Doctor Michel had seen a lot of strange things in her time; she had had her medical clinic stormed by thugs; treated a quarian who had been hunted by Saren's assassins; and recently in the war she had found herself confronted with injuries that should have been impossible to heal. But not once had she ever been with a biotic patient who had been knocked out from high stress levels due to her biotic amp not functioning.
"Her amp wasn't working?" she repeated calmly, "But Avalon was still able to perform and apply her biotics practically?"
"While under attack from a Reaper." Kaidan told her. Michel was unable to stop herself from staring at him with calculating eyes as he and Chakwas stood protectively over the younger Shepard who was sprawled - once again - across a hospital bed in Huerta Memorial.
"That is impossible." she dismissed, "Even with a bio-amp, harnessing biotics in a life or death situation takes years of training - there is no way-"
"Avvy uses an amp and implants of her own design; they might have malfunctioned somehow."
"But it still doesn't explain how she was able to use her biotics in the first place." Chakwas added.
Michel turned back to her computer monitor, deep in thought and utterly confused. Eventually her studious mind led her to one conclusion (which left her very frustrated as she could usually formulate two or three different solutions without difficulty) and she began pulling up different screens on her monitor. From over her shoulder Kaidan read the words Biotic Implantation Removal and Replacement. His blood ran cold and he felt icy fingers enclose around his heart.
"No." he said, not looking at the doctor but knowing she was listening to him. "You can't replace her implants - it would destroy her."
Michel swung around to face him with an unreadable expression that made him feel very uncomfortable.
"There is only one thing that I can think of that will fix this problem permanently, Major. We can replace her custom amp and implants with military issued L5x implants and an Armali Council Prodigy bio-amp that just got sent in from Thessia. It's the best I can do."
"No." he said again, and this time his voice was harsh; causing Chakwas to put a reassuring arm on his shoulder - which he brushed off.
"There's gotta be another way - maybe a way to stabilize or fix the amp that she has. Replacing all the tech in her must just be your last resort."
"Even if I could - which I cannot - it would not fix the problem permanently, it might even make it worse. This is the only way I can guarantee her safety, Major."
Kaidan gaped at her, "She'd rather die than have her custom tech removed; it would be the equivalent to amputating her and then giving her a prosthetic in it's place - she'd need to learn how to use her biotics all over again."
"And I feel terrible for her," Michel told him, "If there was a way to just change her bio-amp then I would do it in a heartbeat but I can't know for sure if her custom implants will be compatible with a new bio-amp."
He opened his mouth to protest but Chakwas interrupted him, "It's for the best Kaidan. Once she comes to terms with it, she'll be fine."
"No she won't." he replied, "She'll feel betrayed. And angry," he took a deep breath, heavy with guilt, "And I wouldn't blame her."
Avalon didn't know where she was but she knew she shouldn't be there. All she could see was blackness and it squeezed her tightly until her head felt woozy and her body grew heavy. She attempted to stumble forward, blindly but everything seemed to be moving ten times slower than usual and she stopped quickly, dazed and confused, not daring to take another step in case she walked into something that she shouldn't.
Her head slowly scanned what was in front of her but there was nothing to be seen; nothing to be made out from the intense darkness. Despite how sluggish her actions were, it hadn't affected how quickly she could react to things - which allowed the darkness to choke her and trap her with one big, black claw. It covered her mouth and stole the air in her lungs and rendered her responding scream silent. Avalon could make no noise as the darkness forced it's way into her body and began to rip her body apart from the inside out; piercing her skin and forcing glimmering obsidian-like daggers out of her.
The excruciating pain paralyzed her; leaving her truly helpless without any solution to rid herself of the dark plague that she could feel killing her. Blood was gushing out from the multiple wounds in her chest and she knew it wouldn't be long until she would die. But that didn't mean she wouldn't go down fighting.
She gathered the last of her strength - using what remained of her willpower to summon the familiar rush that would serve as a small biotic explosion that might buy her a few valuable seconds. Bracing herself for the sudden surge of energy, she clenched her fists and gritted her teeth, wondering how the hell she had gotten to be in this situation and if perhaps she had been captured by the Reapers after all.
But the energy never came.
She tried again, but this time she was cloaked in complete and utter terror that made the stab wounds in her chest flame and roar, and her biotics remained inactive. So this was it then, she thought to herself as her hands reached to where her skin wept through the fabric of her doctor's uniform. I'm just going to die here - in the complete darkness, alone. Her knees impacted with the floor but by now the doctor was numb; already feeling her life slipping away in the form of warm, sticky blood.
And just before the darkness was about to finish her off with one last stroke of its dagger, blinding white light pierced her first. Taking the time to adjust to the sudden light, Avalon could finally see. She just wished that she couldn't.
They were on the CIC deck in the Normandy. It appeared like a ghost ship, empty and forgotten - apart from the figures standing above her. It was her old co-worker, Doctor Michel; standing beside her was Shepard and beside the commander was…
Kaidan.
That was when Avalon noticed that they were all carrying black daggers that were dripping with blood. Her blood. Looking down at her chest with dread she counted the stab wounds that had been inflicted upon her while in the darkness.
