Fic - Law of War
Title: Law of War
Author: skybound2
Rating: T
Characters: F!Shep, Anderson
Word Count: ~2300
Summary: Shepard meets up with Anderson post suicide mission to hash a few things out.
Spoilers: Includes spoilers for ME2 through end game, and LotSB DLC.
Author's Note: This was written as a backup fic for thessilian for the ME Ficathon/Fic Exchange that I hosted (lots of great stories there, which you should all go read!). The prompt she gave was: “Shep meets up with Anderson post the suicide mission to talk about the Alliance, Cerberus and his/her future.” While I know this isn't perfect, I do hope you enjoy! This fic can also be found at FFN and Ao3.
Law of War
"I brainwashed a station full of Geth."
Shepard figured as icebreakers went, that one was most liable to get her a decent reaction. The pinched and perplexed look on Anderson's face didn't disappoint.
"Excuse me?"
Shepard quirked the corner of her mouth upwards as she leaned forward and braced both hands on the back of the chair in front of her, angling her head and body low enough so that she could lock her gaze with Anderson's across the table. "Geth. A bucketload of 'em. Me. Brainwash. Comprende?"
Anderson closed his eyes, a ghost of a smile lighting his features, before he stood and offered a hand to her in greeting. "Hello, Shepard, good to see you too."
She grasped his hand in hers, warm palm to slightly dry one, and squeezed it once before letting go and sliding into her seat. "Sorry for skipping the pleasantries, Anderson. But seeing as how you've been trying to dig up dirt on me, I thought it'd be best to just throw that out there, right at the beginning. Keep the misconceptions to a minimum."
Anderson's perplexed look returned. This time combined with a downturned mouth and somewhat narrowed eyes. Full on confusion mixed with suspicion. Which was good, as far as Shepard was concerned.
She'd been irritated when Anderson had requested the meeting, or rather 'dinner' as he so nicely put it - still reeling from her foray into the Shadow Broker's archives - and making him feel as wrong footed as she had been, fed the nastier parts of her ego nicely.
"Shepard, I'm not sure what you've heard, but I haven't been diggin-"
The clatter of a datapad hitting the table and skidding across its surface on its way towards the Councilor interrupted his blatant lie. "The vid on this pad says otherwise. As do the half-dozen or so transcripts you'll find on there as well. Really, Anderson? Trying to maintain a mole on my own ship?" She clucked her tongue at him. "I figured you hadn't heard about the Geth yet, seeing as how Lieutenant Mole there didn't make it home from our last mission…" She shrugged. "Thought you could use the update."
Wide-eyed, he turned to the datapad, and began to scroll through the info she'd given him. She already knew by heart what it was that he would see. What he would read. She'd poured over it all for hours after Liara had passed it along to her. Couldn't fathom at first that Anderson had been spying on her - and though she wouldn't admit it - it had hurt that he had felt the need to do so. His opinion mattered to Shepard, or at least, it had. She wasn't quite sure what to think of him now, now that she didn't know if she could trust him.
She frowned a little as he continued reading, mirroring his own expression. Trust. Seemed like such a simple thing until you didn't have it anymore. She still hadn't quite worked out how he'd gotten the Cerberus agent's cooperation, but that wasn't a high priority for her at the moment. He was dead after all. She'd deal with the hows and whys of him later, when there was time to worry about such things. For now, it was enough that she knew that what was left of her crew after the rescue on the Collector Base was loyal. And they were. Of that she was absolutely certain.
Catching Anderson off-guard and letting him know that he couldn't get away with that kind of behavior anymore, at least not with her, was what was important. He'd been too good of a friend, once upon a time. She hated the idea of losing that, but she was willing to sacrifice it, if need be. He was too important an asset for her to just give up on, though. Had the kind of pull and sway with both the Council and the Alliance that she was going to need for what was to come.
Lose a friend, but maintain an ally? She could deal with that.
Seemingly finished perusing the information, Anderson lowered the pad back to the table, a shaky finger lingering on it for just a moment longer. Shepard wondered what part got him most: seeing all of his little misdeeds in plain text, or hearing that his little buddy had ended up dead. "How did you get this?"
"It pays to have friends in high places, Anderson. I think you know that." She leaned back in her chair kicking one leg up to cross her ankle over her knee, and rested her hands on her shin. Going for relaxed in counterpoint to his stiff posture.
He didn't respond except to purse his lips in a manner not unlike someone sucking on a lemon, and angled his head away from her. She followed the path of his eyes towards the viewing window of the small room they shared - the clearest view of space from the Citadel, or so she'd been told - one hand continuing to absentmindedly stroke the datapad in front of him.
