Author's note: What's this? An update? Thanks so much to everyone who's still following this story! Let me know what you think!
Brokerage Offices
1245 Zulu
27 August 2185
Nos Astra (ashore), Soarse, Illium, Tasale
Liara hasn't replaced her secretary since Kelsa helped her find out the woman was a spy for the Shadow Broker, so there's nobody to intercept her in the anteroom. It was almost a disappointment when Liara rebuffed Kelsa's offer and instead took care of Nyxeris herself, without Kelsa even being there, but the dull ache in Kelsa's chest hasn't bothered her nearly so much since she took up her little hobby again.
"Shepard," Liara says, her surprise flavoured with a hint of pleasure, and that doesn't hurt near as bad as it used to, either. "To what do I owe this visit?"
Kelsa's lips part as she takes in the sight of the asari for a few heartbeats. Fuck, you're beautiful. "Got some intel you might be interested in," she says, instead. "That is, if you were serious about killing the Shadow Broker."
"Absolutely," the asari confirms, pushing up from her desk. "I had no idea...let me see what you've got." She looks expectantly to the datapad clutched in Kelsa's hand, and the soldier hands it over without ceremony. As Liara looks it over, her lips move wordlessly for a few heartbeats. "It looks like a leaked transmission between a pair of the Shadow Broker's operatives," she observes. "...Some hints as to a location, and…" Kelsa sees a mirror image of a drell, and despite the sand tingling through her nervous system, she feels her chest clench at the expression of recognition and relieved fondness that crosses the asari's face. "...it's about Feron," Liara pronounces. "He's still alive."
The question nearly catches on her throat, but Kelsa forces it out anyway. "Who's Feron?"
Liara blinks, and Kelsa doesn't have to rely on her ocular implants to see the flush of blue behind the asari's freckles. "He was...a friend," she deflects. "He helped me recover your…" Here she hesitates, eyes tipping down to the floor. "Your body...from the Shadow Broker."
Kelsa can't process this new information all at once, and she buys herself a moment's thought with a blink. "What did the Shadow Broker want with my corpse?" She wonders, her mind still working to catch up.
Liara turns around, and Kelsa's eyes track her face, reflected in the window. The soldier ignores the glowing eyes and lines of her own reflection as the asari musters an answer to the query. "He was going to sell you to the Collectors," she admits, hazarding a glance over her shoulder. "Feron and I stopped him...and Feron sacrificed himself to save me."
More questions cut through the sand and the ache in her chest. "So you haven't seen Feron…"
"Since shortly before I handed your body over to the Lazarus Project," Liara confirms, contemplating her own reflection once more. "I hadn't dared hope either of you would survive...but it turns out that both of you have."
She unknowingly (or knowingly, more likely) answered Kelsa's next question. "You gave me to Cerberus," she deadpans, saying the name aloud for the first time in weeks. In the window she sees Liara's forehead tense, but the soldier lets out a long, slow breath. "That makes three times you saved my life, Liara," she points out. "Thank you." It's the first time she's expressed any kind of gratitude in too long, even accounting for her two-year nap.
The asari visibly relaxes, but she doesn't turn to face the human directly. "Part of me was worried that you would see the act as a betrayal," she admits in a hushed whisper. "I'm very glad that you aren't angry."
"Oh, I'm angry," Kelsa corrects her, breathing a rough snort and giving the other woman a scarred grimace. "At the Collectors, at the Illusive Man...fuck, at Anderson and the Alliance brass for sending me out on bullshit cleanup jobs without any backup, but...never you." Her chest tightens again, like there's a fist inside it grabbing at her heart. She shakes her head and catches her right hand sliding up to a certain compartment in her armour, but clenches her fist instead. "Anyhow," the soldier deflects, looking away from the reflection's cerulean gaze, "let's get moving before this intel goes stale."
"Very well," Liara concurs, bringing the datapad up for closer scrutiny. "This office isn't as secure as my apartment. Would you like to accompany me, Shepard?"
Finally, the asari looks over her shoulder, and Kelsa finds that she can't look away, even though she wants to. Even though she's not mad at Liara, she can see the burning coals of her irises reflected in those oceanic depths. "You'd really want me to come?"
Liara blinks, curious. "The Shadow Broker is one of the deadliest individuals-or groups of individuals-in the galaxy. There are doubtless already agents inbound to intercept and eliminate us as we stand here. I can think of no more formidable an ally in the fight ahead than you, Shepard...if you are willing to aid me, that is."
