"There is just no way you got five more than me, Shepard." Three-fingered hands snatched her helmet from her own.
"I wasn't the one who made up the 'visors don't lie' rule, Garrus," she breathed in a laugh. "Read it and weep."
"Spirits… there's no way!"
The decon cycle ended and the inner door let them into the Normandy.
"Well, sounds like you two kissed and made up." Joker swiveled his chair to greet them.
"Ya know, when I announce shore leave, that does actually include you, flight lieutenant Moreau." Shepard crossed her arms across her chest.
"Commander, you never know when you might need a trusty, dashing pilot to your rescue. I stay here for your benefit too." He huffed.
"Oh, really. My benefit." She leaned over his console and put two fingers on the holo display's scroll wheel. "Annnd if I move this, how quickly will I bring up two Asari maidens with a double-ended dildo?"
"Okay, okay, fine. I'm packing up for shore leave right now. Jeeze, crack the whip." He held up both palms in defeat.
"Joker! Seriously, how much do I have to tell you to stop yanking it up here?" Shepard said incredulously.
"You have requested an end to masturbation in the pilot's chair seven times in the last three months, Shepard." EDI helpfully piped up.
"Traitor." Joker murmured.
She spun towards her sniper, intent on proving a point. "Turians don't have anywhere near the sexual hang ups Humans do. Garrus, I'm sure crewmen don't rub one out on duty, right where they work?" Shepard asked.
He looked taken aback for a second. "Uhhh… Not on duty, no. Otherwise… as long as we clean up after ourselves or our partners…" he trailed off, a finger to his chin in thought.
"Wait, a minute... Turians are just having sex all over their ships?" Joker tipped his hat back.
"Well, no not exactly. Bunks and showers are communal just like here, and its… much more common and encouraged as stress relief than on human ships. Turian captain's run us tight. Operational discipline is more rigid. Violence and sex are the only ways to blow off steam, so tolerance is higher." He shifted his helmet under his other arm.
"Violence? They let you fight each other?" Shepard turned toward him and leaned against the pilot's chair.
"It's supervised, of course. No one is going to risk an injury that interferes with the mission. And it's a good way to resolve grudges amicably." His mandible twitched and pulled up. "I remember the night before we were going to hit a batarian pirate squad. Very risky. This recon scout and I had been at each other's throats for days. Nerves, mostly. She suggested we settle it in the ring."
"So you kicked her ass, right?" Joker asked.
"We were both the top rated hand to hand specialists on the ship, actually. I had reach, but she had flexibility. It was brutal. Nine rounds and the judge called it a draw." Garrus leaned against the back wall. "Lot of unhappy betters in the training room." He cleared his throat. "We uh, had a tiebreaker in her bunk that night. I had reach, but she had flexibility. More than one way to work off stress."
"Ooh, look at this smug Turian stud, Shep. What were you trying to teach me again? I need to let you cripple me in the ring to settle our differences, then cripple me further in the tie breaker?" A grin tugged at the pilot's lips.
"You break a man's arm one measly time and he never lets you forget it." Shepard's mouth quirked. Garrus's laugh nearly drowned out the much quieter voice that spoke next.
"Siha?"
Shepard whirled around and there was Thane standing just at the cusp of the cockpit.
"Oh, you're back already! Did everything go okay with Bailey and Kolyat?" She asked.
"That is what I was hoping to discuss. May I have a moment of your time?" He stood as usual, with his hands clasped behind him.
"Of course, as many moments as you need." The two walked down the neck of the CIC towards the lift together.
Garrus and Joker shared a a glance. "What does Siha mean, anyway? That's the second time I've heard him call her that," the Turian grumbled.
Joker eyed him. "Is that jealousy I hear, Garrus?"
"Ha, hardly. Do curiosity and jealousy always sound the same to humans?" He gave the pilot a sidelong stare.
"Yes. But hey, I can make you feel better," he scrolled through his omni-tool for a second before pulling up a short video of Shepard with her fringe cascading across her shoulders, wearing an entrancing dress of green gems that left nothing to the imagination. She was smiling at someone out of frame, hands on her hips. Garrus starred as the little vid looped, zooming in on her rear as she turned on the ball of her foot before she faced the camera man, then it zoomed out quickly and cut off.
"When did you take this?" His sub-vocals trilled embarrassingly as he spoke. Thank the Spirits for deaf humans.
"I didn't, Hadley did. That was the night before she and Kasumi left for that party to rob the rich. The dress was magnificent, wasn't it? You missed out." Joker smiled up at him.
Ah. He'd been drugged out of his mind and asleep. Most likely. "Hadley, huh. I might need to have a word with him about respecting your superior officers," he hummed.