Shepard left him to his pondering for a moment, taking the time to observe their location closer. As meeting establishments went, She thought this one was quite nice. It was one of the higher end eateries on the Citadel, specializing in a fusion of human and asari cuisine; and Anderson had made sure to book them a private table. Not surprising, really: the place was known for being a favorite in the diplomat circles. Didn't mean that she hadn't had EDI sweep it for bugs before she crossed the threshold - some of what she had to say wasn't meant for prying ears…or eyes.
She could feel the gulf between them stretching to uncomfortable proportions as he continued to stare past her, and thought it best to bridge the gap before it became an impossible task. With a sigh, she lowered both her feet to the floor, and waited until he met her gaze straight on.
With less effort than she thought it would take, she tamped down on the feelings of betrayal she had allowed to surface on her arrival, and focused instead on all the years of trust - of friendship - she had put into the man. "You know, if there was anything you wanted to know, you could have just asked."
"Really?' He shook his head at her; the distant expression from earlier giving way to a sour eyed look of frustration. "Forgive me for being uncertain of your loyalties, Shepard, and having needed some proof about where they lie."
She couldn't stop the growl the words evoked. "You've always known where my loyalties lie, Anderson."
She watched as his hand clenched into a fist on the table. "You refused to be reinstated as a Spectre, Shepard." That fist pounded once on the surface, making the datapad bounce. "You joined forces with Cerberus." He leaned forward, eyes thin slits. "You attacked Harkin, and murdered a civilian; on the Citadel." She didn't bother to correct him on who actually perpetrated those acts. Didn't seem like the time. "You gunned down a prominent politician. Again, on the Citadel." He pushed up from his chair, crowding her space, looking as angry as she had ever seen him. "Both of whom, need I remind you, were turians!" She resisted the urge to wipe the bit of spittle that hit her in the eye away. "Do you have any idea the kind of heat that we had to deal with around here, just trying to clean up the messes you left? Hell, Shepard, you activated a Geth, and put it on your squad. And then, then as if that's not enough, you handed the Collector Base over to the Illusive Man - for research! So don't give me crap about being loyal, when none of your actions this past year support it!"
She arched a brow, refusing to give into the urge to lean away from him - not willing to give him that small victory. Agitation and anger were warring with the little girl inside her, upset that her former mentor was looking at her like she was the enemy. "So, you already knew about the Geth and the Base - got another mole on my ship already, Councilor?" She was proud of herself for keeping her voice so steady; she didn't want him to know how much the idea that she was wrong about her crew bothered her.
"No." He heaved a heavy breath, and fell back into his chair. He looked...deflated. Which didn't give her as much of a sense of satisfaction as she thought it would. "I don't. But, like you said. It pays to have friends in high places. And try as you might, Shepard, one thing your actions have never been, is subtle."
The tension between them broke, and she laughed. "You're right on that. Can't deny that it gets the job done though."
"Maybe. But to give that kind of technology to Cerberus…" Anderson shook his head once more, exhaustion born of mental fatigue showing through in the pull of the lines around his eyes, making him look years older than he was. She felt a tiny twinge of guilt at the thought that she had done that to him. "I just can't believe that the solider I knew would make that call. You know what their agenda is as well as anyone, Shepard."
A shiver ran up her spine, undulating in time with the memory of the thresher maw his words conjured. "Better than anyone."
"Then how could you -"
"Come on, Anderson. You telling me that you'd look a gift-horse like that in the mouth and shove a nuke in it?"
"I'm a fan of history, Shepard. I tend to be overly cautious of gift-horses." She watched as he scrubbed a hand down his face, the action drawing the skin down in an unpleasant way. "The fact is that you handed over what could very well be the most significant technological find in recent history - that could result in some of the most significant advancements to weaponry that we have ever known - to a group of known terrorists. To a group known for conducting experiments on living, breathing, sentient beings. On you, for God's sake! How can you possibly justify that?"
Now it was her turn to beat a fist against the table; the datapad tumbled over the edge with the action. "Because this is bigger than all of that, Anderson! This isn't about some scared-as-shit recruit suffering PTSD. This isn't about dead scientists, or missing marines. It isn't about human supremacy; or fighting for controlling interest of the Citadel. Or any of that 'our guns are bigger than yours' bullshit that humans and turians and krogan and everyone else in the damn 'verse likes to thrown down over. At the end of the day, that's all bullshit. It. Doesn't. Matter. And Cerberus -" She scoffed, hating the fact that the words were coming out of her mouth, but feeling the truth of them down to her marrow. "And much as it makes my stomach turn, Cerberus gets that. It gets that this…"
She pushed out of her chair, gesturing to the wide expanse of nothing outside the viewing window, dotted with only the smallest blinking dots light years away - worlds and stars in multitudes, but so far removed as to seem nigh impossible to ever reach. Yet they had. And they did. And they would. So many possibilities out there, and all of it threatened by one common enemy that no one seemed to want to believe was coming.
