Liara

The doors of my new haven opened for me. The throbbing music cut straight through my skin and vibrated against my bones, a dark threnody of bass chaos and rippling treble. In Afterlife, this music had seemed discordant and grating. Here, on Illium, in Eternity, it replaced the dry, dead beating of my heart. Here, in the pulsating pounding of the drums, I could lose myself. I could run from the images that haunted me, the phantoms of my mind that dogged me without ceasing.

I took a seat at the bar and raised a single finger. The newer bartender, not the indigo skinned asari, immediately placed a glass before me and filled it with whiskey. I took a sip of the liquid and swallowed it. It no longer burned. The drugs coursing through my system obliterated any unpleasant sensation. They kept away sleep, scorched the nightmares, and blurred a galaxy of pain to the point where nothing hurt any longer. One prick of the needle and pain faded into a blur of altered senses and infinite pleasures.

I smiled over the rim of my glass as I watched the asari dancers. My eyes devoured the curve of their hips, the press of their breasts against the poles, against each other. The thick, sweaty glide of skin on skin made my throat tighten.

"Oh come off it, T'Soni." Avi leaned against the bar, obscuring my view of the dancers. "You're still drinking Shep's poison of choice. You're still shooting up to run away from her." A martini appeared in the hallucination's hands and Avi took a sip. "Nothing's going to chase away your ghosts."

"Shut up." I growled, throwing back the remaining whiskey in one swallow and slamming the glass down, grinning as the bartender filled it.

They knew me here now, enough to remain silent if they overheard me talking to the blank air in front of me. Enough to keep their eyes averted from the deep bruising on the inside of my arms. There were many here on Illium like me…there were many like me in all planets of the galaxy. Those on the run. Those addicted to a numb, painless existence.

"Damn." Avi whistled low as she looked at the dancers. "No wonder Serena was all over you. If you've got a body like that hiding under those clothes, she wouldn't have been able to resist."

"You're a bitch, Avi." I muttered, draining another glass, letting my eyes fog over as the alcohol mixed with the drugs for an entirely different sort of euphoria. "It was more than that between us, I assure you."

"Yeah." Avi's eyes narrow. "Passion. Acceptance. Love. Tell me, Liara, do you still want that? Have you looked at the time? The date? Exactly seven months to the day that you and Shepard did the deed." she took another sip of her martini. "Six months since she died. And you've been a drug addicted nightmare pretty much since then."

"I don't have to listen to this." I drank a third glass of the whiskey.

It tasted like water. It tasted like numb. It tasted like nothing. The euphoria was lessening each day. Every needle in my skin brought with it less and less satisfaction. And my hallucination had been right. It had been six months since I had been touched. Six months since I had done anything but fight and drink and shoot up.

Disgusted, I lifted my empty glass and threw it on the floor, watching shards of glass skate across the ground with dim satisfaction. Destruction felt good. It felt different. It simply…had feeling. The bartender stared at me, a look of wrathful indignation on his face until I slammed a credit chit on the bar and stalked off, towards the dance floor. My hallucination remained by the bar, sipping her martini, a knowing grin quirking the corners of her lips.

I turned away and let the music wash over me in a wave. The beat took control of my muscles as I began to dance. My eyes closed and I swayed to the slow, seductive rhythm, letting go of my thoughts, my will, the last remainder of my inhibitions, which the drugs had all but obliterated. The music became the sway of my hips, the undulating of my back, the smooth motion of my arms as I lifted them high and twined them together at the wrists, subconsciously acknowledging that I was a prisoner of my own weaknesses.

But I don't have to be strong anymore, I thought, feeling a warm comfort in the pit of my stomach. I am not fighting the enemies of the galaxy. I am not holding steady for the woman I love, because she is dead. Let the purpose and drive I have been a slave to for a hundred years die. I do not need it.

I felt so at peace, so high, that when a warm pair of hands grasped my hips I did not startle. I opened my eyes and looked before me, a slight smile crossing my face. A pair of snapping black eyes met my gaze, framed by long, exquisite lashes. Obsidian hair caught the flashing lights of the club, tinging blue and violet beneath the flare of strobes. I rested my hands over the ones that still held my hips, feeling the smooth, soft caramel skin beneath my own. The human was beautiful...a soft, gentle beauty, not hard and harsh and brazen like...never mind.

"I saw you dancing." a low, velvet voice whispered. "I couldn't resist. I had to touch you."

Desire and honey-mead scented her breath and I moved my hands from hers, lacing my fingers through her belt-loops, pulling her near me as my smile widened and became coy. We moved to the music, our bodies shielding each other from whatever demons pursued us both. No living being lacked its ghosts, phantoms, evils. No living being lacked something it needed to run from.

