One note: You can safely assume that Shepard speaks to the rest of the crew of the Normandy in her downtime between missions. I simply am opting not to log every moment of her day-to-day life, because this fic is already reaching "long novel" status and keeping track of her every interaction would quickly raise it to "doorstopper."

I will, of course, document significant moments and ones that differ, even insignificantly, from the events of the game, but things like "hey, Tali, tell me about the flotilla" and eight paragraphs of ensuing exposition don't need to be included here.

Shepard closed the door behind her and leaned back against it with a long, weary sigh.

"Come now, Commander, it didn't sound that bad," Chakwas said from her desk near the window.

"Listening in, were you?" Shepard asked, opening one eye to look at the doctor.

"Hardly," Chakwas said. "But I did not hear shouting, and neither of you left in a huff, so..." she trailed off pointedly.

Shepard groaned and pushed off of the door. "I don't know why you wanted me to speak to her," she said, a hint of irritation seeping in to her tone. "You know I am not the best at working with people."

"But you are the best at working with her," Chakwas countered. "Nobody else on this ship has the same rapport with Liara that you do. It's plain as day."

"I enjoy her company, but I fail to see why that makes me the one best suited to console her through the death of her mother – especially when I was the one that took her life! She should be speaking to somebody who knows what that's like, or at least has studied it, not the facsimile of a woman playing hero."

Shepard watched an unusual sequence of emotions run across Chakwas' face – alarm, concern, consternation, pensive thought, and finally a kind of gentle determination. What did I say? Shepard wondered.

Chakwas gestured across the table. "Shepard, have a seat," she said, and her voice was a strange combination of the firm, no-nonsense voice she used when working professionally and the gentle, almost 'motherly' tone she took with she soldiers that Shepard had brought in for psychiatric help.

She might have been the superior officer, but there were several issues that Shepard willingly and eagerly deferred to the doctor on, beyond the obvious category of medical procedures: People and perspective. Shepard was, for all her careful analysis and examination of the world around her, still very young, and it was hard sometimes to consider the longer view.

So she sat, moving a data slate aside, and waited for Chakwas to assemble her thoughts.

"You already know why I chose not to reveal your condition to the medical board," Chakwas finally said

Shepard nodded. "Because I choose to act in a way that others find acceptable, yes," she said.

"There were other reasons, but that's the main one, yes," Chakwas said. "Shepard, have you ever had a friend?"

The commander blinked at the apparent non sequitur. "I am friendly to many people," she answered, somewhat stiffly. "You know as well as I do that I do not form 'bonds of mutual affection,' or whatever the dictionary definition says."

"You would do well not to scoff," she scolded. "Those bonds provide a neurochemical incentive to engage in behavior that is not immediately in our best interest. Behaviors like cooperation and coordinating with others – the cornerstones of civilization."

"You are right, of course," Shepard sighed. "Forgive me. I have been... off balance for some time."

Chakwas waved a hand at her. "You might be emotionally limited, Commander, but you are still only human. You are not immune to the need to process new experiences. Make sure you take the time to do so. Now, as for friends-"

"I don't really know what to tell you," Shepard said with a shrug. "I don't form emotional bonds. We've been over this."

"I don't doubt you," Chakwas soothed, "but I think you are confusing the cause and the effect."

Shepard cocked her head at the doctor. "The cause and effect?"

"From an evolutionary perspective, friendship does not exist for its own sake. It is a means to entice an otherwise impulsive and shortsighted creature into behaving in such a way that will benefit it later. You may lack the emotionally driven side of it, but that does not mean those you interact with don't... and those bonds are very deep, and very hard to avoid forming."

Shepard rocked back, her eyes going wide. Oh. Oh! "You sent me to talk to Liara-"

"-because you are her friend, Shepard," Chakwas finished for her, nodding with a smile. "Even if she isn't yours. Even though she knows what you are. Even though you have told her what you are. It does not matter. What matters is that you have, by your own free will, respected her as an individual, listened to her needs, offered her support in times of hardship, and voluntarily sought out her company. Stars above, you saved her life!" she laughed.

"So-" Shepard began, then bit her lip. "So she knows I'm manipulating her... and she signs up for it willingly?"

