Tali was laying on her bed looking up at the ceiling, she spent most of her time recently resting and thinking, when she wasnt busy with her duties. She was reflecting on past events and mainly on what happened at Illium, she kept thinking about the night she had spent with Shepard, the feelings and the desires. Tali couldn't help but smile to herself, the memories left a warm feeling deep inside her, yet a deep sadness also accompanied those warm feelings and a great deal of confusion. She couldn't explain her actions to herself, she knew what was at stake, the fate of the galaxy and the end to the chaos. Or atleast thats what she had once believed, even that now was unclear to her.
Her actions, her beliefs and her feelings, were only part of the confusion she felt. The other thing that bothered Tali was the constant illness and the feeling in her belly, she recently laughed at herself when she came to the mad conclusion that she could be pregnant. But seeing as she never had sexual relations with another Quarian, she knew it was impossible. She did ask a few times for a medical checkup, but for some reason The Illusive Man kept turning down her request.
She sat up as a voice came over her comm device. "Tali'Zorah, The Illusive Man wishes to speak with you." It was Operative. Every recent meeting with The Illusive Man filled her with dread, she worried he would sense her doubt and find out about her actions. She got up off the bed and hurried to go see him.
When she got to his operations room, he was sitting in his usual chair having a smoke, while Operative stood by him, they watched her as she entered.
"Ah Tali'Zorah, I have a new job for you." He blurted out without a hello, "Its come to our attention that after the Alliance learnt that their IFFs no longer worked, they set their best agents to find a way around it. One of them is closer then she thinks. So... I want you to head to the Alliance Prothean research facility and kill Dr. Liara T'Soni."
"Sir? Erm.. How will I get to Mars? The Alliance would of greatly improved secruity in the Sol system." Tali said with concern.
"Operative will help you with that." He didn't seem too pleased about her question.
"We have a civilian infiltrator who works at the facility. He will collect you from the nearby system and take you to Mars and back." Operative stated coldly.
"After you have finished your mission and left the Sol system. I want you to head to Horizon, its been for the best part, abandoned. I want you to recover the remaining data." The Illusive Man then added.
"Sir... Yes sir.." She replied hesitantly and left after The Illusive Man dismissed her.
When Tali was gone The Illusive Man turned to Operative. "Operative, I want you to have Tali'Zorahs location on Horizon leaked to the Council. I believe Spectre Williams is on a mission to hunt down Tali'Zorah."
"Sir?" Operative was slightly confused about the request.
"Tali'Zorahs usefulness will soon be reaching its end. It makes no difference to me which of them survives that encounter. Should Tali'Zorah survive then we'll carry on making use of her, then dispose of her when the time comes."
"It will be my pleasure." She replied with a grin.
. . . . .
"I don't get why we are waiting?" Shepard shouted angrily "Sir!" Shepard was in Price's office pacing up and down before his desk.
"Shepard I understand you're upset but..." Price said only to be cut off.
"Upset dosn't cover it! You havn't seen what they did to the Dholen system! You havn't seen what they are now capable of!.. Sir" Shepard carried on shouting.
"Oh, the reality has finally dawned on you has it?" Price shouted back as he started to get angry himself.
"Whats that meant to mean?"
"You've been off you're game! You've become incompetent! Most of you're crew and friends have also noticed it, I lost alot of friends when the First fleet was wiped out, your not the only one whos upset!" Price then sighed. "Look I won't say I can imagine what you are going through, to have a loved one turned against you, against their will. And I do appreciate your willingness to take the fight to them."
Price paused for a second before carrying on. "But without a new way to go through the Omega-4 relay safely, we can't do much. The Alliance has got some of the best people working on that, including your friend Dr. T'Soni."
"What about Omega station? If there is a Cerberus base there. There could be information on how to use the Omega-4 relay."
"That is possible and that is why we are waiting. We are gathering the fleets and sorting out preparations and strategies. Also we are seeing which other races are able to commit to an assault. It will take abit of time, but meanwhile I want you and Joker to head down to the drydocks. Hackett left a parting gift to you."
. . . . .
"Man... this sucks Phil.. Guarding a door while the fleet is gathering." Complained an Alliance trooper.
"Quit your whining Marcus." Phil said, another Alliance trooper standing outside the entrance to the Mars research facility. "The security and comm systems are down, so were needed out here."
"We should be kicking Cerberus ass across the Omega system." Marcus replied in a bored tone.
"Then what? Without the IFFs we would be sitting ducks, hence why we are guarding this place."
"I suppose... hey whats that?" Marcus pointed to a small drone that had just hovered into view. "Hey!" He called out to it, it stopped. Then hurried off to the other side. "Wait up!" Marcus chased after it, running around in a large circle after it.
Phil couldn't help but chuckle to himself, that was untill the little drone came up to him and gave him a little shock. "Why you little..." And with that they both chased the drone and ran out of sight.
Tali stepped out of the shadows nearby, "Nobody's faster than Chiktikka vas Paus!" She said to herself while smiling, then headed into the facility. She kept to the shadows, avoiding any Alliance personnel she came across, sneaking or climbing around them. She felt different, she didn't want to hurt anybody here. It was strange considering she had been sent here to kill Liara, and even that she had doubts that she could bring herself to do. But she would decide that when she came face to face with her. Any guards she did come across that she couldn't avoid, she disposed of them in non-lethal ways, mainly by knocking them unconscious, a couple she had managed to lock into side rooms.
As she reached deeper into the facility, she found that she stopped seeing any Alliance personnel, no guards or civilians. She entered a large hub, it was filled with consoles and view screens, with a large one in the center of the room and working at the centre, was Liara.
