment 1) or fully activate select portions of genetic code (Experiment 2) using the methods proposed were markedly less successful than uninhibited administration of treatment.
A (theoretical) explanation of this argument is that our procedures identify which genes must be "turned on" or "turned off" based on pattern recognition and holistic integration. The milquetoast results yielded by partial activations of the program are likely due to a failure for these changes to take hold when they are not administered as part of the complete program.
Nicole's door chimed, and she looked up. The action somehow triggered her mental clock, and she realized she'd been reading for four hours and twenty-six minutes. She dismissed her brother's document. Somehow the fact that it was a cold, technical guide was helpful. If she was looking for some clue as to the warm person he had been, that had only presented itself in the foreward; the rest of the document could have been written by anyone. Like a ghost had written it.
"Come in." She expected Miranda again, perhaps with some new attempt to convince her to cancel the trip to Hagalaz. Or maybe Garrus. Somehow, she didn't anticipate Liara showing up in the doorway until she was there, arms folded patiently behind her back. Nicole knew she was staring, but couldn't help herself. She saw Liara's eyes flick towards the warped lounge table, then quickly away from it. Suddenly Nicole felt a hot flush of shame.
"It's been two years." Liara said, almost mechanically. Then she cleared her throat and smiled nervously, looking for the first time like the Liara Nicole had known. She stepped forward, down through the lounge and past the shattered table, until she was nearly at the bed where Nicole had been reading. She was still smiling. Still nervous. Nicole's heart hammered a steady pattern inside her chest. "I thought it might be nice to tell you what I've been doing. Fill you in. If you want."
Nicole thought about her brother's research. Reading it hadn't made her feel better—it had almost made her feel less. As though it had been hollow. You couldn't talk back to a ghost.
But here Liara was. In front of her. Even as the Normandy hurtled towards one of the most dangerous places in the galaxy, there she was. Smiling, nervous, hands still folded behind her back. Liara always did that when she felt something was important.
Nicole realized she hadn't said anything.
"Of course—if you need some time alone, I understand," Liara said, suddenly, starting to dissolve beneath the veneer of professional calculation that had been on display since Nicole had met her at her office.
"I don't know what I need," Nicole admitted softly, the words of her brother's research still floating in her mind. The whispers of a ghost; a ghost, it turned out, who she hadn't really known. She met Liara's eyes. They were blue, and beautiful, the way she'd remembered but nearly forgotten. "But I think I'd like to listen, for a little while."