"I've heard of you, Father. What do you want? Why are you doing this? I will get my Shepard back, mark my words." Liara motioned to EDI to trace her comms. EDI complied with the request.
"It's not what I want from Shepard, but merely what I want FOR Shepard. But there is a problem."
"And what is that problem?" Liara stalled for EDI.
"Shepard is not in his cell at the moment, but I know where he is."
"Did he escape?"
The Father chuckled. "No, no one escapes from this building without my permission. Why don't you ask the person who is tracing my location? Shepard's with me."
Liara looked to EDI. "What do you have?"
"It's coming from a broadcasting station at the top of the facility."
"How are we going to get there?"
"If we continue to fight down the main hallway, the schematics in the council records show a stairwell that leads to the broadcasting station."
"Then that's where we are going."
Liara shot new orders to the squad leaders and informed the rest of the Normandy squad about the new development. She also ordered for the deployment of special shadow broker weaponry; dubbed the 5KStinger. The Stinger was a heavy machine gun emplacement that mobile and small. With these Stingers confined places like the hallway became deathtraps for the enemy. Two soldiers operated them, one at the emplacement, and another that controlled the movement of the emplacement. The Stingers were about the size of a smaller sized forklift.
With the stingers at their backs, the newly inspired shadow broker squads were able to advance against the waves of troops easier. Soon the enemy forces deployed explosives, destroying one of the stingers. The explosion killed some soldiers and wounded several more, including Garrus.
"It's nothing I can keep going!" Garrus yelled as he applied some medigel.
Liara deployed more snipers to take out the rocket soldiers. Soon things were going smoothly again.
But not smooth enough as time was against them. Soon the violence would catch the attention of the c-sec forces. Since the human councilor had the whole council wrapped around his finger, if c-sec came it would not be good for Liara and the rest of the crew.
"Oh I'm going to get my Shepard back, mark my words." The Father had begun to taunt her again. "Is he now your property?" He laughed hard. "You asari whore, now I really don't want Shepard to go back to his life of slavery. He said he would never give up the soldier's life."
"Shepard already has children."
Again the Father laughed. "I know all about Shiala. What makes you think that you weren't a one night stand as well?"
The amount of information the Father knew was discomforting. He really needed to get taken out before he could do any more damage.
Soon they reached the stairwell. Liara had her remaining soldiers cover the entrance so they would be undisturbed upstairs.
The Normandy squad rushed up the stairs and into the antenna room. A lone soldier stood at the console with his back to the stairwell.
"Oh goodness, you've found me." The Father taunted in her ear.
Liara raised her pistol at the soldier. "STOP! Get your hands off the console and behind your head. Turn to face us slowly." Very slowly the soldier began to turn.
The Father laughed in her earpiece. "Look ma, no hands! I can still talk and I can still defend myself."
Suddenly Liara saw a figure faze out of thin air in her left field of vision. The figure seemed to be running at her. Liara didn't think and let her reflexes take over. She fired a shot.
Liara's vision focused on the figure and to her horror she recognized the person whom she had shot. Words that the figure had shouted finally registered in her brain: "No! It's u-"
In slow motion, Liara saw Kasumi hit the ground. She did not move. By this time, Shepard had turned around enough to see what had transpired. Immediately he tore off his helmet and ran to Kasumi. He rolled her over and moved her hood back. Everyone saw the dead stare in her eyes.
Liara began to shake she slowly came to realize what she had done. She dropped her weapon and collapsed on her knees next to the body.
"Kasumi... I'm... I'm sorry." She managed to get out before breaking down.
Comforting arms, arms that she hadn't felt in what felt in ages wrapped around her. Shepard gave her a kiss on the cheek.
"Shhhh it's ok. She'sis with Keiji now." Shepard let go of Liara and picked up Kasumi's lifeless body. "Grab that." Shepard told Vega, pointing to the memory bank on the console. "We need to go, now."
Liara felt his hand gently brush her cheek. "We will give Kasumi a proper goodbye on the Normandy."
Shepard's words gave Liara comfort and motivation to keep going. She stood up and followed Shepard as he led the way down the stairs.
"Good job Liara." The Father taunted in her earpiece. "Too bad your reflexes were to shoot instead of to see."
Liara tore out her earpiece and smashed it on the ground. Using her omnitool he gave the order for her soldiers to disperse.
In the main hallway all was quiet, as if all of the Father's soldiers had simply disappeared. Liara knew a different reason, the Father was happy with his outcome.
"What do we do now?" Shepard asked the crew as they boarded the shuttle to go back to the Normandy.
"We need to get a doctor to look at Garrus' wound, that's what." Ashley spoke.
"I'm fine Shepard. It's nothing worse than my face." Garrus replied.
"Show us then."
Garrus hesitantly showed everyone his wound. His armor had been pierced and the wound had begun to bleed again since the small amount of medigel he had applied had worn off. If the armor was pierced, then he might have shrapnel is his body. It was clear Garrus needed to get actual medical attention, medigel could not help with shrapnel.
"Well Chakwas can take care of you." Shepard spoke, intent to leave.
"That's the problem Shepard, Chakwas is away at some council medical conference."
"Ashley's right and we can't just go to the hospital with an unexplainable battle wound. We can't let anyone know that we did this." Liara added. "If the human councilor has control of the council and they convict us of this, who knows what he'll be able to do."
"I don't think he'll be able to do anything about it so fast though."
Vega laughed from the pilot's seat. "You wanna bet?" He switched on the display to show a news program live. A reporter stood outside the wrecked reaper labs.
"No one knows exactly who perpetrated this terror attack, but the motive is clear: this terrorist group wants access to the reaper artifacts of mass destruction that are housed and studied in this facility. Thankfully, a new council military force was able to secure the facility and beat back these terrorists before they got anything of value." The camera then focused on one of the Father's soldier's. "Thank you Typhon."
"Shit. That limits our options." Shepard rubbed his temples.
"Were you watching the news as you pilot our shuttle?" Ashley asked Vega from the back.
"It might have been a nasty habit that I've developed. Piloting the shuttle is so boring." He answered.
"Maybe it's because you haven't crashed lately." Garrus joked.
"Are you complaining?"
"Not at all."
"So is there anyone we can go to?" Shepard brought the conversation back on track. "Garrus is priority right now."
"Oh I think I know." Tali answered. "Did you ever finish those dextro chocolates Garrus?"
Author's note: You guys must think of me as a big douche right now for killing off Kasumi. But let me explain myself a little bit. First of all, Kasumi will get her piece later in the story. I didn't just kill her off for no reason. I won't go into the plotwise reasons why she died, but merely the logistical reasons. No one is invincible, and if I had let everyone survive the story would have gotten stale. Just think back to From the Ashes (which I still have to fix up big time). Lots of important people died there. Also think back to Mass Effect 3. Same thing there. I also want to state that EVERYONE makes mistakes and its how we deal with our mistakes that makes us unique. I think you will rather enjoy the storytelling that comes next. I want to make the best story possible, so just bear with me for the moment. I'd love to hear what you guys think of the story so far!