Liara
By the time noon rolled around the day after what she was coming to think of as The Interview, Liara had been just about ready to crawl back into bed to pull the covers back up over her head and wish the world away for a while. By mid-afternoon of the second day, she was giving serious consideration to what Shepard would call the 'judicious application of' against selected individuals. By the evening of the third, the idea of stealing away in the freighter in the middle of the night was at the forefront of her mind. She could fly off and find some long-forgotten world where she would never ever had to see another living soul apart from Shepard for as long as she lived. Maybe Ilos. She had always wanted to go back to Ilos. She and Shepard could live there and explore the ruins in peace and blessed silence and maybe emerge one day many, many years later when the galaxy was rather more sane and had hopefully forgotten them completely.
She settled for screaming into a pillow in the privacy of her makeshift office.
It was all too much. Far too much for one person. Too many people, too many questions and demands and requests and offers of help. Too many bad ideas for every good one, too much useless information for every good tidbit. It was worse, in many ways, than being the Broker; for all that the sheer volume of information pouring through the intel network at its height had been far greater, it had been provided to her by professionals, for the most part, who were expected to present their findings to her in a manner that was unambiguous, detailed and to the point.
And she'd had Feron and Glyph to help her, not to mention the old Broker's notes, protocols and carefully built organisational structure. An army of analysts at her beck and call. Here she was flying blind, trying to sort through rambling letters for glimmers of useful information, or being frustrated by terse, mysterious missives that could be read in any one of a dozen ways. What she needed was concrete information on resources and population distribution; what she got were pleas for help, vague offers of unspecified assistance and politely-worded death threats. Even when the material was unambiguous, it was rarely good, and the good news never entirely so.
She had, for example, acquired the backing of some of their surviving military. With High Command in tatters following Sword, Shield and Hammer, and the destruction of the Republics coms network, it seemed as though what little remained of their navy and ground forces had returned to their home systems and city-states, whenever possible. Of those who'd found themselves without homes to go back to, three battlecruisers, an even dozen frigates and a supercarrier, the badly-damaged Elegant Nemesis, had sent word that they were awaiting her orders.
This had seemed like wonderful news for all of five minutes, during which her head had started to race with ideas of what she could do with even a pair of functional frigates and their complements of skilled crew. It wasn't much compared to the asari fleet at the height of their power – or even the fleet she'd had the ability to call upon as the Broker – but they could protect aid convoys, run off pirates and do basic repairs on critical systems infrastructure, like coms relays and refuelling stations. But then one of the new reporters - a teal-skinned matron of perhaps five hundred - had gotten wind of it, had seen the commandos and irregulars starting to trickle in their ones and twos and asked her, point blank, how long she had been planning this attempted coup, and if she expected to meet armed resistance, and all the enthusiasm had drained from her.
Liara's response had been a rather stiff and decidedly chilly declaration that this was not a coup, thank you very much, and that she still believed in the democratic principles on which their government was built, but that if people elected to put their trust in her during this crisis period then she would do her best not to let them down as the matriarchy had.
It made her cringe, now, just to think about it. It was exactly the sort of public justification and self-aggrandising dictators, prospective or otherwise, used. Even if she wasn't a dictator. And had absolutely no intention of becoming one. She only doing this because someone had to, and there was no-one else. At least, there was no-one else who was willing to do it on the scale at which it needed to be done. Given her druthers, she'd be on Ilos right now, with Shepard, making good on their mantra.
But the knowledge sat, heavy, in the back of her mind, that she hadn't meant to become the Shadow Broker either. And that, even now, after the Reapers, the reason Liara had stepped into that role in the first place, were officially gone, she found herself extremely reluctant to let go of it entirely.
She'd told herself that what remained of her network was simply still too useful to be allowed to wither and die – and, crippled though it was, it was also still an undeniably useful asset - but she was not so naive that she could pretend that there wasn't a part of her that liked knowing secrets and wielding power across the galactic stage. It was the part of her that could lie, blackmail, threaten and even kill in cold blood if it had to, and then go home to sleep soundly at night. The part that turned her into someone that took a clinical, intellectual pleasure from arranging the utter ruin and damnation of a foe, who could see people as things, as tools to be used and discarded, who instinctively understood the true meaning of 'at all costs'. The part of her she sometimes wished had died that day on Hagalaz with the yahg, and not just been subsumed back into the greater whole.
Power, the old axiom ran, corrupted those who wielded it, and she was no less susceptible to its call than any other asari. How many of history's greatest tyrants had started out with good intentions, just like her, believing that what they did was for the best? That they were the only ones who could do what was needed? Had Apinla Mori once been like her, wanting to serve and protect and better her people, only to give them secret police, re-education camps and five hundred years of paranoia, regression, repression and brutal war?
It was a chilling thought.