"Oh, come off it, Garrus. You've had to watch that ass for years. Can you blame the poor guy?" The two men locked looks for a moment.
The turian exhaled and stood back up after stooping to get a better view of the pilot's omni-tool. "No, I can't. Why'd they go with green? She'd have been perfect in blue."
"Do you want a copy or not?" Joker asked snippily.
"Absolutely." Garrus flicked his tool open.
Thane dropped wearily onto his cot as soon as the life support door closed behind her.
"Things went well, I hope?" A corner of her mouth pulled up ruefully.
He glanced at her through lowered lids. "I'm not sure I've ever made the right decisions for Kolyat until today. Though he is rightfully distant and malcontent, we did talk, and will continue to do so through messages whenever possible."
Shepard exhaled a long breath. "Oh, well, that's great! I'm impressed he was willing to speak with you at all. He is much more mature than I was at his age. I was full of nothing but rage and spite."
"And now?"
She paused to consider. "Mmm well, still rage and spite, I think. But I've learned to weaponise it in my favor."
He shook his head. "I don't believe a person truly like that would have helped me rescue my child from the life of poor choices his Father has made." Thane held out a hand towards her.
Shepard cursed her lack of will as she slid her palm into his outstretched fingers. "Shhh. I like to pretend I don't have any soft sides."
He smiled. "Thank you again, Siha."
The Commander sighed loudly as the water turned off. Maybe she should let Chakwas recommend her a good tele shrink. She obviously needed one if she kept playing with fire. The first time had already turned out to be a pretty big mistake, but every time Krios put those obsidian eyes on her and recited words any creature would swoon over… Shepard shook her head violently, sending droplets across the bathroom. God, she was just completely over stressed and under-slept. That was the only actual explanation. But how do you just say no to god's gift wrapped in skintex? Get a grip on those hormones, girl.
The light on her console was flashing as she stepped out of the bathroom. Shepard cursed and fumbled down the stairs while trying to towel off. She snatched her sweatpants and tank top from the couch and threw them on while ascending back to her desk. She smacked the call button at the same time she fell into her chair and Liara's familiar face lit up the view screen.
The Asari woman raised her brow at her friend's disheveled appearance. "Did I catch you at a bad time, Shepard?"
"No, not at all, I just got out of the shower, your timing couldn't be better." She picked up the towel hanging around her neck and ruffled it through her hair.
Liara's familiar periwinkle visage softened. "Thank you for seeing to those Prothean ruins and the SSV Strontium Mule. I was afraid you wouldn't even answer my messages after our last parting, but you've helped me out so much."
Shepard blew out a breath that caused her wet strands to slap across her forehead. "To be honest, it's just easier if I don't think about it. It's not like I can do anything about your decision now. So, let's not get into it. What did you need me for?"
She looked very much like she still wanted to talk about it. Liara leaned forward then back before crossing her arms in agitation. "I finally have a lead on the Shadow Broker, thanks to that intel you gave me from Cerberus. I was hoping you would help."
Shepard bent towards her console to flick through the galaxy map. "Of course I'll help, just say the word and I'm there."
"Can you meet me in four standard days?"
She spun the map closer to the Normandy's location arrow. "Mmm yeah that looks do-able."
"Great. I'll forward you my apartment's coordinates."
"What's going on here?" Shepard announced as she walked up to the digital police ticker tape outside of Liara's apartment.
"Ma'am, we'll need you to step back. This is an ongoing investigation." An Asari officer inside the door held up a hand to her, Garrus, and Tali.
The N7 turned to shoot her sniper a look.
A dark blue asari in an expensive Serrice Council hard suit, descended the steps from the second floor of Liara's home. "Someone tried to kill your friend, Commander Shepard. Thank you officer, your team is dismissed." She waved for the Commander to follow her as she turned further into the apartment.
The three Normandy crew stepped through the ticker tape.
Shepard's distrust must have been obvious as the Asari sighed and swiveled. "Tela Vasir. Special tactics and recon."
"A Specter?" The Commander crossed her arms.
"I heard you got reinstated. Good. You are our most famous operative. Remind me to have you sign my chest plate later." The smirk the woman had really rubbed her the wrong way. Garrus must have felt the same, as he shifted to rest his hand on his thigh holster.
"So, I assume you had business with your friend this evening, Commander?" Tela's brown eyes bored into her own.
"I did. What are the facts so far?"
