"With enthusiasm. Salutations, asari. Welcome to Dekuuna."
Jane stares. The elcor stares back. She glances over her shoulder to see how far away Doctor T'Soni is—she's still being processed at the gate all the way down the port. Are elcor blind? Do they see things differently like goats with their weird horizontal pupils and shit? She tries to be inconspicuous in rising up on her toes to get a better look at the towering alien.
"Confused. What is the asari doing?"
"I'm not an asari, bud." Jane cocks her head to the side. It's hard to see the tiny beady eyes—so maybe she's too short for this elcor to see her? "I'm a human."
The snout, or whatever their flappy noses are called, seems to be flapping hard at work. She grumbles at the elcor's answer.
"Concerned. Does this asari have an identity crisis?"
"I'm not an asari!" Jane groans. She huffs and whirls around, eager to get started before she has to turn in for duty. She needs to make the most out of every hour.
Jogging over to the actual asari, Jane grins at the sight of a book already open in the hand—and she plucks it away. She shuts down the protest and snaps the book shut, ignoring the protests about not getting to make a bookmark. She holds it menacingly over her shoulder. "I'll throw it out."
"N-no, wait."
"Then put it back in your bag. I'm nervous too, doc, and I am not walking around with your nose in a book. Anyways." She takes it upon herself to circle around, opening the scientist's satchel to stuff the book inside. "I went to go make some friends."
"Oh no. My heart goes out to them."
"Ass," Jane laughs. She gives a playful pinch to the waist and grins at the flinch, the hands slapping hers away. "Are elcor blind or something? Is that why their eyes are so tiny, 'cause they don't need them? Or are they color blind? I know we're fucked if we step outside the station with their high gravity and crap, but... That one over there kept insisting that I'm an asari."
"What...?" Doctor T'Soni looks thoughtfully in the direction pointed at. "That is strange."
"I know, right?" Jane looks over at the elcor again, chuckling. "I said I'm human and then he flapped his nose, thinks I have an identity crisis now." She looks back.
Panic consumes her when she looks at a purple asari instead of a blue one.
"Doc! What the fuck, are you okay?! Are you choking?!"
"N-no," Liara meekly squeaks, wheezing as she suddenly starts speed-walking down the port. "I am fine. I will be more fine if-"
"You aren't fine, is it the station? Are you allergic to something in here?"
"-yes, you."
"Fuck off," Jane laughs. She jogs to catch up, snaring the wrist. The asari is doing everything to avoid eye contact, and she frowns. "Seriously. I really am worried now, what's gotten into you?"
"Nothing, let us just—please? Just... Let us go."
"...Fine." Jane sighs. She eases off when the blue begins to return, so the doc was just blushing like a beet, then.
But why?
Goddess, this wasn't supposed to get worse. At least it can't get any worse than this, right? Liara is regretting this outing. There is a whirlwind of emotions throwing up a storm inside of her, and now—because of her own inexperience and lack of mindfulness—Jane has been condemned to an evening of demanding she is a human to every elcor that keeps calling her an asari. She dramatically throws her arms to the side when she overhears an elcor rightfully greeting another marine as human.
"Tell me why he's a human and why I'm not! Do you elcor think I have to have a dick to be human?!"
This is getting worse.
Desperate to avoid another diplomatic incident, Liara quickly paces over and grabs to drag the marine away, hailing apologies over her shoulder for damage control. More obscenities are hailed as Jane seems to think the misunderstanding is due to her being a female of her species. If only she knew the truth—the truth she cannot absolutely find out, no matter what.
Volcanic heat threatens to consume Liara's face just at the thought of it again.
"Jane, come on. We have a couple of hours before you have to head to the site for your shift. How about we go shopping, how does that sound? The elcor have a wide variety of goods that I am sure we will not find imported even to the Citadel."
"I want to find out why the hell they're all calling me an asari, though. It's just not right. That's xenophobic, isn't it? I am not spending my whole week here just to be discriminated against."
