Um.

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!

Real life bit me on the butt in a sort of big way. Depression, monstrous class loads, social drama, you know how it goes. That said, I passed all my classes, fought off the big nasty depression beastie, dealt with the drama, and caught up on my sleep.

Which means I now have a backlog of video games to play and a boatload of writing to do.

I haven't played Andromeda yet. I've heard mixed things; as a long-time fan of the series I'll probably pick it up at some point and give it a go. Maybe after they fix some of the facial animations.

N/B: This was written over the course of (literally) a year. Apologies if the tone changes. I tried to edit it, but I can almost guarantee I missed something.

"So as I'm sure you all heard, we will be arriving at the Citadel as soon as the Alliance gets us a secure slip, which means your shore leave will be officially starting in very short order," Shepard said to the assembled crew of the Normandy, prompting more than a few cheers.

She smiled and waved them all to silence. "Yes, yes, you're all very glad. Unfortunately, for operational reasons we're doing things a little differently than normal."

"Can we still get piss drunk?" one of the marines called from the back of the room near the Mako.

Shepard rolled her eyes. "I doubt very much my orders would have any impact on that," she said dryly. "Now pipe down, this is important."

The crew shifted slightly, and while the average posture was still nowhere near formal, it was at least approaching respectful attention.

"You are not to go boasting about your posting while cavorting in bars," she said. "I don't care if you tell your loved ones, but Saren could have eyes, ears, and hands all over the Citadel and we know he has the capability of brainwashing people. So in the interest of sparing our young resident quarian the unpleasant sight of me tossing you into deep space through her bedroom, keep your mouths shut. Do I make myself perfectly clear?"

A chorus of 'yes, ma'am" rolled back at her, and she nodded approvingly. "Good. Now, in the unfortunate event that you are identified, the usual rules apply: You are not allowed to talk to the press or members of the public, refer all questions to me, another officer, or the Alliance public relations team."

She scrolled down her data slate and tapped a button. "Second item: You all should have received your schedules for the weekend, so no excuses for being AWOL. It's dock duty on a secure berth, so I don't care if you're nursing a hangover and half functional, but if you don't show up you will be having words with the MPs. Those of you interested in swapping or picking up extra shifts, talk to the XO before you head out," she said, pointing at the elevator Pressly was leaning against. "He'll get you sorted."

"That's all from me," Shepard said, tucking the data slate under her arm. "Officers and ground crew, please stick around for a few moments. The rest of you – dismissed."

She waited for the hubbub to die down while the Normandy's flight crew, marine complement, and other assorted personnel wandered back to their postings or the mess hall, then waved the remaining small group together.

"Ma'am?" Ashley asked when they'd all gathered in a rough semicircle.

"I have a couple special assignments for some of you, since I'm afraid we don't get a wild raucous shore leave like everybody else," Shepard said.

"I was afraid of that," Ashley sighed.

"There will be other less expensive bars to crash in the future, Williams, don't worry," Shepard said with a smirk. "Alright. First order of business: Tali, Kaidan, and Ash – I'm sending you out of the station quartermaster again."

"Me?" Tali asked in confusion. "But I'm not Alliance..."

"Because you'll looking over the clean room module we're sticking down on the cargo deck. As nice as our airlock is, I'd like it available for short-order use, and I'm sure you'd appreciate a little bit more room and privacy."

"I- oh," Tali said faintly. "You didn't need to do that..."

"Nonsense," Shepard said. "We have those things for a reason. Just help make sure it passes muster – we use them for transporting medical patients in quarantine so it should work for you, but I want you to tag along to make sure."

Tali nodded. "I will, Shepard. And... thanks."

"Don't worry about it," Shepard said. "Ash? Kaidan? You can handle your side of things?"

"Not a problem, ma'am," Kaidan acknowledged. "I think the QM's getting used to seeing me now, anyway."

"Hopefully with fewer shouting matches. Pressley, any issues with the schedule for the weekend?" Shepard said, turning to face her executive officer.

He shook his head. "No, ma'am – there were the usual complaints, but nothing of substance."

"Good. Thanks for handling that," she said, ticking off an item on her data slate's list. "Garrus, Wrex – I have a somewhat unconventional job for you two."

"Hrh," Wrex rumbled. "A job with him?"

"Is that going to be a problem?" she said, eyeing the krogan coolly.

Wrex stared at Garrus for a long moment, then broke into a wide grin. "Naaaaah. I like this one. What do you want?"

Shepard sighed and reached into the pocket of her jumpsuit, pulling out an unmarked credit chit. "I got word from the Saints last night," she said grimly. "One of their operatives reported that an asari matching Benezia's description landed on Noveria several days ago, with several shuttles of commandos."

Liara paled, and Wrex's eyes lost their humor. "Commandos?" he asked carefully.

Shepard nodded.

"That makes things interesting," he said, and this time there was no levity in his voice. "I take it we're going shopping, then," he said, nodding at the chit in Shepard's hands.

