By the time Kacey and Garrus caught up with Tela and Liara, the pair were already engaged in a shoot-out. However, it didn't take long for Tela to jump into her skycar and drive off. Kacey wasn't exactly thrilled with the asari; she hadn't even stopped to see if she was okay.
"Damn it!" Liara shouted.
Liara quickly hopped into her skycar as Kacey approached, gesturing for her to get in.
"I'm fine, by the way." Kacey said as she got in.
Kacey drove the skycar through Nos Astra, eventually catching up to Tela, who quickly zoomed off.
"There she is!" Liara exclaimed.
Kacey took a sharp right, following Tela as she swerved around the corner.
"Hang right!" Liara said, "No, wait, left!"
"I'm on her!" Kacey replied.
"Hang a left!"
"I've got this, Liara." Kacey said as she swerved left and continued to pursue Tela.
As they continued to dip and dive between buildings, pursuing yet another rogue Spectre, Liara continued to frantically shout directions at Kacey, who had stopped listening a while back. Kacey then saw Tela go through a nearby construction site.
"We're not going into the construction site—oh, goddess." Liara said, as Kacey drove right through the construction site.
"We are." Garrus said from the back seat.
Kacey then took another two sharp rights, landing directing into oncoming traffic. As Kacey narrowly avoided the oncoming skycars, Liara grew more and more frustrated.
"I'm not letting her escape with that data!" Liara said.
Garrus groaned as Kacey ignored her; she was more focused on driving than listening to Liara. Kacey continued to pursue Tela, closing the gap between them quickly.
"Go, go, go, go, go, go!"
"I'm going!" Kacey shouted, annoyed.
"Traffic! Oncoming traffic!"
"We'll be fine!"
"Oh, god." Garrus sighed.
"She's dropping proximity charges!" Liara shouted.
"I noticed!" Kacey replied.
Kacey narrowly swerved around the proximity charges. Suddenly two black skycars appeared next to Tela's skycar, shooting at the trio.
"She's got reinforcements!" Liara said.
"What kind of guns does this thing have?" Kacey asked.
"It's a taxi!" Liara shouted, "It has a fare meter!"
"Wonderful." Kacey replied sarcastically.
Kacey manged to avoid the gunfire as the entered another tunnel. Kacey carefully avoided the oncoming traffic until she saw Tela blow up a truck ahead.
"Truck!" Liara said.
"I know." Kacey replied.
"Truck!"
"I know!" Kacey said as she swerved around the exploding truck. Liara screamed as Kacey drove past.
"You clearly had a lot of fun." Kaidan laughed.
"Yeah, I did." Kacey admitted, "Liara not so much."
"What about you Garrus?"
"Me? About the same really." Garrus replied.
"There we go!" Kacey said.
"You're enjoying this." Liara said.
"Yeah. Can you tell?"
"Seriously? Imagine a head-on collision at this speed."
"Yeah, I hear those can be bad for you."
Kaidan had full on burst out laughing, with Garrus joining in as well. Kacey looked at the pair, struggling to contain her own laughter.
"What?" Kacey said.
"What the hell, Kacey?" Kaidan laughed, "There's no way you said that to Liara."
"Kaidan, have you met me before?" Kacey laughed, "I'm the same person who drove a tank through a Mass Relay, encountered and convinced a money laundering AI to destroy itself and threw gas grenades at a giant plant monster. All of which you were there for. Crazy is what I do."
"All while being a smartass." Garrus added.
"Fair point." Kaidan replied, still laughing, "After all, we did nuke a planet."
"And steal a prototype warship." Garrus added.
"And stop a cult, save a committee chairman, stop a criminal empire…damn we've been busy." Kacey laughed, "Anyway, anyway, back to the story…"
Once Kacey had finally closed the gap between their skycar and Tela's, Kacey pulled up next to Tela, who in response rammed into the side of Kacey's skycar. Kacey narrowly avoided another oncoming skycar and rammed back into Tela. The pair continued to ram into each other until Tela crashed into an oncoming skycar and crashed landed into a nearby building.
…
"Watch out!" Liara shouted, "They're dropping reinforcements to slow us down! Look, there's Vasir's skycar. Come on, she can't have gotten far!"
More mercenaries flooded into the skycar lot, opening fire on the trio. Kacey hid behind one of the cars and opened fire on the mercenaries. Kacey used her last two grenades to destroy their shields while Liara used singularity to do some crowd control. Garrus hung back a bit and shot the mercs with his sniper rifle.