"Not all manipulation is hostile, Shepard," Chakwas said gently. "You have only helped shape her into the person she needed to be in order to survive the trials that the galaxy has laid before her. I sent you to talk to her because, were you a normal person, that's precisely what you would be doing, and following through with that expectation is one of the most reassuring things you could do for her right now."

"I... thank you, Karin," Shepard said at last. "I would be less without your guidance."

The older woman smiled broadly at her. "We would all be less without one another, Commander. Sometimes we just need reminding of that. Now, will she be coming to dinner, or should I go get a box for her for later?"

"She's going to try to sleep," Shepard said, relaxing as the conversation drifted into more familiar territory. "She was too terrified to use her abilities extensively on that mission, so she's not nearly as drained as I am."

"Mmm," Chakwas hummed. "I think I'll pack her something anyway."

"I defer to your expertise," Shepard said, then stood to head for the door. "Are you coming?"

"In a moment," Chakwas said, waving her hand at the terminal. "I wanted to finish my medical report for the ground crew."

"I should be working on mine," Shepard sighed, "but..."

"Doctor's orders," Chakwas said briskly. "Eat first. And Shepard..."

Shepard paused at the door, glancing back at Chakwas. "Yes?"

Chakwas paused for a long moment, then shook her head. "Nevermind," she said, waving her hand at her in a shooing motion. "Go eat."

Wonder what that was about, Shepard thought, then headed out the door.

Dinner was, as always, a chaotic affair. Plates, shouting, a too-small kitchen (she really needed to make sure the next generation of the Normandy frigates had a proper galley), marines that thought they could eat more than she could, and the hesitant but growing camaraderie between the new members of the ground crew and the existing detachment.

She wondered sometimes what samples of humanity the other races had to have encountered for them to have such a negative impression of her species. Garrus had been reserved, only coming out of his shell after realizing that there weren't that many differences between the enlisted and the cops in C-Sec. Tali had hidden in a corner, too lonely to eat in her habitat but too scared to socialize, until one of the engineers mentioned she'd be a natural at poker with her face hidden all the time, which had started one of the most ruthless dinnertime card game traditions she'd seen anywhere. Even Wrex had warmed a little, although she suspect his friendship with the crew was more superficial and for the benefit of fitting in than an actual engagement with the men and women of the ship.

Speaking of which...

She shoveled the last third of a plate of food into her mouth, ignoring the horrified stare of one of the pilots as she did, then stood to clear her dishes before making for the elevator.

"Going somewhere, ma'am?" Kaidan asked from his spot at the end of the table, setting aside his data slate.

"Yeah," Shepard replied. "I owe Wrex an explanation or seven... and a favor, to boot."

He winced. "Ah, the rachni," he said. "Yeah, I could see how that might be a sore subject. Anything I can do to help?"

She paused, then shook her head. "Nah, I think I got this."

He nodded, then leaned forward and lowered his voice. "Is uh... is Liara okay? She seemed like she was pretty shell shocked earlier."

She offered what she hoped was a pensive expression. "She's sleeping now. Chakwas will make sure there's some food for her later, and I'll check on her again before I rack out."

"Sounds good, ma'am," he said. "I know I wouldn't want to be alone in a dark room by myself after today, but who knows? Maybe asari are different."

Shepard shrugged. "Not so much as you might think," she said, "but she's taking a nap, and it's, ah, hard to rest out here during dinner."

"True enough, ma'am, true enough," Kaidan chuckled, then picked up his slate again. "Good luck with Wrex. I think he already ate, so at least he's not hungry."

"Thanks," she nodded. "Here goes nothing."

"Shepard," Wrex grunted in his usual taciturn tone when she approached.

"Wrex," she replied.

"Something you need?" he asked without stopping the maintenance he was doing on his shotgun.

"Yes, actually," she said. "Let me see your left arm."

He set the gun down on the table with a sigh and obligingly held out the requested limb. "There a reason for this?"

She hummed, looking the armor plating attachment points over and tapping them thoughtfully. "I believe I promised to teach you how to throw a punch," she said, "but unless you want to break every bone in your arm doing it on top of shredding most of your flesh off, you need to put a decent mass of armor on the limb you plan on using."

He blinked at her, slowly. "Didn't think you'd follow up on that," he said while she started taking notes on her omni-tool.

"Wrex, I won't pretend I keep all my promises, because I don't," she said, "but I try not to break them without good reason."