"You are," Shepard confirmed. "This is a hundred thousand credits. Make sure you use at least some of it to get us a crate or two of the nastiest polonium ammo you can get your hands on – and if you need my authority to make the purchase, so be it. Beyond that, anything goes – intel, equipment, bribes, whatever you need to give us an edge. Try not to start any gang wars you can't finish before we leave."

She handed the chit over to Wrex, who carefully tucked it in a locked compartment on his omni-tool projector. "Consider it done," he said.

"Garrus? Can you handle that?" she asked the turian, who had remained quiet through the whole conversation.

"Not what I'm usually asked to do, but it won't be a problem," he said with a snort. "A bit ironic, perhaps, but I can handle it."

She nodded. "I wouldn't ask if I didn't think we'd need it."

"And me?" Liara asked.

Shepard smiled. "You and I are going to go see your lawyer," she said, "or at least your house's law firm. If Saren has gotten to your mother, I would rather have him not have access to your house's, ah, less official funds and resources."

The asari flinched. "I had not considered that," she admitted.

"I'm not surprised," Ash said. "You, uh, don't really strike me as the 'ambitious daughter looking to replace her mother at first chance' type, if you get my meaning."

"Replace her? Goddess, no!" Liara exclaimed. "Setting aside the fact that she is my mother, I could barely stand the few social obligations she forced me to endure. Actually seeking out more by choice?" She shuddered. "No, please. No sooner than I must."

Ash laughed and slapped Liara on the back. "You're okay in my book, T'Soni," she said, nearly knocking the asari on her face in the process. "Anything else, ma'am?"

Shepard smiled and shook her head. "Nope. That's it from me. Dismissed."

"So... my family's law firm?" Liara asked while they were waiting for the airlock to cycle.

Shepard's eyes flickered up to the intercom before she tipped her head from side to side. "That is one of our errands, yes," she hedged.

Liara sighed. "If you ever give up your career in soldiering, Shepard, I would strongly advise you to consider becoming a professional gambler."

"Duly noted," Shepard said, "But to answer your question – I know we haven't discussed the matter at length, but surely you must have considered the possibility that we will not be able to bring your mother back alive or... whole," she said, tapping her temple to drive the point home.

"I am no fool, Commander," Liara replied, bitterness setting in to her voice. "I am aware of the... consequences... of Saren's capabilities."

"I know you aren't, Liara," Shepard said, "but there are other facets to this. Your family is quite well off, even by asari standards, yes?"

"I suppose," Liara said slowly. "I must admit not paying a great deal of attention to our family's holdings."

"You mentioned as much before," Shepard said. "While all of Benezia's publicly listed assets are frozen thanks to her affiliation with Saren, I have no doubt that she has a strong list of... less public resources available for her use, and that's on top of the followers who may be compromised."

"But I just told you, I know nothing of our family's arrangements," Liara argued. "I cannot-"

"You can't directly reveal them, that's true," Shepard acknowledged. "But you are the sole daughter of Benezia. Let me present two scenarios to you."

Liara nodded, confusion on her face, and Shepard began counting on her fingers. "First, I go in there with what access codes you know and a letter of endorsement. I demand, using my Spectre authority, that your lawyers and accountants cease all under-the-table business on behalf of your mother. They, of course, immediately deny any such transactions are taking place, make a very nice show of taking offense at the implication, and say something along the lines of 'if you have no further business with us, Spectre...?' before shooing me out the door."

Liara giggled into her hand at the image Shepard painted.

"Clearly, this doesn't work very well," Shepard said. "Now, the second approach. Instead of throwing my authority around, you lead the newly-minted and clearly out-of-her-depth human Spectre into the law firm. You are distraught and angry at the reports you've seen of your estranged mother's treason, and, out of a desire to see justice done, you contacted the Spectre you saw in the news and asked for her help in making sure her mother couldn't use the family's back channels to further her nefarious schemes. Confused but appreciative, the Spectre offers her authority to the scion of the family in her attempt to keep the family's name from being tainted by association with a traitor any more than it already has been."

Liara stared at her.

"The only question is whether or not you can play the part," Shepard said. "I believe you're capable of it, but it will call for more assertion than I have seen you demonstrate in social situations up to this point."

"I did train at my mother's side for decades, Commander. I am not wholly useless in the world of politics and lies. They are just not to my taste."

Shepard smiled. "Then it's a plan."

It was not uncommon, Shepard had discovered, for the larger asari houses to have in-house legal teams, which would have made what she was trying to do much more difficult. Chances were, if the house's legal team had been living with and in close contact with Benezia and Saren, they'd have been as compromised as the commandos working personally with Benezia had been.

Fortunately, Liara's family was important but not particularly large. Influential, certainly, but unlike some of the houses that ran large scale businesses, it didn't have staff and extended relations in the hundreds or even thousands... which meant that rather than keep an in-house legal team, they paid a respectable firm to take care of their legal obligations.

