Acuta Eus: a chip made from a combination of grains and spices. Turian doritos.
Caris - Beloved, precious, cherished.
Dilan - fiancee
Morumplacus - Restless spirit, undead, ghoul. From ancient turian folklore.
Inluvis - The second gestational period in turian pregnancy. Between 8 and 16 weeks. Slang: Little one, in the sense of being young and underdeveloped.
Obluvis - One who is senile or absent-minded. Slang: Idiot
Coillas (Coillasi - plural) - The chains that hold turian bonding robes closed. After the ceremonies, they are wrapped and fastened around the wrists of both bond-mates.
Fratrin - Brother, but one of honour, friendship, or of oath rather than one of blood relation. Refers to the bond of karifratrus.
Filitrin - Sister, but one of honour, friendship, or of oath rather than one of blood relation. Refers to the bond of karifratrus.
Cisera - A non-alcoholic, foamy cider made from the juice of more than twenty varieties of edible cactus analogues.
86 Days ASR (0900 Ypres time)
Nihlus checked his chrono: the Aurean didn't arrive for another five minutes, bringing their families from Omega. He stepped out onto the balcony, leaving Thane at the threshold of the dock's security checkpoint, and closed his eyes. Taking in a long draught of the sweet, blossom-scented air, he smiled, mandibles high and wide. Spring on Illium worked truly remarkable magic on the heart. Although Nos Astra lived in a perpetual polar twilight, the asari cultivated seasons to match Thessia, and spring meant the glowing purple blossoms of the t'jotti trees.
As miserable as he sometimes got during his tenure on Illium, spring never failed to entrance him. He chuffed and rumbled at the poetry. Back then, it didn't take much to brighten his days.
Speaking of …. It seemed the last member of his recon party hoped to catch him by surprise. He grinned and forced himself not to give away that he heard her approach.
The soft footfalls padded right up on him, stealthy but light with mischief. He stretched, arching his neck until the muscles groaned and his spine crackled like the bag of acuta eus he'd forgotten on the mattress the night before … at least until he rolled onto it. Shepard complained about laying on imaginary crumbs all night and after waking that morning.
Talons closed on his mandibles, pinching the mandibular nerves just hard enough to send a double jolt of pain lancing along his jaw and up into his ocular orbits. Tightening his mandibles against his face, Nihlus clenched his jaw to brace the tendons. In a lightning quick move, he pulled his arms up, and then out to push down on the hands holding him. He spun, catching his assailant's wrist in his hand, twisting her arm up behind her back.
"Ow! Spurin!" Solana stomped on Nihlus's foot and broke loose. "So not all right to break your little sister's arm." She shook out the assaulted limb, then spun on her talons and marched over to Thane. "You have to take my part in this, Krios. Arm breaking crosses the line."
The drell shrugged and leaned against the balcony railing. "It seems very active for being broken."
Sol chuffed. "I should have known better than to try to break the unbreakable male hormone brain damage solidarity wall." A dramatic sigh later, she shrugged. "So, are we going to spy on the Eclipse, or what?"
Nihlus grinned and waved an arm to beckon them into the crowds moving from the docks to the trading district. "Come on, inluvis, let's get this over with. We have a dinner party to get to."
Sol jogged up next to him. "So, we case out the Eclipse headquarters to see if they know anything about tomorrow's operation?" She nodded without waiting for him to answer, and dug into one of her pockets, sorting for a moment before pulling out a small package. "I got this for you, because I'm sneaky as a morumplacus, and Thane is, well, Thane, but you, caris, are as subtle as an armoured yawg."
Answering her with a glare, Nihlus took the package from her talons and ripped it open. "Very nice. Thank you." He turned the cloaking device over in his hand and whistled. "Very, very nice. Spirits, Kasumi is going to make it her life's mission to steal it from me."
Letting out an ill tempered grumble, Sol flicked her mandibles. "Oh, don't gush over it, it was supposed to be mean." The irritated flicking turned to a wide, lightning quick grin. "Besides, I needed to get you a bonding gift, didn't I?"
That time, Nihlus grumbled. When he spoke, however, he loaded his tone with a heavy dose of sincerity. He didn't want any secrets escaping before their time, not after putting so much effort into them. "I don't know what you think you've figured out in all your scheming, but keep it to yourself, Sol. Please." He clipped the cloak onto his omnitool, then balled up the package in his hands.
