One immediately obvious fact about Commander Shepard was that she was not much of a talker. Morinth had long ago come to the quick realization that the Spectre was a woman of few words. Even in their own conversations Morinth had found the she would end up doing most of the talking. Unlike her Shepard wasn't elusive about her words, when she spoke it was direct and to the point. The Commander would rarely speak unless she had something to say.
This wasn't a weakness, Morinth had come to realize. On the contrary, it enforced the fact that when Commander Shepard did speak up, you had better listen.
There were rare occasions, however, where Shepard would have a great deal to say. In those moments when she wanted to make absolutely sure that her message got across, Shepard displayed a raw talent for delivering her words with all the subtlety and impact of an M-920 Cain. Often with equally devastating effects.
Such was the case now as Shepard stood before the entirety of the Quarian Admiralty Board. All the eyes of the entire Flotilla were on the Commander now. As was the entire crew of the Normandy, who had been watching the trial closely thanks to EDI's initiative in hacking the vid feeds coming from the Quarian Live Ship. Morinth herself had joined Joker, Mordin, and Jacob in the Normandy's cockpit where the the largest number of feeds could be monitored simultaneously.
They may as well have been watching a number of still images at that moment however. Not a single soul in the entire courtroom dared to make a sound. They were clearly still in shock over what they had just witnessed. And they weren't alone.
Most of the Normandy crew, despite not fully understanding the significance that comes with being on the Admirality board for a Quarian, were still primarily made from former Systems Alliance Navy. They knew what an Admiral was, and couldn't imagine Shepard, who was still technically just a Commander, doing what she had just done.
Morinth had certainly never seen this side of Shepard before. Few people have.
Even those that knew her, who knew that the Commander was more than capable of what they had just witnessed, were will in awe of actually seeing it before them. It spoke volumes that Joker, who had mere moments before been yelling and insulting the Admirals through the safety of a one way feed, now suddenly found himself without a suitable pun to say that could possibly do this event justice.
Hell, even Tali, standing in the middle of her own trial for treason, who had just recently dealt with the death of her father, suddenly seemed far more preoccupied trying to reconcile what she had just experienced from the woman standing right next to her.
As near as Morinth could tell, Garrus was the only one who hadn't been shocked numb by Shepard's actions. From his body language Morinth guessed that he was in fact loving every second of it. If he hadn't been currently seated in the midst of the court room where all of this was taking place, Morinth had no doubt the Turian would be laughing his scaled ass off right now.
From what the Asari had seen, the Admirality board had taken numerous foolish and boringly predictable mistakes in their floundering political games as part of their various attempts to steer the course of the entire Quarian Flotilla. Most of those errors weren't worth the bother of paying any sort of attention to. There was, truth be told, only one mistake that mattered. Only one mistake that had ultimately doomed all of the Admirals to their present sorry state.
They had picked on Tali.
It wasn't that Tali'Zorah was somehow incapable of defending herself. She was clearly not a child, and she had developed an even headed maturity to match. Morinth herself had fought besides the Quarian in combat several times now and knew she was more than capable of handling herself in most situations. But for all her maturity, Tali was still the youngest person in the crew, and most certainly the youngest of Shepard's close companions. Without a doubt Shepard saw Tali more akin to a little sister. And she was hardly alone.
Even when she was trying to be serious, Tali held an infectious cheer about her. Perhaps a vagrant life of having so little had taught the young Quarian the value of enjoying every little happiness that she could find. Even the most die-hard Cerberus agents aboard their ship had a hard time being morose when Tali was nearby. Whether they cared to admit it or not everyone on the crew liked Tali, and no one liked watching her struggle with these charges.
Even Morinth herself had been shocked by how much concern she held for the little engineer. Perhaps she shouldn't have been surprised, she knew she liked Tali from the first moment she met her.
So she could only imagine how Shepard must have felt. The fact that they traveled practically the length of the entire galaxy the moment they cleared the Citadel, specifically to deal with these charges, was certainly telling.