Which was what brought them to their current meeting in a nice, wood-paneled office with an older asari wearing a crisp business suit while Liara pleaded her case.

And she sells it well, Shepard thought. She'd expected to need to do most of the heavy lifting in this little maneuver, but to her great surprise Liara had taken the lead commendably, leaving her to simply confirm her involvement or clarify a few details.

The lawyer, who had introduced herself as Asella, pursed her lips at looked at her notes. "Just to clarify, you are not looking to gain access to or control of your family's business dealings, correct?"

Liara shook her head. "I have never wanted to run my family's affairs," she said. "My mother had to do a great deal just to get me as involved as I was. Voluntarily taking on more of that..." she shuddered. "No, thank you. Not if I can help it."

Asella offered a sympathetic smile. "You might be surprised at how many of our clients feel the same way, Doctor T'Soni," she said, standing up from her seat. "If you'll excuse me for a few minutes, I need to go discuss this with other members of the firm. I shouldn't be long."

"Well," Liara said with a long sigh when Asella stepped out, "that was... wearying."

They probably have listening devices in here, Liara. Don't let your guard down yet.

Shepard patted her on the shoulder. "Thank you for being willing to do this," she said. "The fewer resources Benezia can muster against us, the more measured our response can be."

"Do you really think it will make a difference?"

No. "I hope so," Shepard said, "but... even if it doesn't... it still keeps those resources out of the hands of Saren, down the line."

Liara pursed her lips. "I find that to be something of a cold comfort, if you will pardon me for saying so."

There was nothing Shepard could say to that.

As the silence stretched out between them, she found herself thinking back on the impressions and sensations Liara had managed to leave behind when she'd gone rooting through her memories. The emotions were alien to her still, but physical sensations – the churning of her gut, the tremble of limbs, the tingle down a spine, the adrenaline-fueled rush, all of it – defined something, even if what it defined was unknown and unknowable.

I wonder how they endure it, she wondered, moving through the world on the puppet strings of such... compulsions.

Well. They clearly managed somehow, as the galaxy did have some semblance of civilization in it, at least last she'd checked.

Still, I sometimes wonder if-

Her train of thought was interrupted by the hiss of the door to the office. "I'm sorry that took so long," the asari apologized before settling into her desk chair.

"Not a problem," Shepard said. "What's the news?"

"Good and bad," Asella said with a sigh. "I'm sure you understand how the... sensitive nature of some of your mothers' business dealings led her to implement various protections against unwanted scrutiny."

"I am beginning to," Liara said. "Much to my distaste."

"It's not all bad," Asella said, somewhat stiffly. "We'll do what we can. Some of her dealings are buried by bureaucracy, others by obscurity, and some the paperwork was... misfiled. It helps that you're not trying to take control of them; it's far easier to simply deny access than it is to transfer ownership. Especially with some of the protections she put in place."

Liara frowned. "What kind of protections?"

Asella waved a hand in the air. "Oh, important account access numbers get encrypted, DNA locks for access, things like that. It's far easier to put temporary holds on things like that than it is to move them around."

"I see," said Liara, sounding slightly lost.

Asella smiled. "I know it's not your area of expertise, Doctor. If you'd like, I can draft some documents on your behalf that should accomplish most of your goals."

"That would be most helpful," Liara said, nodding. "The sooner she stops using my house's assets to do... terrible things... the better."

Asella smiled sympathetically. "I'll start work on that as soon as we're finished here, then. Do you require anything else, Doctor T'Soni?"

Liara glanced at Shepard. "I don't think so. Unless you need something, Spectre?"

Shepard shook her head. "I think Doctor T'Soni covered most of it," she said. "I'm really just here to throw my thumbprint on any pieces of paperwork that it would help to have a Spectre's authority on."

Asella chuckled. "I imagine when compared to the things you must deal with, legal paperwork is on the boring side."

"Less pulse-pounding, perhaps, but no less important," Shepard said, prompting a startled glance from Asella. "I'm a soldier by trade, but laws and contracts have power, too. Just because I'm not good with them doesn't mean I'm not aware of their impact."

"Well, I may be somewhat biased, but I certainly like to think so," Asella said. "In that case, I'll get started on these documents. I should be able to get a rough outline to you within a couple days, and from there it depends on how many revisions are needed. Since you're not transferring ownership, just placing holds, I don't think it will take too many."

Liara and Shepard stood and shook the lawyer's hand. "That would be excellent, thank you."

"And I have your contact information. Doctor T'Soni, Spectre Shepard – I'll be in touch."

"Do you think it worked?" Liara asked as soon as they were out of the building.

Shepard pursed her lips, then shrugged. "Hard to say. We'll have a better idea when I see the draft she sends us."

"I thought you said you weren't good with legal documents?"