But Liara had one thing that Mori didn't have, couldn't possibly have had: Shepard. Shepard would keep her honest, just as she'd done when Liara had first donned the mantle of the Broker. Even if... Even if the worst happened, if Shepard... never woke up, the fear of disappointing her memory would be enough. Shepard did not work so hard, sacrifice so much of herself only for Liara to try to curtail the freedoms so hard-won. Liara would help their people as best she could for as long as needed, and no more. She would give them facts, show them the truths that had been kept hidden from them, present them with the hard lessons she had learned during the Extinction War and let them decide how best to shape their society to face the future. And when that time came - and she hoped to the goddess that it would be sooner rather than later - her service would end, and she would be no more than one voice among many again.
She rubbed at her eye and took a sip from the energy drink in her canteen, trying to stave off an impending headache that came from skipping another breakfast, and refocused on her work. There had to be some way of efficiently organising and sorting all of this information, and getting the information that she actually required. Or... could she delegate some more of the work? The other morning had been the second time Benezia had suggested recruiting a specialist, and the second time she had been right to do so. D'Azuma had proven herself to be a goddess-send that morning and many times since, as much as Palla and Aurelia ever had. If nothing else, Liara would be eternally thankful for keeping the hungry press more or less at bay until she had been ready to face them, and then again until her mother was.
Benezia hadn't been ready, not truly, Liara knew, but they'd both known equally well that they'd had no choice. Benezia had suffered through the brief conference, looking and sounding for all the world like death warmed over – D'Azuma had thought it'd play better with their narrative. She'd let Liara do almost all of the talking, explaining what indoctrination was, and providing an edited account of how and why she and Shepard had hidden her mother.
The stories the little press corps had concocted out of the affair had run the gauntlet from sympathetic to negative to ambiguous; which portrayal ultimately took hold in the public consciousness remained to be seen. There had been little follow up, aside from one or two vox-pops around the camp, especially once it became clear to the corps that neither Liara nor Benezia were going to discuss the matter any further on or off the record. The only other person with an in-depth knowledge of the situation was Aethyta, and Liara didn't think the nature of her relationship with either of them was fully understood by anyone else.
She'd also spent most of the last few days drunk to the point of insensibility, and so was unavailable to be interviewed in any case.
Uncharitable though it was, the thought of that made her angry. Benezia said that the worst would pass, shortly, but, goddess, was it too much to ask to have both of her parents functioning at the same time? Aethyta could be useful now. If she were sober, Liara could put her in charge of interfacing with the ships that had lent their support, organising and evaluating the new commandos. She worked intel herself - maybe she could help sort and analyse all of the reports that were coming in. Instead, Liara had tried to get Benezia to work on that, but her mother, for all she seemed to have snapped out of the worst of her despondency, struggled to concentrate on any one task for long, and had politely but firmly refused to take on any role that had a decision-making capacity.
If Aethyta was out of the picture for now, and Benezia's use limited, who else could she delegate to? Palla was already picking up more and more of the day-to-day running of the camp. Dora had declined taking the lead on anything more than local defence. Some of Matriarch Efrosyni's surviving students? Mother has said that she'd had a good eye for talent, and Palla was certainly a great find. Someone with a communications background who could coordinate the rebuilding of the Republics coms network? That would be definite start. There had to be someone who worked logistics, even if it was only in a basic capacity, who could start getting really down to grips with matching points of supply with points of need. An administrator to take over running of the lost and found boards, and work out how to get people back to their families.
She was scanning her growing database of volunteers, residents and new arrivals, not entirely certain what she was searching but hoping that she'd know it when she saw it, when Aurelia entered the hold with a knock and a cough. Liara looked up and favoured her with a smile.
"I don't suppose that you've come take me away from all of this?" she asked dryly.
The young maiden gave her an odd look, but then smiled hesitantly back.
"Just say the word and I'll find some way to smuggle you out of here," she said. "But I actually came to let you know that we've got another group of arrivals. Two ships this time, with a third about five minutes out."
The ships the reporters had arrived on had only been the first of a string of new arrivals. So far they'd acquired almost five hundred more mouths to feed, but that five hundred had included, praise the Goddess, a physician, who'd been whisked off to the medical shelters before her feet had properly touched ground. Liara really needed to find five minutes to head over there and thank her in person.
"Anyone of note?"
"A dozen commandos from that colony on Istis that got wiped out. Dora's sizing them up now - she says they're provincial, but they've logged a lot of combat hours. The, uh, incoming vessel is Systems Alliance."
Her rational mind pointed out that it couldn't possibly be Shepard, not now. Miranda's last update on her status had come in only last night, hinting at another small, almost imperceptible improvement. This was most likely simply more refugees, who'd simply commandeered the only available vessel available to them, or - Athame preserve her - more reporters.
But even with the rational part of her mind chiming in with a myriad of reasons as to why it couldn't possibly be Shepard, Liara couldn't help the surge of hope that coursed through her body, propelling her up from her chair and out towards the airlock, drawing on her gauntlets as she went. It couldn't be Shepard. But it just - just! - might be. If anyone could make Shepard whole again, bring her back to Liara once more, it was Miranda Lawson. The human had, after all, done it once before. And Shepard had promised Liara that she would come back to her. Liara was certain she'd move the galaxy itself if she had to.
