II. Illium

"How's Ashley?"

"Ashley?"

"I… heard you two spoke on Horizon."

The Commander blinked at her. "You really are a good information broker, T'Soni."

"Hm." She smirked a little. Confidence looked good on her.

Shepard clarified: "But that wasn't what I was asking."

Liara peeked over the data feed at her, expression inquisitive.

"Well, I'm not exactly up on current events, but last time I was in the loop it seemed like you two had a pretty good thing going."

"I see. And I take it she didn't mention me?"

"We didn't talk long," answered Shepard, "I'm sorry, Liara."

Silently, Liara nodded her head and returned her gaze to her screen. Her attention, however, was elsewhere.

"Did something happen?"

"Suffice it to say we drifted."

Shepard continued to eye her. "Liara…"

"I would rather not discuss it. Not here, in any case."

"Worried you'll have to put down another assistant?"

T'Soni smiled, slightly. "Something like that."

"The Normandy?"

"That's hardly necessary." Not to mention the Cerberus vessel had just as much if not a higher chance of being bugged than her office. "I have an apartment nearby. And I'm sure you'd enjoy the excuse to be away from your ship for something other than business. I can send a car for you this evening?"

Shepard nodded and stood to go. She still seemed somewhat stiff — Liara wasn't sure if that was because of the awkward back-from-the-dead tension in the room, or perhaps just general discomfort from whatever Cerberus had done to her. She had mentioned having to be woken up early from Project Lazarus, and if the angry looking scar accentuating her jawline was anything to go by, the cybernetics helping to sustain her now had yet to fully integrate into her system. T'Soni wondered if it hurt, and how often the automated medigel dispensers under the commander's armor were at work. As she parted ways with Shepard and her shore party, Liara's glance lingered on Operative Lawson, who only gave her a small, almost imperceivable shake of her head. No, said the gesture, No, I haven't told her. She doesn't know how we got ahold of her body.

Liara sighed in relief before she nearly broke down crying as the doors closed behind them and she was left alone to her work.

Things had always been uphill for the two of them, hadn't it? And once Shepard had died, the Alliance moved quickly to dismantle their little team. Aliens like herself and Garrus were the first to go. After that, she and Chief Williams had done their best to stay in touch, but it was difficult. Once Williams was promoted it became even harder. She was able to contact Liara with less and less frequency, and share fewer and fewer details of where she was or what her current mission objectives were. Though sometimes the marine alluded to the fact these restrictions appeared to be done almost out of spite – seemingly arbitrary and unnecessary red tape, considering the fair level of mundanity in most of her assignments over the next several months. It would have been remiss for Liara not to have admitted to Shepard that some of her coming into the information trade had been done while selfishly seeking answers as to the whereabouts and general safety of her lover.

"It didn't ever officially end. Not really," she told her when they sat together, each facing out towards the large row of windows in Liara's lavish apartment on Illium. They watched as the skycars rushed by, and idly T'Soni wondered how many of their occupants were carrying on with hearts chipped and half empty, as hers was. It's a fascinating organ, the heart, she told herself, One of startlingly few things in this galaxy that can still work while broken.

"When's the last time the two of you spoke?"

"Right after she received her orders about Horizon. I'd found out about it through my channels. I didn't want her to go." She looked down and her brow knit as her tone grew soft and mournful. "We fought. I was scared for her after all the reports of human colonists going missing, and she was angry with me for spying on her professional affairs. She said there were reasons behind the security regulations I had bypassed. That my dismissal of those protocols was… emblematic of a larger issue between us."

Shepard watched her, unflinching, as she spoke, and kindly failed to react to the noticeable quiver in her voice as it broke on the final statement.

"I had kept secrets from her. She didn't know what they were, exactly, but she knew it had to do with my work on Illium."

"She thought you were cheating?"

T'Soni shook her head, "No. At least, I don't think so. But she said it was unfair that I was able to keep things from her, while she was not afforded that same luxury."