"I lied," Shepard smiled. "But even an amateur would have an easy time with this one. If she gives us a document with specifics – transactions from account number so-and-so are frozen pending manual approval from Liara T'Soni, and the like – then she likely bought the story and is on our side, so to speak. I'd still consult an information broker to run some traces on the accounts she gives us to make sure they're actually Benezia's, but I'd be inclined to trust her. If, on the other hand, it's full of vague and nonspecific promises, then she's trying to pull a fast one and we need to consider the possibility that they're compromised."

"What if she locks down some, but not others? We have no way of knowing the extent of my mother's dealings," Liara asked with a scowl.

Shepard shrugged. "It's a possibility. I'm relying on your knowledge of the general scope of your house's affairs for this. As long as we're depriving Saren and Benezia of significant quantities of money and material goods, though, we've succeeded at least partially in doing what we set out to do. The question isn't whether or not we got everything, but whether or not we got enough to make the outing worth it."

Liara shook her head. "I wish things like this weren't necessary."

"What?" Shepard glanced at the asari, "the lawyers? Or the scheming?"

"Both, but I was referring to the scheming. I would take the most onerous tasks at a dig site any day over what we've had to do since the geth captured me."

Shepard glanced down at her omni-tool's wrist display. "I could lie to you, if you'd like, and tell you that we won't need to do it again in the future."

Liara wrinked her nose. "I think I prefer the truth."

"Figured you might," Shepard grinned. "If you don't have anything else on your schedule, may I suggest we get lunch? It's getting to be about that time, and we both burned a lot of calories on that mission."

Liara blinked, then smiled. "Lunch does sound nice. Did you have somewhere in mind?"

Shepard shrugged. "Not really. I'm pretty new to the Citadel. I'll eat just about anything levo, though, so if you know somewhere, feel free to lead the way."

"I haven't been on the Citadel in... Goddess, it's been decades. I doubt any of the restaurants I went to are still around," Liara said. "Although I suppose it would not hurt to check."

Shepard gestured at the air car terminal. "Then by all means, lead on."

The restaurant, Liara discovered, was still around. It was a modest affair, as things went on the Citadel, with only three brightly lit signs proclaiming its name and logo instead of the more typical giant illuminated wall blaring its existence to half the galaxy.

"Good afternoon, and welcome to Cerasi's," the cheerful asari at the door said when they approached. "Table for two?"

"Yes, please," Shepard said. "A slightly more private table, if you have one available."

"Of course," the waiter said. "Right this way."

Liara's heart skipped a beat and she glanced questioningly at Shepard. "Private?"

Shepard shrugged. "If we're going to discuss business over lunch, I'd rather not have to worry about keeping my voice down all the time."

Oh. Of course, that makes perfect sense. "I see," Liara said, trying not to let the... relief? Disappointment? She was feeling show on her face.

"Unless you're tired of shop talk," Shepard continued. "I could understand it if you were. It's been a busy few days."

Now that, Shepard, is the understatement of the century, she thought dryly. "Shop talk, as you say, is fine by me."

The waiter led them around to a small table tucked amidst several potted plants near one of the windows looking out on the walkway. They took their seats, thanked the waitress for the menus and ordered drinks – water for Shepard and a traditional tea for Liara – before settling in to a comfortable silence.

It is strange, Liara thought while staring blankly at the menu, how comfortable I am sitting with a woman who I, not twenty hours ago, feared would end my life.

"A credit for your thoughts?" Shepard asked, startling her out of her reverie.

Liara cocked her head to the side. "A credit for my thoughts?"

"Ah. Human expression," Shepard explained with a smile. "Roughly means 'what are you thinking about.' I'm still getting the hang of asari facial expressions, but I think I've nailed down 'lost in thought' well enough."

"Credit for my thoughts," Liara hummed, rolling the phrase around in her head. "I was merely reflecting on how rapidly my life has changed of late."

"We could always take you back to Therum, if you'd like," Shepard offered. "I imagine the dig site's a bit warm, though."

Liara laughed politely into her hand and shook her head. "No, thank you. I believe the risk of death by geth is still preferable to certain death by immolation."

Her smile faded somewhat. "Actually, Shepard, do you mind if I ask you a personal question?"

Shepard squinted at the menu. "Go ahead."

Liara took a deep breath. "You employ a great deal of humor in your conversation, more so even than the eponymous Joker. Even when we are-" she paused, and considered her words for a moment, "-in private."

Shepard sighed and set the menu down. "I'll trade you for the answer," she said.

"Trade?" Liara asked.

"I don't know any of the food on this. Pick me out something?"

Of course. Even if she can read the menu, it's not like she'll know what each dish is! She smiled. "Deal, Commander."

"My thanks. Now, as to your question..." Shepard leaned back in her chair, her lips pursed in thought. "I think it's a combination of several factors, really."

"Oh?" Liara said, looking over the menu for something the human might enjoy.

