"Commander, they have retreated through the relay, out of the system." General Rasler looked up from her series of screens toward where Shepard stood at the command hub. "They launched several mines the moment before they transversed."
"Damage to the relay?"
"Minimal, if any. We should be able to utilize the relay ourselves without complication."
"In time." She stepped off the command hub, and Rasler felt the familiar internal twinge as she saw her face. The twinge not as strong as it had been, but she was still getting used to seeing Del this way after decades of the eyepatch.
Sydney had met Del Shepard for the first time back on Earth, what seemed like ten lifetimes ago. Back then, Del had become the de facto leader of a large and surprisingly effective rebellion formed of criminals, street gangs, and malcontents of every caliber.
Sydney herself had risen in the ranks of an underground faction that had been organized by her parents, back during the First Contact war. When the turians had taken over Earth and dismantled the Systems Alliance, they had executed the Fleet Master and many high-ranking officers. Just being a trained soldier in the Alliance was deemed 'illegal' and many of them had gone underground to avoid capture, imprisonment, and torture. Sydney's parents were two of them, bringing their three-year-old child with them.
They kept on the move, always on the look out for patrols, rarely sleeping in the same place more than once, and doing whatever they could to undermine turian control of the planet. They trained their children as soldiers as well, much as they had once been trained. By the time she was seventeen, Sydney was able to survive in the most hostile environments, track 'a fart through a blizzard' (as her father used to say), could handle and break down almost any firearm known to man, and knew seven different types of hand-to-hand combat.
It was during a raid on a turian armory just outside of Wichita when she met Del Shepard. She'd heard of her by then – they all had – but she never put much stock in the stories. When you heard most news fourth or fifth hand, by people desperate for any hope to cling to, you learned to take such things as 'a group of street gangs led by a criminal has taken back New York City' with not just a grain of salt, but the entire mine.
But she'd been real. Del Shepard had been real. New York had been taken back. And as those 'street gangs' absorbed isolated cells (like the one Sydney had grown up in) and then civilians, they'd taken back the entire country.
Then the entire planet.
Then the solar system.
But back those long years ago, outside that armory in Kansas, Del had already been missing an eye. She'd lost it at age nine, she said, when she'd tried to stab a turian in a raid. Her knifeblade had broken off against that damned armored hide of theirs and the turian had whipped around, backhanding the girl to the ground. A talon caught her just right, and tore out her eye.
He'd knocked her unconscious, left her for dead.
Many had left Del for dead before. It was usually their last mistake.
The latest time had been when they'd taken Tuchanka. The krogan were already neutered, their colonies decimated, when Resurgence boots had touched down on their homeworld, but they were nothing if not tenacious. The last clan chiefs, aided by a handful of asari and rebellious Silent Seveners, had laid a clever little trap. A world-buster bomb, planted on Tuchanka's only moon. They had detonated it when Shepard's command ship (back then it was still the Valkyrie; the Juggernaut was nearly complete but not yet in service) had moved in to orbit.
The explosion of the moon destroyed the Valkyrie. Some of the officers and crew were able to escape via lifeboats, including Rasler herself, but Shepard had been lost to space.
It took them four days to recover the Supreme Commander's body. By then she had entered the Tuchankan atmosphere, coming to ground in the Anterean wastes. It was such a desolate area even those nasty dog-like vermin that crawled all over Tuchanka, the varren, weren't a presence.
Sydney would never forget the sight of her as they brought the corpse back on board. It was a horrific thing, but Sydney didn't remember it because of its horror. No. She remembered it because she wanted to remember.
Flesh burned down to bone, limbs torn free, what meat remained puffed with putrescence. No mortal human being could come back from something like that.
Only a god.
And here she was, a god back in her flesh, even stronger and more deadly than she'd been before. She had both eyes now, cyber-organic. The aliens (and truth be told, many humans) found those eyes demonic, unbearable. Even Syd felt their supernatural weight at even the most casual glance. No matter how human Del was with her, no matter how vulnerable they might be together, a single look in those eyes reminded Syd that Del was something more.
Something imminently unstoppable.
The entire Milky Way had learned it over the course of the last half century and now, this Milky Way would learn it to.
And then the next, and the next, until Del Shepard was satisfied that humanity was safe from all that would ever seek to threaten it again.
Sydney needed no more than Shepard's 'in time' to begin issuing orders.