Of course. Kelsa frowns, surprised at the hint of disappointment on her tongue, even if she knows full well that she is the best person to take Blueblood where she needs to go. A mad varren without a collar. Swallowing, she taps her comm link on her HUD. "Shepard to EDI," she barks, and continues once she hears the AI's receiving hail. "Let Miranda know the deck's hers for the next few hours. Standing order to evac only if my vitals flatline."
"Operative Lawson and the rest of the crew will be informed, Shepard," EDI replies, as sedately as ever. "Logging you out."
Kelsa nods, reaching back to unship her spike-thrower and turning toward the door. "If they're coming for us, we'd better get a move on. How defensible is your place?"
"Not very," Liara says, her voice just a shade more deliberate than usual. "Lead the way to a cab on the loading dock."
Kelsa forges through the anteroom, thumbing her gun's incendiary mod just as Liara discreetly draws her own pistol. At the bottom of the stairs, however, the asari wordlessly takes the lead, heading to a private transit area, reserved for the more important layers of Illium society. The tactical silence between them holds even after they hop into a nondescript skycar with Liara at the controls. The soldier doesn't know their destination, but she recognises the asari's evasive driving pattern, designed to shake a cold tail without drawing attention from unsuspecting civilians. She holds her tongue, even though it seems that if the Shadow Broker's agents are worth their positions, such manoeuvres are likely little more than a formality.
After about half an hour of cruising through Nos Astra's skyline like it's a salarian jigsaw puzzle, Liara finally lands them in a plain-looking parking garage. She takes point again, scouting out their route as thoroughly as any soldier Kelsa's ever seen, and the human almost lets herself get distracted by the change that the two unseen years have wrought in the woman who used to flinch at the sight of a few geth. Now she's threatening to flay people alive.
It isn't just the sand still in her system that tingles Kelsa's thighs at the remembered threat. She has to blink the memory away as they stalk down a corridor and edge into a stairwell; otherwise, she might forget about their little mission and try to get the asari to flare those biotics in her direction, just to feel something. Instead, she forges on. The silence of the concrete around them is nearly total; the building lacks the hum of a drive core or the rumbling of a battlefield, the bustle of civilian traffic or the thrumming of nature. It's enough to let Kelsa hear the ringing in her ears that the implants and reconstructions couldn't keep from coming back. Kelsa's eyes sweep for threats as soon as they step foot in Liara's apartment proper, scanning over the displays of prothean ruins and the gorgeous artwork without really taking it in, without absorbing the essence of the place, what makes it so thoroughly Liara.
It's that focus, plus her ocular implants, that let Kelsa see the flashes from across the skyway just in time. Before she can even think to react, she's on the ground, the lighter asari half-pinned underneath her. Glass tinkles to the floor from three neat holes punched through the apartment's windows, and Kelsa hears three distinct thups from the rounds impacting the near wall. Heedless of Liara's comfort, the human soldier crawls across across the floor, dragging her charge back toward the door and more thorough cover. "Looks like we gotta analyse that data on the run," Kelsa gruffs. "Think you can tease out where the Shadow Broker's agent is while I'm at the wheel of a skycar?"
For just one shining moment Liara resembles that scared scientist, the one Kelsa plucked out of a volcano just in time, over two years and a whole lifetime ago. But the moment passes far too quickly, and the asari collects herself with a couple of blinks. "I believe I can," she judges with a nod. "Shall we go?"
In response, Kelsa slides her back up against the door and palms it open, hinging out into the hallway with her shotgun at the ready. She takes the lead this time, each footfall putting herself firmly between her charge and the deathsquad that's certainly honing in on them. The soldier edges to a stairwell and checks the flights immediately above and below them before throwing a glance Liara's way. "Closest parkade?"
"The one we landed in," Liara confirms, slipping through the door and jamming her shoulder against the wall, presenting a smaller target to anyone following them from the hallway.
Three floors up, Kelsa remembers. Without another word, she begins mounting the stairs, her stomach tightening with a soldier's instinct that trouble's just around the corner.
Hotel Veranda, Azure
1530 Zulu
27 August 2185
Nos Astra (ashore), Soarse, Illium, Tasale
The asari's uneven footprints make a blue trail across the floor, leading away from the crash that Kelsa's manic driving and Liara's precise shooting hounded her into. "Vasir," Kelsa barks when she rounds a corner and catches sight of the asari's hobbled form. "You know I'm gonna kill you, right?"