The mercenaries tried to outflank them; but Kacey had already caught on to their plan and put a swift end to it with three well timed concussive shots and as well as Garrus' excellent aim. Once they had cleared out all of Tela's reinforcements, Kacey quickly followed Liara upstairs and into the building, where a weird looking video of an asari dancing lustfully was playing on full blast.
"What type of hotel is this?" Kacey asked.
"Azure." Liara answered as she headed towards the door leading outside, "It's a luxury resort with an…. 'exotic' edge. 'Azure' is slang for a part of the asari body in some areas of Illium."
"Which par-? You know what? I don't want to know." Kacey said, heading outside.
"Doesn't look like Vasir is here." Garrus said, looking at the flaming wreck of Tela's skycar.
"Look." Kacey pointed at the wooden floorboards, "Blue blood. Probably Vasir's. Come on."
Kacey, Garrus, and Liara followed the trail quickly. Kacey noticed that Liara seemed to avoid Garrus' gaze. It seemed like Liara was still hurt from the argument before.
"She's lost a lot of blood." Liara mused, "We have to be getting close."
"She's tough." Kacey replied, "I'll give her that much."
"So are you to survive a three-story fall." Liara said, "And besides, she's a Spectre.
"So am I."
As they cut through another hotel room, they heard a woman scream. They bolted through the room and back outside where they finally caught up with Tela near a dinning patio.
"Vasir! It's over!" Liara shouted, pointing her pistol at Tela.
Tela stopped moving for a brief moment before turning and hobbling towards a young human woman.
"Hey! Hey, you. Come here." Tela shouted as she used her biotics to teleport forward and hold the woman hostage, "What's your name?"
"M-Mariana." Mariana stuttered.
"Mariana, you want to live, don't you?" Tela sneered, "Tell those people you want to live."
"Please…" Mariana begged meekly.
"We'll get you out safely, Mariana." Kacey said calmly.
Hostage situations weren't something that Kacey considered herself good at dealing with; she'd much prefer shooting at the enemies with any civilians around. It was much easier that way.
"Well, that's good to hear." Tela smirked, "All you had to do was walk away. Now it gets ugly."
As Tela pointed the gun at Mariana's head, the woman begged through tears, "Please. I have a son…"
"A son?" Tela said wickedly, "I hope he gets to see you again. I've heard losing a parent is just horrific for children. Scars them for life. Isn't that right, Shepard? T'Soni?"
Kacey kept her mouth shut; she wasn't going to entertain Tela. Nor was she going to give the asari the reaction she was looking for. However, it seemed that Liara didn't share the same mentality.
"I'm going to end you, Vasir!" Liara snapped.
"It's okay, Liara." Kacey said firmly, "We'll handle it. The usual way."
"You want Mariana's little boy to grow up without a mommy, Shepard?" Tela sneered, "All three of you; thermal clips on the ground, now! Power cells too."
"It was a little ironic that she brought up my dead father. Because I used one of his tactics on her. And she fell for it; hook, line, and sinker."
Kacey scoffed, "Is that it?"
"What?" Tela said surprised.
"Vasir, I sacrificed human lives to save the Destiny Ascension." Kacey said calmly, "I unleashed the rachni on the galaxy. So, for your sake, I hope your escape plan doesn't hinge on me hesitating to shoot a damn hostage!"
"You're bluffing." Tela said, pointing her gun at Kacey.
"Now, Liara!"
Liara biotically threw a table at Tela, sending her flying and allowing Mariana to escape unharmed. As Tela picked herself up, the trio got into position, ready to take down Tela.
Kacey reached out and picked up some power cells she found nearby as Liara used warp to drop Tela's barrier. However, Tela wasn't making it easy; she kept teleporting across the area using her biotics, making it hard for Garrus and Kacey to land shots. The best shot Kacey had was to get up close, which was easier said than done.
Once Liara had ripped away at her barrier, Kacey used her inferno bullets to melt through Tela's armour, the fire that had generated kept Tela still enough for Garrus to get more precise shots in. Liara used a mix of biotics and bullets and soon enough, Tela finally went down.
Liara ran over towards the badly injured Tela and took that data from her and uploaded it to her omni-tool.
"Seket's personal datapad." Liara mused, "This has what we need to find the Shadow Broker."
"You're dead." Tela spat, "The Shadow Broker has been in power for decades. He's stronger than anything you've ever faced!"