Shepard nodded. "It's partially a defense mechanism, obviously. It took me years to learn to... blend in well with people. Making jokes and earning a reputation for humor meant that if I said something wrong, chances were good it would be dismissed as a joke that missed the mark rather than a sign of something more serious. As for the rest, well," Shepard spread her hands and smiled. "A great deal of human humor has its roots in the defiance of expectation and the juxtaposition of what is expected with what actually occurs. I find those idiosyncrasies interesting, and so I study them. You might even say I find them funny," she added with a small shrug.

"You jest, then, because you share the sense of humor as the rest of your people?"

The human rubbed her chin. "Probably," she admitted. "Humanity as a whole is not prone to bouts of self-reflection. There are those among us that take the time to, of course, but for the most part there is a strong fixation with being 'right' among humans that leads us to avoid re-evaluating our positions and viewpoints as often as we should."

"You seem to be an exception," Liara said. "I know I have seen you carefully consider your deeds, both before and after you do them."

"Not as much as you might think," Shepard said, shaking her head. "It's like the mirrors on a ground vehicle: Just because I know the areas that I cannot see does not mean I know what's in them. Ah, there's our waitress."

Liara ordered their lunch: A brine-preserved spiced shellfish bowl for her, and after a brief consultation, a baked kelp and fish platter for Shepard. Both were fairly traditional meals, or at least as decent a reproduction as one could find beyond Thessia, and Liara was careful to select one that had relatively low levels of element zero. While the substance was essential for her own health, it was a poison in high doses for nearly every other species in the galaxy – humanity included.

"I take it seafood is popular among asari?" Shepard asked when the waitress finished taking their orders.

"You might say that," Liara smiled. "Asari are not as far removed from our aquatic evolutionary origins as you would think. Not to the same degree that the hanar are, of course, but we are only a few hundred generations removed from our last significant evolutionary branch... and it was the branch that moved our species out of the water and on to land."

Shepard's eyes widened. "Humanity differentiated roughly.." she frowned and pursed her lips, "maybe four or six thousand generations ago, and even that was a fairly minor shift from what I remember. You're telling me the asari changed their environment entirely that quickly?"

"You are hardly the first to express doubt," Liara smiled, "but I assure you, the genetic markers are clear. The change is so sudden that there are even a few scholars that believe the asari were uplifted in a similar fashion to the hanar, although if you think the response to my articles was severe-" she trailed off, laughing softly. "Well. Needless to say, they are not taken seriously."

"Is it possible?" Shepard asked. "I mean, if it happened to the hanar..."

Liara paused. "I suppose it is," she said after a moment, "but I personally find it unlikely. With so few generations between the alterations and now, we would likely still possess stories of the change and the outsiders that caused it, and I know of none in any of the asari cultures I studied. A more likely scenario would be a volcanic eruption near a large element zero deposit causing a spike in the mutation rate, or some other environmental cause. Thessia has an unusually number of mutagens in its environment – it's part of why asari live so long."

"A side effect of defenses against genetic damage?" Shepard asked.

"Precisely," Liara confirmed, beaming. "It's even why we have these-" she gestured to the almost iridescent flecks on her skin. "Subdermal mineral deposits that help reflect ultraviolet radiation."

"But if the asari have so many defenses against genetic drift, doesn't that make it unlikely to have a large random mutation?"

"The usual argument is something along the lines of 'we evolved them after emerging from the ocean,'" Liara said with a sigh.

"It sounds like you don't agree with that viewpoint."

"I don't, I suppose," Liara said. "Perhaps I am biased in this, but it feels like this is another field that is not getting the attention it deserves because there are people holding positions of respect and authority that feel the matter is settled."

Shepard smirked. "I can see why that might be something of a hot button issue for you, yeah."

Liara canted her head to the side. "Hot button issue...?" she asked, her tone questioning.

"Oh, another human expression," Shepard explained with a wave of her hand. "It means something that upsets you."

"Hot button issue..." Liara said, rolling the expression around like she was trying to taste it. "I'm not sure I understand that one."

"Most of my colloquialisms are pretty old, I'm afraid," Shepard said. "Blame my education."

"I thought you told me you didn't get have one?" Liara asked.

"Not a formal one- oh, lunch!" Shepard gave the waitress a closed-mouth smile as she set their dishes in front of them. "You know I grew up in the streets of Vancouver..."

It was, Liara reflected numbly, a most unusual education.

She'd gotten a solid impression of the major events in Shepard's childhood from their meld, but there was a difference between getting a selection of the strongest memories and a description of what the day-to-day experience actually was like.

Shepard had grown up in a slum, true, and had lived most of her life as a member of a street gang. What that didn't tell the asari was simply how much free time she'd had as a consequence. As a child that had, by her own account, expressed little interest in playing with peers that she often found unpredictable and incomprehensible, Shepard was naturally drawn to one of the few institutions open without question to a young child:

The library.

Her days were, for the most part, spent in the solitary company of books and the few functioning digital terminals. After several failed attempts to bring social services into the picture, the librarians working at the branch had settled for simply keeping a watchful eye on the youngster, who was perfectly content to pass the days reading and resting in their quiet halls.

