A note: Well, I miss Thane. That's pretty obvious. So I wrote this, listening to Jack Wall's Soundtracks for the games. Enjoy, fellow Krios Lovers! And as always, please review.
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His Siha.
Deterioration
Solipsism. Was it a curse, sometimes? Yes. Sometimes.
A seat in semi-shadow, and no-one would know whether he was living in the past or the present. A little darkness would conceal his dancing pupils, eyes wide as his brain was saturated with details; scents that were no longer there, light that had long stopped shining, sounds that had long since ceased. He remembered it all.
Sometimes, it came unbidden. The moment he met Irikah for example. He would often fall into that memory gladly. Others however, were not so comforting.
Shepard. Only the gods knew how wonderful those memories had been, the memories with her. That strong, pale beautiful human who had stolen his blackened, dying heart, and made it beat again in earnest.
-Sunset eyes, staring at me defiantly through the scope, skin, the colour of desert sand- It never failed to take his breath away. -Irises, hard and cool, glaciers, unrelentless, unstoppable.-
"Siha…" He whispered her name, leaning forward in his seat in the shadows. There was none to hear his address, the loud Omega club continuing to buzz around him. The incessant thud of the bass carried on, the chink of glasses, shouting, giggling…
-The scent of ethanol thick on the air, everything white and sterile. Leather creaking beneath you as you sit and wait- Grunting in annoyance, Thane got to his feet, slipping silently through the crowd. Just a shadow, nothing more. He barely even raised a glance from anyone. They never saw him leave… never saw his arrive… -ocean-coloured skin, cool in his hands, as he set her down to die, the scent of burned flesh assaulting his olfactory senses. Shepard, glowing bright in the Illium sunset-
He was standing in a corridor he didn't recall walking to. Steam buffeted out of a nearby vent. The smell told him it originated from a kitchen of sorts. He faced a dead-end. Sighing, he turned on his heel, only to find he was not alone.
Two Vorcha, another Batarian. Uniforms, blue: Blue suns.
"We don't get many Drell on Omega." The Batarian commander grunted, brandishing his pistol menacingly.
"You should look more closely," His deep voiced hummed in the metal-walled alley. "Over there, for instance." In the brief second of their distraction, he was able to call upon the shadows to guide him. Stepping back into the mask of the steam, he drew his Pistol and fired off three fatal shots. –The assassins dropped dead at his feet, though nothing, no amount of deaths would bring her back. The taste of revenge was tainted- His vision swam.
He needed to get off Omega.
-0-
The Normandy was a hub of activity, bustling with officers and crew. Shepard paced her rooms, fatigues tossed to the ground. She could think more clearly with the metal panelling beneath her bare feet. She tucked her black hair behind her ears hastily, grunting in annoyance as the shorter strands only fell in her way again.
Just biding time… wasting time…
"Commander Shepard," EDI addressed the room coolly, bathing the steel in a calm blue glow. "I have received an unknown transmission from Omega. Should I patch you through?"
She frowned, crossing to her console with two strides. "Yes, EDI."
She only momentarily fumbled with her earpiece before the transmission wavelength came up on her screen. "This is commander Shepard of the Normandy speaking. I would ask that you state your name, and your reason for reaching me on this secure wavelength."
"Siha."
"Thane!" She exclaimed, dropping the authoritive tone in an instant. "You're—where are you? I've been trying to find you-"
"I have tried, and I have failed. I… I am on Omega."
"I'm on my way, Thane. Stay safe… please. And stay PUT this time!" She was pulling on her trousers already, shouting to EDI to set co-ordinates for the Omega system.
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Her suit felt itchy all of a sudden, as she waited impatiently in the airlock for the Normandy to dock. Come on, come on…
"Nervous?" Garrus intoned coolly at her right hand.
"Shut up, Varkarian." The hum of the decontaminant didn't mask his dry chuckle.
-0-
He was waiting at the dock, calm as you please, hands folded behind his back in the classic Thane manner. But something was wrong, she saw it instantly. They shook hands, mostly for Jacob and Garrus' sake, and were back on the Normandy and pulling out of dock as soon as the airlock doors closed shut behind them.
She ushered him to Mordin immediately, making sure her commander's stride was well used as she crossed the bridge. She was looking out for a colleague. Nothing more.
Pressing the button for the lift a little too hard, she tapped her foot as she waited. Thane was as calm as ever- did that frustrate her more? The lift arrived with a polite 'bing'.
Once inside, she took a deep breath. "What the hell were you thinking?"
"Siha, I…"
"Don't start with that. It's Shepard to you! Do you want to explain to me why you just left my ship without so much as a 'I'm just nipping out for milk'?"
If he was human, she supposed that his eyebrows would be raised. Instead, his wide black eyes seemed to refocus on her face. "I apologise, Si- Shepard. I… I needed to try and find answers. I was… deteriorating." He lowered his chin slightly. An acceptance of guilt.
"Be that as it may, do you realise how insulted Mordin is? He's one of the best geneticists alive, and you seek out outside help?"
