So, I was done with this story, but in response to some feedback from Planetar, I added this chapter, which mostly fills in some stuff after Leviathan. Enjoy.
After Despoina: Leviathan
"I don't want any tentacled creature inside your mind… except me."
Liara laughed when she said it, but there was an undertone of anxiety in her voice. Melanie knew it had been frightening for Liara when she had to watch her girlfriend go down into the trench without her, and she does what she can to soothe the asari's nerves.
"I'll try my best," she reassures, tenderly kissing her lovely blue forehead. "After all," she added jokingly, "Leviathan isn't nearly as pretty as you."
"Well, I appreciate the effort. And Melanie," Liara continued, her voice becoming softer, "I also appreciate your patience with me about… being inside your mind."
"Don't worry about it, Liara." She brushed her lips lightly against the asari's soft mouth, and even in that brief kiss, she could feel Liara's ambivalence. Desire and hesitation were wrestling with each other, and when the moment ended, Melanie added affectionately, "You're worth waiting for."
Of course, as she left the room, Shepard was grappling with her own mixed emotions. Not on the subject of Liara: their growing closeness was immensely welcome to her, and she meant what she had just said: she was willing to take as long as was needed for Liara to be ready to make love. After all that she'd put the asari through, turning her down and then changing her mind, how could Shepard be the impatient one? Liara had waited two years for them to be together; Melanie would wait for this. Still, it was nice to know that joining was on Liara's mind as well as hers, and the thought provided a small shield against the other worries currently bouncing around her head.
The Shadow Broker wasn't the only one uneasy about having enlisted the help of the leviathans. Melanie had always lived by the idea that people made their own decisions and were responsible for the consequences. For that reason, forces that took that right, that responsibility, away were especially repellent to her. The Reapers with their indoctrination, or the Thorian with it's spores, revolted her more than the standard array of mercenaries, slavers, and terrorists she had fought against.
She could still remember the moment on Feros when she'd had to watch Fai Dan take his own life rather than do the creature's bidding and attack her team. The way that his hand had shaken as he raised the pistol had been troubling, but what had really gotten to her was the look on his face as the bullet entered his brain. It wasn't fear or sadness, but rather relief, death providing the only escape he could find from the agony of servitude. It had been in the back of her mind when she told Saren she would sooner die than submit to the Reapers, and she believed it just as strongly now.
Given all of that, working with the Leviathans was distasteful to say the least. Not only had they inadvertently created the Reapers, but their own methods of mind control were just as bad as anything else she'd encountered, their victims turned into zombie-like automatons. These creatures were the tyrants who had once enslaved a galaxy and compared to that, working with Aria T'Loak or the rachni was nothing.
And yet, give the situation, there was a decided lack of good alternatives. After Thessia, after her failure to secure the Prothean VI, their need for allies had become increasingly desperate. Even if this lead on Horizon panned out and they recovered the information they needed to find the Catalyst, the leviathans' assistance would be a major help in protecting the Crucible when it deployed. And if it didn't, if the data was lost for the foreseeable future… Shepard hated to think about it, but if they were forced to start from scratch, then these additional forces might provide a slim hope of staving off total collapse long enough for something else to be found. All she can do is gamble that that help, and her choice to accept it, ends up coming at a price they can bare.