And read she did.

History. Philosophy. Science. Mathematics. Law. Programming. Physics. Anthropology. Culture. Biology. Genetics. Engineering. Music. She would pick a topic and devour it before following an unfinished thread out into another one, and slowly – like a spider working its way across a web – read her way through a large chunk of the small library's nonfiction section.

By her reckoning, she'd spent about ten years in the library. When she returned the book she checked out for the last time, the librarian informed her that she'd gone through just over five thousand.

"It's not really that I had a formal education," Shepard finished explaining, "it's more that I've read enough to have a passing understanding of most things that are at least old enough and well-known enough to have a book in a small branch library in the bad side of a human starport town."

Liara was staring at the human.

"Did I say something wrong?" Shepard asked.

"The bulk of your education was... reading a library."

"Not a whole library."

"Most of a library, then."

"A modest portion of the non-fiction section."

"How quickly do you read?"

Shepard shrugged. "It varies a lot depending on the material. For most things, I manage about fifteen or twenty words a second."

Liara tapped a few numbers into her omni-tool to convert the time measurements before blinking in surprise. "You could read my entire introductory textbook in an afternoon!"

"Well, maybe." Shepard said. "If it's something I have to spend a lot of time figuring out things from context or looking up new concepts, I slow down a fair bit. It's a handy talent to be sure, but in my line of work it's not really that useful."

"What about other languages?" Liara asked. "You speak... I'm sorry, I don't even know the name of your tongue."

"It's called English," Shepard said, "and no, I don't speak any other languages. I can read simple things in a few other human languages, but I can't speak any of them, and I can't understand them when they're spoken. It's hard enough to learn the correct pronunciation from books, let alone the accents most people speak them with."

"Surely the library had terminals you could use, yes? Translation software has been common for many years now," Liara said.

"I think you underestimate exactly how out-of-the-way this place was," Shepard replied with a quickly fading smile. "Besides, the terminals they did have were... more exposed than I was comfortable with at the time."

It is a tragedy of the highest order, Liara thought sadly, that a woman of her talents saw no alternatives to the military. Even with her condition, she could have been one of the brightest scholars of our age.

"But the past is the past," Shepard said, "and lunch is now. I will happily discuss it further with you later if you like, but this smells delicious and my body is reminding me that I expended quite a few calories yesterday."

With that, the human skewered a piece of kelp-wrapped fish, popped it in her mouth, and began to chew.

"You're going to buy ammunition from batarian operatives?" Garrus sputtered.

Wrex shrugged. "Hierarchy won't touch the stuff. Alliance won't admit to it. Flotilla might, but they're not here. STG uses it but they won't sell it. Might be able to find a Volus merchant, but they'll sell the fact that you were looking to the next person who walks in the door. We can either shoot pirates for it or buy it from the source, and I'm in a hurry."

Garrus shook his head. "Spirits preserve us..."

It was, Shepard reflected, not wholly unlike sushi, albeit baked and without the rice. It was tasty, if a little mild, and she enjoyed noting the similarities and differences between it and human dishes. The seaweed was stringier than it looked, though, and she had a devil of a time avoiding getting it caught in her teeth.

"What do you think of the meal?" Liara asked while Shepard was running her tongue around her mouth to dislodge a particularly stubborn piece of wrap.

"It's interesting," Shepard said after wrangling the offending piece out of its hiding spot. "It tastes quite nice, but the wrap keeps getting stuck in my teeth."

"Ours have slightly more separation than yours, I suspect," Liara replied with a smile. "That aside, I am glad you find it tolerable. I will admit to more than a little concern you would find it unpalatable."

"I grew up in a slum and joined the military, Liara, I'm not exactly a picky eater."

"Be that as it may, if I am suggesting a meal, I would prefer it to be something enjoyable rather than merely tolerable."

Shepard laughed. "Fair enough."

"So," Shepard asked as they left the restaurant, "did you have anywhere else to be? Otherwise I thought we'd stop by the Embassy to give them a status update before heading back to the Normandy."

Liara wracked her mind, then shook her head. "My only duties are ones involving official documentation and a great deal of terminal time. I should let the sponsors of my research know that I may be somewhat delayed in releasing findings. It is, after all, somewhat difficult to perform excavations in the caldera of an active volcano."

"I'm sure they'll understand," Shepard offered.

"That is my hope," Liara replied. "Do you... would you prefer if I returned to the ship?" she asked, hesitant.

Shepard pursed her lips, then shook her head. "I doubt we'll discuss anything you won't hear from me in short order, and they should know my degree of confidence in you."

Liara had heard it before, of course, but it still made something in her chest squeeze in a not entirely unpleasant way to hear it spoken out loud. "Thank you," she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

"Didn't I tell you not to worry? Come. The politicians await."