I ran my hands around the small of her back, waiting for the thump of the music to reignite. I grasped the curves of her shapely ass and pulled her forward, moving my thigh between her legs. A low groan left her lips as she rolled her hips to the beat, pressing herself against my thigh. Her hands grasped my shoulders for leverage and she continued her movements, which became less a dance and more a primal surge against my body. Her wet, crimson lips parted and her breath washed against my face with a remembered warmth…a memory whose power I immediately quashed.

I did not want the memories of sweet whispers in the night. I did not want the sensation of tender hands that knew every curve of my body intimately. I wanted to continue to run, to flee, and, if need be, bury every memory of sweet seductions in the body that I held close to mine. To let animalistic passion be the grave in which I discarded the last of my emotion and soul.

I stepped away and my dance partner whimpered at the loss of contact. Her hands swiped against her leather pants, leaving a streak of sweat on the gleaming material. I wanted that heat, that slick, fevered touch. So I took it. I grasped her hand in my own and she followed me through the crowd of undulating bodies of all species.

I walked her to the velvet rope that separated the VIP booths from the normal crowds. A huge, towering human man stood beside it, crossing his arms and glaring at me. Before he could demand a pass, I dropped a credit chit between his arms and chest. He pulled it up, eyes widening at the amount.

The velvet rope dropped and I led my conquest to a shadowed booth, pulling the curtain closed behind us. The lights above us were red, the color of anger and passion. It suited the pulsing blood in my veins, the rapid tattoo of my heart, the thrumming need between my legs.

"Well this is nice." my partner commented, coming up behind me and rubbing her hand up my side. "I'm…"

I turned and pressed a finger to her lips, sparks shooting through my arm as she took my finger in her mouth and slid her tongue along it, making me shudder.

"I don't want your name." I told her. "Just you, naked and writhing beneath me."

She released my finger from her mouth with a resounding 'smack' of her lips. Her smile revealed brilliant, gleaming teeth.

"We're going to get along just fine." she purred.

Her hands reached for the buttons of her white silk shirt, but I did not want a slow unveiling. I wanted nothing that would remind me of Serena. It was bad enough that this woman was human, but I would take what came to me. And I would forget. And for once, away from the drugs and the liquor that defined my life, I would feel good.

I grabbed her wrists, stopping her movement, forcing her against the wall and pressing my lips to hers. I was not subtle, not kind, not tender. My lips attacked her with months of pent-up fury, desire suppressed. Arousal surged through me, mixing with the amphetamines and the Hallex, doubling every sensation until I felt weak in the knees, ready to come with one touch.

I kept her pinned to the wall with one hand and moved the other between her legs, squeezing the seam of her pants tight against her. Her hips bucked into my hand and her mouth opened in a gasp of shock and pleasure. Taking advantage, I plunged my tongue into her mouth, raking it along her own, feeling the shockwaves as our teeth collided and tongues dueled. Heat suffused me as I continued my rough massage between her thighs, indulging in the whimpers that spooled into my mouth. I swallowed them down, drowning in them, forgetting everything but the body surging against my own.

I lowered my lips, feasting on the pulse point at her neck, feeling the blood pounding through her veins. I bit and pulled on the tender skin, intent on leaving a bruise, a mark, something to show that I had been here, touched this, done this.

Her breath hissed out and her hand clutched the back of my neck, fingernails raking in the creases there, sending sheer pleasure radiating across my crest. It felt good, but I needed more, wanted more. My lust gnawed at me from the inside, clawing through my gut, between my legs, sizzling across my lips.

I pushed myself off of the wall and took in the lean body of the human in front of me. Her hands were pressed against the wall for support. Her breath shuddered out and through the thin white silk of her shirt I could see the rise of her hardened nipples. My mouth watered with want as she began to straighten up and get her legs underneath her for proper support.

Biotic energy swirled around my hands and I wrapped it around her body. She stared at the blue glow encompassing her, looking at me with heated eyes that, to my satisfaction, held a spark of fear. I pulled my hands apart and her clothes followed, ripped to shreds by the biotic energy. Scraps of white silk and black leather floated to the floor as I molded the energy around her body, flowing around her nipples, flaming between her legs, probing and spreading the lips of her sex with undulating pressure. She gasped and stumbled back against the wall, her head thrown back, her lower lip caught between her teeth, her hands running across her breasts and stomach with fingers splayed.

Her raven hair floated, lifted by wisps of the energy I used to torment her to the edge of pleasure, always ceasing when I felt she was close to release. Panting moans fell from her lips as I manipulated her body from afar, dominating her, making her mine without her knowledge.

"God." she gasped as her legs began to tremble. "You're…fucking…evil."

With a smile on my face I snapped my biotics out of existence. Her legs buckled at the loss of support and I was there, holding her limp, quivering, unsatisfied body in my arms, savaging her lips with my own once again. I guided her to the couch and straddled her, cupping her breasts in my hands, kneading the malleable, sensitive flesh, running the flat of my palms over her rock-hard nipples, savoring every hitched breath and high-pitched whimper.