But it wasn't Shepard. Liara realised that with a sinking heart as the ship skimmed by overhead and dipped down to land out in the former killing field beyond the walls, alongside the krogan's dropships and the ships of other new arrivals. It was not even half the size of the original Normandy, a fast attack craft with a hull that still bore scars from the battle and a name that translated into a meaningless collection of sounds. Something that small wouldn't have the medical facilities Shepard would need to make the trip, and certainly wouldn't have been able to house those that had, to Liara's ever-present shame, refused to leave her side. Miranda and Karin, working so hard to save her life and repair her body. Ash and James and Javik, who stood guard at her bedside and outside her door in shifts, glowering at anyone who came near. Joker, who wouldn't let her go anywhere in a ship he wasn't piloting, and EDI, who wouldn't let her go in a ship she wasn't.
"Liara..?"
Aurelia's hand upon her arm, her concerned voice brought Liara back to herself. She touched a hand to her cheek, and wiped away the wetness she found there, trying to force her guilt and irrational disappointment to go along with it.
"Come on," she said, shaking off the other maiden's hand. "We have work to do."
She led the short way to the wall above the gate, noting how the expanding settlement was starting to encroach upon the fortifications again, and the clutter this entailed. Her inner archaeologist wondered if some lucky dig team, millennia in the future, wasn't going to have a field day trying to puzzle out the contradictions of this site. Her inner administrator noted that it was probably past time to push the walls out another bit further, or, perhaps, even to begin looking at taking back the parts of the city that still stood. And her inner commando quickly made note of available cover, idly checked the pistol at her hip and coolly evaluated what threat each of the five armed and armoured humans approaching the gate posed.
She immediately pegged two of Marines, one skinny male and one squat female, as veterans, their movements relaxed but alert; the third, another male, radiated nervousness, and discomfort with his full suit and sealed helmet. His nervousness was shared by one of the remaining two members of the landing party, two more females dressed in light combat shells over navy skin-suits rather than full body armour. The fifth and final member of the group, though, walked at its head, a slight and surprising spring in her step. She stopped the squad just before the gate and raised her hand in what, Liara had to quickly remind the other watchers on the wall, was a greeting, not a warning.
And then she called up to them, asking in polite but halting and oddly accented tones for entry, and Liara felt her face break into a smile, as best as it was able to.
"Sam!"
She vaulted over the parapet without a further thought, letting her biotics slow her fall just enough to take away the worst from the impact, and moments later was standing in front of the shorter human, who grinned up at her through a slightly foggy faceplate. Seconds after that, she was startled to be pulled into a brief but fierce embrace.
"Liara! It's so good to see you."
"And you too, Sam," Liara agreed as they parted. "And you too. What brings you to Thessia?"
"Admiral Hackett sent me. I come bearing gifts."
"Gifts?"
"Of the best kind," the human confirmed happily. "Really expensive ones. Um..."
The last was directed over Liara's shoulder, even as the Marines behind Sam snapped into defensive stances, weapons coming up to the ready. Liara turned to see her own guard moving in to circle the smaller group, weapons hot, led by a furious-looking Aurelia.
"This… ah, this isn't exactly the welcome I expected, to be perfectly honest," Sam said warily, trying to follow the asari squad as it fanned out.
"And it is not the one you should receive. Stand down, please," she directed the commando squad, simultaneously waving for Aurelia to come up beside her. "Sam, this is Aurelia Vamos, the, um, captain of my guard." Goddess but it sounded so unnatural and narcissistic to say it aloud. "Aurelia, this is specialist - sorry," she noticed for the first time the changes to the uniform, the insignias of rank, "it's lieutenant now, isn't it? - Lieutenant Samantha Traynor. She was with us on the Normandy."
"Hooray for battlefield commissions, I suppose," Samantha Traynor said with a roll of her eyes. "It's a pleasure to meet you."
The hand she extended for a human-style handshake, however, went unmatched, she slowly dropped it back to her side.
"Charmed," Aurelia said icily, not taking her eyes off the Marines, even as they themselves began to lower their weapons. "My Lady, I beg the favour of a word with you in private."
In the awkward, tense silence that fell, Liara looked from her to the tense Marines, to the commandos surrounding the group, to Sam and then back up at the wall, where two more Huntresses had arrived and had weapons out and trained on the humans.
"Of course," she said eventually. "Griete, would you please see Lieutenant Traynor and her company safely to my office?"
The older commando holstered her rifle behind her back and stepped smartly forward.
"Yes, my Lady. If you would all follow me please."
Aurelia, to her credit, waited until the new arrivals were safely behind the gate and out of earshot, and even then kept her voice low enough not to be heard by those still standing watch atop the wall.