No doubt the Admirals had not expected that. Considering the timing of their trial it would have been extremely difficult for Tali to arrive in time to properly defend herself if she had to rely on normal transit routes. They probably also assumed that since she was not presently part of a Quarian ship, and in fact was currently on a Cerberus vessel, that she would have made an easy target. An obvious and noticeable scapegoat to use as a sacrificial pawn in their internal political scheming. But in all this they never once took Commander Shepard into consideration.
Morinth had underestimated Shepard once, back on Omega when she didn't know her yet. The Asari now took a small amount of pleasure watching the Admirals suddenly finding themselves squirming in the same position. The realization dawning on them that the Commander was not a woman to be trifled with.
Shepard for her part simply stood there, as if unaware that all eyes were on her, and likely would not have cared one bit had she known. Instead she simply glared back at the Admirals, waiting to see if they dared to counter her statements. Morinth had seen lesser people utterly crumble under Shepard's glare. After all, this woman had come face to face with a Reaper and didn't back down.
When it became obvious that the Commander would not give the Admirals any sort of lifeline out of their current predicament the Admiral officiating the trial finally decided that she would have to speak up. Though she first had to take a moment to let out a cough just to make sure she still had a voice to speak with.
"Has the Admirality board rendered the judgement?" The Admiral, Shala'Raan, finally managed to say. Her official tone and phrasing seemed so empty and hollow, almost synthetic, in the wake of Shepard's … impassioned speech moments before.
Though it was protocol for the Admirals to render their judgement anonymously via their omni-tool, Morinth imagined they were likely grateful that they would not have to vocalize their votes as they quietly looked at one another briefly before keying in their responses. As Admiral Raan collected the judgements from her fellow Admirals, Morinth easily detected a wave of relief washing over her from her body language alone.
"Tali'Zorrah," The Admiral addressed the accused officially. It was only then that most people, including Tali herself, finally managed to shift their gazes away from Shepard and look up at the actual proceedings. "In light of your history of service, we do not find sufficient evidence to convict. You are cleared of all charges."
Immediately the courtroom burst out in a mass of cheers, shocked exclamations, and all manner of loud reactions to the verdict. Only now was Garrus able to get away with letting out the excited laughter he had been holding onto the whole time. Amusingly enough, both Shepard and Tali remained standing quietly where they were. Tali was clearly relieved; she had no words, no way to express her joy in that moment, and could only stand there, trying to process the whole thing. By contrast Shepard seemed … annoyed? As if the verdict should have been a foregone conclusion, and the whole trial was nothing but a waste of time. Perhaps she simply held a lingering amount of scorn towards the Admirals for what they put her "little sister" Tali through.
"Hell Yes!" Joker cried out, "Now that's what you call a classic 'Drop the Mic' moment right there! That'll teach those stuffed up Admirals what happens when you mess with Shepard's crew!" Before realizing it the whole crew had joined in the celebrations of the verdict, and their cheers were now ringing throughout the Normandy.
Eventually the Admirals began to regain control of the trial, quieting down the crowd around them. When things settled down enough that she could speak again the Admiral, interestingly enough, decided to address Shepard directly.
"Captain Shepard, On behalf of the Admirality board we would like to expresses our appreciation to you for taking the time and effort to represent one of our people." Admiral Raan said. Most curious, Morinth wondered if this was an attempt by the Admiral to save some semblance of their pride or, perhaps, offering her own personal gratitude and relief in the guise of an official statement. Which ever the truth, Shepard was hardly in a forgiving mood.
"With all due respect, Admiral, I didn't represent one of your people. I represented one of mine." Shepard shot back.