It was not enough. I needed to feel the heat of her skin against mine, to soak myself in the sweat the sheened her body and made it glisten in the red light. I removed my hands and pulled off my shirt, letting it fall to the floor as I grasped her wrists and pressed her hands against my own breasts. The softness of her hands comforted me as she probed my body, so alien to her and yet so similar to her own. She moved up from the couch and lowered her mouth to my nipple, teasing its opposite between her fingers as she licked and nipped and sucked my skin into her mouth, feeling its rigidity. Her teeth clamped down on the tip and I arched my back and restrained a cry of pleasure.

Her lips and teeth tormented my breasts and her hands fumbled with the clasp of my pants, at last figuring out how to undo them and pulling them off of my hips, her nails raking my skin. I pulled away from her and stood, removing the offending clothing the rest of the way. She reached for me and grasped my arm. I winced as her thumb pressed on the bruises on my elbow and she took notice, removing her hand and staring at the obvious needle marks in my arm.

I thought she might pull away, might sneer in disgust, but instead, her black eyes sparked. She looked at me with absolute want in her gaze, as though I were a goddess, and she a needy supplicant at my temple.

"What are you on?" she asked. "And do you have any with you?"

Oh yes, my sex pulsed with a fresh rush of blood. Join me in ecstasy. Feel everything.

"I do. And it is wonderful." I replied, tracing my finger down her cheek, catching her sweat and lifting it to my lips, tasting it. "But I want something from you first."

Her eyes flared. "Anything." she whispered.

I knelt in front of her and reached for my discarded pants, slipping my hand into the cargo pocket, where I kept a locked box with filled syringes at all times.

I lowered my head and kissed her inner thigh, smelling the musk of her arousal. I pulled the box out of my pocket and met her eyes.

"Touch yourself." I ordered, pressing my thumb on the bio-scanner of the box and hearing the snap of it unlocking.

I stood and pulled out a syringe, setting the box on the table and watching as her hand dipped between her legs. Her middle finger slipped inside her and a light, breathy moan escaped her lips as she began moving it in and out in a slow, tormenting rhythm. I licked my lips as I watched, holding the syringe in front of her, a promise of bliss and heightened sensation. She bit her lips and moved her other hand, circling her clit with movements that became more and more frantic. Her back arched off of the couch as her hips pulsed to her own touch.

Her eyes closed and she began to moan, rhythmic bursts of sound that stoked my desire. Her abdominal muscles fluttered, her thighs trembled. She was close.

"Stop." I ordered.

She cried out in distress and want, absolute need spreading over her features, but her hands stilled and withdrew. I owned her completely, in this moment, and I reveled in it.

"Lie down." I whispered, and she complied, stretching out on the couch, her fingers finding her breasts, kneading them, pulling at her nipples. The air was scented with her desire, and I craved it.

I tightened my biotics into a band around my arm and slipped the syringe into my bruised veins, injecting its contents. I closed my eyes and moaned as the high resurged. Every part of my body that had been touched, kissed, and licked caught fire, spilling straight between my legs. I wanted release, satiation, satisfaction. I opened my eyes and stared at the naked, lean, yearning body in front of me. So weak. So submissive.

Exquisite.

"Please." my partner's lips quivered. "Please. I need…"

I reached back, placing the empty syringe in a box and withdrawing a full one. Her eyes ignited again.

"Beg." I whispered, walking closer, standing over her. "You do it so prettily."

Her lips parted and a stream of words left them that I did not hear and did not care about. The power I had over her felt intoxicating, better than alcohol, better than drugs. It held a rush that drove away everything. I felt nothing in that moment but desire and power and it felt so good and right that I pushed away the last little voice that said I was going insane.

I lowered my body over hers and she shivered. Her lips parted and she literally cried out from the pain of needing release.

"Give me your arm." I whispered. She extended it and I traced the large vein at her wrist with the tip of the needle, scraping it along her skin to the flesh of her elbow. I wrapped her upper arm with biotic energy and compressed it until her veins rose to the surface of the skin. I pressed the needle into her vein and she sobbed. My other hand stroked through the thick, black curls above her sex, titillating her already abused nerves.

I spread my fingers and ran them across her swollen lips, carefully avoiding touching her clit, though I could feel the hard bundle of nerves pulsing against my palm. I pressed two fingertips to her entrance and, with deliberate movements, depressed the plunger of the syringe and slid inside her at the same moment.

She shrieked and her body lunged upward. I pulled the syringe out of her arm and threw it away, releasing my biotics, wrapping my arm around her shoulders and pulling her to me, thrusting inside of her, ravaging her neck with my teeth as her head fell back. I splayed my hand across her back, feeling the muscles spasm with every pulse of my fingers. I curled them inside of her and an anguished, needy growl peeled from her throat as I pulled upward in short, quick jerks, pressing my palm to her clit with every movement.