"What in the twelve stinking hells were you thinking!?" she hissed. "Are you trying to get yourself killed? You can't just do things like that anymore! What if they were hostile?"
Liara blinked, taken a little aback by the fully revealed depth of her anger.
"Aurelia, Samantha is a friend of mine," she said placatingly. "And Commander Shepard's. We fought together during the war. I trust her with my life."
"That's wonderful and all, but what about the other four? Do you know those humans as well? Do you know if you can trust them?"
"Well, no-" she admitted.
"For all you knew, they could have been Cerberus, or Terra Firma, or mercs, or just nutjobs wanting to kill someone famous!"
"But I know Samantha. She-"
"-might have been bait! Or - what's the word? - indoctrinated! Did you consider that before you decided to run out to meet them? Any one of them could have shot you, or dropped a grenade, or-
"I appreciate and note your concern, Aurelia, but I can handle myself," she said, her tones clipped as her own anger started to rise. The young commando was good, and had the potential to become great with age if she stuck at her trade, but Liara would bet, thanks to Shepard and Garrus, Wrex and Ashley and even James Vega, that she was better, here and now. "I could certainly hold off five humans long enough for backup to arrive."
"Maybe, but you wouldn't have had time to put a barrier up if one of them had an explosives vest. Do you want to lose your other eye? Because that could be the least of it!"
Liara couldn't stop her hand, this time, from flying to her face. Her own skin was dry and rough and dead, numb beneath her fingers. And, in her mind's eye, she saw the Mako again, heard the whoomph from deep within its shattered remains, felt the sudden, incredible wash of heat and pressure. But it would all be ok, as long as Shepard-
Shepard had promised to come back to her. There would be bonding, and growing older and more comfortable together, and maybe even daughters of their own to teach and tease in equal parts. Shepard had promised it would be so, and Shepard's promises were the things on which the axes of the universe spun. And Liara, in turn, had made a promise of her own, one never spoken aloud but no less sincere:
She would always be waiting.
And she shouldn't ignore good advice just because she didn't like it.
Liara let her hand drop, the bright, unconscious flare of her biotics fading along with it. Aurelia was watching her with wide eyes, fear of more than one sort behind the anger there.
"What do you want of me?" she asked, as calm as the breathless moment before a thunderstorm.
"You made me your guard. I promised to be your shield and your spear, and to keep your secrets and your life," Aurelia said, and her voice was almost pleading as she echoed the words of her oath. "Let me be your guard, and keep you safe. I can't do it if you won't let me."
And letting her, Liara knew from her youth and her mother's entourage, meant more than the occasional escort. It meant guards at locations hours before her visits, searching venues and vetting crowds. It meant itineraries and plans and escape drills. It meant a constant, wary shadow that smelled of leather and gun polish at her side, at her heels, a presence built an unspoken barrier between her and every person she would ever meet, another ocean between her and any chance of a normal, quiet life.
She had never wanted to be in that position again. Never a moment real peace. Never a second real privacy. Never an instant of true spontaneity. She had left her home, her mother, in large part to escape that kind of life. But for Shepard-
For Shepard, she could endure anything.
"You are right, of course," Liara sighed, and found a smile from the goddess only knew where. "I'm sorry. I am afraid that I am just not used to being the centre of attention like this. Not even five years ago I was fending for myself, alone at dig sites on forgotten planets. And on the Normandy, my work meant I kept to myself for much of the time. I will need some time to adjust."
She'd gone for days sometimes, particularly after the fall of Thessia, without seeing another person face to face. She would work until she fell asleep at her desk, waking hours later, stiff and sore, only to pick up exactly where she left off. She ate if she remembered, or if someone reminded her to. Shepard was better about that than she was - she joked about the ghost of her old 'gunny', whoever or whatever that was, coming back to haunt her - but only just.
They'd made a concerted effort to find time for each other during the opening phases of the war. They'd eat and talk and plan, and make love to decompress and wish the conflict away for a little while. By the end, however, when they'd found time for each other, they'd been more or less limited to sharing bland ration packs in various degrees of silence, then falling into bed, too tired to do anything more than lie together and spoon until duty or nightmares drew one or both from slumber once more.
"I understand that it's a big change for you," Aurelia said slowly, cautious in her seeming victory. "But it's a necessary one. I think we can trust the people that have been here from the start, and the krogan all seem to be too wary of Matriarch Aethyta to risk trying anything and they're leaving soon anyway, but we can't say the same of all of these strangers coming in. We've had more than fifty so far just today, and I caught some of those reporters trying to break into your ship this morning. Who knows what will show up tomorrow? We just can't afford to risk you. You're all that's holding us together."
The almost reverential way that she said the last two sentences made Liara feel oddly uneasy. The asari were a resilient people. Someone, or multiple someones, would rise up to do the job if she fell or stepped aside. They would just do it differently, perhaps more slowly, and without all of the facts she had at hand. Perhaps the old matriarchy might persist, but it would, at least, be some sort of an order. And it probably wouldn't persist anyway once the secrets Liara held were let out, and she would make certain, no matter what, that they were.