"Hey, don't be such an obluvis." She butted him in the ribs with a gentle elbow, her signature—and oddly gentle—scent of woodsy cleanser, gun oil, and armour cleaner overwhelming the blossoms in the wake of her movement. "I am an impenetrable wall of silence." After a moment—apparently spent proving her ability to remain silent—she butted him again. "I know you love her, and you love Garrus, but does the arrangement with the three of you make you happy enough to wrap your coillasi around her wrists?"
Nihlus tossed the packaging into a trashcan, then slipped an arm around his filitrin's shoulders. "I didn't know happiness like this existed, Sol. I'd never been truly happy before Garrus and Jane … you and your parents. It's a revelation, particularly with the horror of the reapers hanging over us. The three of us …." He shrugged, struggling to give voice to the warm pressure in his chest. "They are where I'm meant to be."
After giving her a squeeze, he released her and stepped away, glancing back at Thane. The most talented and trained infiltrator needed to take point. For all her teasing, Sol had the right of it: when the Council needed covert, they'd called on other Spectres. "Let's see what the Eclipse are up to."
A solemn nod answered his silent question as the assassin stepped past him, making a path through the crowds without drawing the slightest amount of attention. People parted like metal filings pushed away from an invisible magnet. Nihlus could escape notice when he wanted to, but Thane's gift left the Spectre in awe.
They threaded their way across the trading floor and up the stairs into Eternity. Operative Lawson planned to meet her contact, Lanteia, at 0900 in one of the back rooms. If the Eclipse intended to eavesdrop on the meeting to confirm Lawson's game plan, the gang would need ears in the room. In turn, he intended to use their hardware to track them. He doubted they'd conduct surveillance of such a risky nature from a main base of operations, but covert investigations unraveled one thread at a time.
"I'll do a quick scan on my way to the head." Sol tossed back over her shoulder as she split off on her own vector. "Order me a large cisera. All they had stocked on the Aurean was puala juice and something called cola." She shuddered. "Humans are weird."
Nihlus grinned and headed for the bar while Thane made a slow sweep of the room under the guise of admiring the view. The assassin … retired assassin …. Nihlus frowned, a slow, curling sliver of guilt burrowing in behind his keel. He needed stop identifying Thane as an assassin. None of them—he, Garrus, and Shepard included—remained who they'd been before Archangel, and the drell retired even before he set out for Omega looking for his son. He never talked about why, but it didn't take anyone as perceptive as Garrus to see tragedy behind Thane's eyes.
Nihlus cleared his throat. Tragedy … and vengeance. He knew both far too well to miss it in another's stare.
After ordering their drinks, Nihlus turned to lean a hip against the bar, watching the drell at work for a half second before looking away to do his own. He didn't see any Eclipse uniforms in the bar, but he wouldn't have considered anyone in uniform anyway. Involved with the sort of money behind Lawson Sr., careful didn't begin to cover the amount of attention the Eclipse would put into the minutia of their op.
He winced as the music changed one thumping techno beat for a slightly different one. Reaching up, he pressed the heel of his hand against his aural canal on that side. Something in the music felt like a pin in his head, probably a security feed. His aural implants hated mixed signals.
"Your drinks are ready, handsome."
Speaking of signals …. The asari smiled, all flashing white teeth and stars twinkling in lavender eyes.
His replying nod and smile lacked even the false pleasure he once showed to be polite, suddenly longing for coillasi around his wrists. Funny how he only wanted to hear that word from one set of lips … for the rest of his life. His younger self, the one who loved Saren, would have preened. Regret burned, an aching thirst that sent his hand to his thigh. What an obluvis. Of course, he'd never admit that self-knowledge to Sol.
Drinks in hand, he crossed the room, taking a booth with a clear line of sight to all but the far end of the bar. He sat in the corner and took a long drink from one of the glasses of cisera before placing it at an open spots for Sol. He'd missed his little sister while she helped their parents move to Omega, and he hoped to eventually convince Garrus and their pari to let her serve on the Aurean. The three of them—including Thane—made an excellent team.
"So," Sol said, sliding into the seat next to him, "there is a strip mike under the door frame." She picked up her glass, looked into it, then swapped it with his. "Subtle. I almost missed it."
He grinned, but self-congratulations lasted only a second before Sol chuffed, shattering it.
"Not your lame gag, I meant the strip." She followed a long drink with almost a minute of pleasured sighing that began to draw attention. When the salarian two tables over began to make that disturbed clucking sound, Sol stopped.