"Was that a joke, Shepard?" He inquired politely. "After you."
The elevator had reached the crew deck, and she hadn't quite noticed. Flustered, she stalked out of the cabin and took a sharp left, toward life support. In answer to his silent question, she said; "Its more arid in here, remember. I thought you would be more comfortable."
"I… thank you."
-0-
He had disappeared shortly after they had visited the Citadel on yet another fruitless plea trip. No, the council wouldn't just give them a fleet of ships on their word, no 'suspicions', that the reapers planned to harvest all organic life…. Again.
It had all been so promising. Mordin had been holing himself away, carrying out research, and Thane had participated in regular testing. His relationship with Kolyat was going relatively well. The boy was angry still, yes, but they had some time to make amends before…
Then he hadn't returned to the Normandy. So unlike him to be late or forgetful, yet it had taken an hour for her to be fully convinced that he just wasn't coming. No reports of a Drell being ambushed on the Citadel. Nothing. He had just left her side, just like that, after everything.
She kicked the edge of her desk to vent some of her frustration. If there was something she hated, it was feeling like she had been betrayed.
She had left him in life support with Mordin and Dr Chakwas, unable to face him in the company of others. She didn't want to just scream at him, though if she were to do so, it would be in privacy.
EDI burst into life in her room an hour later, announcing that Mordin wished to report to her. Sighing heavily, she allowed the Solarian entry, not really feeling up to listening to his ramblings.
"Shepard. His condition has… significantly worsened. I cannot say why but… his cerebral function is beginning to wane. He tells me that he is unable to control the Drell ability of solipsism, often losing chunks of time to his recollections. Worrying. Should keep him under surveillance."
"Ah." She felt a little guilty for her treatment of him, yet still… "Does he… wish to speak to me?"
"You are the commander Shepard," Solus politely reminded her. "If it is his wish, it must be yours also."
-0-
Staring at his interlaced fingers as a form of meditation, he focussed on the gentle hiss of the dehumidifier and the distant hum of the generator. He found it helped to stop him falling uncontrollably into memories against his bidding. It was draining, however, especially in a room which held so many memories for him. Though, they weren't bad ones, by any means. Perhaps he could just slip—
-hands, pale and white, warm between his. Calm blue eyes, questioning, open. The Armour of the warrior Goddess, glinting in the light of a trillion suns, blood of the fallen staining that pure white skin- Someone calling his name –bullets. So many bullets, firing off into space and time… her lips, moist and wanting, meet his, and all thoughts are knocked into oblivion-
"Thane!"
There she is, his beautiful and terrible Siha. Her forearms are bare, her hands gentle as she reaches out to touch his face. "…Shepard."
"Thane, please, I'm sorry… I shouldn't have… I should have understood." She shakes her head, hair the colours of the void falling into her eyes, as it always seemed to.
"Shepard…"
"I'm here. Come, let's get you up."
He didn't recall falling from his seat, though the overturned chair and his current position confirmed that it was so. The clatter must have alerted a crew member.
"I'm sorry, Si—Shepard, I shouldn't have left your side. I made an oath to you once," –Ilium, sunset. She is sweating, breathing heavily form the exertion of her battles along the way up to find him. The sun glints in her eyes as she gazes upon him with barely contained wonder.- "I… I promised I would follow you to the end and I failed you."
"No, no you didn't. You were just scared. It's ok to be afraid." –he barely feels the pain as he drives his fist into the desk, though at the touch of her hand, he comes undone. He is afraid, for the first time in a long time. Though in her eyes, he sees the same fear. They are different, yet the same.-
He realises belatedly that she made no effort physically lift him from the floor. His lapses into memory must be more frequent now. "I am not afraid when I am with you, Shepard."
"Please, Thane," She is whispering now, holding his palm to her cheek. "Stop calling me Shepard. I'm you're Siha, remember."
"Yes… Siha."
-0-
She never liked therapists. Not after her early military career mishaps, nor after the death of her father. They patronised her, made her feel stupid and inferior. She was a commander of a state of the art warship for heaven's sake, not some blubbering green marine longing for home. Yet Mordin had insisted.
"There is more to it than just Thane. You felt betrayed. Why is that?" The therapist was a particularly round-face Asari with beautiful lilac-toned skin, with an almost too-soothing voice, considering Shepard was lying on her back on a very comfortable sofa.
"It was… after Kaidan." She admitted to the ceiling fan, staring resolutely in front of her.
"Alliance, right? You two worked together during the siege of the citadel."
"And before that. We… we were close." For a time, at least.
"Close? And what does that mean to one such as yourself? You are a strong woman, with a very notable reputation. Nothing like this ever happened before, am I right?"
"Sex is very much part of the military, whether or not the alliance chooses to acknowledge it. All that aggression has to be spent somewhere, and strangely enough, fraternisation is more harshly punishable than starting a fight in the barracks," Shepard chuckled to herself. "I was just a lowly recruit once, and I had my weaknesses. But to get up high, you have to learn to prioritise. You have to… squash down your emotions."
