Archaeologists Gone Wild

Notes and Notices:

I will be up front and say that Liara is my least favorite character. I've tweaked it a bit since ME2 has come out. Liara's tentacles/head tails are skin-folds in her scalp now.

Many Thanks: Thank you to everyone who has been following and thank you to everyone who has left reviews/comments or has added this to their alerts. I feel honored to have given someone some kind of entertainment (whether it be laughter or outright groans of annoyance.) XD

More Inane Ramblings: I hope you enjoy my version of Liara. I added some author's notes at the end for info on Liara and on the Minoan eruption of Thera/Santorini—in case anyone's curious as to where I got the names of locations on Therum.

The human male was an intriguing specimen, Dr. Liara T'Soni thought as she stood in the arid heat of Therum, feeling perspiration creep from the folds in her scalp down into the back of her collar. The sulfuric odor of the local caldera hung in the air and was beginning to get the better of her. Her eyes would start to water soon if she didn't get back into the shelter of the dig site. She wished to be anywhere but there listening to the company representative explain company policies to her.

Just after the human initiated the conversation, Liara resolved herself not to say too much to anyone lest she end up embarrassing herself and inciting some kind of argument. The humans in the encampment already regarded her as a peculiarity.

Humans were an exotic species; how they looked so much like asari (and their hair!) but were so different! And this one—a male—this one was so… so colorful. Her—his, Liara mentally corrected herself, male identifiers are his, him and he: just like the salarians, turians, volus or elcor—his skin was the color of Therum's igneous rock formations found around the excavation site. Even after meeting with them, she knew that she would have to be careful not to associate asari biological terms with the humans. The humans were reputed to be a fickle, emotional lot.

The tone of this one's skin was quite beautiful, really. Liara wondered idly if the human would take offense if she told him so. The young asari archaeologist watched, fascinated, as the interplay of Knossos' ruthless light against the human's features made the shades of his dark skin tone jump from one nuance of brown to the other, the deep lines of his oval-shaped face wrinkling in different patterns as he spoke in a booming voice with that curious accent all humans Liara had encountered seemed to adopt when they vocalized the interstellar trade language.

She promptly decided against admitting to enjoying his exotic beauty when she made the connection between who was talking to her and what the human was telling her.

"You cannot be serious," she responded to the company representative's statement sharply, abandoning all pretense of pleasantness and no longer amused with his coloring. His facial features oozed into something that resembled a frown, but she couldn't really tell. By the Goddess, she hoped she didn't say anything stupid. She would never be able to figure out what he was saying if he actually got angry.

The human male—man, they are called "man: singular" or "men: plural", she remembered—held up his gloved hands in what Liara assumed was a placating manner. She hoped so. The posture didn't indicate any defensive stance she had seen. But then she had never had to use her biotics against a human before. Besides that, humans were difficult to read—though the few males she had encountered were much easier to read than the females. The females' body language had minutiae of degrees similar to the elcor though without the pheromones—she mentally shook her head and focused on what the man was telling her.

"I'm sorry, Dr. T'Soni." Again he gestured with his hands causing Liara to wonder exactly what he meant by apologizing. One apologized when one did something wrong. Why was he apologizing now? Had she said something idiotic again? Had he said something idiotic? Something cautioned her not to ask.

Though she was leery of the man and his overall intentions, she couldn't help but be fascinated at the way his deep voice resonated off the tall walls of the camp. It lacked the hollow echo of turian speech or the strained vocalization of the salarian dialects.

"You're welcome to stay after the company pulls out, ma'am." His tone changed again, but she was still unable to discern what it was that he was actually telling her. Humans were strange and violent creatures. Their Alliance was the third largest fleet in the galaxy and—Liara had been told—they were nearly as violent as the batarians. She hoped that this one wasn't about to attack her. She did not need another diplomatic incident.

Dealing with the hanar had been an exercise she did not wish to repeat. Oh, how the extranet tabloids loved that debacle. Now, what had the news headlines been? Matriarch Benezia's Daughter Fends Off Noisy Hanar? Little Wing's Litigation?

Something similar, she was certain.

Liara cocked her head to the side, hoping that the human knew the asari gesture for impatience, desperate to not only leave the human encampment but also to think about something less stressful than being such a prominent figure's daughter. "And once the company has left?" she questioned her—him! Liara once again reminded herself. She hoped that she didn't slip and use the wrong identifier aloud. She didn't think the human would appreciate being referred to as a different gender.

The man blinked, his eyelids blocking his dark eyes for an instant as he hesitated before stammering, "Well, there won't be anyone here, Doctor. After the GGS report, the company determined that the mining site is too unstable. Gas emissions are increasing daily, and the earthquakes are becoming a regular occurrence. They estimate that when Santorini Mons blows, most of the Valley will be buried under molten rock."

He leaned forward and added with less resonance, "I don't think you want to be here when Santorini Mons erupts, ma'am.

"And then there's the legal business with Parliament. When the company pulls out, so will the security team. Any privateer, pirate or batarian within a few parsecs may come out to loot the place before the volcano explodes. And you'll be stranded here if you don't leave with the rest of the miners."

"I see," she replied flatly, but made no other comments as he continued to stammer his way through what she assumed was a memorized spiel directly from the company spokesperson. Getting vaporized by a huge volcano or being caught when the magma chamber emptied and the caldera collapsed wasn't something she wanted.

But…

Two weeks.

A sense of mental anguish washed through her. Two weeks until Eldfell-Ashland Energy Corporation completely removed its presence from Therum's surface.