"About twenty-five minutes ago someone took a shot at T'Soni," She hooked a thumb over her shoulder at the massive glass windows overlooking Nos Astra. Two large holes were present, and spidering had sent more pieces to the ground. The floor was wet where the deluge outside was getting in from the holes. A peel of lightning and a crack of thunder seemed to accentuate the Asari's words. "She stuck around for almost four minutes before taking off. Whatever she was doing must have been important. But there's no blood, no body, T'Soni must have gotten away."
Shepard nodded as she took in the scattering of Liara's things all over the place. Datapads, clothing, and a multitude of Asari and Human books littered the floor. A small fortune in actual real paper, ruined - pages had been torn and shredded, some laying sadly in the puddles of rainwater.
"The sniper must not have been counting on her having a kinetic barrier installed. Clever girl. Paranoid, but clever." Tela folded her arms and somehow made that sound less like a complement and more like annoyance. Hm.
The N7 watched Tali bend to pick up a Prothean relic of some kind and set it back on the shelf it must have fallen from. "Whoever took the shot ransacked this place pretty good. Did you find anything on her console?"
The Specter sighed. "Not much. She wiped her drive before she left."
Good. "Mind if I search around a bit?"
Tela shook her head and held out a palm to the apartment. "Go right ahead. You know T'Soni better than I do. Hopefully if she knew you were coming, she left some sort of backup disc that will tell us something."
Garrus moved to the glass with his omni tool out, Tali hit the kitchen and office, so she meandered up the stairs to Liara's bedroom with Tela following her a little too closely for comfort. Sure enough, one extra creepy display of her old N7 suit pauldron, one biometrically coded picture frame, and a Prothean relic later - she found a data disc Liara must have left for her.
Vasir moved over to boot up Liara's terminal. "Great, lets see what's on it." She held out a hand for the disk while Shepard was still trying to tactfully decide how to leave with it.
The Commander recoiled from the Specter. What in the hell would the Council want from an information broker on Illium?
Tela huffed. "Look, I already know she was on to the Shadow broker. That's why I'm here. Time is of the essence if we want to find your friend alive, Commander."
Point made, she'd have to worry about the implications later in order to get to Liara now. Shepard put the disc into the terminal as both Tali and Garrus wandered into the office. A recorded vid call between their friend and a Salarian named Sekat played.
"He had solid info on the Shadow Broker's location… and his agents have obviously already been here trying to kill her. We need to get to the Dracon Towers." Shepard ejected the disc and snapped it into a pocket on her armor.
"They are meeting at Baria Frontiers. Come on, I've got a ride and know where that's at." Tela was out the front door in seconds with team dextro right on her heels.
Seriously, just once it would be so nice if she was wrong about something. Why couldn't they have found Liara having tea with the salarian? As soon as the trio landed the third floor of the building ignited, blowing out every inch of glass onto the bystanders on the streets below and sending all three off of their feet.
Shepard had barely peeled herself off the duracrete before Tela had jumped back into the skycar. "They took out three floors to make sure she's dead, I'll hit the roof and work down!" She yelled from the ascending vehicle before the door shut, ferrying the Asari off into the sky.
"Perfect" the Commander mumbled as Garrus hauled her to her feet. "Are you guys alright?"
Tali nodded. "Thankfully, I've always got my helmet on. Unlike you two." She pulled up a suit read out to check for abruptions.
Shepard hissed in a breath as her probing fingers found a large lump already forming on the back of her head. She looked at the Turian. "How do you always get up so fast?"
He grabbed the yoke of his armor. "Large keel, handy at keeping one's head from hitting the ground." Garrus pushed his helmet down over his crest and stooped to pick hers up.
Shepard scowled as she took her lid from his hands. "I don't know if that's better or worse. Seems like a recipe for more broken necks than us." She clamped it down onto her suit seals.
Garrus's dual toned timbre came over the com. "Well, our necks arn't as scrawny."
"Haha. Tali you good? Let's go find Liara."
The Quarian sniffed while looking up at the flaming building. "If my suit catches on fire you are paying for it, right?"
Her nerves were so on edge by the eighth floor with no sign of their friend that nausea was threatening to set in. No sign of Tela either. The building was nothing but Shadow Broker agents and the dead bodies of the Baria Frontiers workers. Shepard ripped her helmet off with a barely suppressed snarl. "God, I can't see shit through these flickering lights and sprinklers. Tali, can you do anything to get them off?"
"Shepard, come on, we are still in the middle of things here, put it back on!" Garrus growled over her ear com. She looked over to where he was crouched behind an overturned desk, exchanging fire with a Broker agent at the other end of the hall.
"You arn't my real Dad!" She threw herself over their cover, flaring blue before crackling down the hallway in a shock of biotic lightning. The Commander slammed into the soldier, sending him clean through the wall. He crumpled satisfyingly in a heap of desks and datapads in the next room.