"You are not," Liara blurts, shrinking when those heated eyes snap to her. "Trust me, you are not. It... Is a little more complicated than that."
"What? How? Why?"
"Just—please, I'll explain en route to the next destination. Let us just go and make the most of our time, okay?"
What little time she has left, before they say goodbye.
Jane still doesn't know. She doesn't know that the Alliance has terminated Liara, intending to replace her with another asari that's studied the protheans. She's going to have to find her own way, now, from here on out. She's certain she can, as she always has, but she's not so certain that she has the heart to say goodbye. The marine will get to continue on with the project.
They will go their own ways and be split up by the end of the week.
It's already been cumbersome, trying to make it appear as though she's still been at the frigate to meet with Jane off-duty. How long can she keep up this lie?
Her heart grows weary whenever there are moments of fun, or moments of endearment—especially whenever the marine gets timid herself, confessing sweet things under her breath. She seems to be intrigued by casual wear, her gaze falling on the asari's form-fitting attire often. Liara refuses to acknowledge what's beginning to buzz between them again. She can't. It will hurt even worse when they have to say goodbye. They have to stay as friends. She must do everything in her power for them to stay as friends.
That is challenged every time an elcor greets a steaming human as an asari.
Every time, Liara struggles to tune it all out so that she isn't caught blushing all the time, and then the truth would be revealed. Enough times, though, and she can't help but laugh, watching the marine thrown at the mercy of bewilderment as she throws slack-jawed looks, exaggeratedly blinking her eyes at Liara as if trying to say what the fuck through them.
Delicate aromas surround them when they wander into a flower shop and Liara breaths a sigh of content, closing her eyes as she inhales deeply. Nostalgic memories coast gently, and she smiles as she rolls her thumb over a yellow petal, the texture softly sticking to her skin. She tenses, both with thrill and anxiety, when the marine saddles up close beside her to try the same—a momentary look of guilt and panic of her own when her roughness accidentally rips the petal off.
"You have to be gentle with fragile things," Liara softly admonishes, her gaze traveling the distance of her mind. A slight shudder rolls through her over the low murmur.
"Are you fragile, Doctor T'Soni?"
Warmth faintly throbs, clawing up her throat. She clears it, poorly, audibly, feeling the heat spread across her nose bridge. "I do not consider myself as such."
She's stopped correcting the marine to call her Liara. Such a strange decision. Perhaps it is her way of trying to stall this buzzing between them, by remaining professional.
Lively green irises darken, a seductive smile accompanying a purr. "Good."
So much for professionalism.
Goddess, this is still getting worse. Liara renews her efforts to ignore the tension tingling along her nerves, her skin sparking with electricity any time she's touched, tethered, and pulled.
Time reasserts itself, when an alarm goes off on the marine's omni-tool. She has a sheepish smile, indicative of what she wants to do and how she feels about it—stealing a quick and innocent kiss on the cheek. It hurts. It's so delightful, it hurts. Jane waves off with a promise she'll be back as soon as she's done her shift. She jogs back and disappears in the crowds at the station, her back gone from view after turning a corner.
Liara waits, to be sure, then walks quickly to the windows to take a look outside. An Alliance-marked vehicle rolls out of the station's garage, and she wonders how the marine feels about the constant vigilance needed so that her bones would not snap the moment she steps outside a planet evolved from high gravity. Hopefully she's aware and will keep herself safe.
Satisfied to know Jane is truly gone for her shift, the asari follows the signs until she comes to the hotel sector, taking the elevator up to her floor. She takes out her keycard from her satchel, a momentary shot of anxiety coursing through her upon finding it tucked in her book. She doesn't remember any confusion on the marine's face, though, apart from the whole asari misunderstanding. Perhaps Jane didn't see it, find it, or think anything of it.
Hopefully that will remain the case, that no explanations will be demanded of Liara, and then the inevitable heartbreak following it. Just a few more days. A few more days of this bliss, and she wants this to last forever. She is dearly hanging on and trying not to let the dread taint her final experiences with the endearing human. She reaches behind to unclasp the hooks of her zipper, turning in a mirror as she focuses her biotics to pull it along where she can't quite reach.
