Chapter 13

"That was the past. Let's focus on the future." Shepard stood on the Council floor.

One of the turien ministers glared at her from across the floor. "But the asari—"

"Does it matter?" Shepard snapped gripping the lectern tighter.

"Situations like this always matter," Ilk said from the Council table.

The crowd in the Council Chamber stirred. Usually about the time a councilor chimed in, the debate was winding down enough to be tabled and a new topic introduced. These pre-Summit talks to orient the upcoming discussions could drag. Everyone in the chamber seemed ready to adjourn for the evening. The dark windows around the hall flickered with lightening.

"Councilor." Shepard raised her voice turning to Ilk. "Concealing the prothean beacon in the past put the asari ahead, true. That's recognized. It was a betrayal." Tevos squirmed in her chair. Shepard looked out over the rows of faces in the audience. "But councilors, leaders, it doesn't matter going forward, and that's the only direction that counts."

"What else has been concealed from us?" Ilk frowned. "Their betrayal has implications for future behavior."

"The asari stood with us," Shepard said. "We couldn't have gotten here without them. Same with the salarians, the turiens, the krogan, the elcor, the hanar, everyone. What the asari did was wrong, but it was a decision made long ago and perpetuated by a minority. Most of the asari were as surprised as the rest of us. They probably felt more betrayed than we did. This is a fresh start. We've all earned a new beginning. Forgive and move forward, because the next time, maybe it's your people that needs the hand up."

The turien minister across the floor shook his head and stormed down from the stage. "A future without consequences for the past is a dangerous one!"

"Minister Factus is right," Sparatus said. "There must be consequences or anything's allowable. That will destroy cooperation as much as over-focusing on past wrongs."

"Losing Thessia, millions of lives, being stranded all over the galaxy - those aren't consequences enough?" Shepard asked.

"That happened to all of us," Sparatus said.

"We've all suffered," Shepard agreed. "The asari along with us, despite all the advantages their secret gave them. Does their suffering need to be worse than ours to restore the balance? We've suffered enough for every species. In the future, there will be wrongs and there will be consequences. But for now? What's done is done. We've bleed and died, suffered and lost together. Let's move forward and start over."

Sparatus sat back in his chair and folded his arms. Mason and Tevos leaned their heads together whispering while Ilk drummed his fingers on the desk and looked over the crowd. The audience waited in silence. There wasn't an open chair in the auditorium. A line of people stood against the wall and down the aisles. Finally, Mason stood up.

"We're adjourning for the night. We will resume tomorrow morning. The Council will discuss the upcoming Summit topics concerning the krogan."

The room erupted in harsh voices. The other three councilors pushed up from their chairs. Ilk glanced back marble-eyed as a yelling crowd surged to the banisters. C-sec officers fanned out along the bottom of the stage. A rabid group of turiens screamed at Shepard from the front row. One even threw something at her. As it rolled on the stage floor, she could see it was a pen. Reporters waved over the heads of the C-sec officers and yelled questions about Tuchanka and the genophage.

"Shepard," Mason called waving her to the stage's back door.

Shepard hurried to him amid the roar of angry voices.

"Damn," Shepard muttered passing by Mason into the back room. "You hadn't released that until now?"

"As you can see, there's a reason, we weren't eager to announce it," Tevos said.

This private hall off the Council Chamber was empty except for them. Ilk strode to one of the exits and left without a preamble. Mason's hand patted Shepard's back as he passed around her.

"Spectre Shepard," Tevos said watching the other councilors stepping. She came closer. "I applaud your moderate stand on the prothean matter. I want you to know, I fully intend to support your position with the krogan."

Shepard frowned. "That's not why I did it, Councilor. I'm not pandering to raise support on anything."

"Of course," Tevos inclined her head with a smile. "I wasn't implying that."

Sparatus waved his datapad and yelled from across the room. "It's already all over the extranet!"

"We knew it would be," Tevos sighed and moved over to him.

Shepard left through the same exit Ilk had taken. It spilled her out into a hallway down from the Council Chamber and the roaring chaos. In the distance, the Council Chamber's entrance crowded with cameras and reporters churning to get a view inside. Shepard spun on her heels and started the other direction. The click of cameras and roar of press behind her made her feet slowed, and she stopped. Her mind ran through possibilities. She turned back and charged down the hall to the chamber entrance boiling with reporters. A few heads looked over and fingers stared to point as the sea of faces turned toward her. They shoved over each other. Cameras flashed, bobbing and bouncing off each other as the reporters surged around her.

"Commander Shepard, how is your health?"

"Did you mean what you said in there about the asari?"

"Did Urdnot Wrex threaten the Council into supporting his cause?"

"What is your relationship with the asari councilor?"

A familiar voice purred behind her. "An exclusive, Commander?"

Shepard whipped around. Diana Allers held out her microphone out in a wavering grip as people shoved against her. Shepard snatched the microphone from her. The inner layer of reporters pushed back glancing back at their cameras to assure a good angle. The questions hushed as they waited. Shepard fixed her eyes on Diana.

"I will give an exclusive to Diana Allers, Battlespace News. Other questions later."

Groans and dirty looks rolled through the crowd. Glares turned on Diana as she pushed forward with a beaming grin. She shoved back a row of reporters loitering with absently held microphones aimed Shepard's direction.

"This way, Commander."

Diana ushered her down the hall beyond the frowns and narrowed eyes. Diana found a nook down the hall, a spot by the window with a couch in the corner. She glanced behind them before shimming straight her tight dress and hailing her camera as it came around the corner.