"What the hell are you even talking about?" Garrus mumbled. Man, was he ever not in the mood today.
"Come on Garrus, I can actually hit things when I can see. It's fine."
"Shepard, I already tried the sprinklers on that last floor, I can't override the emergency protocols of this building. Not without some better software at least." Tali's exasperation with them both creeped into her speech.
"Ok, fine. Let's do the next one. Shepard flipped wet strings of hair out of her face and snapped her helmet onto her belt. She pointed at the red lock on the door to a side office.
A moment and a muffled gunshot later and the trio passed through the threshold to see Tela standing over a now dead Broker agent.
Red blood intermixed with the puddles on the floor as she ejected a heat sink. "If I'd only been a few seconds faster I could have stopped him." She tipped her chin towards the wall by the door they'd just come through.
Shepard swiveled to see a salarian slumped in a pool of viridian. "Damn. It's Sekat."
"Did you find your friend's body?" Tela pulled two fingers away from Sekat's neck.
"You mean this body?!" Liara jumped through the sprinkler mist covering the doorway.
"Oh thank god, you're alive!" Relief flooded the Commander's pores even as Liara moved straight past her to point her pistol at Tela.
"Yes, I'm alright. But it's no thanks to her." The archeologist slammed a new heat sink into the gun.
"Okay, well, you've had a rough day T'Soni, so I'll let that slide." Tela raised a hand and took a step back despite the threatening words.
"I saw you ransack my apartment. I doubled back and watched you break in! You took that shot, didn't you?!" Liara shouted.
Shepard exhaled noisily. "That explains all the creepy. You didn't know where she'd gone and you needed me to find her." She brought her shotgun up to the Specter's face. Garrus and Tali both audibly pulled their weapons as well.
"Once she had my location, she called in the Shadow Broker's troops to bomb the building. I'd bet she still has Sekat's data." Liara spat.
Vasir took another step backwards, towards the office's wall of windows. "Good guess. Not that you'll ever see what's on it, you pure blooded BITCH!"
Garrus didn't even see what happened as the glass behind the Specter erupted, sending razor sharp pieces hurtling at them. Shepard raised her arms to protect her face but Liara was one step ahead, bringing up a biotic barrier within a split second to shield the Normandy crew. Shepard launched herself across the room at the Asari, slamming into her and wrapping arms around her middle as they both tumbled out of sight in a haze of blue. An uncharacteristic stab of unmistakable panic gripped him. Both he and Tali rushed to the window. The two Specters grappled with one another, but Tela's biotics were vastly superior. She bent the Commander at a painful angle until she lost her grip. The azure woman planted a foot on her chest plate and pushed - Shepard plummeted with biotic enhanced speed, straight into the ground.
"Shepard!" Tali screeched.
His mouth went dry as he watched helplessly from eight floors up. Vasir landed delicately, cushioned by her power, and swiveled back towards the N7s prone form.
It felt as if he was trapped in slow motion, he couldn't pull his sniper rifle up to his eye fast enough to draw a bead on the woman. Liara threw herself from the window next, landing lithely between the two Specters. Luckily, her presence caused Tela to turn and run off instead of finishing off the Commander.
"Come on Tali!" He barked over his shoulder as he dashed towards the last set of stairs he'd seen.
Garrus sprinted down as fast as his legs would carry him, cursing the blown out lifts as he descended. Tali's steps tapped right along with him. It took a millennia to hit the bottom of the Drakon building, but once on flat ground he could fly. Tali's steps faded as he hurtled around the side of the building into the courtyard. He vaulted a curved planter, landing right where she'd fallen.
Except,
The only things left in the yard were glass shards and dead agents.
Shepard groaned and shakily pushed herself up to her hands and knees. Hands and knees? When had she been laying down? Gunshots echoed around her, forcing her to her feet faster than her sudden onset of dizziness would like. She doubled over, trying to breathe in deeply even as rounds bounced off her shields. She stumbled into cover, the ground warping and undulating beneath her feet. The spinning subsided a bit, and the Commander poked her head out to see armored salarian's and either human's or batarian's shooting at her. Who'd she pissed off again? She looked up from the pile of glass she'd been laying in to the broken window high above. Oh, she'd fallen from there. Damn.
It was about halfway through gutting the last two of the hard suited agents that she finally remembered they were Shadow Broker forces. Shepard dashed through the courtyard between the business buildings, chasing the distant sounds of gunfire. She sped by five more dead recruits before finding Liara and Tela locked in a shoot out in a sky car taxi lot. She must not have been knocked out for long. The two asari weaved through the vehicles, taking potshots at each other.