But there was more to her unease than that, and, as she looked into her guard's big, brown and decidedly worried eyes, she abruptly realised what it was. She'd seen that expression before, back on the original Normandy. In the mirror.
Oh no. Oh no no no. What had Benezia said about Aurelia, when recommending her for this very role? That anyone could see, just by looking, that she was devoted to her? Liara had thought it was just a bit of, dare she say, hero-worship, and had tried to dissuade it as gently as she could, encouraging the younger maiden to relate to her on a more personal level. Even if such adulation were not inherently uncomfortable, Aurelia would not be able to function effectively as her guard if she saw Liara as more than asari. But her efforts seemed to have backfired. Devotion indeed.
Great goddess, what did she do now? She could have dealt with flirting from the girl. Their people expected some such play and flattery in most social gatherings; it was, in a way few aliens understood, the grease on which the wheels of asari society turned. She'd learned to deal with it, and flirt herself, on Illium. She had even turned it into a science project, of sorts, bringing to mind all of the times she had watched her mother and her friends at those interminable, intolerable meetings and parties and other gatherings, using them to create rules of behaviour she could apply and refine. Flirting had never meant anything to her at the time, and she hadn't cared then if it had mattered to anyone else. It was hard to care about hurting other people's feelings when you had none of your own.
But here, now, she did care about hurting Aurelia. She was sweet, and loyal, and had been through a great deal. And, besides, Liara had quickly discovered working as an intelligence broker that the most horrific, relentless vendettas arose when love was turned, for whatever reason, to hate. She could ill-afford to make another enemy, let alone make one of the asari who was supposed to guard her back.
Liara had a feeling that she already knew what Benezia would say if she when to her for advice on the matter. Traditionally you were supposed to take key members of your guard and your entourage to bed, at least once. It built rapport and trust, her mother had said by way of explanation, all those years ago, and bound them to you more tightly. It was another level of security, too, as it was hard to conceal your true feelings and intentions in a meld. Was Aurelia expecting that of her? The younger maiden was... nice, certainly, and even attractive in a lanky kind of way, but the idea left Liara feeling decidedly cold.
Aethyta, on the other hand... Actually, Aethyta would probably offer the same advice the same as Benezia, only rather more crudely and with accompanying hand gestures. So that was no good either. But there wasn't really anyone else she could ask.
What had Shepard done, back on the first Normandy, when it became painfully obvious that half of the ship was infatuated with her? She had been friendly to everyone and eminently approachable, but was still, somehow, unavailable at the same time. Until, quite abruptly, she'd become available to the reclusive, stammering, naive archaeologist who'd never been able bring herself to fantasise about anything more than kissing and hand-holding before. And when Kaidan had misread the signals, she'd dealt with him calmly but firmly, keeping their working relationship and friendship intact.
But Shepard was Shepard, and so was deeply charismatic and generally wonderful with other people. Liara, on the other hand, applied the scientific method to basic social interactions like flirting. She had even, goddess help her, made charts.
"There are others who can step up," she countered after a too-long pause, turning and starting back for the gate to cover her sudden discomfort. "I'm sure that not all of the matriarchs have their heads in the sand. Just most."
Another pause.
"Their... 'heads in the sand'..?"
"A human phrase, taken from the behaviour of a mythical bird. A phoenix, I think. It means something like, oh, pretending that something dangerous will not exist if you refuse to look at it. I've never been able to find a similar saying of our own."
"It's a good saying," Aurelia said non-committedly, falling into step.
They passed under the battlement and back into the camp, pausing to roll and lock the heavy steel panel serving as the gate back into position. They set out again in silence, coming to a halt only when they'd reached the grimy, brooding bulk of the freighter.
"I expect you to tell me if I have my 'head in the sand' Aurelia," Liara said, "much as you did today. And I will make more of an effort to consult with you about my movements and be less impulsive and otherwise let you hold to your oath to me. But I still expect you to respect my privacy when I ask you to, and to obey my orders when I give them to you. Am I understood?"
"Yes, my Lady," Aurelia replied, saluting just as stiffly.
"Good," Liara said, keying the airlock. "I am going to speak with Lieutenant Traynor in private. You may re-join your comrades for the time being, or help supervise the other humans if you wish," she added, nodding to the small group, led by Griete, that was vanishing deeper into the camp. "I will call for you when we are done."
"As you command."
Liara didn't wait to see which direction she set off in, or even if she did, but stepped into the airlock as soon as the door cycled open, breathing a sigh of relief when it closed behind her again. Goddess, it wasn't as if she didn't have enough problems already! What had her mother been thinking? Had she?
