They still needed information. And, as it happened, The Insistently Mendacious had provided some. Granted, it wasn't information he wanted, but he someone he knew was interested. "Joker, take us back to Illium."

#

Liara smiled when she saw him. At least someone off his ship still did. "I know you're looking for the Shadow Broker. Cerberus gave me data on where to find him." He raised an eyebrow. "Interested?"

"Absolutely. I had no idea..." For a moment, she looked as giddy as her old self. "Let me see what you've got." She nearly snatched the datapad from his hand and began scrolling through it. "It looks like a leaked transmission between Shadow Broker operatives. Some hints as to the location, and..." She trailed off as she stared at the image of a drell. "It's about Feron. He's still alive."

Well now. That lit up her eyes. "Who's Feron?"

"He was a friend. He helped me recover your body from the Shadow Broker."

"Remind me to thank him." Michael nodded. "Why did the Shadow Broker want my corpse?" Please don't let the answer have anything to do with necrophila, puppet shows, or puppet shows about necrophilia.

"He was going to sell you to the Collectors, but Feron and I stopped him. Feron sacrificed himself to save me."

"Right. So, we are going in and saving his ass." His eyes narrowed. "If you rescued me how did I end up with Cerberus?"

"Well, they gave me intel to help recover you. They actually put Feron with me in the first place." She gave him an apologetic look. "After I got out, I gave you to them. They said they could bring you back."

"So, you're the one responsible for me ending up with Cerberus?" Michael stared at her. "Why?"

"Was I supposed to let my friend die when someone offered a sliver of hope?" Her eyes watered a little as she stared back. Then she glanced down at the datapad. "They brought you back. And now they're giving me a chance to find Feron. After two years, I hadn't even dreamed..."

More likely, the The Idiotic Meddler needed the Shadow Broker out of the way and figured his best bet was pointing Michael and crew at him. "He's your friend." Michael nodded. "That's really all the reason I need. Let's go."

#

"So..." Garrus clicked his mandibles. "Liara has a boyfriend..." He folded his arms.

"And he needs to be rescued." Tali nodded.

"I always sort of thought Liara had a thing for Shepard." Garrus settled the new sight into his rifle.

Tali turned toward him. "You..." She shook her head. "I thought you used to be a detective or something."

"Hey!" He glared at her. "It was obvious to everyone. Liara had a thing for Shepard, Alenko had a thing for Liara..."

"I..." Tali made a sighing sound. "Go calibrate something." She turned and stalked off.

Garrus clicked his mandibles again, then turned toward where Kasumi was fiddling with something. "What did I say?"

"I..." She glanced up at him, down at what she had in her hands, then activated her infiltration cloak and vanished.

#

"Someone..." Michael narrowed his eyes. "Put holes in Liara's apartment." Tali made a growling sound. She'd insisted on coming along, eager to spend see where Liara lived. As it turned out, Liara's place was pretty impressive. Other than the holes. And the cops milling about the place. "Think Liara's hurt?"

"There is nowhere near enough damage done to the place for someone to have got to Liara."

"Good point." Michaels nodded. "Alright, let's go talk to the cops."

She shook her head. "Remember, Shepard. The cops might be on our side."

"Has that like..." Michael tilted his head. "Ever happened? I mean, other than Garrus?"

"Uh..." Tali mimicked his stance. "Not that I recall seeing, no." She shook her head. "But Liara would be upset if we blew up her apartment. Or got blood on the walls. Unless, you know, it was really necessary."

"Right. Let's keep collateral damage to a..." Michael started to head in, then stopped. "You know, maybe somebody else should do this part?" He sighed, and started heading in again. "Like maybe Grunt."

#

"What's going on?" He stopped at the police line rather than walking through. Like a good boy. It was physically painful.

"This area is sealed off." The cop turned toward him. "Please step back, sir."

Since she'd asked nicely, he wouldn't be a dick about it. Yet. "Sealed off? Why?"

"Someone tried to kill your friend, Commander Shepard." Another asari strode down the stairs. This one... He frowned. Wasn't a cop. "Thank you, officer. Your people are dismissed."

"You can't do that!" The cop glared at her, then glared at him when he walked through the police line.

"Already done." The cops glared, but started leaving as the other asari smirked at them. "Tela Vasir. Special Tactics and Recon."

"A Spectre?" That made sense. Spectres did tend to be assholes.

"I heard your status was reinstated." She smiled at him. "Good. You're one of our most famous operatives. Might even get you to sign my chest plate." Something was a little off about her. He really hoped he wasn't going to have to shoot her. "So I assume you had business with your friend this evening, Commander?"