"Liara!" Shepard called. Both she and the Specter swiveled towards her. It was the split second distraction Vasir needed to throw herself over the ledge and into a waiting sky car just below. She blasted off, leaving a vapor trail through the misty rain enveloping them.
"She's getting away!" Liara cried and with no hesitation threw open a taxi cab door. "Shepard, do you know how to drive these?"
She sprinted over to the vehicle as Liara folded herself into the driver's seat. The Commander pushed her legs over into the passenger seat and shoved her head up under the footwell. "Lucky for you, I do. How are you a hundred years old and you can't fly a sky car?" She tore out a panel and pulled apart the connectors from the main module.
"I think it says more about you that you can by-pass the autopilot on these and fly them, when I've gone a hundred years without needing to." The asari sniffed.
"Okay, good point." She tore a few of the yellow wires out and swapped pins before plugging the harness back into the module. "Bingo! Hit the ignition!"
"Which button is that?"
Shepard sighed as she crawled out from the footwell and sat. "Just hold on to your seat. Oh, and I'm fine by-the-way, thanks for asking." She smacked the ignition and the mass engine buzzed to life, lifting the car into the air.
"The vertigo is nearly gone and everything." The Commander said as the hatch closed.
"Nearly?!" Liara screeched as they shot off after Tela.
"Shepard? Where are you?!" A flanged tone barked over coms. Uh oh. "I followed a trail of bodies and found nothing. I assume you are alive?"
"Uhhh…" She looked at Liara, who mouthed something at her. "Uhh yeah, we are somewhere near what? What the hell is elcore roast pet core?" She squinted at her friend as they sped through a line of oncoming traffic after Tela's skycar. Horns blared.
Liara sighed loudly. "I said Asvor Post Secto - SHEPARD LOOK OUT!" The Commander jerked the handle bar and tipped them narrowly past the antenna of a building.
"I saw it, geeze, you freak out way too easily for a centenarian. Right, Asvor Post Sector - wherever that is, buuut I assume I'm just blowing through as I'm right in the middle of a daring high-speed chase." Shepard huffed back.
Tela's shuttle took a nose dive through another traffic lane below them and disappeared between buildings.
"Oh no you don't you son-of-a-bitch!" The N7 mumbled, jamming the control bar into the console and pressing the accelerator as hard as she could. Liara let out a little scream as they whizzed between the long red trails of light of passing vehicles.
Garrus let out a frustrated noise. "Can you reboot your suit, your tracker isn't working."
"Little busy at the moment Big Guy, just follow the trail of wrecked sky cars and you'll find us. I'll boot up if I get a minute or I'll tell you where we land. Or crash, depending on the outcome here." She spun the bars and corkscrewed the vehicle through a narrow construction passage through the interior of a building, full of ladders and metal scaffolding. "Wait, I can't see outta this eye very well… Liara is my eye swelling up?" She pointed at her face.
"Goddess, we are going to die! Yes, it's swelling closed, your entire face is purple!"
"Keelah Shepard!"
"Relax, we have two eyes for a reason. Ah HA! See, there she is - that was a perfect short AHHH!"
The coms whited out for a second and Garrus wondered, yet again, if he'd just heard her die. "Shepard, are you alright?!"
"Totally fine, she laid a proximity charge. You know, average dinner date stuff." The taxi screamed around a corner after their target. Keeping Tela's personal car in sight was becoming difficult as she launched mines and darted through traffic lanes trying to lose them. Or maybe it was less Tela's driving and more nighttime rain droplets glaring through the oncoming headlights and her losing an eye. Shepard cursed.
Suddenly shots flew past the nose of their shuttle car, rocking the cockpit and jarring the two occupants.
"She called back up!" Liara craned her head around backwards out the glass roof. Behind them were two small cruisers.
Two more rounds bounced off the shielding as Shepard tried desperately to keep Tela in sight. "No shit, what kind of weapons does this thing have?"
"It's a taxi, it has a meter!" The archeologist bawled.
"Dammit, Shepard, we are coming for you! Tali get in!" Garrus announced over the coms.
The next few shots jarred the cab, and the shield flickered. Bright red alarms began to pop up on the viewscreen, obscuring the darkness outside the car.
"Shit, I can't see! Hang on tight, Liara!" Shepard spun them like a top and corkscrewed around a building Tela had put between them. Rounds whizzed by the hood.
"There she is! We're right on top of her. Can I convince you to hang out and shoot her?" The N7 glanced at her companion.
Liara's face was white as a sheet. "Are you mad?!"
"Okay, fine. Brace for impact!"
"What?!"