"This is bigger than all the petty squabbles we like to invent for ourselves, Anderson. We don't have the luxury to debate morals when the universe is hanging in the balance. Decisions have to be made, and I'm not going to apologize for making them."
"But they aren't always your decisions to make, Shepard."
She wheeled back around from the window to face him, her voice rising with her conviction. "Yes. They. Are. Because I'm the only one willing to make them."
Anderson parted his lips to respond, but she cut him off. "The Council wanted a hero, Anderson. That was the mantle they sidled me with. Whether they want to admit it or not. And I'm doing my damn job. I died, and I am still doing my damn job. Whatever it takes. Even if that means teaming up with the Geth, or Cerberus, or utilizing Collector tech."
She scooped the datapad off the floor, and folded her body back into the chair, meeting his weary eyes again. "Whatever calls I have to make, I'm gonna make 'em, Anderson. Once the Reaper threat is dealt with, then the brass can do with me what they will. I'll happily leave the job of deciding whether or not my calls were the right ones to make to people far better suited to it than me. They can debate it all, years from now. Until their hearts are content, from high on their thrones of hypocrisy. They can feel free to shred my decisions and question my moral fiber, all the while benefiting from the choices I made. 'Cause they'll still be around to do so. That'll be my gift to them: the chance to live lives long and annoying enough to turn tales of me from hero to villain. And I won't even bother to file a complaint."
She punched a sequence into the digital read out built into the table, and pulled up the restaurant's menu; choosing to ignore Anderson's contemplative expression for the time being. "You asked me here to eat, didn't you? Let's order. I'm starving, and I hear they make an excellent falafel."
~End
Author: skybound2
Rating: T
Characters: F!Shep, Anderson
Word Count: ~2300
Summary: Shepard meets up with Anderson post suicide mission to hash a few things out.
Spoilers: Includes spoilers for ME2 through end game, and LotSB DLC.
Author's Note: This was written as a backup fic for thessilian for the ME Ficathon/Fic Exchange that I hosted (lots of great stories there, which you should all go read!). The prompt she gave was: “Shep meets up with Anderson post the suicide mission to talk about the Alliance, Cerberus and his/her future.” While I know this isn't perfect, I do hope you enjoy! This fic can also be found at FFN and Ao3.
Law of War
"I brainwashed a station full of Geth."
Shepard figured as icebreakers went, that one was most liable to get her a decent reaction. The pinched and perplexed look on Anderson's face didn't disappoint.
"Excuse me?"
Shepard quirked the corner of her mouth upwards as she leaned forward and braced both hands on the back of the chair in front of her, angling her head and body low enough so that she could lock her gaze with Anderson's across the table. "Geth. A bucketload of 'em. Me. Brainwash. Comprende?"
Anderson closed his eyes, a ghost of a smile lighting his features, before he stood and offered a hand to her in greeting. "Hello, Shepard, good to see you too."
She grasped his hand in hers, warm palm to slightly dry one, and squeezed it once before letting go and sliding into her seat. "Sorry for skipping the pleasantries, Anderson. But seeing as how you've been trying to dig up dirt on me, I thought it'd be best to just throw that out there, right at the beginning. Keep the misconceptions to a minimum."
Anderson's perplexed look returned. This time combined with a downturned mouth and somewhat narrowed eyes. Full on confusion mixed with suspicion. Which was good, as far as Shepard was concerned.
She'd been irritated when Anderson had requested the meeting, or rather 'dinner' as he so nicely put it - still reeling from her foray into the Shadow Broker's archives - and making him feel as wrong footed as she had been, fed the nastier parts of her ego nicely.
"Shepard, I'm not sure what you've heard, but I haven't been diggin-"
The clatter of a datapad hitting the table and skidding across its surface on its way towards the Councilor interrupted his blatant lie. "The vid on this pad says otherwise. As do the half-dozen or so transcripts you'll find on there as well. Really, Anderson? Trying to maintain a mole on my own ship?" She clucked her tongue at him. "I figured you hadn't heard about the Geth yet, seeing as how Lieutenant Mole there didn't make it home from our last mission…" She shrugged. "Thought you could use the update."