"We'll have to backtrace their signal, get into their computers remotely if we can … infiltrate their base if we can't." He finished his cisera without tasting it, only registering the dry, tartness on the back of his tongue. Feeling Sol's eyes on him, he braced himself for incoming snark.
"What do you think I was doing in the head all that time?" She sighed her 'dear spirits, without me, he'd forget to breathe' sigh. "I backtraced it, but they're using top of the line hardware and security that made a fool out of my poor, old omnitool," she said, long, elegant talons patting the inside of her wrist. "Now it's locked itself in a corner of the extranet, reconsidering its life plan."
"We have EDI, do we not?" Thane asked, sitting down. "Two observers watching the door to the room, a human and a salarian." He glanced up at the speakers flooding the space with music. "I hear something in the music as well." Frowning, he closed his eyes and cocked his head, turning it a little. "There's a slight feedback in the sound system. It might be club security, corporate espionage …."
"... or our good friends in yellow." Nihlus leaned back, one hand dropping to his lap. "I noticed it when I was at the bar. Finish your drinks and we'll head out, ask EDI what she can do."
86 Days ASR (1147 Ypres time) (A closet somewhere in Nos Astra)
"Why?" Sol asked, the words nothing more than a hissing breath between clenched teeth. "A closet?" She wriggled, jabbing an armoured spur under Nihlus's fringe. A soft curse met his gasp of pain. "Sorry, but you got us stuck in here, senux." Continued shifting and shuffling on his shoulders emphasized her malcontent, as if he'd trapped them in a cleaning cupboard on purpose. She sighed again, finally balancing on his shoulders. "Why do missions with you always turn into something weird and scary?"
Before he could formulate a scathing enough reply Nihlus froze. Tarc, he might just have screwed up as badly as Sol thought he had. Marching footsteps approached from the right, stopping outside the door to their closet. He glanced toward the open panel in the ceiling, but saw no sign of Thane. He tightened his grip on Sol's ankle when she moved for her omnitool, no doubt to scramble the door's lock, but in the dark, even low power mode could give them away. When she nodded, he loosened his grip.
They'd just better not get caught. Not only would it let the Eclipse know their ambush the next day had been compromised, he knew the others would never let him live down being caught in a closet. He swallowed. They did make for quite the spectacle with Sol dangling around his neck and cleaning supplies piled up to his knees. Premature embarrassment set the plates down the back of his neck twitching.
"Pretty sure Captain Enyala is just getting paranoid," one of the mercs grumbled. "Maira in T'Sair's platoon said they didn't find any evidence of the computers or the base being breached, and I had a really great night out planned."
Another merc approached the door. "The captain's being a few million credits worth of paranoid. I don't blame her. The client's loaded, he's here in person, and if she lets him get killed, he's not going to be hiring us again, is he?"
"Not to mention she's hoping to avoid getting dead," a third voice—female salarian by the pitch of it—said. "The client's supposed to be one ruthless bastard."
"That too." The door control beeped. "Locked. Let's keep moving." A long, nasal sigh ended in a grumble. "If we get this section covered, we might be able to salvage our day off."
Nihlus let out a long breath as the boots marched off. He glanced up, but couldn't see anything past Sol's knees. "Thane? You ready up there?"
The drell's answer came in the form of Solana's weight disappearing off Nihlus's shoulders. He looked up to see Sol's feet disappear through the hole. Two arms reached down, yanking him off his feet the moment he grabbed hold. Landing balanced on a wide, steel girder, Nihlus reeled, both hands scrambling for something solid to hang onto. His right found a metal column, the left smacked down on the top of Sol's head.
"Not the head." Sol grabbed his hand, bracing his forearm along her own until he found his feet and pulled away.
"Thanks." He nodded toward the far end of the space—a life support service node by the looks of the equipment—and gestured for Thane to take the lead. They needed to find a way out before Captain Enyala's net of paranoia closed around them.
"EDI, is the route clear ahead?"
Nihlus cocked a brow plate as Sol asked the question. She hadn't made any opinion known about the AI, so he'd assumed—wrongly so, it appeared—that she didn't trust EDI enough to treat her as a colleague. He hurried along the girder as far as he could, then jumped to the next and the next.
"I am reading no Eclipse in your immediate vicinity," EDI responded. After a short pause, the AI said, "Continue through the hatch five metres, then turn left."