He thought for a minute while she worked, then grunted in acknowledgment.

She kept going, noting the differences in construction between her armor and the gear Wrex wore. It wasn't cruder, although the thick material certainly gave that impression. She supposed that made sense – hers was designed to be light and easy to wear, especially in her case, whereas Wrex could wear armor that weighed as much as she did without even slowing down. That much mass in the armor cut way down on the amount of shielding and high-cost synthetics required to provide the same defense.

The advantage, of course, was that Wrex had a more options when it came to striking surfaces he could use her punching technique with.

"Interesting," she said, tapping at an interlocking joint.

"What, the armor? It works," he grunted. "Not much more to say about it."

"I'm just musing on the differences in design," she explained. "Your armor masses about what I do, so you probably don't need the asymmetric gauntlet setup that I have. With enough practice, I think you could hit people with pretty much any limb."

"What about a headbutt?" he asked immediately.

She raised an eyebrow at the krogan. "You'd need a headband or something. I don't think your helmet will take the impacts without it."

He grunted. "I'll figure something out. Or Tali will."

"You've been talking with her?" she asked, stepping back from him.

"Some," he said. "She wanders over sometimes, if the engineers get tired of her questions."

"I didn't think they minded," she said. "At least, they didn't when I asked them."

He grunted again. "Didn't say it happened often."

"Fair," she replied.

"So," he said, "if you don't need to change anything... where do we do this?"

"Faster, Wrex," she ordered while the krogan panted. "It's not power. It's speed. The power comes from that."

"I know," he snapped, blue gathering around his clawed hand once again. "It's not like I'm undoing half a millennia of practice or anything."

"Don't hit the dummy," she said, "slap it. Like you were trying to wipe the smile off a smug turian's face."

Wrex narrowed his eyes and spun, clawed handed forming a whirl of blue, and the resulting crack of his armored hand tearing a hole in the ballistic dummy echoed around the bay.

Shepard nodded. "There you go," she said approvingly while the dummy slowly collapsed in half. "You're figuring it out."

"... still got nothing on yours," he said, bending over and resting his hands on his knees.

She shrugged. "I cheat," she said, without further explanation. "You still picked it up quickly, and with practice you'll be a nightmare for anyone in close quarters. Well, more so than krogan battlemasters already are."

"No such thing as cheating in a fight," he said, shaking his head and sitting down on one of the cargo crates. "Though that does remind me."

"Reminds you?" she prompted, tossing the ruined target dummy back into its crate. "Reminds you of what?"

"Why I don't take jobs with Spectres," he said, leaning his head back and staring at the ceiling.

Shepard coughed. "I'm a Spectre, in case you'd forgotten," she reminded him.

"Yeah," he said, "you are."

Well, that was as clear as mud, she thought grumpily while packing up the dummy.

"A few years back," he said abruptly, "I took a job. Wasn't a glamorous thing, pirate operation on the edges of the terminus systems. Pretty typical stuff, hit a ship, lock up or space the crew, run off with the cargo before automated systems called anyone."

"One day," he went on, still staring at the roof, "we get word of something big coming through. Volus freighter, one of the half-kilometer rigs they use to move shit between worlds. Boss wants us to take it, not just hit it and run. We figure sure, why not, everything else has gone like clockwork. Sure enough, we show up where the boss says the ship will be, and there's a ship there. Block their transit, pop the airlock, and work our way through their security team."

He leaned down and gave a low laugh. "Now, krogan mercenaries versus volus corporate security? Fight was a joke. They surrendered in minutes, we rounded the living ones up and stuffed 'em in a corner while the batarian tech we had got working on their computers."

"Then the boss shows up. First time I've seen him in person. Turian fellow, which was rare. Didn't say anything. Went through the manifests, ignored the mercs congratulating him on his score. Noticed the volus we'd rolled into the corner."

He shook his head. "Didn't even blink. Drew his gun and shot the lot of 'em, right there, without a word. No twitch. No anger. No warning. Just him reading a slate, then slaughtering a whole bunch of people."

"Sound at all familiar?" he asked, staring straight at her.

She stared back.

The krogan let his gaze slip back up to the ceiling. "Well. I got out of there after that. Didn't like the feel of it. Didn't even stop to get my pay. Sure enough, few weeks later, word comes around that all the other mercs on that job wound up dead. Funny coincidence."