The airlock went through the full decontamination cycle before letting her back aboard, and, once inside, she realised that the ship's environmental systems were powered, air circulating briskly through the scrubbers. She found the cause of that, her visitor, examining the almost empty cargo hold with apparent interest, her bag and helmet carefully placed atop Liara's desk but her breathing mask unclipped from her belt and affixed firmly over nose and mouth.
"Sorry, the atmospheric eezo reading outside here's five parts per million and I couldn't wait to get out of this bloody helmet," Sam said by way of explanation, turning towards her. "I have no idea how Tali stands it."
"Quarian suits are better engineered," she replied, thinking back to the periods of downtime aboard the original Normandy when they'd had nothing better to do than 'shoot the breeze', as Shepard had called it – another strange human idiom, now that she thought about it. As they'd talked about their homes, their families and their people, Liara had been surprised to discover how much she and the rather more garrulous quarian had in common. "And they're more or less raised in them. I'm told that, after the first two or three years, it's not so much like having a second skin as having a stronger, thicker first one."
She stopped and gave the human woman a good once-over, noting that the dark shadows beneath her eyes, and the lines of stress and worry that had aged her face by decades over the closing weeks of the war had eased, though not disappeared completely.
"You're looking well. Peace suits you."
"And you. You're looking," the pause was noticeable, "better than the last time I saw you."
"Considering I was barely conscious, half-naked and laid out on a surgical bed, I'm not sure that I can consider that much of an accomplishment."
She didn't remember much about those first few days, spent initially in an overcrowded field hospital, and then in the relative quiet of the Normandy, after someone had seen her laid out between the only three other asari in the facility and realised who she was. There had been pain and confusion, the latter not at all aided by the former, and, particularly, the various medications she'd been given for it.
Liara had hazy recollections of humans apologising for not being able to do more for her, of going into and out of surgeries, of waking up to hear Garrus arguing weakly with Karin. Faces, familiar and not, swam into and out of view in a strange world where every light had a halo and every sound was curiously sharp. Once, an asari, a matron with enough vanity to highlight her natural markings with tattoos, had been wrapping her arm in a new set of bandages soaked in something that smelled like bile. On another it had been Javik at her bedside, telling her that, if she died, she'd simply be proving what a useless, weak and primitive species the asari were. She had cursed and tried, unsuccessfully, to slap him, and taken his curiously approving grin back with her when she'd passed out, the right side of her body on fire again.
Sam, though, had been the one there when she'd woken up, truly, for the first time, with enough of her faculties intact to ask 'had they won?' and 'where was Shepard?', in that order. Sam had been the one with the answers, too, before Karin had stepped in with her tests and her drugs and her more clinical explanations, and her assurances that they were looking for an asari-compatible dermal regenerative unit. Liara hadn't processed much beyond the realisation that she was still alive, that Shepard was still alive, and that the Reapers were not. The mirror hadn't come until later.
"Well, the half-naked bit wasn't so bad."
"Do you often ogle half-naked asari?"
"Only when they're extra-crispy." The human paused and glanced up at the ceiling, as if in deep in thought. "No, wait, that's a lie. If you must know, I wasn't entirely heartbroken when Admiral Hackett told me that my next assignment was to the planet of the hot, blue, alien not-women."
Sam dropped her head back down to meet Liara's eye with a smile and a wink, and Liara surprised herself by laughing, a short, sharp burst. She couldn't remember the last time that she'd laughed.
It had taken most of the war for Liara to warm to the human Specialist, and they had really only established something approaching friendship after the first couple of months had well and truly gone past. At first, Liara simply hadn't cared to get to know any of the new crew beyond the dossiers she'd carefully assembled on them. She'd had her work, which they could have no part in, and, if she ever felt the urge for some sort of social contact, there was Shepard, or, failing that, Garrus, Tali, Ashley and Karin or, if she was feeling particularly desperate, Joker. As a result, the crew had found their resident asari archaeologist cold, aloof, abrupt and secretive, treating her with grudging respect to her face and gossiping about her, in sometimes unpleasant terms, behind her back. Shepard had eventually found out and both put a stop to the gossip and forced Liara to engage more with the crew.
Liara hadn't really minded the gossip all that much. Fear kept people from asking questions that didn't need to be answered.
Specialist Samantha Traynor, though, had been actively nosy, pestering Liara whenever she stuck her head out into the mess or onto the bridge with persistent questions about what went on the supposed XO's office, with its unnaturally high data and power usage levels and ever-locked door. Liara had even caught her trying to infiltrate her network more than once, and the resulting silent arms race had proven costly in terms of time and credits. From then on, Liara had made a point of keeping an eye on the Specialist from a comfortable distance, which had, in turn, lead to twin, uncomfortable revelations. The first was that Specialist Samantha Traynor, with her sharp mind, esoteric interests, innocence of war and occasional tendency to – when had she started thinking in human idioms? - put her foot in her mouth, reminded her just a little too much of her younger self. The self Shepard had fallen in love with. The second was that she, Liara T'Soni, first and only daughter of Matriarch Benezia, had an unexpectedly strong jealous streak.