Sol chuffed and followed Thane out the hatch and down the left hand branch of the maintenance shaft. "What tipped them off? Did you register anything?"
Nihlus watched his little sister, admiring the professional operative in action. Even during their last adventure on Illium, she'd stayed in the little sister role. Understanding flashed, illuminating the reasons behind Sol's actions. He'd needed the little sister the last time. He didn't need loving support this time, but a pro doing her job.
His mandibles flicked, and he turned his attention back to the task at hand … namely getting back to his family without any extra holes punched through his hide.
After a good thirty seconds, EDI replied, "I see no Eclipse alerts as a response to your presence within their base or my access to their computer network. The bulletin and extra security is in response to the arrival of a high value client." Another pause. "At the next junction, take the right hand shaft thirty-five metres."
The three of them moved silently through shaft and tunnel, trusting EDI's directions to get them clear. Finally, Nihlus dropped down through a ceiling panel into a small back corridor that led to a service elevator to street level. The hallway stood silent, the Eclipse security teams having cleared the perimeter, moving in toward the center of the base.
"I just arrived." A dark voice and thick accent shattered the silence, sending sharp slivers of dread slicing through Nihlus's armour and flesh to sink into bone.
The Spectre held his breath and raised a hand to stop Sol and Thane before they entered the corridor. He opened his omnitool, but when he tried to access the man's tool and comms, a series of massive walls rebuffed him. Not willing to accept defeat so easily, he sent a message to EDI. Surely, the AI could break through the tool's security.
"Working," EDI replied through his comms.
"I have the Eclipse running a security drill. Everything is on schedule. The Ypres arrived this morning. Shepard is accompanying Miranda to meet her contact at 0900 tomorrow. Everything's on schedule."
Nihlus crept forward, heart pounding against his keel, every nerve keen-edged and tingling: a billion proximity sensors on high alert. Pressing his face against the sliver of light around the closet door, he blinked against the painful brightness. Once his eye adjusted, he peered through the crack, searching to see what particular variety of tarc they'd fallen into.
An expensive blue suit … an off-white dress shirt with what Shepard called a ... um … a clerical collar and a light blue crossover tie … short, meticulous hair … Miranda's elusive billionaire father, he'd bet a crate of his favourite acuta eus on it.
EDI's voice spooked him, breaking through his concentration, as he tried to hear the rest of that call. "I've successfully penetrated the firewalls, Spectre Kryik. The accounts belong to Henry Lawson. Both his comms and omnitool use advanced, up to date Cerberus security protocols."
So, Miranda's father still maintained ties to Cerberus. Tarc. Cerberus's web tangled through their lives on so many levels … more by the second … or maybe he just hadn't noticed them before. How many more lurked where he couldn't see them yet? Nihlus stepped back and signaled for Sol and Thane to follow. They needed to get clear. He needed to talk to Shepard and Garrus, get their take on Lawson and Cerberus.
"Hey!" Sol's elbow jabbed Nihlus in the side. "Where are you?" She sat sideways in the driver's seat of the car, brow plates low over her eyes. "You haven't said a word to anyone other than the car since we got out of there."
Nihlus let out a long breath that whistled a little as it bullied its way through his clenched jaw. "Cerberus is tied up in this war so much deeper than we suspected. Every time we come up against something lately, it's got Cerberus fingerprints all over it." He turned a little to face her. "I know they were behind what happened to Garrus and me. Now, I'm thinking they're behind so much more."
"The Eclipse in the base we uncovered during our last investigation were working for whoever is behind the black orbs," Thane said from the back. He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees. "Could the same force be backing Cerberus?"
Sol frowned and flopped back against her seat, her expression turning thoughtful. "Or they could be the other side, moving in to take away the leviathans' resources. Cerberus has a really dark history." She slouched into the empty space between her seat and the door. "The Council is on the reapers' side, so they're backing the collectors as well." A sharp clicking sound chased an equally sharp chuff. "Yeah, I don't buy Cerberus doing anything for anyone other than humans. They're netichiks waiting in the branches waiting for Shepard and the rest of us to wander beneath, and by the time we see them coming, we'll just be dry bones on the ground."
Nihlus smothered a grin, but didn't succeed completely. She had Shepard's gift for prolonged, graphic imagery. "EDI is into Lawson's comms and omnitool." He faced front as the car chimed their arrival at the apartment. "She and the geth will worm their way in and strip the leaves off those branches."