"Secure this system. I want full guard patrol on that anchor and communications stations set up in sectors gamma, delta, and ro. Fighter wing patrols on regular rotation, and status updates every hour. Put the anchor down to minimal power. Is the Keymaster in position?"
"Taking position now, General. The barrier should be up around the relay in three minutes."
"Good. Get Intel to work. Debriefing at 15:30 hours."
She turned to follow Del, who had gone to the lift. Sydney didn't need to ask her destination; after their conversation with the 'natives' it went without saying.
So as they doors slid shut, leaving them alone, Sydney said instead, "It seems we were right on the nose. Vibrational signatures of this volume exactly match our preliminary readings. The ridiculous Galactic Council, the cross-species boondoggles; I have to say, it turned my stomach a little seeing her on a human ship."
"A Council ship, by Captain Feris's own mouth. As far as we are concerned, any humans in service of this 'Galactic Council' are as much traitors as the Silent Seven. I was not surprised to see her, but unlike home we shall have to take the threat of the asari in this universe quite seriously."
Yes, they would. They had learned that in this new volume, the asari hadn't suffered through the Maurillian Scourge, the V'Dess Genocide, or the Kil'taka Massacres. Their numbers would be far, far greater than the mere sixty million back home, and they would be technologically on par with the rest of the galaxy, rather than industrial pre-spaceflight.
"Keiji has insured that the asari and Thessia itself is top on our intelligence list. I believe he's working on infiltration networks as we speak."
The lift doors parted, and they stepped out onto the brig deck. Ranks of cells lined each wall. Right now, most were dark, but three or four shimmered with barriers indicating their occupied status.
The guards in the corridor immediately snapped to attention, saluting as the two women went past them. Neither Del nor Sydney glanced at them, or into any of the other cells that they passed. Shepard's eyes were on the final barrier at the very end of the hall, and thus so, too, were Syd's.
James Vega was on duty outside of this barrier. He saluted as well, and as the Supreme Commander nodded at him, went to parade rest.
"Been quiet, ma'am. Nothing to report. Gentle as a kitten. It's amazing how much it tempers their fire."
"Thank you, Mr. Vega. Open the cell please."
He touched the security pad, and the shimmer vanished. Syd went to follow Shepard as she started to step in, but a brief gesture with her hand halted her. Del went in alone.
Liara T'soni sat on the floor in the cell. There was no bench, not cot; not a single stick of furniture to soften the hard metal floors and walls. The most alien prisoners in Shepard's brig could count on as far as luxuries was a single small toilet basin that emerged from one wall at need; filled with chemicals, so they couldn't drink out of it.
She was dressed in a simple jumpsuit that had been white when she was first stripped and hosed off after being captured four weeks ago. Now, it had gone a worn, dingy gray. There was a strange, greasy odor coming off of her; alien sweat did not smell the same as human sweat.
Her feet and hands were bare, the only additional ornament she now wore was a thin, almost silky strap of metal that had been wound crossways around her torso. The metal itself was dark, but along the tiny links that formed it, a soft purple-white glow had begun.
Though the asari had taken no food or water for two days, the moment the barrier went down she started to get to her feet. Shepard paused in the center of the cell, watching with detachment as the clearly weak thing used the wall, struggling to rise. It was several moments, and two near misses where she nearly fainted or toppled over, before she finally got there. Leaning a shoulder into the corner, she turned her sky blue eyes on the human woman.
Shepard smiled a little. "You are a stubborn thing, aren't you?"
"I am not a 'thing'," Liara said, voice a rough hitch of dry disuse. "My name is Liara T's-"
Shepard batted the words out of the air with a dismissive sweep of her hand. "Why is it that aliens always seem to think the sounds they choose to call themselves are of any importance to me? You are a thing, asari. A creature. An animal incapable of true sentient thought, nothing more. I have warned you about standing when speaking to me, moving without permission."
"I will not go to my knees for – ah!"
Shepard had slipped her hand into the pocket of her uniform. As she drew it out, fisted, the animal cried out in pain, the metal strap around her flaring briefly with light. It was too much, even with the wall supporting her. The asari dropped down to her knees, only just preventing herself from collapsing fully to the ground.
Shepard looked down at her. "It is also rather remarkable how many of you seem to think you won't do something, just before I prove you will."
"What…?"
