A/N: once again, all thanks to the incomparable Bladhaire for her infinite patience and help. Sorry for the delay in this chapter, and it's shortness.
Shepard felt the bullet as it hissed past her ear close enough to draw blood. The next instant she was crashing into her clone and the two fell to the ground.
Bailey, woozy and coated with blood from the numerous cuts on his head, grabbed weakly for the gun in Not-Del's hand, just managing to tear it free of her grip. She grabbed for Del's throat instead, and as Shepard tried to press her advantage the pair of them rolled and hit poor Bailey again. The back of his head struck the wall of the van and that was enough to break his last tenuous grip on consciousness.
Del managed to gain dominance again, pushing herself up enough to tear the grip away from her throat, and smashed a fist into her clone's face.
Not-Del may not have had the upbringing or the training that the original Shepard had, but the bitch could take a hit. Ignoring her split lip she almost immediately returned the punch, cracking her fist into the side of Del's face that was still a marble of bruises from the hit with the skycar. The cuff and iron bar still hanging from her wrist only made the hit worse as it cracked into Del's temple with the same blow. Blood immediately began to pour down the side of her face as the cuff opened a nasty gash.
Not-Del heaved, throwing Shepard back and off of her before she could get the stars out of her eyes. Del's feet tangled in one of the limp bodies as she stumbled up, and for a brief moment she realized she was going to fall right out of the open doors of the transport.
Just as she tipped the balance, her hands flailing out to either side in an attempt to catch hold of one of the doors, she felt the transport bump hard beneath her feet. A second later, she landed flat on her back on the hood of the skycar. Liara had surged forward, rear-ending the transport and using the car to keep Del from falling.
Del didn't have a second to catch her breath. She tore her pistol off her hip in the same motion she shoved herself up and back into the van, but Not-Del hadn't been idle. The moment she'd shoved Del, the clone was back on her feet, weapon back in hand and opening fire.
Bullets smacked into Shepard's pads, one singing past far too close to her face again for comfort. More than one sparked off the skycar, forcing Liara to pull back again.
Del couldn't fire back. The big metal box that was the back of the transport would only send the bullets singing back toward her and Liara if they missed, or might hit Bailey. Instead she twisted, bringing the fist weighted with her pistol slamming into the side of her clone's face with such force she felt her wrist crack.
Now it was Not-Del's turn to lose her balance. She stumbled into the wall, pistol flying from her hand. She recovered fast, grabbing hold of Shepard's broken wrist and shoving back toward her.
The two Shepards' spun around again. Del grabbed the empty cuff as Not-Del tried to tear back from her, using it to haul her in again and slam a fist right into the middle of her face. Her nose exploded with a glut of blood and Not-Del stumbled again, managed by the barest margin not to go down, and hauled herself backward hard on the cuff that remained around her wrist.
Del stepped forward, trying to prevent her from tearing her hand free of the last cuff as she'd done the first, and attempted to pull her back in, but her tug came just a second too late. The clone's feet slipped from the open back of the van and suddenly she was falling. Del, yanked off balance by the sudden full weight of the other woman, stumbled and nearly went out with her. Her free hand grabbed frantically at the frame of the door and she hit the floor of the transport hard on her knees.
Wind whipped around them. From past where the clone was hanging from her cuff, Del could see they were still a good five hundred or more feet up into the air. Liara was still dogging them, a crumpled dent in the hood of the skycar where she'd caught Del, and several cracks in the windscreen from the various bullets that had struck it.
The clone was kept from falling to her death only by the cuff that Shepard still held tight to. Her grip on both the cuff and the transport was white-knuckled, and she shouted to be heard over the wind.
"I'm going to haul you up!"
"Fuck you!" the clone shouted back, her words snatched away almost instantly, making her sound far away. Reaching up with her free hand she gripped onto the bar of the cuffs and started trying to pull.
For a brief moment, Shepard thought she was trying to get her to over-tip- going on the idea if she had to fall and die, she was going to bring Del with her. Then she realized the clone wasn't trying to overbalance her, but instead trying to get her hand out of the cuff again.
"Don't do this!" Shepard tightened her grip on both cuff and door. "I can pull you in! You don't need to do this!"
"Fuck you!" came the return shout, and she continued to struggle. Her motions were now making her twist a little, and it was threatening to tear Shepard's grip free.
Shifting, Del lay down on her stomach, releasing her hold on the door frame and doubling her grip on the cuff. Not-Shepard screamed wordlessly up at her, a sound of furious rage rather than fear.
"Let me go!"
"No!" Del called back. "You don't have to die!"
An expression that was almost feral appeared on the clone's face. Her feet swung up and planted on the bottom of the transport and she grabbed her own wrist.
"I said FUCK YOU!" she roared, and gave a monstrous heave. Bones snapped audibly, part of the skin on her hand tearing away, as she ripped her hand free from the cuff and fell.
Del could do nothing but watch her drop.
Melara smiled faintly at her father as Shepard went quiet, the sound of the river and the trees the only sounds for a long moment.
"You know, I think I've lost track of how many times Mama saved your life," she said.
"So have I," Del said softly.
"What happened to the clone?" Mel asked, and when Shepard looked at her, added, "Did they…find her?"
"It'd make a better story I think if I said that no trace of her was ever found," Shepard said with a smirk. "That she may show up someday, seeking her vengeance? I guess if I were to ever write a book, that's the direction I'd go in. Sad to say, the reality is less dramatic. They found her. I made very sure that she was disposed off properly. No chance of someone using her to make another clone, or trying to bring her back the way they did me."
"I still don't know if I believe your point," Mel said thoughtfully.
"Which point is that?"
"That you would have been anything like her without your past," she said. "It was not just the lack of your past that differed the two of you. She had someone lying to her almost the moment she opened her eyes, conditioning her into hating you, coveting what you had. Her disdain at what she called the 'Cult of Shepard' to me is just jealousy- seeing what she could have been and had and knowing she fell short."
"And if I hadn't had my past, I at least wouldn't have had another Shepard that I was constantly forced to compare myself to."
"Yes."
"I guess you're a pretty smart kid," Del said. Mel gave her a wry look, then turned her eyes back to the river, sighing heavily. Reaching over, Shepard put her hand on her daughter's shoulder. "I know."
"I suppose in the end it doesn't matter if my life would have been different," Mel said after a long moment. "Or if those differences would have been good or bad, in the end. This is what I have. I hate it. I hate it so much, but this is what I have."
"It's all any of us have, I guess," Del nodded. "We just gotta make the best of it as we can. Figure out what we believe in, then fight for that as hard as we're able."
"Learn to swim in the ocean," Mel said softly.
"Exactly right."
"You and Mama did not keep Anderson's apartment," Mel said after another short pause. Del lifted a brow.
"No, we didn't," she said. "After the war was over, we just wanted to get as far away as we could from everything- metaphorically, if not physically. After Anderson died I just couldn't stomach stepping foot there again."
"What happened to it?"
"We gave it back over to Kahlee Sanders. She held on to it for a little while, but I think it ended up being too painful for her too. It's still there, as far as I know. I think it belongs to one of her students, or a cousin of hers or something. Doesn't matter I guess. Last I saw of it was when we left the Citadel the last time before hitting Anadius."
She smiled a bit then, looking at the river with wistful eyes. "We did have a hell of a goodbye party, though."
"A party?" Mel asked, and Del laughed.
"Yeah. It was Joker's idea. About the only good one he had. It ended up being quite a weekend…"