From what they've gathered on the chase, the woman is a Spectre, like Kelsa used to be...or, rather, entirely unlike Kelsa, since the asari was a pawn of the Citadel-and, evidently, the Shadow Broker-for longer than Kelsa'd been alive, while the human barely tolerated the title for a handful of months and is repelled by the idea of groveling in front of the Council to get it back. But for all her experience, Tela Vasir is still bleeding all over the fancy wood-panel floors of the balcony. Dozens of Shadow Broker agents stood and died to keep her three steps ahead of Kelsa and Liara for the past few hours, but either there aren't any agents left or the Shadow Broker's decided to cut his asset loose. And if that's the case, they don't have much time to recover the data Vasir stole from Liara's contact about half an hour ago, and Vasir knows it.
The asari doesn't turn back, doesn't acknowledge the taunt, but instead she limps more quickly to an occupied part of the balcony. "Hey," she grunts, at a human server who's taken aback by the sight of a wounded asari commando lumbering toward her. "Hey you," Vasir says, snatching the woman by her shoulder and pulling her into a back-to-front embrace, a pistol at her temple.
Goddammit, Kelsa growls to herself, drawing up and leveling her spike-thrower right at the asari's throat, which happens to be tucked behind the human woman's collarbone. "You really don't know anything about me, do you, Vasir?"
Liara stops beside her, pistol fixed, but even her icy resolve is melted somewhat by the presence of the civilian. "Shepard," she breathes, equal parts pleading and plotting.
"I know you're a monkey," Vasir spits, hitching her own pistol higher on the side of her hostage's head. "Hey," she breathes again, more directly to her prisoner. "You wanna live, right?" When the server chokes out a terrified affirmation, the asari chuckles. "Well, you'd better convince the other monkey. I hear you stick together."
"P-please," the woman begs, closing her eyes against the tears that spill over her cheek. "I've got a son...a little boy."
"Hear that, monkey?" Vasir gurgles, taking her turn at taunting. "She's got a little boy. We wouldn't want him to grow up without his momma, would we?"
Kelsa pulls the trigger on her rifle, feels the telltale clicks of the shard charging up. "Look at me," she says, not moving her eyes from the target, just above the woman's collarbone. At the top of her vision, she sees the hostage's watery eyes open, another plea-or maybe a prayer-on her lips. "The squid-head behind you is going to die, and it looks like she's taking you with her. For what it's worth…" As she speaks, she sees that biotic flare come from her left, from Liara, but it's too late. Kelsa's finger's already relaxing. "...I'm sorry."
As nimble as Liara's biotics are, as powerful as she is, she can't move fast enough to beat a shard of superheated tungsten. Kelsa doesn't blink as the round punches through flesh and bone, through the last-ditch barrier that Vasir throws up against it, through the cartilage and meat of the asari's throat. It lodges there, embedded between two of Vasir's vertebrae, joining asari and human into one multi-coloured fountain. Blue and red mist and spray gloriously for a pair of heartbeats, until Liara's botched intervention arrives in the form of a table that she'd pulled, evidently in hopes of breaking Vasir's grip on her hostage.
Instead the two women get knocked awkwardly to the floor, still welded together by tungsten and blood; the human struggles, feebly, but her strength flags with every heart-pumped spray of crimson. All Vasir can do is blink, dumbly, as Kelsa saunters closer. "I am sorry," she husks to the human. She knows what it's like to grow up without a mother, but that doesn't stop her from shouldering her gun again and putting the woman out of her misery.
The soldier ignores the crowd that was too stupid to scatter when the excitement started; she crouches down, kneeling in the swirling pool of blood, and tears the two corpses out of their stapled embrace. It's the work of seconds to find the data core tucked away in Vasir's armour, and soon enough she's standing, turning to face her companion. For one glimmering instant, she recognises some sliver of emotion on Liara's face, some hint of just how disturbing the scene had been; but, just as quickly, it's sublimated into the cool mask that the information broker's maintained almost without fail since their reunion. A tongue of white-hot anger licks across the inside of Kelsa's ribs, and she can't keep it from flinching across her own cheeks, but she makes no comment as she draws near. "EDI," she gruffs to the aether, and her omni-tool chirps in response. "We need an extraction before Nos Astra security comes knocking."
"Indeed," the AI affirms. "Flight-Lieutenant Moreau is setting us underway as we speak. We should arrive at your location in thirteen point three five seconds."
"Understood," the soldier grunts. She spends every millisecond of that time in silence, locking eyes with Liara T'Soni, unable to discern the intent behind those deep blues. It's only as the Normandy pulls up level with the balcony and opens its forward bay that Kelsa reaches out, holding the glowing orb out for her companion to take, which she does without a word. "Come on," Kelsa says, already hearing sirens closing in on them. "Let's go kill us somebody that deserves it."