Shepard cranked the wheel and threw the skycar sideways. They smashed off of Vasir's car with a jolt and a fantastic grinding of metal that reverberated through her molars. The Specter's visage was so close as they impacted that Shepard could see the purple stripes on the asari's head. Tela nose dived her craft again, straight into a traffic lane and muscled through oncoming vehicles in an effort to lose her pursuers. Shepard followed, just a second behind her.
"Truck! SHEPARD TRUUUCK!" Liara threw her arms up in front of her face as cars screamed past them, horns blasting.
"I know, I know!" She shouted. Vasir barely cleared the massive barge in front of them, and Shepard narrowly managed to spiral them under it, just as one of the cruisers following them fired. The bellies of both ships dragged across each other but their car slid underneath neatly, suffering merely the deafening screeching of their hulls contacting. Shepard let out a whoop when the tankard truck blasted an air horn just as a glaring explosion lit the night up behind them. One of their pursuers must not have missed the huge ship.
"Are you having fun with this?! Liara asked incredulously as the soldier laughed.
"Liara, you've got my memories rolling around in there, right? I grew up street racing as a kid. Of course this is fun! OH! Look, opportunity knocks! Heads up!"
Vasir's luck ran out when she smashed headlong into an oncoming sky car in front of them. Shepard took advantage and rammed the vehicle as it spun, sending sparks and smoke twisting through the air behind it as it plummeted to a rooftop below them.
Shepard cursed the shitty turning radius of the sky car as they doubled back around to view the Specter's wreckage. Unfortunately for them, she lived. The asari kicked open the broken canopy of her vehicle and hobbled out of the flaming mess.
"Dammit. There she goes." Shepard inhaled a deep breath and sighed. Her head was starting to throb.
The roof was a landing pad for whatever business. The entire top was littered with sky cars.
Liara pointed out the passenger window. "There! Set it down and we will go after her."
"Give it up Vasir, please for the love of all things holy don't make me run through any more rooms - I can't handle being scarred this way anymore." Shepard pointed all twenty-four inches of her Valkyrie rifle at the Specter.
Liara rolled her eyes. The business they'd dropped on was called Azure, a slang term for asari… parts. And Tela had forced them to give chase through nearly every god-damned room of it before they caught her out in the open at a patio restaurant. They'd fought through a whole god-damned battalion of Shadow Broker forces and saw every rich, pasty creature in the galaxy being serviced by asari maidens.
The purple striped asari lost her footing on her own blood as it pooled at her feet. She must have been hurt in the wreck. It didn't slow her down though - she grabbed one of the servers and shoved her pistol into the human woman's cheek. Someone screamed and the crowd in the restaurant scattered. Why was there always a screamer?
Vasir positioned herself behind the woman and faced her assailants. "Tell these nice people that you'd like to live."
The hostage was surprisingly stoic, despite the tears on her cheeks. "Please -"
"Good god, Vasir. You think I wouldn't shoot a hostage? It doesn't matter what she says. Remember all the people I got killed on Torfan? How many troops I sacrificed in the Battle of the Citadel?" She cocked the gun menacingly and stepped forward. "I'll do whatever it takes, and you know it."
"I don't buy your bluster. You've always been trumped up news stories Shepard." Tela spat.
Liara walked around the Commander towards the restaurant, her eyes darting back and forth between the two Specters.
Shepard sneered. "You are pathetic. Hiding behind a hostage because you don't have the stomach for a real fight. Just like an asari. Why don't you stick to dancing on tables like the rest of your kind Vasir?"
The Specter spat a globule of blue blood onto the ground at her feet and vehemently jabbed the barrel into the hostage's throat. She coughed. "PLEASE! I have a son!"
"Drop your thermal clips Shepard!" Vasir hollered.
"What's the end game here? You attacked a trade center… kill a hostage… even if you get out of this alive, your Specter status is revoked." Shepard darted her gaze to her friend. Liara had biotically picked up a table behind Vasir. Bingo.
"Really? Kinda sounds like those were things Cerberus terrorists did, with their precious human Specter at the helm. Which story do you think they will believe?" Tela was doing a poor job of containing the bleed, blue blood seeped through the fingers clutching her abdomen. Did she not have medi-gel?
"I'm gonna kill your hostage Vasir, then I'll show you how a real Specter gets things done." She took another step forward.
It was just the intimidation the asari needed, she tore the gun away from the hostage, aiming at Shepard. "You're bluffing!"
"Now, Liara!" The Commander yelled.
The table slammed into Tela's back, launching the Specter across the landing and into one of the fountains. Shepard charged, blowing a geyser of water ten feet into the air as they collided. Nothing was visible over crackling licks of plum and cerulean biotics and droplets of spray.