"That turian's name was Saren," he said at last.

She folded her arms across her chest. She didn't think this was a prelude to a fight, not when she'd just worn him out teaching him the basics of a new biotic technique, which meant that he wanted to talk. "Is this your way of saying you want to get off at the next stop, then?"

He grunted and shook his head. "No. Saren needs a bullet, and I've got several with his name on 'em."

"Then what is this?" she demanded, putting her hands on her hips. "I kill people, Wrex. It's my job. I'm good at it. The Alliance sure as hell didn't nominate me to the Spectres because they felt an underweight redhead would look better in the holos."

"Rrrgh-" Wrex growled, slamming his fist into the crate next to him. "You want to know what it is? Fine. I don't like sitting down here in the dark while we fight for your schemes, only to look around when the shooting stops and realize we just helped you change the damn galaxy to suit your whims."

"You're already involved in all the tactical discussions, Wrex," she pointed out. "That's what the briefings are."

"Tactics, bah," he snorted. "Been through one briefing, been through them all. No. I don't want to sit here and realized you used me to change history only after it's done."

Ah. "This is about the krogan, isn't it," she said.

"I-" He hit the crate again, putting a fist-shaped dent in the metal container. "Damn it. Yes, it is about the krogan. You spat all over everything my people fought for, and the only reason I didn't point that shotgun at you is because there's a chance you're not wrong about it saving them."

He stared down at the deck. "I thought I was done with them, Shepard. Guess I'm not as done as I thought."

Silence fell between them again.

"I'll let you think things over, Wrex," she said as the minutes stretched on. "We'll arrive at the Citadel tomorrow. After that, you will have a few days to decide what you want to do. If you decide to go, then I will thank you for your service and drop you off at a port of your choosing. If you choose to stay..."

She let her face go flat. "Then we will have a very frank discussion about what it means to be a part of this team. Until then, Urdnot Wrex."

Shoving off the wall, she walked toward the elevator without a backward glance, leaving the krogan alone with his thoughts.

She made her way back to her cabin and shut the door behind her, then leaned against it with a long, tired sigh.

This mission is not what I had expected, she thought wearily. Yes, her skills in combat had been taxed, and often, but the hardest part had been the people.

Even when she was doing her 'rehabilitation' deployment, she'd never been put into as many uncertain situations as she was. Risky, yes, dangerous, yes, but always well-defined: Go in, rescue some trapped civilians from slavers, get out. Go in, kill a terrorist holding hostages, get out. The ones in charge of planning the missions decided what was an appropriate cost, and it was simply her job to implement their plans as best she could.

Now, however, she was the one calling the shots, and while it was welcome in many ways, it was certainly far more mentally tiring than she was accustomed to... especially when one factored in the number of different masks she needed to wear in order to keep everyone on task. There was the "experienced soldier" for the crew, there was the "humble hero" for the media, the "voice of wisdom" for Tali, the "stern senior officer" for Ashley... the list went on, and swapping back and forth was far more wearying than she anticipated.

She settled at her terminal and brought up the blank document from earlier.

The problem, she realized, wasn't that she didn't know how to summarize what had happened on the mission. That much was straightforward, and could even be done by a modern VI analyzing her helmet camera footage. No, the issue was that she could not reconcile what she'd done with the mask she'd presented to the Council... which meant that she would either need to lie on her report, or admit that she'd misled them about her goals.

The question, then, is which is worse: To lie about what one did... or reveal oneself to be wholly unsuited for the office which one now holds?

It wasn't as if it was simply a matter of revealing her... less sociable nature to the Council. They either knew or suspected, she was sure of it. No, the problem was that revealing that, along with what she'd done, risked them throwing her out of the Spectres altogether. With Saren loose and in possession of a warship that could flatten colonies, that would be a disaster.

But regardless of what I do, I need to do it soon, because the longer I take, the worse the outcome will be.

Sighing, she cracked her knuckles and began to type.

Nearly six hours later, she rubbed her eyes blearily and sipped at the congealing cocoa in her mug.

Her reports up until this point had been simple affairs: A few pages of commentary and automated summary, then the raw footage from her helmet camera. This one, however, was different: Pages upon pages of handwritten (or at least hand-typed) summary, piles of context for her actions, and some edited footage in addition to the raw data dump and machine-generated text. The whole thing weighed in at the 'light novel' level, and while she wasn't proud of it, it certainly got her point across.