"Liara was following a lead on the Shadow Broker." He started looking around. Liara had fish in one of her walls. Tali was trying to get one to follow her finger, but he knew she was scanning everything with her omnitool.

"The Shadow Broker? Dangerous enemy to have."

"What did you find on Liara's terminal?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Not much. She wiped her drive before she left." He felt just a bit of pride at Vasir's words. His little asari was all grown up and covering her tracks.

And she'd been the smartest person he knew even before he died. "Liara knew I was coming. She'd have made a backup of whatever she found."

"Makes sense." Vasir nodded. "Haven't found it yet, though." She folded her arms. "You knew T'Soni better than I do. Where would she have hidden her backup."

"Let me take a look around." He didn't need to gesture to Tali. She was already scanning. Liara wasn't the only one who'd grown up in the past couple years.

#

It only took him a few minutes to locate the data unit. There had been a time in his life having someone know him that well would have made him uncomfortable. Now it almost brought a smile to his face. "Looks like Liara found something big on the Shadow Broker." He started to gesture to Tali, and noted she was already calling in some backup. He was actually in a fairly good mood.

Right up until the building exploded. "Liara's in there." He started running.

"What the hell?" Jack put up a biotic shield to knock some debris away as she, Tali, and Garrus followed.

"Samara..." Michael jerked his head at the justicar. "Take the others and establish a perimeter. Make sure whoever did this doesn't get past you." He then turned to look over his other shoulder. "Mordin, the wounded. Grunt, stay with him.

"They just took out three floors to make sure she's dead." Vasir fell into step next to him. And since his people wouldn't dun in Liara and the only other person who knew... Dammit, he hated when he had to shoot Spectres. There was just so much paperwork. "I'll grab the skycar and seal off the building from the top."

"I'll start down here and work my way up." And find Liara before she did.

#

"Bullet wounds, military grade hardware..." Garrus looked around before glancing at Shepard. "These people are..."

"So, unprofessional it's insulting?" Shepard raised an eyebrow.

"Let's go educate them." He nodded.

"When you say educate, you mean kill, right?" Jack turned toward him.

"Yes." He clicked his mandibles.

"Right." She flared her biotics, and a moment later a couple armed goons were smashed between a wall and a desk. Not to be outdone, Tali tossed a flashbang into another group, driving them out of cover for him and Shepard to shoot. Then both women were moving in.

"Shepard..." He clicked his mandibles.

"The girls are making us look bad again." Shepard nodded before heading in.

#

After several rounds of violence, they reached the office. Garrus and Michael took up positions and Jack readied her biotics. Then Michael nodded for Tali to open the door.

They entered to find Vasir shooting a mook in the back of the head. "Damn." She holstered her sidearm. "If I'd been a few seconds faster, I could've stopped them."

It took all he could do not to roll his eyes. He knelt to check the body, knowing Garrus would be covering him. "Is this Sekat?"

"Must have been." Vasir was still looking around. "No sign of that data Liara talked about. Looks like a dead end." The timbre of her voice changed just slightly. "Speaking of which, did you find your friend's body?"

"You mean this body?" Liara stepped out, gun in hand.

"Liara." He nodded to her. "Something I should know?"

"This is the woman who tried to kill me." The gun was fixed on Vasir.

Vasir started walking backward. "You've had a rough day, so I'll let that slide. Why don't you put that gun down?"

"I saw you. I doubled back after I left." Liara wasn't having it. "I watched you break into my apartment."

"I'm sure there is a perfectly logical explanation." Michael drew his own sidearm and turned to point it at Vasir. "Like you were just using me to find the message?"

"Nothing personal, Shepard." Vasir shrugged. "Just needed a little help tracking down Liara."

"Once she had my location, she signaled the Shadow Broker's forces. They bombed the building to take me out. She found Sekat, took his data, and killed him. I'm guessing she's still got the disk on her."

"Good guess." Vasir actually sounded smug. "Not that you'll ever see what's on it..." Vasir flaired her biotics. "You pureblood bitch."

Vasir started running, and he tackled her on her way out the window.

#

"Okay." Michael picked himself up as he watched the two biotics running. "Next time, someone remind me that I can't fly or biotically float down, alright..." He turned to see Jack lowering the others down. "Or, you know, catch me."

"Walk it off." Jack shrugged.

"Let's go..." He saw a gate open, and armed men rush in. "Kill these people, then go see if Liara needs any backup.

#

Liara didn't need backup, but Vasir had gotten to a car. "Damn it." Liara got to a car of her own.

He gestured for her to scoot over, and got into the driver's seat. "I'm fine, by the way. Thanks for asking." There was only room for one other. He gestured to Garrus. Tali nodded and gestured to Jack, and the two started back to the others. Jack casually tossed another mook off the building on her way.