It's her turn to feel sheepish, then, as she falls in her bed, cradling her shirt, burrowing her nose where the human has touched most—her forearm. Just the standard smell of soap.
If only that would be all over her instead of her shirt.
Liara flushes deeply over the raunchy thought, trying to ignore the sudden outburst of them. She curls into a ball, stuffing a cool pillow over her warm face, trying to focus on the sensations and textures of the fabric against her skin, rather than the temperature. It's all that cursed human's fault. It's hormones, chemicals, pheromones.
"You have to be gentle with fragile things."
"Are you fragile, Doctor T'Soni?"
"Goddess," Liara hisses, squeezing her eyes shut. Her nose throbs intensely. She's desperate for a distraction, and clamors off her bed to retrieve the book from her satchel. She gets an even better one when her omni-tool buzzes, and she opens up the message thread without thought. Her lips pull in a smile of their own.
As she watches a secret live recording of the dig site, courtesy of a bored marine.
Their team seems to be having some kind of a stand-off with the team that's already there. Jane sniggers, sometimes, when there are distant curses of salarians embroiled in a yelling match. No doubt the battle of egos, as Doctor Dasum Elan could sometimes be inclined to engage in. Then the camera's perspective switches, snapping to the view of olivine eyes dancing in the sliver of a helmet's thin visor.
"Save me, I'm bored."
Liara chuckles, engaging her audio-feed. "What would you like to talk about?"
"Anything."
That's too broad, the scientist wants to whine. She looks at the book cradled in her hand. Then she beams with her idea, eager to share the contents, courtesy of the one that has picked this book out for her. "Turn your omni-tool off and transfer the audio to your helmet, so that the others will not catch on to you. I will read to you until your shift is done."
There's a slight sharp inhale, for some reason. The video dies. The lovely lively green eyes gone.
Her cheeks ache in a perpetual smile as she begins to read, occasionally interjected by a shy whisper.
"I can't wait to see you again."
And her heart is perpetually tormented.
"It looks super weird, from what I can see," the marine regales her observations from the dig site.
It shrouds the artifact in more mystery than it actually is, from her tell of it.
"It's almost flattened like a pancake. Which I guess makes sense because of their gravity, here. I would not want to step outside, that's for sure. Unless I get all muscular like the elcor. Could you imagine?" The marine leans back in her chair, sipping noisily at her drink, looking over as she brings up her arm to flex her bicep. She cheekily kisses it. "These guns are already pretty big."
Liara rolls her eyes, smirking away as she inwardly asks herself just what about the audacity of this cheeky human is believed to be attractive. She sinks into her meal, distracting herself by listening to the conversations exploding around them in the food court. When she glances up, she stiffens a little over the look of concern.
"Hey..." Jane leans forward, a calloused hand sliding up to clasp the middle of the forearm. "Something is bothering you. Is it because you aren't on the dig site? I'm sure your team will get over it, in time." She grins mischievously, then, her sarcasm apparent. "They seem like a mature bunch—especially that salarian. Best test of discipline in my life. Was hilarious, and real hard not to laugh at them bitching. It's just a rock with scratches on it! No, it's not just a rock with scratches on it! Don't you see, you fool?! This is a glimpse into the evolution of ancestral art!" Her face falls flat. "Elcor. Art. Whatever that salarian smokes, I want to take a puff. Hope to god someday someone finds that rock I scratched on Kahje and bitches about whether or not it's an artifact."
Graciously, she's back to story telling. Ungraciously, she remembers why she stopped. She seems to try a different approach, then, her hand gliding up and down the forearm.
It hurts.
"Seems to me your team is suffering a pretty big loss, Doctor T'Soni. They don't have you there to mediate egos."
"You are biased and give me far too much credit," the scientist chuckles softly, her gaze falling to the hand on her. She reluctantly pulls away. "I have always preferred to work alone. I do not think I contributed much to the team."
"Yeah? You think so?"
"Yes. I know so."