"No, I don't care that they're not approved for this specific use! We're going to use them for that, because the things they are rated for more than cover what we plan on doing!" Kaidan said, waving his hand in exasperation. "You didn't even have a problem with this until-"

He paused while Tali made herself look very small at the entrance to the door.

"-fine. If this is how you want to play it, then this is how we play it. I will leave empty-handed. Your superior will get an official letter of complaint. I will then return with the Commander, and you explain to her why she needs to wave her Spectre authority to check out a piece of standard equipment."

He stared at the purple-faced quartermaster levelly. "Or you can put your thumbprint on that screen and we can all go home without that business."

"Commander, this is an unexpected pleasure," Udina sighed when Shepard barged into his office without knocking.

"I'm sure," Shepard said, then nodded at Anderson sitting in one of the guest chairs. "Captain."

"Spectre," he said, returning the gesture. "Is something wrong?"

Shepard shook her head at the pair. "Not that I know of. We were in the area and had some business to take care of."

"Ah, yes, about that," Udina said, tapping his reader on the desk. "You seem to have taken to politics like a fish to water, Commander. Well, the blackmail aspect, at least."

Anderson sighed. "The ambassador has some concerns over your arrangement with ExoGeni, Commander."

Udina looked like he was about to explode for a moment before closing his eyes and letting out a long-held breath. "Concerns. Yes. I would say I had some concerns, Commander."

Shepard cocked her head, waiting.

"What were you thinking? Blackmailing one of the largest companies into giving away their secrets? And to aliens? Do you have any idea how this is going to play with the public?"

Shepard quirked an eyebrow. "I wasn't aware the public would ever find out," she remarked.

"Oh, you know what I mean," the ambassador snapped. "It's going to be hard justifying your nomination to corporate sponsors if you pull stunts like this on a regular basis, Commander!"

"What companies think of me is of little concern," Shepard said. "If human ones won't help, I will find nonhuman ones that will."

"You would turn your back on your people so quickly?" Udina asked, his voice low.

"My people?" Shepard scoffed. "Ambassador, I have no people. I was tricked into taking this job by my captain, after being blackmailed into fighting for you. If you want a puppet to dance to your tune, you would do well to pick one with better strings."

Anderson covered a smirk with his hand, coughing politely while Udina glowered. "Please, people, this isn't helping," he said. "Shepard, you said you had business?"

"I did," Shepard said. "My crew and I are reasonably certain that Saren is attempting to – and may have already partially succeeded – in reactivating some of the vessels used by the race that wiped out the Protheans."

Udina blinked. "I was not aware the Protheans were wiped out."

"Most aren't. Now we don't have hard confirmation on any of this yet, which is one of the reasons we're heading to Noveria on Monday, but... we're pretty certain that he has at least one of the vessels already operational."

The change in Udina's attitude was remarkable, Liara noted. She was far from an expert in human emotions and attitudes, but even a fool couldn't have missed the vitriol that the ambassador had directed at Shepard when she'd walked in. The sudden shift now from antagonistic to concerned and contemplative almost made her head spin.

"These vessels," Udina said slowly, "wouldn't happen to resemble a giant cuttlefish?"

Shepard nodded. "Data recovered from a prothean communication beacon definitely show images of them, in the context of a warning."

"And the reason you felt this didn't belong in your report is...?" he said, rubbing his temples.

"Because the prothean beacons impart their knowledge via mind-to-mind data transfer, and I have some very strong reasons to not let people poke around in my head," Shepard replied primly. "Not to mention the, ah, ease with which one might discredit said knowledge."

Anderson snapped his fingers. "So that's why you went after T'Soni first," he said with a grin. "You wanted somebody to double check what you already knew!"

Shepard tapped the tip of her nose. "Precisely."

"Hoist by our own petard," Udina muttered under his breath. "Damn. I can't give you orders, Commander, but if it's the same kind of ship we saw at Eden Prime, I want to have hard evidence on my desk as soon as physically possible. Naval Intelligence has been looking at what kind of weaponry it would take to glass the spaceport there, and they're not liking what they're seeing."

"Understood – and I agree, Udina," Shepard said, and Anderson nodded.

"Was there anything else?" the ambassador asked.

"Yes," Shepard said. "Did the Saints finish their investigation into T'Soni?"

Liara's heart skipped a beat.

"They have," Udina said, glancing at her. "Did you tell her she was being investigated?"

Shepard nodded. "All of her extranet access has been monitored and she's been supervised by me whenever we've been off the ship. We've also engaged in a mind meld to give her access to the prothean beacon message."

"Reckless," Udina said, but there was no bite to the remark.

"Necessary," Shepard replied.

"If you say so. To answer your question, however, yes, the Saints finished their investigation."

"And?" Shepard pressed.

He sighed. "You were right," he said. "As far as they can tell, she's been genuinely estranged from her mother and her affairs since she began her studies. They're not happy with her being on board the Normandy, mind, but they don't consider her to be a mole – no more than the other aliens you've recruited."