She was just about to send it off when her door chimed.

It's nearly two in the morning, she thought, a small spike of adrenaline coursing through her veins while she tied her robe's sash and made for the door. Who is up at this hour, and what do they need me for?

The door slid open with a hiss to reveal Liara, eyes purple and bloodshot, with tear stains running down her cheeks. "Liara? What's wrong?"

"I-" she sniffled, then swallowed. "I am sorry for waking you," she said.

"You didn't," Shepard reassured her before stepping out of the way. "Here, come on in."

"Thank you," she said, taking the chair across the desk while Shepard closed the door and set the 'do not disturb' flag on the latch.

"So," Shepard said after she got back to her seat, "Couldn't sleep?"

The asari gave a bitter chuckle. "I did... briefly. Humans get nightmares too, I believe?"

Shepard nodded. "Woke you up?"

"I- yes," she said. "I made the mistake of checking my mail while I was awake..."

"Bad news, I assume?" Shepard asked.

"I am... apparently persona non grata with my extended family," Liara said. "They are... they are demanding my mother's remains and then... and then they never want to see me again..."

She trailed off, sniffling.

How does that old saying go? 'It never rains, but it pours?' Shepard thought. Poor girl can't catch a break.

"Well," Shepard said after a moment, "I'm not sure-"

"Shepard, I can't take it any more," Liara interrupted, lifting her head to stare at her with a kind of desperate intensity. "Please. It hurts."

"Liara, short of borrowing your tranquilizer kit or raiding Chakwas' secret alcohol stash, I don't know what I can do to help," Shepard protested.

"I am asari," Liara said with the same desperate tone. "The meld, it is... it shares pieces of us. Memories, feelings, thoughts. It can shape us, even, to be like our partners. You don't care. You can't care. Please, Shepard. Let me borrow that. Just for tonight. I just... I need to not be me for a little while."

She took a deep, shuddering breath. "So I can rest, at least."

Whoa.

Ever since their brief meld to pass on the beacon message, she'd been idly musing how to get Liara to share more of her experiences with her. It wasn't her highest priority – there was a job to do, and one that demanded most of her attention and energy – but it was something she'd thought about in the few moments she'd had to herself over the few weeks since they'd met.

To have it just offered, teased in front of her like a treat in front of a pet... well. That the experience would be painful didn't bother her. She didn't mind pain, except insofar as it alerted her to some damage her body had suffered. Knowing that the pain was both not hers and not due to any damage that necessitated action on her part would make it all the more delectable, like peppers on food.

And besides, she thought, Liara already knows my secrets.

"I- I'm sorry," Liara said, turning away. "I shouldn't have-"

"Wait," Shepard ordered, her arm snapping out to grab her shoulder. "I didn't say no."

Liara looked back at her. "But it was a foolish idea. There are other options, I should avail myself upon them before making a request like this of you."

Shepard let the hunger she felt drift onto her face as she held her gaze. "Do not tease me like this, Doctor T'Soni," she said, and Liara flinched. "It is a cruel thing, to dangle a morsel like this in front of me and snatch it away."

"You- you want to feel my pain?" Liara said, indignation creeping in to her voice. "Why would you want this, Shepard? Goddess, it is awful!"

"Because it is life," Shepard said, with a fervor most atypical for her. "Anguish. Fear. Agony. Those things, or the threat of them, have fueled more great works than anything else in existence. Civilization is built to protect us from them. Entertainment exists to distract us from them. Our best artists were said to suffer when they made their magnum opera. I have lived my life reading about these things, never to know them myself. And now you are giving the chance to have what I thought could never be mine."

"So yes," she said, reaching both hands to cup Liara's head and pull it slightly closer, "show me. Let me wallow in your pain, let me feel your heartbreak, let me live your fear of the dark. Please."

"I, uh..." Liara stammered. "When you put it like that..."

Shepard grinned and let Liara's head go. "My only question," she said, "is whether or not I should fetch a bucket."

Liara gave a small chuckle. "Aheh- no. No bucket this time. Although... may I suggest we do not sit in these chairs?" She gave the standard-issue steel chair a tap with her finger. "I do not want to fall out of them."

"No objections here," Shepard said, padding over to the double bed at the end of the room and sitting cross-legged on it. "Come sit," she said, patting a spot next to her.