"So good to see you again, Commander." She smiled coyly.

"How have you been, Allers?"

"Excellent." She smoothed her hair. "This is a surprise. I'm glad you remember how beneficial our talks on the Normandy always were. You made the right choice. Exclusives are the best way to go. Less pressure, more elegant."

"Right." Shepard smiled.

"All right." Diana glanced around again. "Maybe we could go to your room. Less chance of being interrupted there."

"How about we do some questions here." Shepard handed Diana her microphone back and readied herself. "I don't have much time but if you think over questions for the future, we'll see what we can do about a longer exclusive later."

Allers grinned slyly. "Absolutely, Commander."

She held up the microphone and pivoted to the camera. Shepard tapped her shoulder.

"Allers, before we begin …"

"I thought you said we don't have much time." Diana frowned back at her.

"We have enough," Shepard reassured. "I want to ask you something."

"Oh?"

"You have your ear to the ground. You ever hear of the Gray Arena?"

Diana twisted her lips as if thinking but shook her head. "No."

"The Gray Stadium?"

"No. Why?"

Shepard sighed with a frown. It had been worth a shot at least.

"Why are you asking?" Diana repeated.

Maybe there was still information Shepard could use.

"Major Alenko told me you may have contacts with Terra Firma," Shepard said.

"He doesn't know what he's talking about," Diana said. "I might have heard some things, but I don't have contacts."

"Sources then?"

"I've had a few interviews, taken notes here and there. I'm not an investigational journalist. That's not my story."

"Is there anything you can give me? Any footage, notes? Whatever you have on Terra Firma, anything remotely connected."

Diana gave her a flat stare. "I see."

"See what?"

The microphone pressed against Diana's chest dropped to her side with a sigh. "You're not really interested in an exclusive, are you?"

"I said I would give you an exclusive. I mean it."

"And the second interview?"

"I meant that too."

Diana's slit eyes relaxed as Shepard tugged down on her uniform and looked straight at the camera.

"And you don't require anything?" Diana asked. "You're giving me this interview without something back?"

"Yes," Shepard said. "I'd like it if you had something for me, but I'm ready for the interview. Feed it live if you want. Whatever. I'll give you ten minutes."

A smile broke across Diana's face. "Shepard, I knew I liked you. Now, anything off limits?"

"Let's stick to business."

"Of course," Diana smiled flicking her hair as she turned to the camera. "Your health? The injury?"

"That's fine."

"Here we go then." Diana glanced back at Shepard who gave her a nod. "Three, two, one. This is Diana Allers for Battlespace News."

XXX

Shepard paced around her room like a cage. The screen on her desk flashed with vids from Diana Allers's interviews over the last year, anything related to Terra Firma. Diana had been right. There wasn't much there. Shepard let it play in the background, the sound turned down but audible. Just because she was awake in the middle of the night didn't mean her neighbors needed to be.

She checked her refrigerator again, but it was still the same one option that had been there ten minutes ago. She'd eaten everything else. Everything else but the eggs. Lots of eggs. Damn grocery delivery service. She slammed the refrigerator door shut. Their order form needed to be more explicit. And anyone in their right mind filling an order for 'twelve' eggs should have questioned it, if it was mean to be sold by the dozen. Ridiculous.

On the screen, Diana Allers slinked around a Vancouver bar interviewing witnesses to some anti-alien brawl. It was rough footage, the unedited takes that ran on and on. Editors must have a tedious job dragging themselves through this sludge and picking out the nuggets worth showing. The camera rolled as Diana touched up her lipstick in a mirror hanging over the bar. She tugged down her neckline and boosted her assets while smirking back at her reflection. Her hair whipped through the hair as she twisted on her heels to the first patron at the bar. She leaned forward spilling herself over the bar as her arms squeezed her chest. She purred a question to the bartender. The man's words came out jumbled as his eyes strayed then flitting back up with a wary grin. The smile only broadened as she leaned further over with the next question.

Shepard rolled her eyes and flopped onto the couch. She pressed her head back into the cushion and looked out the window. She did have one hell of a large window. Diana's chattered to the camera about the turien military officers that had ran into trouble at the bar the night before. Shepard vaguely remembered it from months ago. Five dead when one of the female turiens decided to chat up a human patron, one of the dockworkers. The flirting hadn't gone over well with the humans in the corner watching. So stupid. Wasteful.

Shepard checked the time. Her Omni-Tool glowed in her face before she snapped it off. She twisting off the couch and got back onto her feet. Almost three in the morning. She crossed her arms and tapped her elbows with twitchy fingers. She'd admit it to herself - she wondered. There was nothing wrong that. She just wanting to know.

The desk chair teetered as she barreled over to her bed and threw herself down. She stared up at the ceiling. Three o'clock and it's all she could think about. Damn James for saying anything at all.

Shepard sat up on her elbows suddenly. She could call him. He'd answer. He always answered for her. He'd sit up on the screen wiping sleepiness out of his eyes, and she'd squinted behind him at the background listening for clue. Calling him in the middle of the night needed a reason though. Saying it was an accident seemed puny. In the end, it didn't matter anyway. Let him do whatever damned thing he wanted.

Shepard's ear caught on something from the footage, and she froze repeating it in her head. She leaped out of bed and rushed to the terminal. The camera's view bobbed as Diana Allers reached up and turned it off. Shepard rewound it and played it again. A smile stretched across her lips. Bingo.