"Holy Athame's Ass!" Morinth blurted out before she could help herself. Everyone else in the Normandy's cockpit stared back at her. Apparently no one else was as familiar with Quarians like she was. Morinth may not be an expert on their culture but she had dealt with numerous Quarians before, even got to know a few of them very well before she killed them. Fortunately it turned out that at least one other person managed to figure out the added meaning, intended or otherwise.
"Shepard's words proclaim her extraordinary actions as simple, inevitable, part of her Captain position to Tali." Mordin explained, "Proclamation comes immediately following successful defense of her crew before all Quarian Admirals, who Shepard just accused of failing a fellow Quarian."
"In other words," Morinth clarified, "Shepard just told them that she made a better Quarian then they did."
"Sounds like she added a sick burn on top of her verbal rampage," Jacob added, "Damn, kinda crazy to think that in a ship full of the deadliest, scariest, meanest son'a bitches in the galaxy, the Commander's still the scariest bitch on this ship."
"Yeah, no offence to the scary sex vampire behind me." Joker said sarcastically as he jerked his thumb back at Morinth.
"Hey, none taken." Morinth chuckled, "I pretty much agree with Jacob."
It was interesting that the pilot was now feeling more comfortable around the Ardat-Yakshi, enough to make jokes at her at least. There was a time when Morinth might have been concerned about that, taken it as a cue to move on. But she had come to enjoy the familiar atmosphere of the crew at, at the very least, were willing to accept her. This moment of camaraderie between her fellow crew was a moment she never imagined she would have enjoyed.
It was several hours later before Shepard, Tali, and Garrus finally returned to the Normandy. Tali had a great deal of catching up to do with her people, after all. Shepard decided she would take the time to get as much information out of those who were still willing to talk to her. Garrus was satisfied tagging along. Eventually the three of them stepped back through the Normandy hatch to the celebrations of their fellow crewmates. Predictably most crowded around Tali, congratulating her on the Trial's outcome. This allowed Shepard to slip through the mass of people and quickly make her way to the elevator, intent on reaching her cabin as quickly as possible. It was a bit of a surprise then to suddenly see the Ardat-Yakshi standing in the Elevator as soon as the doors slid open.
"Morinth? What are you doing here?" Shepard asked her.
"Waiting for you actually." Morinth answered.
"Really. I figured you'd want to congratulate Tali on dodging the Treason charge." Shepard drawled as she stepped in and set the controls for her top cabin.
"She has plenty of people doing that now, I can wait." Morinth said, "Besides she hardly dodged the charge, she was just lucky you were there to yell it into submission. You deserve some of the congratulations yourself."
"Hah, cute." Shepard chuckled, "I really didn't do much. In the end all of that was just me getting angry."
"Shepard, when you get angry you tend to move mountains," Morinth smirked, "Even if it's only so they can get out of your way."
Shepard looked over her right shoulder, giving Morinth a slight smirk, "So what did you need me for? If you wanted to talk you know I have an open door policy right?"
"I'm aware, but I wasn't planning on taking that long." Morinth continued, "I only had one question for you."
Shepard simply shrugged as she looked back towards the front of the elevator, "Well don't keep me in suspense Morinth."
"I just had to ask," Morinth hummed, "Am I one of your people now?"
"Well you're still here aren't you?" Shepard joked, "You've been an asset to this team. And surprisingly, you haven't given me a reason to space you yet. So yeah, I'd say you're one of my people now."
Morinth simply smiled as she watched the doors open and her Commander step out. It had been a long time since a smile felt this sincere. "Thanks Shepard, that's all I wanted to know."
"Anytime." Shepard said simply as she strolled quickly into her own cabin.
As the doors closed Morinth's smile slowly dissolved as she thought about what she had seen in the Commander. She wasn't looking people in the eye as often as she once used to. When she turned to look back at Morinth, Shepard did so over her right shoulder specifically. But the biggest sign that something was wrong was that the entire time Shepard had walked in from the Quarian ship, she never removed her helmet.
Though it had not been her initial intention, Morinth had confirmed that Shepard was in serious need of help.