Liara blushed, but nodded, desperation and exhaustion proving to be more of a motivator than whatever embarrassment she was feeling over being welcome.

Shepard shoved a few pillows around, adjusted her robe, and leaned against the headboard. "Whenever you're ready," she said easily, trying to keep the eager note out of her voice.

The asari tentatively settled next to her, then cleared her throat. "Shepard... in advance, thank you... and, well... embrace eternity!"

The first time she'd entered the Commander's mind, she'd been shocked – both by the cold her own mind used to warn her of Shepard's nature, and by the objective reality of what she'd seen. Now, it was precisely those things that led her here, flinging herself into the arms of a monster to hide from her own.

She closed her eyes and pushed back the guilt and sorrow that threatened to overwhelm her. It was not weakness to seek relief from pain, she reminded herself, nor was it wrong to share it with one who was so eager to help her with it.

Eager is right, she thought, shuddering briefly at the new memory. Shepard did a good job hiding it, but there were times – rare in public, but more common in private – where her true nature showed, and knowing it was there didn't make it easier. Watching the kind, careful, and considerate woman get replaced by something far more alien to her than any creature she'd ever encountered in her studies remained profoundly unsettling.

She looked over the edge of the memory iceberg into the flat, gray waters below and bit her lip. There really was only way to go, as moving around atop the metaphorical ice had only let her see memories of different ages – it had not granted her any kind of strong connection or meeting of the minds with the woman who owned them.

And so, with a steadying breath and no small amount of trepidation, Liara stepped off the edge and into the water.

It burned.

That was the only word Shepard could think of for the sensations that rocked through her when Liara opened her mind – an intense and raw feeling of fire and pain. It echoed with every heartbeat and doubled in strength with every passing thought.

Grief. Anguish. Rage. Terror. She felt her heart pound, adrenaline coursing through her veins as her mind tried to prepare her body to flee from a foe that did not exist, felt her breath hitch and her muscles tense as her body tried to flinch away from a source of pain that could not be physically avoided.

This is amazing, she thought, almost drunkenly, while the primal intensity of what Liara endured stormed through her.

She bared her teeth in a feral grin, her eyes blazing with uncharacteristic light, and savored every delectable moment of agony that the asari could give her.

Goddess.

Liara gasped out loud and nearly broke the meld when she entered the water. The cold was beyond description, beyond comprehension. Even the blackest void of space could not be as icy as the sea she'd jumped in to. Worse, it was not the kind of cold that faded if one held still – each passing moment only deepened the sensation, and it was with a dull horror that she realized it was not a cold that could numb, either.

It crept around and inside her, chilling her skin, her muscles, her veins, her bones. It crawled up her spine and wrapped around her brain, it filled her nose and mouth, its silence blanketed her hearing. It moved into her chest, and settled around her heart. It crawled inside her mind, and inched, inexorably, along her thoughts and memories.

She remembered her mother, dying in her arms, and the emotions that the memory evoked – agony, loss, guilt – blazed once, twice, then weakly a third time... before fading, the recollection losing its intensity between an ocean of uncaring cold. She remembered the doctor on Noveria who'd screamed in terror when he'd seen her, felt the self-loathing drift away, replaced by the confident knowledge that he'd forget the whole experience.

The dark waters around her began to brighten.

She remembered her rescue at the hands of Shepard, felt her desperate relief and terror... not change, precisely, but dampen to become satisfaction and concern. She remembered speaking with Shepard one evening, laughing at a passing joke, and the joy dulled to contentment.

To recall a memory is to relive it, a voiceless thought drifted through her mind, and to relive it is to change it. We shape memory just as much as memory shapes us.

The cold began to change, from something painful, to something... calming, and the water brightened further.

This time, when she gasped, it was in wonder, not pain.

The fire of Liara's mind had burned down – still bright, still hot, but no longer searing – while Shepard had gone hunting through the new and profoundly alien memories available to her, licking her lips at the huge variety of sensations she could lose herself in.

The cutting knife-edge of anxiety. The twisting, gut-deep agony of shame. The soaring wonder of joy. And... the strange combination of fear and need that was love. Fear, at the potential for loss, and need, to be with and around a person, for the calm they brought to her.