Three. And three people holding one knife each. They had all betrayed her.
Kaidan stepped forward, allowing the blade to fall from his blood soaked hand, and moved his hand towards her face, trying to wipe away her tears. But she leaned backwards, doing her best to avoid his touch from where she was kneeling.
"I'm so sorry, Av." he whispered, emotions catching up to him and causing a tear to escape from his mortified gaze.
"No you're not." she choked, through tears, terror and blood.
He reached out to catch her body as she fell forward and at last her vision faded, freeing her from the burden that his betrayal had given her.
A warm sensation washed over her and all of the hurt melted away, enveloping her in a blanket of protection.
She was free.
Kaidan sat down beside the hospital bed and buried his head in his hands, inhaling deeply before letting out all of his frustrations with one long sigh. The surgery with Avalon had gone as well as it had been expected, although that did not mean that it went entirely well. Whatever she had done when she had first gone about designing and testing L6 implants had been at a very big risk to herself. Doctor Michel informed him that she had looked into Avalon's file and that the young Shepard had originally been given L3 implants just before she turned 10, but that she turned up to the hospital 8 years later and with the assistance of an asari intern, underwent a surgery to use the L6 design that she had come up with. Whatever the intern had done hadn't been correct which had probably caused the complications and issues that had spiked up on Rannoch.
But despite Chakwas' and Michel's constant reassurance that an L5x implant replacement was the best course of action, Kaidan remained unconvinced. There was something that was telling him that with all the resources and knowledge that Huerta Memorial had gained over the years, there should have been some way to fix the faulty neural connection between the L6 implants and Avalon. Yet Michel seemed confident that the prototype tech was beyond saving.
He raised his head from his hands and cast his eyes over Avalon, who was breathing heavily and kept twitching in her sleep. He focused on her eyes and bit his lip nervously when he saw how wildly they seemed to flutter. Her entire body seemed to tense up even though she had barely moved since the surgery had finished. Even though her hair had been shaved during the procedure so that Doctor Michel could easily access the section of it that contained the amp, he still noted how beautiful and strong she looked despite everything. And then he noted that if he stood up for her and been her voice during the deciding conversation with Chakwas and Michel, that she might still have her custom tech right now. If he had been stronger.
"I'm so sorry Av." he whispered, tears running down his cheeks. He reached out and caressed her face, gently, gasping when her cold skin came into contact with her warm hand.
She gasped and sat up quickly, as though she had been shocked by lightning. Catching sight of him, fear and hurt clouded her usually defiant eyes.
"Get away from me!" She ordered. Her voice was chilled but Kaidan heard it waver slightly. He did what she asked, and got up from his seat, backing away slowly with hands hands raised in a surrender gesture.
"Why am I here?" she demanded to know, "What did you do to me?" What did you do? She knows, he realised, I don't know how but she knows.
"It was… your amp." he started, "It wasn't working and after Rannoch…"
"Stop." He did as she said, hoping that she wouldn't have some sort of explanation about why her amp was as stone cold as it was the day she collapsed.
But when she correctly predicted what the 'problem' was - his fear began to grow bigger and bigger. "So Doctor Chakwas did a scan on me after I collapsed, right?" He nodded.
"And when she couldn't find any kind of heat being projected from it, you all came up with the conclusion that it wasn't working?" He nodded again, feeling as though she was about to give him some bad news, rather than him telling her about the L5x implant.
"I designed the amp to store heat in the centre of my body so that I could reduce my cooldown time almost indefinitely." she explained, "It works kind of like the Normandy's stealth drive when it stores the heart emissions and then lets them out when the stealth mode is deactivated."
"So then-"
"There was actually no need to hospitalise me because I am one hundred and ten percent fine. I'm excellent in fact." Then she remembered the dark place she had been trapped in. The nightmare. A pang of nausea swept over her, making her feel uneasy.
"Before I woke. You said, 'I'm so sorry.' Why are you so sorry Kaidan?" she was suddenly very aware of the monitor behind him. The same one that Kaidan had seen over Michel's shoulder.
"You didn't…"
"We thought it was the only-"
"No. No. Nonononononono NO!"
Kaidan stepped forward, wanting more than anything to hold her close and promise her that everything would be okay. But he didn't. Because he couldn't.
"I'm so-"
"DON'T YOU DARE!" she screamed, "DON'T YOU DARE TELL ME YOU'RE SORRY WHEN YOU LET THEM DO THIS TO ME!"
So he didn't. Kaidan stood by the door, trying to read her blank expression. She was angry, he knew that much - but she wasn't letting anything show anymore. It was as though she was isolating herself from him, shutting him out so that he couldn't see her anymore. She'd even wiped those first few desperate tears away.
"Tell me how I can make this better."
"Leave." The reply was almost instantaneous, suggesting that she had been about to say it anyway. He didn't want to feel hurt by what she had said. He knew that everything she said was true; every accusation; every glare - it wasn't without reason. Deep down he'd hoped that Avalon would have just nodded and kept quiet during his explanation of the surgery and afterwards he'd apologise and they'd hold each other for as long as it took to forget about everything. He hated being a romantic in the middle of a war.
So he left, vowing to be stronger. To be better.
For her.