Kacey tried to hide her laughter, "Well, unless the Shadow Broker is a three-kilometre, squid looking starship, I think we'll be fine. Besides, you're the one sold out the Council to work for him."
"You think I betrayed the Council? Like Saren?" Tela snapped, "Got to hell! The Broker's given me damn good intel over the years. Intel that saved lives and kept the Citadel safe. So, if the Broker needs a few people to disappear, I'll pay the price without hesitation."
"Spectres don't blow up buildings filled with innocent people!"
"Sure we do. We get our hands dirty so the Council doesn't have to." Tela said, "The councillors might complain about our methods to soothe their consciences, but they never look too closely. Besides, you're with Cerberus. You have any idea what your terrorist friends have done?"
"Oh we're friends now, are we?" Kacey replied sarcastically.
"Kidnapping biotic kids for biotic death camps! Killing Alliance admirals who ask questions! And you think you have the right to judge me? Look in the mirror!"
"You've never heard of the term, 'undercover mission', have you?" Kacey said, "Although, if it's convinced you then I guess it's working."
"You little…"
Tela passed out, dead. Kacey walked off, heading toward the hotel room Liara had gone inside. Garrus was waiting by the door by the time Kacey arrived.
"Vasir's dead." Kacey said, "Now what?"
"I'm putting the data through the Normandy's computers." Liara said, "We can be at the Shadow Broker's base within a few hours. He'll know about Vasir before long. If he decides to kill Feron…"
Liara began to walk off, with Kacey right behind her. Something wasn't sitting right with Kacey regarding Liara.
"We'll get Feron out of there alive, Liara. I promise." Kacey said.
"I know." Liara replied, "You're here to help. Just like always."
"That's not a good thing?"
Liara sighed, "When we first met on Therum, you saved me from the geth. You fought a krogan battlemaster while I cowered. Now, you're doing it again. And I'm still leaning on you for help."
"That's what friends do Liara." Kacey said, "You're not the only one who leaned on me for help, remember? Wrex needed help getting his family armour back, Tali needed help with her pilgrimage, and I've lost track of the amount of times I've pulled Garrus and Kaidan's asses out of the fire and vice versa. There's nothing wrong with leaning on your friends for help."
Liara stood there, speechless. She let the silence hang in the air before leaving the room, with Kacey close behind.
"I can get us there, based on Seket's data." Liara continued, dismissing the previous topic of conversation entirely, "The Normandy's stealth drive will keep them from detecting us. The Shadow Broker's agents are still shooting their way through Illium. With luck, they won't know we've left until it's too late."
"And that couldn't have sat right with you, Kacey." Kaidan said, "I know you wouldn't stand for that."
"And I didn't." Kacey replied.
"That's a little cold." Kacey said, shocked, "They killed innocent people."
"You know what I mean."
"Do I?" Kacey said frustrated, "When I hit the ground back at the trade centre, you went after Vasir without a backward look."
"That fall didn't kill you!"
"It should have!" Kacey shouted, "Three stories, Liara. Biotically slammed down from that height. That should've done."
"I had to stay on Vasir!" Liara shouted back, "I had to stay rational, make the call. Like I did with Seket."
"Staying rational doesn't mean abandoning your allies." Kacey said, "And as for Seket's death, it was Vasir's fault, not yours."
"Seket had no idea what the stakes were. I put him in harm's way to get the data I needed. I got him killed. And I'd do it again. Sound familiar?"
"You're referring to Virmire." Kacey said.
"Were you being rational when you chose to save Kaidan and let Ashley die? Would you make the same choice again, knowing what would happen?"
"I knew what the stakes were and so did they. We all knew what we signed up for." Kacey replied, "I don't regret my choice and I would do it again. So yeah, I get it."
"Hopefully from here on out, things will be simple. Get in, get Feron, get out. And kill anyone who tries to stop us."
"That's it?"
"That's it."
"Would you just stop for a second?!" Kacey said, stopping Liara, "We'll be jumping several lightyears. There's time to talk."
"About what?"
"You." Kacey said, "I don't know what's going on with you, why you're being this cold or why you brought up Virmire, but I want it to stop. If you've got something to say to me, now's the time."
"Now isn't that time for that."
"When will it be?" Kacey asked.
"What do you want me to say?"
"The truth."
"Fine. I'll tell you when we're on the Normandy." Liara said, "I'll tell you what's been bothering me."