It quickly became a high powered game of chase. The two Specters dashed at one another, spraying each other with a hail of bullets. Liara managed to grab Tela with a singularity but the woman just barely teleported with her powers before Shepard rammed into her at breakneck velocity. It was a surprisingly drawn out cat-and-mouse scenario considering Vasir's blood loss. Finally she slowed, and the asari screamed as the N7 grabbed her by the shoulder and careened them both into the wall of the restaurant. Vasir's body took the brunt of the impact and she slid into a heap on the ground, leaving a blue smear on the surface.
Shepard stood over her opponent, chest heaving, struggling to catch her breath. Her head was pounding, and with every pump of her heart her skull felt like it was trying to crack open.
Liara scrambled over, and with zero pomp, frisked the Specter until she found the data disk. She plugged it into her omni-tool and began typing. "Saleon's data will lead us directly to the Shadow Broker."
Tela coughed raggedly, bringing up more blood. "You are DEAD Shepard. The Shadow Broker has been in power for decades. He's more powerful than anyone you've faced."
"Oh? Is that why you double crossed the Council to work for him?" Shepard growled.
The asari's visage darkened, her brow furrowed. "You think I betrayed the Council like Saren? Go to hell!"
"That's my M.O. isn't it? To put down you rogues."
"The Broker has given me damn good intel that has saved thousands of lives and kept the Citadel safe. So if the Broker needs a few people to disappear? I'll gladly oblige. You can wipe that smug look off your face. You don't get to judge me, Cerberus. Do you have any idea the things that they've done?!"
Shepard crouched to face the Specter in the eye. "I do. And I don't care who funds me, as long as I save you ungrateful bastards. The Collectors won't stop with human colonies, Vasir."
"You are a fucking hypocrite!" She cringed and grasped her stomach. "It DOES matter! You wanna judge me? Look in the mirror Shepard. Kidnapping kids, biotic death camps, experimenting on your own people, an entire Alliance unit on Akuze killed! They are terrorists Shepard! And you are with them. Knowingly. Don't you fucking judge me." Tela choked on the last few words gasping and gurgling before sagging to the side, eyes partially open.
Shepard released the breath she'd been holding. Sirens in the distance were getting closer, meaning Nos Astra's slow as shit police force were finally figuring things out. She stared down at Vasir. The woman wasn't wrong. She was a hypocrite - and damn well knew it. There was a gross swelling of guilt and anger in her belly. Another dead Specter. And what proof did she have for this one? She couldn't even think, the pressure in her brain was unbearable, her thoughts were mush through a strainer. The Commander turned to the side and heaved, spilling the meager contents of her stomach. She wiped her mouth and peered groggily at Liara.
The horror she saw there really seemed out of place… that was the last thought revolving in her head.
Garrus spit a string of expletives. "How many floors does this place have?!" He dashed through yet another room with three crying asari and a pissed off batarian. "And why did she have to fight in every single one of them!?" He groused, kicking a spent thermal clip to the side.
"Your complaining isn't going to help us find them faster!" Tali pointed down a corridor. "Look, the blood trail leads this way."
Her voice held more mirth than he would have liked. Why was any of this funny to her? He grumbled and trailed after the Quarian. "She could have at least rebooted her suit. It doesn't take that long."
"You know how she is. Ah, see, another dead one." Tali prodded at the corpse of a salarian Broker agent.
A shrill scream echoed down the hallway. Tali spun towards the noise. "That was Liara!"
The two sprinted down the passageway.
Garrus rounded the corner first, and pure chaos greeted him. Liara was trading biotic blows with multiple agents in heavy armor, and Vasir was slumped against a wall in a puddle of indigo. The terrace was swarming with agents in silver hard suits, a multitude of every species. A vanguard tore across the field at the archeologist.
Well trained eyes took in minute details in milliseconds… but there was no fiery fringe, no black and red armor, no gleeful laughter or scathing taunting.
"Shepard?" He called over coms.
Liara ducked out of a grapple. "They took her Garrus!"
What?! He didn't have time to unpack that statement though, Liara was quickly being overrun.
"Incoming." He growled out and unloaded two concussive rounds near the asari, blowing back the agents swarming her. Tali darted past his elbow, shotgun thundering. It took an entire clip of his disruptor ammo to take down two humans he'd laid out.
Liara shook her head vigorously as they plowed through the Broker's forces towards her. "No, No! Go get her!" The blue woman pointed towards the end of the balcony at a group of agents crowding and kneeling around something.
The telltale sound of a shuttle approaching had his legs moving before he fully realized it. Garrus vaulted clean over two men and sprinted at the cluster of agents.
There.