"Load of shit," Jane shrugs, leaning back as she folds her hands behind her head. "One good thing about being bored out my mind when I'm on watch duty is that things stand out real quickly, real easily, doc. I remember lots of times from the first dig site—remember the looks others gave you. 8 hours of watching, every day, for a whole week. You stood out real quickly, real easily, a lot. Wish I knew what I was really appreciating, at the time."
Heat threatens to claw up the throat again. Threatens to bloom in the chest, too, but she suffocates it viciously. She fidgets with her hands, idly tracing the lines of her palm as if it's the first she's ever discovered them. Her gaze flickers up at the amber glow, her heart sinking at the sight of the marine's omni-tool engaged. Jane's face is bored, the way it always is when she's pinged for her shift.
"Time to go already? Today really flew by..."
"Yeah," Jane mumbles. Her gaze is stuck. Then she snaps her omni-tool off with a smile and bounces up from her seat, holding out her hand. "Care to walk with me to the garage?"
Liara flushes as she stares at the hand, torn into two when the marine hesitantly drops the offer, misunderstanding—or is she understanding? It's so hard to tell where she stands. She nods dumbly, her brain feeling like cotton, tailing along like some lost pyjak.
Every step brings dread.
She hates saying goodbye. She hates this garage. She hates the way the marine smiles at her, stealing a shy kiss on her cheek. She hates the words with every fiber of her being.
"I miss you already. I can't wait to see you again."
All Liara can ever think to do is nod.
"I hope you have an evening as lovely as you, Liara," Jane whispers meekly, running away soon after.
Frustration chases the warmth swelling in her chest. She's falling apart. She's falling apart, and they're going to be apart, and there's nothing she can do about it. She shouldn't be entertaining this, this buzz, this growing thing between them. It's only going to hurt more. They have a couple days left. Better to just tell the marine now, and at least she won't be in a shock when she boards the frigate, searching for an asari that is no longer there. Liara engages her omni-tool, opening their message thread where it takes a minute to load from how much they've been chatting, many moments stolen during the shift.
Her eyes burn when she sees there's already an 0-1 Ensign Shepard typing flickering on and off.
Liara forces herself to move, if only to have a quiet place to fall apart, safe from prying eyes and eavesdroppers. She rushes to her hotel, scrambling to take her keycard out, and heads to the bathroom first to douse her face in ice-cold water. It doesn't snap her out of the fog that's now snaking around her heart, after drowning her mind. She hates this. She misses the days when they were simple, when this assignment was simple. Study prothean artifacts. Be a part of a wonderful initiative to mend cross-species relations. She hates this initiative. She hates these relations. She needs to get off this station and book a flight back to Thessia, to gather her tools and go back to exploring ruins. She ignores the buzzing of her omni-tool.
It hurts.
Two more days. Just two more days of this, and then it will not hurt anymore. They will be split apart and go their own ways. She will tune in to the news every now and then, to read articles and say I told you so to her artifacts as she listens to the marine's achievements—and likely more boastful speeches of how she still won't stop there, until she's the absolute best of the best, blazing the path to set an example of what it means to be the best so that there can be more like her. But she'll still be number one.
She will be. She isn't the only one who knows she can do it.
Another buzz. Another splash of ice-cold water. Liara gulps in a few deep breaths before she walks to her bed, steeling herself to answer the calls for rescue from boredom. Her prediction is spot on, upon opening the message thread, smiling away when Jane keeps poking and prodding for them to call.
0-1 Ensign Shepard: There's juicy drama, doc. Shit is going down. Shit is going up. It's flying everywhere.
Doubtful, but entertaining. Liara starts to input the frequency to call up the marine, and falls back on her bed with a sigh. She closes her eyes. Her lips pull in a smile upon hearing the wispy voice in her aural, delighted to hear all the whispering and sudden pauses for the marine to check if she's still safe to talk.
"Hey, Liara."
"Hey, Jane."
"Did you get my messages about the drama bit, or should I start from the beginning?"