"What you have on, asari, is called a Cinch. It collects your biotic energy whenever you try and use it, but it also allows me to release it back into you." Del showed her the small cube, in her palm. "Like this."
She did it again, and the thing screamed in pain, dropping to her belly and gasping against the floor. As she shook, the Supreme Commander crouched. "Fascinating little gadget, isn't it? We were a little concerned when biotics began to change, that it wouldn't work for this new variety – but it seems the eggheads managed to figure it out. What do you think, asari?"
Its jaw tightened. It was still breathing rapidly, but in its stubborn defiance it struggled to hide the fact, to look unshaken as it glared up at Del. With thick sarcasm, Liara said, "You care what I think? I thought the asari were just animals, incapable of true sentience?"
"At last, we are in agreement." Del's smile was almost beatific, and Liara's hate-filled glare at her sharpened.
"Why do I still live?" it asked, forcing itself once more into a sit.
Of all the aliens, Del thought the asari had to be the most repulsive of the lot; even more than the turians. Despite the color of their skin, and their strange crests which looked like tentacles, asari looked like human women. Extremely attractive human women. Outside of still images or blurry video, Shepard had not seen one face to face until she'd woken up after Tuchanka. It had taken almost two years for her to recover from her injuries on the krogan homeworld. They were repulsive not because they looked like lizards or beasts or mutant animals, but because they were familiar, seductive. The 'sirens' of deep space, luring their enemies into complacency, only to destroy them against the rocks of complacency. And since they could apparently 'reproduce' with any other alien species, they also used their wiles to 'breed' them out. Shepard had made it a crime in the Resurgence, punishable by death, to enter into any sort of romantic entanglement with any of the aliens, but especially the asari.
They had not before considered the asari a threat to Earth, or to any human fleet. The things didn't even have their own spaceflight technology, but as the krogan grew more desperate, their numbers beginning to vanish as the genophage took control, they brought a number of asari off their homeworld to help. This one hadn't been on Tuchanka. All of those had died in battle or been executed by Sydney while Del lay in a coma, being rebuilt.
No, this one had been captured fleeing a sabotaged space station on the fringes of the Resurgence's Keldar Front. It had been an attack by the Silent Seven. Intelligence had warned of the attack, and that Sewe, Septa, and even Shichi themselves, the leader of the treasonous deserters, might be part of the attack.
On that intelligence, the Resurgence had prepared a trap. It had prevented the loss of the station and human life, so on that front it had been successful, but it had resulted in the capture of only this single prisoner. Shepard was inwardly glad that their brief interactions were coming to an end. More than once, she had found even herself feeling moments of sympathy for the thing as it was tortured, found herself thinking of it huddled in its cell, even when she was on other duties. Sirens, indeed. Research into the various alternate volumes of the multiverse had shown that several of Shepard's counterparts had fallen for this disgusting alien seduction. That they had actually bonded with this 'Liara T'Soni, considered aliens no different than human beings, and most stomach-turning of all- in some cases even reproduced with her.
It revealed to Shepard her own internal weaknesses, what she needed to guard against so as not to fall into the same trap as those pathetic, animal-rutting versions of her. No. No, she was not falling into the same trap. Her people, humanity, and keeping them safe was all that mattered. She would not fall under the sway of this beast's wiles, not debase herself as the others had. Soon, Liara T'soni (this version, at least) would be gone, and Del would have proven herself stronger than her other 'versions'.
"Why do you ask questions you already know the answers to?" Shepard asked it. "Three of the Silent Seven still live. You know their identities."
"I have said time and again, I do not," Liara said. "I do not know their true identities, and that will remain true however you choose to torture me."
"Do you think I've been torturing you for information?" Shepard asked, then laughed. "Torture is useless for reliable intelligence. Oh no. We have much better ways to get the information from you than something so crude as torture. What I have been putting you through the last several weeks has nothing to do with the information we need from you. That, we'll have in just a few hours."
She straightened, turning her head. "Get her to her feet."
The asari's defiance started to become fear, as two of the guards entered the cell, grabbing her and hauling her up to her feet. Her struggles were feeble, her voice cracking as they pulled her upright.
"Where are you taking me? What are you doing?"
"I already told you, asari. I know it is difficult to keep up, but please put in at least some effort. We are getting the information we require from your tiny little squid brain. Be happy. Your suffering is almost over."
Shepard's red eyes shifted to the soldiers. "Get her upstairs. Osco is waiting."