XO's Quarters, CSV Normandy SR-2
1945 Zulu
30 August 2185
Sublight Transit to Hagalaz, Sowilo, Hourglass Nebula
"I will SMEAR THE WALLS with you, bitch!" Miranda's soundproof doors open to Jack's cracking scream, a sound Kelsa's had a couple of occasions to become familiar with in a slightly different context, though not since Liara came aboard three days ago. They should've been to Hagalaz by now, but that would've meant risking a core overload, which would've ruined Liara's plan to kill the Shadow Broker and rescue her friend.
Evidently Kelsa isn't the only one unable to handle the trip with anything resembling patience. As she steps into the room, the windows flicker with a sudden flash of blue from the Cerberus operative who calls the space home. "Please," she drawls. "You'd have to tear through the hull first, and where would that leave you?"
"We gotta shuttle," Kelsa butts in, before the smaller woman can muster a response through her outrage.
Miranda rounds on her skipper, a snarl threatening to crease her supposedly-flawless face. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprise that you're siding with that," she hisses, tossing a dismissive glance at the tattooed woman crouching on the other side of the room.
"Funny," Kelsa gruffs, squaring her shoulders. "Thought you were supposed to be a genius, Lawson." She doesn't leave enough time for the dig to sink in before she pushes on. "If both of you don't bury this, right now, I'm putting you both on that shuttle...and I won't really care if either of you get off it." The pair of them try to yell over one another, almost like Kelsa didn't say anything; Jack's throwing up Cerberus' experiments on her, while Miranda's trying-and not quite failing-to remain aloof. "Hey!"
The scream doesn't get their attention, but a spike in the floor between them does. Kelsa doesn't ship her gun when the bickering dies down, keeping it crossed at her torso, ready to bring to bear against either one of her supposed subordinates. "I wasn't fucking kidding. If you both don't shut the fuck up I'm putting you on that shuttle, alive or dead."
Jack doesn't take her eyes off of Miranda as she starts to talk. "Thought you were building a team, Girl Scout," she points out. "How's that gonna look for you if you start offing us?"
"It'll look pretty good if it keeps the hull intact," Kelsa shoots back. "I got an asari Justicar, a drell assassin, a quarian architect, a turian sniper...fuck, even a spare Cerberus lapdog," she adds, smirking despite herself. "You've both got issues I've dealt with. You hate each other; I get that. But you owe me enough to put that shit behind you until our job's done...and if that's too high a price for you to pay, then both of you need to get the fuck off my ship. Tonight. Now." Three heartbeats pass before the other women's biotics flicker and fade; they don't relax, exactly, but it's clear that they won't tear each other's throats out in the next few minutes. "Fine," Kelsa settles, shipping her shotgun at the small of her back. "You two, remain a deck apart at all times until the mission's over. Understood?"
Miranda's lip is the first one to curl. "Understood, Skipper," she acknowledges.
Jack huffs, slinking toward the door. "Whatever," she bluffs, stalking out of the room.
The Loft, CSV Normandy SR-2
2300 Zulu
2 September 2185
Hagalaz (orbit, discharging), Sowilo, Hourglass Nebula
The hollow place in Kelsa's gut feels just big enough for the vial in her pocket to fill, but she holds the hunger in a clenched fist behind her back. She grimaces, inspecting her reflection in the fishtank, and she doesn't need her ocular implants to notice the telltale luminescent sheen starting to show through her teeth. The sight makes her close her mouth, but she can't keep her tongue from swirling over her incisors from underneath her lips.
She's nervous, even though Liara's been on this ship for almost a week; in all that time, the two of them haven't spent a single moment alone, have hardly spared a word that wasn't about the Shadow Broker and what they were going to find when they got to his base. A whole lotta people willing to die for nothing, it turns out, Kelsa reflects. Not like there's ever been a shortage of those around. And for what? A yahg, some kind of monster alien race that makes the krogan seem like a bunch of pet iguanas. He was one tough motherfucker to take down, but she'd done it, in the end.
She always does.
And after the blood cooled and Garrus and Tali had come to, Kelsa thought that'd be that. But as she'd turned to leave Liara in control of the most dangerous ship in the galaxy, the asari called her back, asked her if they might have a proper talk the next day.
The next day's today. Now.
Kelsa forcibly relaxes the fist behind her back as her door dings. EDI's already been briefed to give Liara the run of the ship. Miranda didn't like that too much, but she liked the prospect of another hole in her floor even less. For just a second, though, the soldier regrets her unexamined insistence, her empty gut clenching in the space between the door hissing open and the asari stepping over the threshold.