#

"If I had been driving, we wouldn't have crashed."

"If you'd been driving, we would have crashed earlier." Michael fired another shot. "Into a thresher maw." He glared. "And that wasn't a crash, it was a slightly uncontrolled landing."

"You crashed."

"Did not."

"Did too."

"I cannot believe you two are still having this argument." Liara glared at them.

"It's not like..." He fired again. "Killing all these mooks requires a lot of effort."

Garrus made a triumphant sound. "Got the last one."

"There's Vasir's car. Come on, she can't have gotten far."

#

"Vasir. It's over." Liara took the lead. He let her.

Vasir was staggering. She turned back toward them. "Hey. Hey, you. Come here. What's your name?" Michael cursed under his breath as Vasir grabbed a waitress. She pulled the woman in front of her as a shield.

"M-Mariana."

"Mariana, you want to live, don't you?" Vasir aimed at him and Liara. "Tell those people that you want to live."

"Please..." The woman's eyes were full of tears.

"Even if you do get out of here, you'll lose your Spectre status." He could try reason. It rarely worked, but he could try. "You attacked the trade center."

"You think so? I think maybe Cerberus terrorists did that." Vasir gave him a smug look. "Which story do you think the Council will believe?" Well, they were a bunch of idiots. Except Anderson. Usually. "All you had to do was walk away. Now it gets ugly." She put the gun against Mariana's head.

"Please. I have a son."

"A son? I hope he gets to see you again. I've heard losing a parent is just horrific for children." Vasir smirked. "Scars them for life."

"I'm going to end you, Vasir." Liara sounded pissed.

"It's okay, Liara. We'll handle it." He nodded to her. "The usual way."

"You want Mariana's little boy to grow up without a mommy, Shepard?" Vasir shook her head. "Thermal clips on the ground, now. Power cells, too."

He had a reputation. Time to actually make it be useful. He narrowed his eyes, and took a step forward. "Hiding behind a hostage, Vasir? No stomach for a real fight. Just like an asari."

"Drop the thermal clips, Shepard." Her voice wavered just a little.

"You girls should really just stick to dancing..." He drew a bead on the center of her forehead. He could make the shot. And she knew it too. It kept her focused on him, as did his words. "You know, play to your strengths."

"Drop the clips." She glared

"I'm gonna kill your hostage, Vasir." He shrugged. "And then I'm going to show you how a real Spectre gets things done."

"You're bluffing." She took the gun away from the hostage's head and aimed it back at him.

"I don't bluff." He took aim...

And Liara hit her with a table, sending her flying into the fountain.

#

The damn woman moved fast, using her biotics to blur across the battlefield. It took him three tries before he could figure out how to lead her with his rifle. The grenades helped with reinforcements. Why is it his own reinforcements never arrived that quickly?

He dodged a biotic attack, then smirked a little when Liara hit back. She lacked Jack's sheer brutality, but her attacks were certainly more elegant. If the word elegant could apply to dropping a third of an aircar on someone. Garrus tossed off a grenade, and Vasir stumbled just a little. He fired, and the bullet impacted the back of her knee.

"Ugh. Damn it." She fell, bleeding heavily. "Damn it."

Michael noted that Liara had developed a decent battlefield stalk as she strode over and retrieved the data disk. "Sekat's personal datapad. This has what we need to find the Shadow Broker."

"You're dead." Vasir tried to get up, but stumbled and slid down a wall, leaving a smear of blood. "The Shadow Broker has been in power for decades. He's stronger than anything you've ever faced."

Well, there was that one Reaper... Michael rolled his eyes, but caught Garrus managing the turian equivalent of a smirk. Clearly Vakarian was thinking along similar lines. Michael turned toward Vasir. "Is that why you sold out the Council to work for him?"

"You think I betrayed the Council?" Vasir glared. "Like Saren? Go to hell. The Broker's given me damn good intel over the years. Intel that saved lives and kept the Citadel safe. So if the Broker needs a few people to disappear, I'll pay that price without hesitation."

"Tell yourself whatever you like." He shook his head. "The Council would never accept you working for the Shadow Broker."

"The Council? You pay them lip service while working for terrorists?" She glared. Fuck he wished she didn't have a point. "You have any idea what Cerberus has done?"

"I know who they are and what they've done." And at the moment, they were the lesser evil. He crouched to look her in the eye. "It doesn't matter."

"I think it does. You want to judge me?" She coughed up some blood. "Look in the mirror. Kidnapping kids for biotic death camps. Killing Alliance admirals who ask questions. And you're with them. Don't you dare judge me." Her voice grew weaker. "Don't you..."