It was completely irrational, and, at the time she honestly hadn't been entirely certain as to where it had come from. It really, hadn't been all that long ago, after all, that she would have happily agreed to sharing Shepard with Kaidan Alenko, if it meant she got to be just a small part of the Commander's life and heart. And then again, later, before Shepard went through the Omega Relay; Liara heard all of the rumours swirling around about Shepard's possible involvement with half of her crew – how could she not? - and had steeled herself to wish her beloved well and wave her goodbye, because after two years spent immersing herself in the cesspit that was Nos Astra, Liara hadn't felt worthy of Shepard anymore, and had truly wanted her to be happy with someone. But the very thought of Specialist Samantha Traynor, the Oxford graduate and oral hygiene enthusiast with a ready smile and sinfully dark eyes, whiling away two evenings a week teaching Shepard how to play chess over a bottle of wine somehow tied Liara's stomach in knots and turned her hands into fists. It had taken every ounce of her willpower not to abuse her network to discredit the Specialist's expertise, somehow, or disgrace her publicly, or manufacture some sort of crisis involving her parents severe enough that Shepard would feel compelled to release her from service to go to them.
Shepard had been amused but... disappointed in her. Disappointed in both of them, really, particularly after EDI, who was an insufferable and oftentimes inappropriate gossip, had informed her of their private espionage war. Shepard's disappointment had always impossible to bear, and so Doctor Liara T'Soni had found herself seated at the bar on the Port Observation Desk beside an equally uncomfortable Specialist Samantha Traynor with orders to 'kiss and make nice'. And they had. Made nice, that was, over several shots of some horrible drink called tequila, shared tales of past horrific embarrassments and a lengthy discussion about data compression algorithms. Sam - and it had become Sam very quickly - had eventually suggested that they enact the kissing part of the order, if only to get back at Shepard, but Liara had declined on the grounds that she would feel hypocritical. And also her suspicion that it might not have the desired punitive effect on her lover.
That particular suspicion had been confirmed later that night, when she'd found her drunken way up to Shepard's cabin to be confronted with a human whose eyes were a little too amused and whose grin was a little too innocent. Liara had ignored her questions with exaggerated care, walked her back towards and then onto her bed, shucking her methodically out of her uniform as she went. Then, straddling her naked thighs, she had attempted to smother her with a handy pillow.
Shepard had laughed so hard she'd cried, and when they'd eventually made love that night, it was full of the echoes of her amusement.
"So, what does bring you to Thessia, aside from the view?" she asked, scooting around to her side of the desk. "I believe that you mentioned gifts."
"I did," Sam replied, drawing a datapad out of her bag before taking up her own seat. She held the device out to Liara, who took it, left-handed. "On behalf of the Systems Alliance, representing Earth and all of its associated colonies, settlements and outposts, I am duly authorised to extend the hand of friendship once more and offer the official re-opening of diplomatic relations between our peoples. If you're agreeable, we'd also like to begin negotiating a formal military and trade alliance."
Liara stared at her, uncomprehending for a moment, and then looked down at the datapad. It certainly looked legitimate, as she scrolled through. The text, repeated in several asari and human languages, was too flowery to have come from the Admiral himself but it was his signature and prints, voice and thumb attached to the bottom alongside the digital seals. The device itself was a one-time-use diplomatic pad. A few such pads had crossed her desk during her time as the Broker, and she'd even come into possession of one once while working on Illium; they were very difficult to forge or alter, but not impossible if you had the right connections.
"Provisionally, yes," she said, looking back up. "Very much yes. I'll have to read through it first, you understand and-"
'Put it to a vote', she almost said.
Really, by every law and custom their people possessed, something of this magnitude had to go to the people for debate and approval. The entire people. Who were scattered across hundreds of worlds and thousands of outposts, some still without any way of contacting the outside world. Who typically took part in debates via dispersed electronic forums moderated by extremely sophisticated VI constructs, all of which utilised the very same communication infrastructure that the Reapers set out to destroy from day one.
And then the debates themselves, for policy changes of this magnitude, took years to complete at the best of time. How many years had it taken to ask the turians to join the war against the Krogan Rebellions? Three, was it? Four? While they'd continued to lose ground to the unstoppable horde inch by inch and relay by relay? And then it had taken almost another decade of debate to agree to extend a seat on the Council to them for their efforts.
Forgiveness, not permission. A second mantra to live by.
And, later, a mantra to rot in prison by.
Well, at least if she did end up imprisoned or, more likely, if Samara or another Justicar executed her for treason, she could rest easy knowing that any agreements she'd illegally put her name to on behalf of her people would be more easily broken than made.
"-and," she continued more slowly, "run it past wiser and more experienced heads than mine. But I would hate to see everything we worked for during the war to fall apart now, in the peace. I do have to ask, though: why me? My sources indicate that the matriarchy on Cyone is still at least partially intact, and they worked very closely with Alliance forces during the war."