Too preoccupied with her own scarred reflection, Kelsa isn't at all prepared for the vision that greets her when she swings around. It's Liara, unmistakably, but not like Kelsa's ever seen her before. Rather than the functional attire of the scientist or the practical uniform of the information broker, she's wearing a sleeveless crimson gown made out of shimmering silk that hugs her in all the ways that Kelsa's can't deny she's wanted to since she got off of Miranda's table. Further, the asari's normally-freckled cheeks are now a faded cerulean, her race's equivalent of blush, expertly applied. "Fuck," the soldier gruffs, unable to hold it back this time. "You're beautiful."
"I...thank you," Liara allows, her head tipping forward. "...Kelsa," she adds, in a small, uncertain voice. "I've brought you a gift," she points out, more strongly, holding out an honest-to-god wicker-weave basket that Kelsa didn't notice until now. It's almost enough to make her laugh, until she catches sight of what's in the basket. "Favourites of yours, as I recall," Liara adds, over the gasp of pleasure that steals out of Kelsa's throat.
A pristine bottle of Jameson whiskey sits nestled amidst a veritable mountain of pears. These are indeed two of Kelsa's favourite things in the galaxy, and for a long moment the soldier just stands there, awestruck and overloaded by the gesture. It takes Liara patiently clearing her throat before Kelsa snaps out of her trance. "Thanks," she grunts, reaching out to grab the basket; electricity runs over two of her fingertips where they brush against the asari's knuckles, but the contact doesn't last. "I don't...have anything…" she begins, grimacing. I didn't even dress up, she almost says, but Liara speaks up just as her lips part.
"That isn't true, Kelsa," she corrects the soldier. "You have the spirit of the galaxy within you. Never forget that."
Kelsa glances away, her scarred cheek tingling with the force of her smirk. "Don't you say that to everybody, Blueblood?" Unlike a lot of her kind, Liara really does believe in her Goddess, at least in her own way.
"Not everyone actually has the galaxy in their debt," Liara observes, wryly. Then her eyes skip over Kelsa's shoulder, fixing on the pane of glass behind her. The asari's head tilts thoughtfully. "...There appears to be a layer of fish corpses floating at the top of your tank. Interesting design choice."
Kelsa gruffs a laugh, rubbing the back of her neck with her free hand. "Picked them up on Illium," she explains. "Kinda...lost track of time over the last few days. Sorry, I shoulda cleared them out before you got here, I just…"
"Had other things on your mind?" Liara ventures, somewhat kindly. She takes the liberty of stepping down the stairs into Kelsa's quarters proper, and the soldier can't help but follow, still holding tight to that wicker-weave basket. "What has been on your mind, Kelsa?" The asari probes, once Kelsa reaches the lower floor. "Have you put any thought to what you might want...after…"
After I've saved the whole damned world, Kelsa fills in, mentally, though she can't hold back another grunted laugh. "You kidding?" She gruffs, shaking her head. "You know me better than that, Blueblood." Or at least you used to. "I could've died half a dozen times the last time I set foot outside this boat. No idea if I'm gonna see the other side of next week, much less get back from the Omega-4 Relay, assuming we're able to hit it before the Collectors can evacuate the rest of humanity's presence outside the Sol system." She breathes a heavy sigh, finally setting down the asari's gift. "Truth is...I'm not sure I wanna come back," she admits, unable to look directly at her guest. "Done a lotta things a hero ain't supposed to do...a lotta things I shoulda done different."
The asari's fingers send another jolt of electricity through Kelsa's flesh as they brush over her cracked cheek, gently guiding the soldier's face up to meet the taller woman's eyes. "That would entail a great deal of pain for those of us who count you as...dear," she says.
Kelsa's breath catches in her throat, and she has to swallow hard to clear it. "Didn't think I had any of those left," she gruffs. "Some of those things I shouldn't've done...they'll hurt some of those people, if they ever find out about 'em."
"You should keep in mind that the people close to you are of a certain calibre," the asari insists. "People like us do not easily succumb to common hurts." Her fingers begin to draw away, but Kelsa catches her wrist impulsively, leaning forward into the contact, her eyes half-lidding as she breathes in Liara's crisp scent under the perfume of the pears.
"I don't know about next week," the soldier breathes, hissing through her teeth. "But we're here tonight, Blueblood. I...missed you."
Liara's eyes flutter closed as she draws closer. "I've missed you, too, Kelsa," she husks, a tremble in her voice. "So very, very much."
Author's note (again): I find myself in the market for another beta-reader. If you're interested, you can message me here or hit me up on tumblr (link in my profile).