It did not take long. The drugs ignited her nerves and my hand forced her to ecstasy. She screamed and I gloried in the sound, in the rush of heat against my hands, the full-body convulsions that shook her as she released. Her inner walls clamped around my fingers with powerful ripples and my own desire heightened as she sagged in my arms, her black eyes no longer snapping, but glazed from the drugs and the hormones flooding her system.

I held her body against my own, pressing vicious kisses to her lips. She returned them with an uncoordinated gracelessness that made me simply want more. More of this new, unique high that chased everything away, that killed the demons, that buried everything.

I kept my hand inside her as we kissed, feeling her clit, still hard and pulsing, against my hand. Her body wanted more. As did mine. I pulled my fingers out and she groaned as I spread her slickness across the bundle of nerves that begged for attention.

"Wait." she gasped. "Just…give me…a second."

I smiled into her deep black eyes. "One." I whispered, and entered her once again.

She groaned and her eyes fluttered closed as her breathing became soft pants. Her surrender was beautiful and I craved it. I slid my body down hers and feasted at her breasts as I kept up my slow, undulating rhythm. I could feel her body tightening again as I scraped my teeth down the taut lines of her stomach. Giving into my desires, I closed my mouth over her sex, laving her clit with my tongue, grinning as her hair tickled the bridge of my nose.

"Oh…God…" her voice was high, still with that velvet edge, intoxicating as she lost control.

Her had splayed over the top of my crest, urging me on, begging. Once more, I curled my fingers upward and pressed down on her clit with my tongue, micro movements that dragged her, inch by inch, towards the edge. Her thighs trembled and I felt their vibration across my cheeks. A single push, and she was over the edge, sobbing on the razor sharp blade of release. I continued still, between her legs, tasting, kissing, nipping, drawing out her aftershocks, tasting the sweet, tangy flavor of her essence. I dragged my tongue through her slit and a high, keening wail filled the room.

"No more." she begged. "Oh God, please, I can't take it. Feels…so good…but…too much."

"I know." I whispered, running my hand through the hair between her thighs, up, along her stomach, leaving it splayed between her breasts, feeling her accelerated heartbeat.

I did not know who I was anymore. Neither did I care. This felt too good. It was not simply release of the body. Something else had fled, something that a deeper part of me wanted to chase after. I ignored it.

I rose to my knees and straddled her stomach, tangling my hand in her hair, tracing the shell of her ear with a flicker of biotic energy.

"Make me feel good." I urged her, lifting her arm and licking the line of blood that had trailed down it from the prick of the needle.

Her black eyes sparked once more and she lifted her arms, wrapping them around my thighs and pulling herself up. Her lips closed over my azure and I groaned, pulsing my hips against her mouth, threading my fingers through her hair. Each sweep of her tongue stacked sensation upon sensation and I began to tremble and lose control. Biotic energy swarmed around my body. My hand gripped her hair tighter and I rode her face without mercy, seeking the crest of pleasure with drugged, avid abandon.

An urge whispered through me and I did not deny it. I grabbed her head and held it, moving it from between my legs, staring into her eyes.

"Embrace eternity." I whispered.

I fell inside her mind, ignoring her identity, pushing back her memories, focusing solely on the nerves that still pulsed with sensation. Using the technique I had learned with…someone I once knew…I fused our nerves together.

Her mouth went back to its work and she cried out as she felt what she was doing to me echo in her own body. I abused every spike of pleasure, building one upon the other within me, looping them through her nerves, sending them back into mine with double the sensation, multiplying the pressure until it almost became agony.

Her teeth grazed the ridge of my azure and I broke. My body convulsed and I did not even hear her voice as a third orgasm ripped through her. I snapped out of the meld and collapsed on top of her, breathing heavily, savoring the quiver in my thighs. The oppressive weight that had been on my shoulders vanished. I rolled off of my partner and dressed, tucking my box back into my cargo pocket. I looked down at the naked woman on the couch, her body still shuddering with orgasmic convulsions. Her swollen lips were parted with soft, stilted breathing, her eyes were closed, dancing beneath her lids as she succumbed to exhaustion and slumber.

I rolled my shoulders and stole out of the booth, back through the crowd. I wanted to go home and savor the intense freedom I felt in my soul. I felt light...without care…good.

The door of Eternity opened for me and I stepped out onto the streets of Illium, savoring the darkness that surrounded me. Phantom footsteps sounded in my ear and I looked into Avi Rivera's hazel eyes.

"Do not even begin." I ordered, and she shrugged her shoulders.

"I'm just here to say good-bye." she told me, her expression darkening. "I may be crafted from your mind but…but it is no longer there. You're not Liara anymore."