Liara let out a breath she wasn't even aware she was holding.

"Excellent. Now they can go back to writing complaints about how the quarians are going to steal our drive technology, or some other such nonsense." Shepard said.

"Those concerns are entirely reasonable-"

Shepard snorted. "Hardly."

Udina glared at her. "-but I understand why you don't share them, Commander. Now if there's nothing else, Anderson and I were having a meeting."

Shepard bowed her head at the pair. "Then we'll leave you to it, Ambassador. Captain."

"Shepard?" Liara asked tentatively while they rode the elevator from the presidium down to the Normandy's dock. "What would you have done if they said they found evidence that I was a spy?"

Shepard rubbed her jaw. "That depends, really," she said after a moment, "on what the evidence was. If it was just suspicions, or something I believed to be an attempt to get me to remove you from the Normandy for other reasons, I'd have ignored it."

Liara smiled. "I will admit to fearing you might trust their xenophobia over my word."

"Perish the thought," Shepard said. "Now, if they offered something substantial... that's where things get interesting. If you betrayed me due to coercion or blackmail, I'd probably try to convince you we could protect you or mitigate the cause. If it wasn't, well... I'm a decent shot."

Liara felt another chill run up her spine. "Just like that?"

Shepard shrugged. "It's pretty painless and you're a biotic. I'm not giving you a chance to fight back if I can help it."

"I will admit- hello, what's this?"

The elevator door slid open to reveal a veritable riot of activity: C-Sec hovercars, flashing lights, a turian and several humans standing with a megaphone at the edge of a holo-perimeter.

"C-Sec," Shepard said, eyes flickering across the scene before them. "I wonder what happened."

"You there!" A uniformed C-Sec officer jogged up to them. "Ma'am, I'm sorry, this is a very sensitive scene. The elevator should have denied you access-"

Shepard gestured at the sigil sewn into her armor's breastplate.

"Oh! Spectre! I'm sorry, I didn't realize. Maybe you can help?"

"Maybe I can," Shepard replied, "but you'll need to tell me what's going on, first."

"Apologies, ma'am. There was a rescue from a batarian colony raid, very traumatized. Managed to get her hands on a pistol and is threatening herself and others. We're waiting on a specialist to try to talk to her, but he's on the other side of the Citadel and is stuck in traffic."

Shepard reached forward and patted the man on the shoulder. "You have my condolences, officer, but I don't really have the training for that. I'd probably make a mess of it, and it sounds like that could have a bad ending if mishandled."

The officer sighed. "Well, it was worth a shot. Thank you for your time. Uh, you don't need to get to that dock, do you?" he asked, suddenly worried.

Shepard shook her head and pointed to the Normandy one slip over.

"Oh, good," he said, relieved. "It might be a while, otherwise."

"I am somewhat surprised you declined to help that man," Liara said while they sat through the abbreviated decontamination procedure.

"Liara, you of all people should know I am not the person for that job," Shepard said with a laugh. "At best, I would be doing it 'by the book.' At worst, I would make a mess of it and the girl would kill herself, and that's really not the ending everyone there wants."

Liara frowned. "I think your sell your skill short, Shepard," she argued. "Surely your life experiences are worth something in a situation like that."

"They are and they aren't," Shepard said. "Yes, I've seen people in bad places, and I know more than the layperson does about what kind of problems surviving trauma can cause. But that doesn't mean I know how to fix them, or that I can be the person that she needs. I'm good at faking it, Liara, but that's all it is."

Shepard turned to look at her, her face dead and her green eyes dark. "If she sees this, even for an instant..."

Liara resisted the urge to back away. "You haven't failed so far," she argued.

"Oh, I have, and many times," Shepard said. "But people are good at explaining away things they don't want to see. 'She's a soldier, they've seen some awful things' or 'she's N7, they have to be tough.' Somebody that's just survived a horrifying and dehumanizing experience? They're terrified. Frightened. Paranoid. Their mind wants to protect them from going through whatever traumatized them the first time again, and it's not trying to rationalize away the scary or wrong things it sees. It's doing the exact opposite. It sees monsters where there are none, because the alternative – missing a monster – might lead to a repeat of whatever hurt that person the first time."

Shepard sighed, and looked wistfully up at the roof of the decontamination chamber. "Trust is hard, Liara, even among well-adjusted and secure people. For somebody that's survived a slave raid? It's nearly impossible. To make her extend trust, and then betray it by being the very thing she feared... I would be amazed if she ever trusted again."

"But you are not the thing she fears," Liara said. "You are not a batarian slaver, and you really are trying to help."

Shepard smiled ruefully over at Liara. "But I am a monster, Liara, and right now, she is terrified of monsters."

The decontamination cycle completed with a ding and Shepard walked out into the hall, leaving Liara alone with her thoughts.

Next up: Some Citadel departure wrap-up, Noveria mission prep, and then GLORIOUS FAMILY DRAMA.

Also shooting stupid people in the face.