That wasn't enough time to do anything, much less find any type of evidence for the University to set up a real excavation after Santorini Mons finally erupted. Not only was Therum a veritable cornucopia of heavy metals it was also teeming with Prothean treasures. The Valley of Akrotiri was the most prolific source of working Prothean artifacts on Therum. She felt like she had only just begun logging them after two years of careful digging and mining throughout the underground chambers. A thrill went up her spine as she thought about it even as the human male continued to speak to her about getting her equipment together and leaving with the mining team within the week.

"Two weeks then," she said briskly interrupting the man, resigning herself to leave when the final crews did—and be back with a full team once the plate tectonics had settled down once again, "Perhaps in that time, I will be able to find something worthwhile for the University to sponsor a larger excavation."

"As you say, Doctor," he replied, giving a shrug. She wasn't sure what he meant but didn't press the subject.

Fifty years of research put on hold because of volcano, Liara thought, suddenly grumpy as the human moved away and began issuing orders to the other human workers who had been standing in the area. She ignored their stares, re-collecting her pack which contained her bare necessities and walking away from the human encampment, moving without haste but with unhurried purpose.

The scorching heat of Knossos bore down on her, and even this far away—half a kilometer—from the local lava cluster that oozed directly from the caldera, she could feel the molten river's calidity. As she stomped off across the settlement towards the M29 Grizzly specifically designated as her own, she wondered absently if she used her biotics against the containers of mining instruments between there and herself, if anyone would notice. It would certainly ease some frustration. Some of the reports she had read about humans in her studies of the species stated that the males did not fully understand the female temperament. Something labeled PMS—whatever that stood for. She had yet to look it up as she had been too busy with the hanar lawsuit and dealing with the erroneous press releases and tabloid accounts.

Liara reached her Grizzly and clamored up the footholds to the hatch, wrenching it open, still angered with the entire situation, all but heaving her gear into the hold before gripping the ladder and following her equipment. She swallowed the despair in her throat and powered up the vehicle, the controls coming to life in vivid amber. Her fingertips danced across the keys absently as she recalled this afternoon's adventure.

When the human foreman had summoned her from her dig site in the Valley of Akrotiri, Liara had not really known what to expect. At best she expected to be told that Eldfell-Ashland Energy would be pulling its people until after the volcano erupted. Not that Eldfell-Ashland Energy was undergoing a human Parliament-ordered Reconstruction and permanently disbanding their mining facility on Therum and, thus, pulling all their sponsorship for her dig.

At worst, Liara expected to be propositioned. If it wasn't a turian, it was a human. She avoided both species just as she avoided public appearances within asari space. The last article she had read about herself touted the fact that she was a Pureblood and after that, she had decided that a dig within the Traverse would do her some good. Determined, she had grimly set about rebuilding her reputation, and if she had to go through the humans, then so be it—so long as she could avoid them when necessary.

Humans didn't really live long enough to know any better, she supposed, but that didn't give them a right to think that just because she looked like a female of their species that she was ready to meld with one.

To think, melding with someone, just to meld! That thought made her prickly all over. She had plenty of time to choose a mate and bare a daughter; she wasn't close to being ready to begin her Matron Stage yet. Perhaps she could find a nice volus—Liara blinked. She couldn't afford to be distracted by romantic notions right now. She had to find something that the University would find interesting. Something different and unique to Therum. Something that proved her theory right.

As the Grizzly lumbered through the gates of the human encampment, she recalled the statement issued by the Galactic Geological Survey six weeks ago—just after the first tremors tore across the Valley—stating that increased seismic activity in the area was hazardous to the workers and that Santorini Mons was on the verge of eruption. The Valley was promptly swarming with volcanologists from every Council Race. The GGS had not bothered to speak to Liara when they had arrived, speaking only with the Eldfell-Ashland Energy mining company representatives.

And now—she heaved a sigh—she would have to hurry and find something. Anything. And that was the problem. There was evidence that the Protheans had been there. But there was also a lack of specific artifacts where Protheans were concerned. It was like something didn't want the Protheans to be discovered. Something didn't want anyone to know who the Protheans were, what they were—their biology, their culture, their beliefs, their practices. Something didn't want any other dead species discovered either.

There were other dead species. Even the zeioph necropolis on Armeni showed some evidence of that particular space-faring race, and, though momentarily it was a myth, the Leviathan of Dis appeared to give light into another race as well.

But she was working on a time line. Fifty thousand years was enough to time to hide anything, and as the Grizzly ambled along the Valley of Akrotiri skirting the lava river, Dr. Liara T'Soni vowed to find out what it was that the galaxy was hiding. And to do it in two weeks.

Not-so-quick author's notes:

1. I hope you enjoyed my version of Liara, and I hope that I did not portray her too out of character or too much like Ambassador Delenn from Babylon 5—though both Delenn and Liara are very capable women/females in their respective fields. I do, however, see the human male as thinking Liara had a very vapid expression on her face because she really wasn't paying attention to him to begin with. :)

2. It really bothers me that Liara's Dig Site only contains one person—Liara. After watching far too many History Channel specials on archeology and Egyptian pyramids, I added people to the dig site. I probably should have added more archaeologists, but, eh, this worked better, and I was able to add some much needed techno-babble.

3. As for Santorini and Akrotiri - Since the Knossos system is probably named after the Minoan city of Knossos (according to the Mass Effect Wiki anyway), I used the volcanic theme of the eruption of Thera which is also called the Santorini eruption and devastated Akrotiri (which may or may not have inspired Plato's Atlantis story)… Hooray for Wikipedia! Anyway, it may or may not be what Therum is named after since Therum is a volcanic world and there's an eruption and all. But that's just my two cents. And, trust me, my two cents aren't necessarily worth anything. o.O