For a moment, he just stared at her corpse. Then he stood. And one day, The Imprudent Moron would answer for all that. It just couldn't be today. Not until the collectors were dealt with.

#

"Eliminate T'Soni and retrieve that data. Civilian casualties not a concern." Liara was already staring at the data. Garrus had gone to get the others.

"Vasir's dead." He walked up behind her. There was a time she'd have cared.

"I'm putting the data through to the Normandy's computers. We can be at the Shadow Broker's base in a few hours." She shut off the omnitool and started walking. "He'll know about Vasir before long. If he decides to kill Feron..."

He followed her. "We won't give him time."

"We'll need the Normandy's stealth systems to get us in close undetected." She didn't look back at him as they walked, and he actually had to increase his pace a little to keep up. "The Shadow Broker's agents are still shooting their way through Illium. With luck, they won't notice we've left until it's too late."

This wasn't like her. This was... A lot more like him. Maybe he had been a bad influence. "That's a little cold. They killed innocent people."

"You know what I mean." Liara turned back toward him.

"Do I?" He closed the distance between them. "When I hit the ground at the trade center, you went after Vasir without a backward look." That, at least, she hadn't gotten from him. Dammit, what had the past two years been like?

"A little fall wasn't going to kill you." She shook her head, then walked to the balcony. "I had to stay on Vasir. I had to stay rational, make the call. Like I did with Sekat."

Michael took a deep breath. He made those calls, so people like Liara never had to. He moved to stand beside her. "That's Vasir's fault, not yours."

"Sekat had no idea what the stakes were. I put him in harm's way to get the data I needed. I got him killed. And I'd do it again." She looked out over the city. The sun was starting to rise. She straightened up. "But from here on out, things will be simple. Get in, get Feron, get out." Liara started walking again. "And kill anyone who tries to stop us."

"That's it?" He raised an eyebrow as he followed her past the burning remains of a sky car. It made for a hell of a reminder.

"That's it." Liara nodded as she kept walking.

A burning skycar had changed his future. What would have happened, if he'd run that day instead of going in? What would happen to Liara now? She deserved better than to follow his path. "Will you just stop for a second? We'll be jumping several light years. There's time to talk."

"About what?" She shook her head as he caught her arm, but she turned to face him.

"You haven't been the same since I came back, Liara."

"What do you want me to say, Shepard?" She took a step forward, closing the distance between them. "That I mourned you? That I feel guilty because Feron got captured? I made mistakes. I lost people. I helped get you back, and I want to do the same for Feron. I'll sit and talk once he's safe. Until then, enjoying the scenery is an insult to the man who saved both of us."

In his mind, he heard Brekin's voice over the radio. He hadn't been able to bring himself to contact his old squadmate. Not from a Cerberus ship. There was a man left behind. "Okay. Let's go." He nodded to Liara. Words could wait. Who knows, maybe he'd even figure out what the hell to say.

#

Kaidan stared at the news on the datapad, then immediately reached for the comm. He wasn't expecting the man on the other end to answer, but from the bleak look on Brekin's face he'd already heard the news. "Brekin, I..."

"Tandy Mullins lived next door to us. She was six months pregnant. Sandra just..." Brekin's eyes were read. "She just talked to her two days ago. Twins, Kaidan. Tandy was going to have twin boys."

"I'm sorr -"

"What the fuck is the Alliance even doing?" Brekin smashed his fist into the desk. "Ferris Fields welcomed the Alliance. We had a station and..." He shook his head. "Goddamn it, Kaidan!"

"We are -"

"No, no you're not." Breken glared. "You're not doing a fucking thing and I owe you my family's lives anyway and..." He took a deep breath. "You know I can't blame Michael for working with Cerberus. At least they aren't standing around with their thumbs up their asses." He hit the button and the comm went dead.

For a moment, he just sat there. It wasn't like he could blame Brekin for being angry. At least... Kaidan swallowed. At least he'd managed to save a few. That was... "Better than the alternative." He jumped a little at the sound of Hackett's voice.

"Sir." Kaidan got to his feet and started to salute.

"At ease." Hackett sighed. "I've got the final report. Six thousand, nine hundred, forty-eight souls, gone."

"I don't..." Kaidan looked away, then back at Hackett. "We cleaned up a few of Cerberus's messes. Experiments they were doing on people. Brutal, horrific..." He sighed. "And what they did to the rachni was unthinkable. What they intended to do with the rachni was worse. They aren't the good guys here."

"No." Hackett nodded. "They aren't. At best, they are the lesser evil. We can protect humanity without putting humanity above the rest of the galaxy." He met Kaidan's eyes. "I've got a mission for your team. They ready for field work?"

"Yes, sir." He nodded.

Hackett handed him the datapad. "Get it done, Alenko."