She was there, he caught a small glimpse of red locks between the bodies.
"Garrus, wait!" Tali wailed, her shotgun echoing through the coms.
No. Not this time. Not on his watch. A trooper stepped in his path. He lifted his rifle and blasted down the bastard's shields until the weapon overheated. Batarian? Or human. Didn't really matter. Garrus popped the heat sink with one hand and stuck a glowing omni-blade through the neck seals of the man's hard suit with the other. He gurgled and dropped to his knees. The sniper propped one boot against his chest and pushed him off the blade.
That little sliver of red stayed in the center of his vision as he powered through Broker agents, mixing rifle with hand to hand as he closed in on his target. What happened? Why was she so limp? A Shuyak shuttle tore over the edge of the building and hovered near the ledge of the balcony.
"Get her on the ship!" a turian yelled. Four agents grabbed Shepard and made for the ship.
Tali's drone sped past him and electrocuted a salarian and the human/batarian. Garrus caught the back of the turian's yoke as he boarded the craft and slammed him into the ground so hard the decking splintered. He tore the man's helmet off and stuck two fists through his mandibles in rapid succession. There was a satisfying crack of plates under his gauntlets before he turned his attention to the lone asari huntress dragging the N7 into the shuttle. Suddenly she was launched into the air with a yelp, her body glowing with biotics. He spun to see Liara had grabbed her. She let her loose over the edge, and the woman screamed all the way out of ear shot as she fell. He barely had an arm looped around Shepard before the shuttle pilot panicked and full burned away from the action. He turned his back and crouched over the Commander to let his hard suit protect them both from the thrusters.
In his arms Shepard was blinking slowly, her iris's bouncing back and forth. Tali dispatched the last soldier and tore over to them both.
"Keelah, they nearly got away with her." She exhaled long and loud.
"She's awake. I think." Garrus pushed her fringe out of her face and called up her suit metrics, resting her body along his thigh. "Liara, what the hell happened?"
The asari took to wringing her hands. "She killed Vasir… but we were ambushed by these Broker agents. Like they'd been hiding, waiting to see who won. I can't believe they didn't help Vasir." Liara looked out across the carnage and bodies. "I think they were waiting for a chance to catch Shepard off guard. Something is wrong, she bent over to retch and they drugged her."
Shepard gurgled, trying to keep her eyes open. Her vision was swimming hazily but the silver and blue glimpses looked familiar, and the oscillations of sub-vocals moved through her body. She braced her hands against him and shoved, rolling herself out of his lap.
"Shepard -" He rumbled.
She rolled over and brought up the contents of her stomach again.
"What is wrong with her?" Liara crouched, resting a palm on the Commander's back.
"Who knows what those Bosh'tets injected her with." Tali sheathed her shotgun.
"If she was sick before they got her, it's probably a concussion. Like she had after Virmire. "He stood. "And with the way she hit the ground back there I'm not surprised. I told her to put that helmet on…" His sub-vocals rippled in agitation.
Tali hummed. "You're right. That's the only other time I've seen her sick."
Shepard coughed and sat back on her legs. "I can hear you, you realize that right? You don't have to talk about me like I'm not here."
"Are you alright?" Liara asked.
"I think so. My hands and feet are tingling… hopefully that will wear off as my Cerberus liver scrubs the Broker's bullshit from my body." The Commander slowly stood, wobbling dangerously.
Garrus grabbed her elbow to steady her. "If you didn't have this new obsession with killing yourself, this wouldn't be happening."
She motioned to Tela. "Looks like I'm not the dead one, so that pokes some holes in your theory." Shepard propped her palms on her knees as the ground undulated under her feet. Erratic, pulsing noise thrummed from his chest. "Get over it Garrus. I'm fine." She snapped testily and shook his hand from her arm.
Liara raised her brow. "Can you hear his sub-vocals, Shepard?"
Tali looked up at the turian.
His noises ramped up a notch. "That is hardly what's important here! It is absolutely NOT fine to take off after one of the galaxy's most powerful being's personal army alone Shepard!"
"I wasn't alone, I've got Liara."
"Dammit, Shepard, why are you willfully ignoring the fact that I just dragged your immobile body out of a Broker shuttle myself?!" He angrily jerked a thumb over his shoulder where the vehicle had been. "If we'd been even a minute later, you'd be on your way to being sold to the Collectors-"
A Nos Astra police cruiser blasted past them and hung a u-turn, sirens blaring. The noise drowned out whatever else he was about to say. It was followed shortly by five more police vehicles.
"Hands up!" An asari yelled from the open side door of a craft, brandishing a large rifle.
Shepard exhaled loudly but complied. "Great."