"I did." Her smile grows wider, relaxing and drifting. "But start from the beginning, anyways."
She wishes they were back to it. That she could turn back the clock. Two more days.
Every minute and every call is precious now.
Today is the day.
It's hard to shake the marine off. Liara's hardened her heart and has tried to think nothing of their shopping trips—where she rarely buys anything, and is stuck carrying bags for apparently a humanoid junk rat. The audacious human is always in her damn satchel, stowing her credit chit inside there instead of the many pockets she has in her uniform pants.
"This is a souvenir," Jane announces as she puts in a plush elcor in one of the bags.
"I am fairly certain you can buy that at the Citadel."
"Well, yeah, but it's elcor-made. It's proof I've been on Dekuuna. I will never forget this place—since all the fucking elcor are blind as bats."
Liara blushes. She will never reveal the nature of the 'blind' elcor for as long as she lives.
"There goes all my credits earned from this assignment," Jane announces proudly, her obnoxious rummaging in the satchel making Liara move about as she stands, waiting. The credit chit is stowed away for a final time, and the mischievous marine is up in her face. "Alright, doc, I can carry my bags. Thanks for being my mule."
"Glad to be of service," Liara deadpans, smirking when laughter embraces her.
"Your turn. My treat. What's the one thing you want, so that you never forget this place?"
To never forget this place? Liara has been in a race to do exactly that, so as to forget all this hurt already. She's stumped, staring, slack-jawed. A cheeky elcor plush sashays left and right in her face, and the toy boops into her nose. She laughs, swatting it away, and soon finds the plush stuffed in her hands.
"You can have that, then. We'll name it: Identity Theft."
Liara rolls her eyes, looking down at the plush. She instinctively squeezes it—coaching herself not to fall apart here, once her eyes start to burn. Her gaze snaps up when the amber light catches her attention, the omni-tool engaged, and the marine's look of panic.
"Oh, fuck, we gotta go, Liara! The frigate is departing!"
Suddenly, Jane takes off running. It's amusing, her bags thrashing about so viciously. She looks over her shoulder and comes back, scrambling to loop all bags onto one arm as she grabs the asari's hand to drag her. Liara's grip tightens on the elcor plush. She tells herself to rip away, to get lost in the crowds, to promise she's just behind the marine. She does exactly that. She uses the elcor's sheer size and slowness to hide behind. When she peeks out, ignoring the confused elcor looking over at her, she no longer sees the auburn hair furiously whipping about. The bags aren't jostling. The port gate is devoid of any humans or science personnel.
Something numb sweeps over her. Her heart is ticking away like a time bomb. She forces one foot after the other, her nails sinking into the elcor plush, as she walks up to the vast window pane. She barely catches the nearest bench to fall apart on as she watches the frigate take up in the air.
Just like that. It's over.
Every minute has been precious, she tells herself. She's made the most of every single second. She can't help but wish she had just one more.
Liara looks down at the plush elcor, squeezing it, her eyes burning hotter. She doesn't have to hold on anymore. It spills freely, ignoring the turns of nearby concerned elcor, likely able to smell her tears even from a distance. More eyes fall upon her from tourists and business folk alike. She can't find it in her to care. She buries her face in the plush to hide, to absorb, to unleash.
It's over.
It's not, hope urges. She can still message, stay tuned to the news. After the patrol is over, perhaps there will be time they can meet again, before Jane is shipped off to her next assignment.
But she's just abandoned the marine without saying anything.
She waits for her omni-tool to buzz, asking where she is, dolling out all the what the fuck's at the rate of 30 per hour. The wait is agonizing. She's petrified. She can't help but feel as though Jane will be too upset to reach out to her, then, once she realizes what's happened.
"Goddess," she curls over her lap, pressing the plush in harder in hopes to somehow soak up all the guilt.
"Vulnerability doesn't suit you, Doctor T'Soni."
Liara freezes. Her head shoots up in disbelief, following the source of the voice that's just behind her, to the side. Jane looks down at her, all confused. She sticks out her tongue and playfully gags when she pries the damp plush away.