She'd just finished sampling a memory of one of their evening chats from Liara's perspective when she felt something change, like a seam shifting in her jumpsuit, or somebody opening a door across the hall. Nothing profound, but... not something she'd done.

Peering around, she frowned. When she'd first entered the meld, she'd found herself in one of the mnemonic tricks she'd used to organize her thoughts – the mental image of a library, based fairly closely on the alcove she'd spent years reading in as a child. It helped her organize her thoughts, and gave her a framework to tie everything to when she tried to recall something specific. Seeing some of Liara's memories had been as simple as finding the appropriate book and opening it to relive the experience, all within the context of the same library alcove.

But as the meld had deepened, things had begun to change. At first, it was just the persistence of sensations, remnants of the memories she'd gone through, but now the library itself had begun to shift. It had brightened and gotten warmer, and the roof had vanished some time ago, to be replaced by what looked like a sky full of floating icebergs.

And now, she felt... something else. Something not of her own imagining, something that felt tired and curious and hurt and amazed and relieved all at once.

Liara.

She made her way to the door of the library, noting the shimmering of the walls above the shelves with mild curiosity, and opened the old glass-and-metal door onto what would be the street in the real world.

Liara stepped in from the sea floor and smiled.

They didn't need anything as crude as words. Not this close. Their thoughts quite literally floated off of each of them, perfectly clear and without needing further explanation. Sometimes they were fully formed, but usually just snippets of feelings – gratitude, understanding, appreciation, confusion, weariness.

They were not the same person. Not even remotely close, and now, they knew with certainty that they never would be. Liara would never be truly cold and calculating, and Shepard would never be caring and compassionate.

That was okay.

They take a moment to sit and reflect, enjoying the shared yet opposite sensations – Liara's impression of chill, and Shepard's perception of relentless heat – before the walls began to waver even more than they were, and Liara blinked and hid a yawn behind her hand.

Shepard smiled at her, nodded, and the real world returned with a roar.

The first thing she noticed was how stiff she was. A quick glance at her omni-tool's wrist display said that it hadn't been more than fifteen minutes, and yet she felt more wrung out than she'd been after the week-long hostile environment final during advanced training. She'd also been crying, apparently, as her eyes felt like they were full of sand and there was the drying remnants of tears running down her cheeks. She'd obviously been sweating, and she'd apparently wormed out of her bathrobe somewhere during the meld.

Rolling over with a groan, she turned to face where Liara had been sitting.

The asari hadn't had an easy time of things either, if her current appearance was anything to go by. She had flopped forward from her cross-legged position on the bed, and then apparently curled into a ball at some point. She couldn't see her face, but a small smear of blood staining the sheets indicated that she'd likely bit her lip or tongue somewhere along the way.

Shepard reached over, wincing slightly at the complaints from her cramping muscles, and rested a pair of fingers against the asari's throat. Her pulse was strong and steady, if a little fast, and while she was trembling slightly, Shepard didn't think it was cause for alarm. Besides, she was mumbling something into the bedspread, so even if she was more miserable than Shepard, she wasn't likely in immediate danger.

She let herself fall back on her side of the bed and let out a long, slow, and contented sigh. She didn't have the energy to think about everything she'd seen, but the fact that she'd lived through it was enough for now. She'd analyze it later. Right now, more than anything else, she just wanted to rest.

Probably should make sure Liara doesn't put a crook in her spine, or something, she thought with another groan.

Rolling over once again, she dragged the asari out of the half-faceplant, half-fetal curl she'd wound up in, and shoved her spare pillow under her head. Her lip was a bloody mess, and she'd clearly bitten part of it, but it wasn't actively bleeding everywhere, so tending it could probably wait until morning... or afternoon.

Liara muttered something Shepard's translator didn't quite catch and shivered.

Cold? I suppose that makes some sense, she thought with a crooked smile, then grabbed her bathrobe from where she'd shed it during the meld and heaved it over the woman. Whatever effect was making her feel warm and Liara chilled likely wouldn't last, but at least in her case she knew she'd sleep just fine in the cold dry air of the Normandy without blankets.

Still beats Vancouver's streets, she thought muzzily, then tapped in one last adjustment to her alarm for the morning before allowing the persistent tide of exhaustion to pull her almost instantly into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Next up: Some consequences (both personal and otherwise), a few discussions, and a bit of a breather before Virmire.