"-Hence why many of the higher ranking alliance members are required to attend so many psyche sessions in a year." She said this with an air of displeasure, as though she disapproved of Shepard no-doubtedly blank file.
Kara Shepard snorted, folding her arms across her chest. "Well, as you may know, we technically stole the Normandy to carry out some heroics. We were bound up in the frenzy of it all, and I guess… We'd gotten to know each other pretty well after everything that we'd been through on that ship…"
"Then of course, you died, for all intents and purposes. How did that make you feel?"
Those damn patronising questions again. "It made me feel like shit, to be honest. Lost, and confused. Why had Cerberus taken an interest in my broken bones and my desiccated corpse? Only they could tell you that. But Kaidan didn't see it like that. He saw my disappearance as some sort of betrayal of his damn gold and shiny alliance ideals. He didn't see the big picture, what was really at stake."
"But Thane did?"
She paused, drumming her fingers on her forearms. "Yes, I suppose so." Her voice was quiet and she considered the question. "Thane was, well he is… dying. He wanted to make a difference, to make a mark on the galaxy before he could accept his death. Some warrior's philosophy or something…" she waved a dismissive hand.
"Yet something changed?" The Asari prompted, furtively tapping away at her hand held tablet.
"I think it was just fear. He didn't want to die anymore."
"-Because of you."
"Hell, who said anything about-"
"Because he fell in love with you." The therapist raised her voice over Shepard's, not looking up from her tablet. Shepard realised somewhat belatedly that she had gotten to her feet, the blood pounding in her ears.
"Its not so wrong is it? I'm a human woman after all, Don't I deserve-"
"And he is a renowned Drell assassin, feared the galaxy over."
"And I am Commander Kara Shepard, known in every fucking rathole in this galaxy. So tell Mordin that I'm in control and I don't give a shit about his piece of crap therapy sessions-" she continued ranting long after she had walked out of the door, blissfully unaware in her fury that the therapist was smiling as she neared completion of her report.
'Kara is making excellent progress coming face to face with her fears and concerns, and her own identity as not only a human, but as a woman.'
-0-
Mordin was in his element, tossing equipment out of cupboards here and there, punctuating each dismissal with a running commentary of babble. It made Thane's head ache somewhat, yet there was a kind of peace to watching the Salarian bustle around in his natural habitat. It spared him from thinking, to watch another do so so loudly.
"No, this won't do. AH! Perfect, now if I could just find that mouthpiece. Where did I put. It. Hm…"
It was bliss.
"Mordin! You sly son-of-a-bitch, that therapist was a complete waste of my time! I swear to god if she even so much as looks at me with a clipboard in her hand again I'll—Thane? You're awake."
Her form, so animated seconds before visibly fell away. He almost laughed, were it not for the pain in her eyes as she looked upon him. That was one of the reasons he had wanted to leave. Should his treatment fail… which it most likely would, he didn't want her to witness his slow degeneration. She deserved so much better.
"Shepard, you are back earlier than expected. Mr Krios's condition has improved slightly since his recovery from sedation. Perhaps you could entertain him whilst I- ah! In the flax cylinders! I knew I'd left it somewhere!" The Salarian bustled away to the rear of the room, leaving her somewhat alone with Thane.
"Your session did not go well." He stated, fingers interlaced calmly in his lap. He looked so beautiful, so vibrant beneath the too-white lighting in the laboratory. So many shades of emerald green adorned his toughened skin, and she almost forgotten how black and depthless his eyes could be.
"You look better." She noticed aloud, leaning a little closer. Perhaps it was just the enhanced lighting, but his eyes were much darker than they had been in his delirious state the previous day. They had taken on a most unhealthy grey hue.
"It is only temporary, no doubt. Though I do not think Omega- the lights, the smells, the noise- helped my mind to remain cleared."
"Listen, I said some things yesterday, and I wanted to-"
Mordin announced his return with a not so inconspicuous throat-clearing cough. "I have managed to assemble a proto-type piece of apparatus. Now when the gene splicing sequence is complete, we can insert the vectors into some form of aerosol. I believe bi-weekly treatments would suffice at first, until we can know fully the potency of the treatment."
"Do you think this could work?" Shepard dared to ask, not caring whether Mordin was present or not and taking Thane's cool palm between her own.
"Hm. Hard to say. Usually dosage efficacy takes a lot longer to refine in laboratory testing prior to phase three patient trials. We don't have that time. Will have to do. I shall monitor it closely, and make adjustments as we go. Will record findings. May also help other Drell in future." His eyes unfocussed momentarily, as his speech trailed off into nothing. "Well, I'm very busy, must get back to work. Talk soon, Shepard."
She took that as a sign to leave, gesturing to Thane to follow her. She needed to get some things off her chest, make amends for what damage she might have done. They almost reached the elevator, when a familiar voice stalled her hand before she could depress the call button.
"Shepard?"
"Alenko, what are you doing here?"
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To be continued…