"Damn. Poor thing, drowning in snot. I think Identity Theft is having an Identity Crisis now, wondering if he's Elcor or Booger."
Heat surges to the scientist's face as she blushes fiercely. She reaches to shove, nearly falling over her bench when the laughing marine takes a step back. Her wrist is snared and she's pulled right up, a hand pushing carefully on the back of her fringe, tucking her tear-stricken face to hide in a shoulder.
"D-did you miss boarding?" That's the more believable answer. "There may still be time if you send a mes-"
"You thought I didn't know?" Jane whispers. A brief kiss to the top of the crest. "Come on. I have a lot to unpack. We'll figure out our next step after you get decent food in you."
Something propels her, and it's not mindfulness. The world flicks by like a slideshow, moments shuttering in and out of her mind. She's stuck staring at the hand wrapped around her forearm. The other hand jostles with all sorts of bags, where she realizes now many things haven't been souvenirs. An assortment of snacks and clothes. All credits blown. The marine has skipped out of duty.
"Won't you get in trouble?" Liara croaks.
"I've already asked for reassignment."
Her brow pinches, mind racing to try and figure out at what moment the marine has caught onto her lies. They enter the hotel sector, the elevator, and Jane looks pointedly at her before at the row of numbers. Liara presses the button for the third floor. She watches as her own keycard is taken out of one of the many pockets of the uniform pants. So that's why there's been so much rummaging in her satchel.
As they enter the hotel room, the bags are dropped off in the corner, by the couch. The marine's shirt is pulled off and thrown over. Liara looks away, fixating her sheepish gaze on one of the mundane paintings, catching glimpses in the corner of her eyes to determine when it's safe to turn back.
"How did you find out?" Liara asks. "When?"
"They updated the science team roster a couple days ago. A different asari arrived to the site to be the new prothean expert." Jane's head pokes out a cozy cardigan sweater, rolling and folding up her sleeves to her elbows. Her eyes harden as they snap up. "Fuck politics. I'm not going to be a pawn in that bullshit anymore." She doesn't seem to have any awareness to the effect of her changing so carelessly, so brazenly, working off her uniform pants next.
Liara whirls around, trying to quell and ignore the heat in her face. "J-Jane, I appreciate the thought, but you should not have sacrificed your career over this."
"Nah, not sacrificing nothing. I didn't state the reason why I want reassignment. I don't care if the Brass interprets that as me not being able to get along with aliens, or if it's because of my rep with Lieutenant Jerkoff." Rep? What does that even mean? "Life will keep moving with or without us on that frigate. Year from now? This will mean nothing to us, and we'll be the ones laughing in the end. I'll make sure things are different when I climb the ranks, Liara. Watch me. I'm going to dig my way through the bullshit and it will be because of my own hands, rather than some smear campaign. This is me putting my heart in, just like you said, doc. I'm chasing this out in a way that's meaningful to me."
Guilt lurks back in, snaking around Liara's heart. She isn't sure how much more of this she can take. She's unwittingly become the facilitator to naive dreams being crushed by reality—a system they evidently can't hope to fight through well wishes alone, as she's the recent example of such a casualty. She turns reluctantly, melting with relief to find the human just done pulling up some slacks, needing to hold onto the waist until she loops a belt through.
"Well, we have another week before I'll have to get on a flight and report back to the Arcturus Station for reassignment. Do you want to stay on Dekuuna, or do you want to catch a flight elsewhere?" Jane reaches up and musses her hair out of the bun, stroking it over her shoulder. She's still so casual about all of this.
There's nothing life changing about any of this. No, of course not. The notion that's suggesting otherwise? Now that is what's ridiculous.
Laughter bubbles in Liara's chest, chuckling and staring out of disbelief. "You are unbelievable..."
Jane grins as cheeky as she clearly feels. "I know." As she approaches, her grin takes on devilish connotations. Most ominous indeed. "Now, mind telling me when you stole my identity, making me smell like asari?"
Liara abuses her biotics to launch a pillow assault.