The first reports of the reaction to her... speech on Cyone had not been entirely promising. The fortress-planet had stood up to the worst the Reapers could throw at it and so the old order still held out.
Goddess, how quickly had she fallen into thinking of it as 'the old order'? Was she really that arrogant? But their mindset was clearly old: Cyone was accepting no refugees, and sending only limited aid.
"We've been dealing with your colonies on a world-by-world basis, but it's been an uphill struggle and there's a lot of duplication and wasted effort. We've been hoping for a while now that someone would step up and start trying to re-form some sort of central government that we can deal with directly. Admiral Hackett thinks you're the best bet we have of that. And… I probably shouldn't be saying this, but I think he respects you. Even if you say 'no', I'm still to give you the QEC."
Liara perked up a little more. She had a great deal of respect for Admiral Hackett herself, and to hear that he still thought well of her in turn gave her a surprisingly warm little glow. And a QEC, even one just linking her to the Alliance, would be invaluable. She'd gotten so used to having it, aboard the Normandy – instantaneous communications untraceable by the Reapers, even within certain limitations, was worth its weight in eezo.
"A QEC?"
"That really expensive present I mentioned," Sam said happily. "It's in the back of the Canberra over there with a portable fusion plant that's good for about another two years. I've got a week in total to get it set up and tied into your local coms before I've got to head back to Earth. Here, I'll send you the specs."
Seconds later, Liara was looking through the basic technical specifications for the QEC unit and the fusion plant. She was no Tali, but she thought she had some idea of what she should look for, and was looking at. The plant, she was certain, was nothing special - she'd used ones like it on half a dozen major dig sites - but it would be a welcome supplement to their current limited power supply, even if most of its output went to the QEC unit. The QEC itself, on the other hand, was pure top-of-the-line Alliance-military, much like the one on the Normandy. The previous Broker had acquired the plans for a similar, at some point, and had commissioned a number for use within the network; they were all useless now, unfortunately, with the central node on Hagalaz destroyed. Given the expense and difficulty of creating QEC units, the unit on offer had probably been salvaged from a damaged Alliance command ship or station.
"Expensive gifts indeed," she murmured, killing her omni-tool readout. "What does the Admiral want in return?"
"Just the chance to bend your ear, I think. We're proving units to the turians, the quarians and the krogan as well, and the salarians, if we can find someone to deal with. In another week you should be able to talk to them directly yourself. We only have enough units to give everyone one, so it will all have to be routed through our central hub. But we promise not to eavesdrop."
"Too much," Liara remarked dryly.
"Too much," Sam agreed, with a slightly devilish smile.
"How is Admiral Hackett doing, anyway?"
"Well enough, I think, but he complains that he's twice as busy now as he was during the war. 'When the shooting starts'" she continued, in a rather poor imitation of Hackett's gravely tones, "'people do what needs to be done, but the moment it stops, all they want to do is argue. They'll argue themselves right out of an airlock if they're not careful'."
Truer words were never spoken – at least when it came to her own people.
"It sounds as though you and the Admiral are getting along well."
"I think so. I'll admit that I was a bit nervous about working for the old man at first, but when you've worked with Commander Shepard, it's rather hard to be intimidated by anyone ever again, isn't it?"
"It is."
That was the very sentiment she had clung to on Illium, the one that had let her stare down information brokers five times her age, let her stand stock-still and relaxed in the face of a raging krogan ready to charge, let her antagonise the most dangerous man in the galaxy.
"He keeps threatening to promote me again. I don't think lieutenants are supposed to tell admirals to stick thing up their jumper, but I will if I have to."
Liara laughed again.
"You don't want another promotion?"
"I didn't want this one!" Sam groaned. "But he insisted that I needed a commission if I was going to be overseeing this sort of thing."
"You do deserve a commission, though, and probably more," Liara insisted. "You are exceptional at what you do. Without you, we would have lost the war."
The human woman changed colour slightly in a way that Liara knew signalled embarrassment, and waved her hand vaguely as if to ward off Liara's words. Since learning of it, Liara had always been vaguely thankful that asari lacked a similar such involuntary mechanism.
"You can say the same thing about two dozen people. Including you. Without you and your research on Mars, we wouldn't have had the Crucible."
"And without you and your work on the Normandy, we wouldn't have known that the Catalyst was the Citadel," she countered pointedly. "So, I suppose that makes us both 'big damn heroes', as Garrus would say."
"It's a big damn pain in the arse," Sam muttered. "I know I should be thankful. And, not all of the hero stuff is bad. A Star of Terra and a nice fat pension - I can handle that. But, you know, I never wanted command. That's why I went in as enlisted."
"I wanted to spend the next several hundred years quietly unearthing prothean ruins and writing the odd paper," said with a shrug. "We don't always get what we want."
"No," Sam sighed, and it was full of regret. "No we don't."