She had anticipated the chaos

She arrived ten minutes earlier

Anonymously moving through the crowd

Every species was represented in the throng

Some trying to get a glimpse of the war hero

Others the widow of their Messiah

Their eyes locked on her private shuttle unaware she moved among them

Following her own path had led her back to her mother's perch

Fate had deluded her into believing she was free

Entering the apartment had reminded her of a dig site

She remembered the smell of stagnant water

The stale air of the ruins

It had invigorated her to step into the past

Here…she felt trapped by memories…Therum

Could she be rescued by him?

In the end he was more machine, than human

Was she becoming something similar?

He'd loved her

While she loved nothing

A man once flesh and blood

Now smoke and ash

No

Whatever she'd become

It bore no resemblance to the man she'd loved

She felt the echoes of her past

Resentment, anger, and loneliness hung in the air

Alone most of her life without experiencing love

She'd craved it

Now having had it only to watch as it disintegrate

It seemed like madness

To strive in vain for something that could not be attained

Even when found it was elusive

Love was finite it always came to an end

Whether by death or the passage of time

How could one life absorb everything?

Her mother's shadow cast her into darkness

His first death launched her into the light

She was a creature forged in the fires of a personal hell

How had she resurrected herself after such a devastating loss

If she could only remember

Maybe she could find her way back

A way back to him

A voice from the shadows whispered

I'm always coming back.

A lie

She'd thought Illium would have the answer she sought

Instead a memory she couldn't touch hung in the air

She touched the case containing the only piece of him in the room

She could almost feel him

His lips against her own

Whispering promises

Each broken

She remembered that day

The day of broken promises


Searing hot shrapnel breached the armor

Her flesh screamed a leg buckled

She crashed to the ground

Her eyes never leaving the man she chose to follow

No

She hadn't chosen this

The constant danger the worry

Love had never been a choice

Dark violet stained hands clawed at the blackened earth

She dragged her unwilling body after him

In a flash of red light he was gone

A bloodstained scorch mark upon his home world

Yet she continued her slow trek towards him

Would she ever stop chasing after him?

Only a few agonizing moments later she watched him rise

If he could withstand such violent force

Surely she could do the same

Her mind was willing but her body weak

She collapsed once more

Her screams unheard by the ringing in her ear

He never looked back

Her fingers clawed the dirt as she dragged herself forward

The beam was within reach when a pair of strong hands took hold

Pulling her away

No…

Her throat was raw, but she yelled to be released

She would follow him

Her body had failed her

She had failed him

Yet again she was helpless

It was Therum all over again

Imprisoned by her own failures

She prayed to a false Goddess

Hoping for one moment she could be real again

Maybe if she believed


The memory faded

The Matriarch whose shadow had caged her

She was to blame

She'd led the human to her

He'd been searching for the Matriarch

When he'd found the Maiden

Her decision to mate with an Asari that caused her to be ostracized

She would have known love

Happiness without the human

The Matriarch had caused every ounce of pain in her soul

Her mother's voice broke into her thoughts

You sought the isolation of tombs

Preferring the company of the dead to the living

You are the monstrosity that takes lives willingly

I take responsibility for being an absent mother

Blocking your path

And denying you a mother's love

I will not accept blame for what you have become

An empty vessel abusing her power to fulfill a pointless fantasy

She shut out the voice

There were no innocents

It had been for them he'd died

Every life owed her restitution for what she'd lost

Nothing about him had been pointless

He'd done what no one else could

Yet he never looked back

Did he realize he would not return?

Had he known would he have looked back?

She could feel the anger

The resentment of being left behind over and over again

By her father

Her mother

Him

Humans made so many promises they could not keep

Was it their lifespan?

Did they believe they would not live long enough to be held to them?

Nothing was stopping her from breaking her promise

She could find peace in the ….

No, there was no Goddess

Only a Prothean lie

She had nothing left to believe in

There was a time she would have sought the answers

In the ruins of Therum, Illos, or Feros

But now…the truth was known to her

They had usurped the knowledge of those before them

The Protheans could not accomplish the one thing he could

It always came back to him

He would hold the answer

She had to find him

The glass case shattered and she picked up the last remnant of him

She would follow him to the end of his path

If he could not be found there

He did not wish to be found

He had turned his back upon her for the last time

She looked down at the glass upon the floor

Was she as irrevocably broken?

There had been a time when she believed

When hope existed within her mind

Any hope she harnessed always dissolved

When she realized there was no substitute

He could not be replaced

She left the apartment

It had once held despair and rage, but there had also been hope

Now all hope was lost