She moved forward slowly and silently, her hand slowly moving to her waist and pulling out her pistol. As she got closer she slowly raised her arm and pointed it at the back of Liara, then her voice came.
"Tali, I've been expecting you." She said calmly without looking at her then she slowly turned around.
"Liara.. you were.. expecting me?" She asked in a confused tone, still aiming the pistol at Liara. She looked at the view screen to see Liara had cracked a tiny part of the new IFF frequency.
"Yes, how do you think The Illusive Man found out about what I was doing here? I let him."
"If that was true... where are the guards?" She asked, feeling wary. Something wasn't right here.
"I asked them to keep the areas nearby clear, didn't want them to disturb my work... and so you could get here safely."
"What?.. why? Your lying!" Talis arm was shaking.
"Tali.." She moved forward slowly, "I don't want to fight you or hurt you.. I believe I can help.. I have been working on a way to help you, and now I feel confident that it will work.. which is why I let the Illusive Man find me, I knew he'd send you"
Liara had moved closer to Tali, standing just infront of Talis out stretched arm. She could see Tali watching her closely, but Liara was unarmed and possed no threat. She hadn't lied when she told Tali she'd been working on a way to save her. She belived an ancient Asari technique could be used to bring Tali back to who she used to be by showing her, her memories, using a mind-meld. But normally it would only show an Asari's memories to whoever they melded with. Liara had spent week's studying scriptures to find out if it had ever been done before, to show others their own memories.
One scripture did have what she needed, on very rare occasions it had been done in the past, and not only had that been done, on some of those occasions, memories could also be fabricated. Liara had trained her mind day and night, and now was the time to put it to the test.
With a flick of her hand she used her biotics to place Tali in stasis, this wouldn't last long, she would have to be quick.
"What... are you... doing!" Tali cried out
"Reminding you who you are.." Liara placed her hand softly on Tali, normally she would need Tali to close her eyes. But she doubted very much that Tali would listen, then she started the meld.
Images flashed in Tali's mind. She saw herself on the Citadel, in trouble only to be saved by Shepard. She saw how Shepard had helped her with her pilgrimage. The images kept flashing before her, the next one she saw was of her on Freedom's Progress meeting Shepard, she could remember how she felt knowing he was alive again. Then a mission on Haestrom where yet again Shepard came to her rescue, then how Shepard defended her so passionately against exile from the migrant fleet. Then came a vivid memory of her first night with Shepard.
The images didn't stop there, next showed how they defeated the collectors together, then meeting up during the war with the Geth for her homeworld, she felt her heart sink. Shepard was hugging her on a cliff on Rannoch, planning a future together. She saw how they spent the night together before the fleets of every race came together under Shepards name to defeat the reapers. Another image showed her cuddling Shepards body on the battlefield, and how she felt her world has ended when she believed he could be dead. The last image she saw, was of her in a chair, with The Illusive Man and Operative torturing her.
"Now... what you could still have to come.." Liaras voice came in her mind.
She saw a house on Rannoch, on a cliff overlooking the sea. She saw herself just walk out of it, she was out of her suit and in a weird style of clothing. She stretched as she watched the sun rise, a voice called out to her and Shepard came out of the house, in his arms was a small child.
The images were too much for Tali to bare, she managed to broke free of the stasis and in the confusion a gunshot went off. Liara staggered back against one of the consoles. Tali seeing what she had done, dropped the gun in shock.
"Liara.. I..." she began to say, she sounded close to tears.
"It's ok Tali... over there, on the console is a data disk.. take it." Liara said as she held her wound, sliding down to the floor.
Tali didn't move at first, she carried on to watch Liara, then she headed over to the console and picked up the disk. "What is it...?"
"You'll see... and I'm sorry for whats on it.. We all are.." Liara gave her a small sad smile.
Tali looked at the disk then put it in her suit pocket, she then looked up at what Liara was working on, it would take her weeks maybe even months to finish it. She looked away, leaving the data intact and started to head towards the exit, she stopped next to Liara. She opened up another pocket and slowly handed Liara some medi-gel. "I'm.. sorry.." Then she ran off.
Liara watched as Tali left, she smiled to herself. "We believe in you Tali.. by the goddess you will have that future." She said to herself as she applied the medi-gel.
. . . . .
Shepard, Joker and Price had just arrived at the Drydocks.
"So err.. what are we doing here?" Joker asked as Price led them through a large blast door and into a massive dark hanger.
"A couple of weeks before Hackett's death, he set the wheels in motion.." Price then used a nearby console to bring the hanger lights online. "For this." As the lights came on, the hanger lit up and both Shepard and Joker nearly fainted.
"Beautiful.." Joker said amazed, he leaned forward with hands on the rails infront of him.
"I don't believe it.." Shepard said just as amazed as Joker.
Before them rested a large ship in Alliance colours, along the side of the hull was the name "Normandy SR-3" On visual inspection the SR-3 was largely similar to the SR-2, but Shepard could see some of the differences right away. Besides being even larger, the ship was bulkier and had several large dome turrets mounted along the top of the ship, it also had broadside cannons that ran along the side. "This was a warship" Shepard thought, it seemed to have the characteristics of both a cruiser and a frigate.
"I'll take your reactions as that you are both pleased." Price said, "And I'm sure the ships AI will be able to fill in on all the changes and..." He was cut off.
"What? Im not working along side a new AI.. I wouldn't betray EDIs memory like that." Joker said in a hurt tone.
"Which is why I'm here." Came an all too familiar voice.
Both Joker and Shepard looked over at the ships boarding hatch. Standing in the doorway, was EDI.
"Hello again Jeff." EDI said with a smile.