"I will return to the Ypres for the night," Thane said, the words drifting out of the shadows in the back seat. "What time should I report in the morning?"
"Don't be crazy," Sol said, beating Nihlus to the punch. She contorted between the two front seats. "There's more than enough room at the apartment. My parents will take one room, the happy trio will go upstairs, Jane's mother and sister can take the other room, and we can camp out in the sitting room." She shrugged. "I don't want to camp alone." Nodding, her last word given, she turned front. "We could even camp out on the balcony … watch the stars."
Thane's wry chuckle tugged at Nihlus's mandibles even as the assassin replied, "Nos Astra creates too much light to see the stars."
"Details." She chuffed, the end coming out with a little extra force thanks to the car touching down. "Don't make me demonstrate my hand to hand skills, Krios." Even Sol and her talent for deadpan snark didn't manage to get that out without a heavy dose of humour singing through her voice, widening Nihlus's smile.
"No, indeed." Thane slid forward on his seat, the evening light bright orange and red across his face in the rearview mirror. He met Nihlus's reflected gaze and cocked a brow ridge, asking permission to intrude upon their family evening, perhaps.
Nihlus nodded, then opened the top and doors, waiting for them to get out before he followed, but only as far as the car's front end. "Go ahead in," he told them, suddenly needing the almost-coolness and peaceful almost-darkness. "I'll be down in a couple of minutes."
Surprising him, they both just nodded, then stepped into the elevator, Sol starting a gentle argument about whether or not they'd be able to see the brighter stars, even through Nos Astra's light pollution. Nihlus just shook his head, then turned away, walking over to the wall where he and Al sat weeks before and made their peace.
He pressed his knees into the low wall, unsure why he hadn't just gone inside with the others. Letting out a long, hollow feeling breath, he sat and then eased his legs over to hang free above the city. Everything had changed so much and so fast in the past seventy-five days. Sometimes it felt like drowning, caught and dragged along in a torrential river.
He wouldn't trade it. Not one bit of it. He just needed a minute to stick his head above the water and catch his breath. The reapers and Cerberus and the promise of war scared him; he wasn't a complete idiot. But that particular fear amounted to a drop in a wide sea.
Closing his eyes, he dug his talons into the seam along the top of the wall and took a deep breath. Blossoms … sweet smelling, like fruit, ripe and dripping with nectar. It settled behind his keel, beating like insect wings. Why did the wonderful things terrify him?
"Cikabeknai?" The call came from a couple metres away, soft enough that it didn't startle him. "What are you doing out here?"
He took another deep breath, then turned around to face Shepard, planting his feet back on solid concrete and gravel. "Thinking." He shrugged, just a crooked bob of his head. "Taking a few minutes to breathe before everyone gets all excited about Izzy."
Shepard walked toward him, her steps uncharacteristically pensive. "I think I know you too well to imagine that you've gotten cold feet about all this family stuff, so what's on your mind?" She moved to sit next to him, then hesitated and twisted to sit across his thighs, her arm draped loosely around his neck.
Nihlus shook his head and wrapped his arms around her. "Just how much life has changed in a short time." He nuzzled her ear, the skin satin-soft against his mouth-plates. "It's mostly great things, but it's still just flying at us so fast that it leaves me breathless sometimes."
She kissed him. "Yeah, I get that. Seems like I've been running without stopping since I woke up. Hell … since I saved your gorgeous, reckless ass on Eden Prime." She tucked her head in the curve of his neck, her cheek cool, her hair silky and soft. "It's hard to believe it's just nearing the three month mark since I woke up."
"And now we're a family and getting prepared to make the opening salvos in a war that could destroy everything." Turning his face into her hair, he took a deep breath, letting a few moments of calm settle around them. "I just want to start our lives."
Gripping her tight, the flutter in his chest becoming almost frantic, Nihlus fought to calm his racing heart. His mind spun out a thousand desperate ideas how to avoid the war or end it, but it wasn't cowardice that inspired his landslide of avoidance. He'd face the reapers and give it all the strength he had … more even, because those spurin stood between his family and peace.
Shepard stilled his mind with a soft kiss. "We'll get each other through it," she whispered, her lips still brushing his mouth. "And then we'll find somewhere quiet—somewhere new and beautiful—and raise our family." Another kiss, that one longer and heated enough that his momentary panic vapourized. "Come on, let's go give the family something happy to focus on."