She got up and poured herself some wine from the kitchen. Shepard heard a second bottle being opened, and when T'Soni returned to her seat, she handed her a glass, the contents of which were a slightly different color than hers. Shepard thanked her, took a sip, and recognized the vintage. An Earth wine. One her mother was rather fond of. The implications behind how an exact bottle of the stuff could have arrived in Liara's homestead was, admittedly, a tad unsettling. Perhaps she could see where Williams had been coming from.

"It wasn't just because of what I could uncover in my new line of work," Liara went on, "She was always a bit wary about asari melding practices." She sipped her glass and watched as the sun began to set behind the buildings. They were each briefly painted in glorious gold, and Shepard was reminded of the old Earth story of King Midas, whose quest for what he thought he desired above all else led to the loss of those he held most dear.

"I remember." said the commander, "She never liked having to do those back when we were hunting for Saren."

Liara preoccupied herself with drawing tiny circles with her thumb against the swell of her glass. "It wasn't just then. Even after, it took us - her - a long time to be comfortable using one while… being intimate." She blushed, ever so slightly. "It was always a point of contention."

"Ash always was pretty guarded. Not an easy woman to get to know."

"Not at all."

"But worth the challenge?"

"I certainly always thought so."

"So then is she worth the challenge of chasing?"

The question prompted a tired breath from her lips. "It's not that easy, Shepard."

"Nothing worth doing ever is."

"I have responsibilities here. Commitments."

"Ah. Of course." There was that signature sarcasm that could make entire parliaments tremble. Liara bristled slightly as her guest continued, "Those important, time-sensitive commitments. The same reason you can't come with me to help fight the Collectors. Not like the Shadow Broker would still be here when you got back—"

"That isn't fair, Commander, and you know it!" She set the wine glass down on her table a little too hard and some of the contents slosh out and formed small, dark pools against the glass coffee table. Liara used the excuse of getting up to grab a dish cloth to put some distance between herself and the commander, a woman who she'd always respected and, in more ways than one, sometimes feared. Her steadfast moral code, while not always predictable, had been centering during the time they'd traveled together. Liara envied Garrus in some ways, that he could drop everything and go play hero with her again.

She could tell the commander was angry with her — disappointed that she had turned down her request to help her and Cerberus defend against the latest Reaper threat. If she only knew, Liara thought as she returned with a kitchen towel and mopped up the spill, how instrumental I was in her predicament. And some part of herself cruelly asked: Haven't I already done enough?

"I'm sorry," she said, softly, once the mess was cleaned. "I shouldn't have shouted."

"I've heard worse."

Liara picked her drink back up and feigned interest in examining it for cracks as she felt the commander's gaze on her. The stare crackled through the air like static and raised the skin along T'Soni's neck and forearms.

"You should talk to her. She's probably back on the Citadel by now, after what happened on Horizon."

"What would I even tell her?"

"You could start with the truth."

T'Soni turned and felt herself glare. What the hell was that supposed to mean? But Shepard offered no further explanation. She finished her drink soon after, thanked Liara for her hospitality, as well as the leads she'd provided earlier, and then was on her way. She promised to keep in touch as her mission continued, and wished Liara luck with her personal matters. All of them.

"Thank you, Shepard," Liara had replied without watching her go. She heard the door open and automatically lock behind her as the Commander walked out. Liara watched nightfall blanket the city in cold shadows and head-splitting neon, and felt a loneliness so heavy it nearly crushed her.

'It was you, wasn't it?'

The subject line of the email hung in the air like a noose when it popped up on Liara's terminal. At first, T'Soni assumed it to be spam. Another of the countless advertisements on Illium that were always finding new and inventive ways to circumvent even her most expensive firewalls and ad-blockers. It was only once she recognized the sender's ID code that she stayed her hand from where it hovered over the delete button.

She clicked open the message. The body was empty, save an icon in the lower left corner that indicated the user was still online.

Liara considered her reply as she typed it out.

'I don't know what you mean.'

But she stopped herself, touch lingering above the send key.

She erased the message.

'Yes.' Send.

'Does she know?'

'No.'

'How could you do that to her?'

'Ashley…'

The other user went offline and the chat window automatically closed out. Liara sat and stared at the screen of her terminal as she felt a harsh burning in the back of her throat and bit her tongue so hard it nearly bled. She wouldn't allow herself to cry, not when she couldn't trust that she wasn't being watched.

She took a few deep breaths, and returned to the task at hand. She had promised proof of a multi-department cover-up spearheaded by several local politicians, and her buyer was not the type who liked to be kept waiting. Something inside her ached for the days when the secrets she dug up were good for something more than just fodder for blackmail and personal tragedy.

Williams was angry as she snapped closed the display on her omnitool. But she knew she'd say something she'd regret if she kept on.

How could you do that to Shepard? Just hand her over to Cerberus like that? — The group that wiped out her whole squad on Akuze! — Without backup? Without telling her? Without telling me?

Selfishly, that was the part that stung most.

Had T'Soni ever trusted her at all?

She should stop being surprised by now. Liara had always had a penchant for secrets, hadn't she? It was what had drawn her to researching the protheans: the biggest secret in all the Milky Way. Hell, at first, it had even been what had drawn her to Ashley — unlocking the mysteries of those damned visions from the beacon on Eden Prime. But, in the years that had followed their commander's death, that penchant had mutated into near obsession. She drowned in secrets now, and any time Williams had tried to meet her there, the efforts had been suffocating. She was distant. Cold. Closed-off and self-punishing. It was only now that Ashley finally knew the reason why.

She'd thought, at first - maybe narcissistically - that it had been her doing. How the innocent and kind archeologist had ever been drawn to the jaded and pessimistic marine was something Williams had often found herself wondering. She'd been so guarded when they'd met. Reluctant to open up or veer in any way from her human sensibilities. Some part of her had just assumed T'Soni had grown tired of that. And she couldn't really blame her. Williams had been in startlingly few serious relationships in her lifetime. Most had been casual affairs that required little trust and even less vulnerability. Williams had always managed previously to keep up her idealized sense of 'feminine mystique.' But that strategy had proven unusable with a suitor who's people practiced linking minds as part of their intimate relationships. It had been ironic, in its own way: to fall for someone who, rather than bulldozing through the walls Ashley had spent so many years methodically building up, simply stepped right through them all, instead.

Liara had always been kind with her, comforting and helpful in Williams' efforts to make sense of the images and sensation felt on the few, careful occasions she'd been willing to try that more exoticform of lovemaking. But despite the generosity and care from her lover, it had never been easy for Ashley. It had just never felt right. Humans weren't meant to share everything in their heads like that, she'd reasoned. Not to mention how trying to comprehend the sensations and images that passed to her through the joining was all but maddening, at times, even if the physical results had been euphoric.

"You fight it," Liara had told her once, though had done so while smiling. "It would be more enjoyable if you could get yourself to open up and let go."

"I want to," she had answered. "I'm trying."

Williams slammed her fist against the paneling of her small hotel room overlooking the Presidium. 'Let go,' my ass, she thought in her frustration. In all their time together, Williams had never once thought Liara capable of something so violative. Hadn't she herself once said that asari were all taught to be accepting of the deaths of so-called 'short-lived species' like humans? A dozen or more questions raced through her head. How long had T'Soni hunted for Shepard's body? Had she always planned to give it to Cerberus once she found it? Why had she never said something about it to Ashley? How had she never seen even a hint of the idea in her mind when they'd been together? Had she simply been too distracted with her own insecurities and misgivings about the melds, or had Liara actively hidden those thoughts from her?

Had she not trusted her, or did she just know that if she'd told Ashley about it that she would have tried to stop her? Williams wasn't sure which possibility hurt worse.

They'd not been together long when they'd lost the commander, but, despite their rocky origins, Williams had thought that what they'd been building had been the start of something special. Something that had the potential to last. She wondered now how much of that had been little more than a foolish desire from her hidden, romantic side. She chastised herself for mistaking hope for acumen.