She stood, leaving his lap feeling cold despite his armour, but then she turned back and held out her hand. He took it, making her tug a little before he followed. For a second, he let himself imagine where they would be and what they'd be doing the following evening, but shut it down, afraid he'd give his plans away in some small way.
Although Shepard said nothing in the elevator, Nihlus felt an expectant sort of excitement around her. That energy grew as the seconds passed until the elevator doors opened and she sprang out.
"Look who I found loitering on the roof," she called, leading the way into the empty-feeling room.
"Nihlus!" Their mari stood to greet him, arms steady as she reached for him, eyes bright and keen. She looked wonderful, better than he'd seen her, even two cycles back when they met. Pulling him in to touch brows, she chuffed softly. "You look wonderful."
"I look good?" He held her at arm's length, grinning at her. Dear spirits, she glowed so bright that it burned its way up his arms. Despite the pressure in his throat, he managed to chuckle. "Who are you, and what have you done with Treana Vakarian?"
She cradled his face in her hands, her bare palms warm and strong against his mandibles. "I'll explain everything once you three tell us why you dragged us to Illium." Releasing him, she sat back down, expectant gaze shifting between them.
Nihlus embraced his pari, then looked past the Vakarian clan to the Shepards. "Hello, Lucille … Bunny." He leaned over the coffee table and shook Lucy's hand and met Bunny's glower with a nod and a smile. He hadn't really spoken to Shepard's family since the trip to Palaven for the first bonding ceremony, and he felt the need to tread carefully around Jane's mother. She really hadn't been pleased about her daughter bonding with two torini and made it clear she'd set up her tent in the Garrus camp if it came down to it.
"Nihlus." Lucy smiled, the expression bright and genuine, easing back his concern. "It's good to see you again."
"And you." He bit back the urge to make a small hint to the fact that they'd been brought to Illium for more than the announcement about Izzy. That news had to wait for Garrus to take Shepard out of the apartment after dinner.
Speaking of …. He turned, meeting his dilan's bright green stare, the emerald lights in that gaze twinkling with mischief and delight. She'd already curled in next to Garrus, leaving a space for him on the couch. When she patted the cushion in invitation, he took the seat and leaned back a little, letting them take center stage for their news. As much as Izzy felt like his child—as much as she was his child—she really was Garrus and Shepard's to announce.
He grinned as his fratrin and dilan spent a moment staring at one another in a silent war of 'you go first' before Shepard cleared her throat, and sighed, a noisy, grudging admission of defeat. Shepard opened her mouth, freezing like that for a moment before shutting it again.
Nihlus watched her, wishing he could see her thoughts. He harboured no doubts that the news would be met with joy, but he didn't envy them the explanation.
"In six months," Shepard began, prodding him from his thoughts, "you're going to be grandparents." She grinned at Bunny and Sol. "Or aunts as the case may be."
A good three minutes of breathless silence followed, five stunned sets of eyes looking from Shepard's face to her belly then Garrus and back. Nihlus pulled his mandibles in tight against his face as he watched, only his traitorous brow plates betraying his eagerness for the storm to break.
"Wait."
He should have known Sol would beat everyone to the punch. His filitrin's mandibles flicked several times before she let out a soft, subvocal rumble of awe, surprising him with the depth of love behind it … well, maybe not surprise at the amount of love so much as the lack of teasing.
Sol opened her mouth a couple of times before she managed to say, "You're not out there taking on collectors with my niece or nephew in there, are you?" Stare riveted to Shepard's stomach, she chuffed and shook her head. "I don't know how things work with humans." Her awe slid back and forth between curiosity and confusion. "Can we see it? Can you find out if it is a girl or boy?"
"How?" Lucy whispered, her brow knitted into deep furrows. "You're not … you two aren't ..."
Shepard activated her omnitool, bringing up the scan, everyone in the room melting into cooing, gasping puddles that deepened to concern as Shepard explained about Mordin and his experiment. The explanations complete, the sitting room dissolved into a flurry of embraces and joy.
Nihlus's comms chimed. No doubt EDI getting back to him about the mission the next day. He hesitate for a half second before sending a message to try again in a couple of hours. For the next little while, the war needed to stay outside. In the coming hours, they needed to store up happy memories … bright lights to hold up against the darkness waiting on the other side of the door to swallow them whole.
(A-N: Nihlus and his secrets. He'd better just hope that Shepard appreciates being kept in the dark. :D As always, thanks so much for reading and reviewing/commenting. Loves and hugs and frisky kittens with balls of wool.)