Wide-eyed, he turned to the datapad, and began to scroll through the info she'd given him. She already knew by heart what it was that he would see. What he would read. She'd poured over it all for hours after Liara had passed it along to her. Couldn't fathom at first that Anderson had been spying on her - and though she wouldn't admit it - it had hurt that he had felt the need to do so. His opinion mattered to Shepard, or at least, it had. She wasn't quite sure what to think of him now, now that she didn't know if she could trust him.
She frowned a little as he continued reading, mirroring his own expression. Trust. Seemed like such a simple thing until you didn't have it anymore. She still hadn't quite worked out how he'd gotten the Cerberus agent's cooperation, but that wasn't a high priority for her at the moment. He was dead after all. She'd deal with the hows and whys of him later, when there was time to worry about such things. For now, it was enough that she knew that what was left of her crew after the rescue on the Collector Base was loyal. And they were. Of that she was absolutely certain.
Catching Anderson off-guard and letting him know that he couldn't get away with that kind of behavior anymore, at least not with her, was what was important. He'd been too good of a friend, once upon a time. She hated the idea of losing that, but she was willing to sacrifice it, if need be. He was too important an asset for her to just give up on, though. Had the kind of pull and sway with both the Council and the Alliance that she was going to need for what was to come.
Lose a friend, but maintain an ally? She could deal with that.
Seemingly finished perusing the information, Anderson lowered the pad back to the table, a shaky finger lingering on it for just a moment longer. Shepard wondered what part got him most: seeing all of his little misdeeds in plain text, or hearing that his little buddy had ended up dead. "How did you get this?"
"It pays to have friends in high places, Anderson. I think you know that." She leaned back in her chair kicking one leg up to cross her ankle over her knee, and rested her hands on her shin. Going for relaxed in counterpoint to his stiff posture.
He didn't respond except to purse his lips in a manner not unlike someone sucking on a lemon, and angled his head away from her. She followed the path of his eyes towards the viewing window of the small room they shared - the clearest view of space from the Citadel, or so she'd been told - one hand continuing to absentmindedly stroke the datapad in front of him.
Shepard left him to his pondering for a moment, taking the time to observe their location closer. As meeting establishments went, She thought this one was quite nice. It was one of the higher end eateries on the Citadel, specializing in a fusion of human and asari cuisine; and Anderson had made sure to book them a private table. Not surprising, really: the place was known for being a favorite in the diplomat circles. Didn't mean that she hadn't had EDI sweep it for bugs before she crossed the threshold - some of what she had to say wasn't meant for prying ears…or eyes.
She could feel the gulf between them stretching to uncomfortable proportions as he continued to stare past her, and thought it best to bridge the gap before it became an impossible task. With a sigh, she lowered both her feet to the floor, and waited until he met her gaze straight on.
With less effort than she thought it would take, she tamped down on the feelings of betrayal she had allowed to surface on her arrival, and focused instead on all the years of trust - of friendship - she had put into the man. "You know, if there was anything you wanted to know, you could have just asked."
"Really?' He shook his head at her; the distant expression from earlier giving way to a sour eyed look of frustration. "Forgive me for being uncertain of your loyalties, Shepard, and having needed some proof about where they lie."
She couldn't stop the growl the words evoked. "You've always known where my loyalties lie, Anderson."
She watched as his hand clenched into a fist on the table. "You refused to be reinstated as a Spectre, Shepard." That fist pounded once on the surface, making the datapad bounce. "You joined forces with Cerberus." He leaned forward, eyes thin slits. "You attacked Harkin, and murdered a civilian; on the Citadel." She didn't bother to correct him on who actually perpetrated those acts. Didn't seem like the time. "You gunned down a prominent politician. Again, on the Citadel." He pushed up from his chair, crowding her space, looking as angry as she had ever seen him. "Both of whom, need I remind you, were turians!" She resisted the urge to wipe the bit of spittle that hit her in the eye away. "Do you have any idea the kind of heat that we had to deal with around here, just trying to clean up the messes you left? Hell, Shepard, you activated a Geth, and put it on your squad. And then, then as if that's not enough, you handed the Collector Base over to the Illusive Man - for research! So don't give me crap about being loyal, when none of your actions this past year support it!"
She arched a brow, refusing to give into the urge to lean away from him - not willing to give him that small victory. Agitation and anger were warring with the little girl inside her, upset that her former mentor was looking at her like she was the enemy. "So, you already knew about the Geth and the Base - got another mole on my ship already, Councilor?" She was proud of herself for keeping her voice so steady; she didn't want him to know how much the idea that she was wrong about her crew bothered her.
"No." He heaved a heavy breath, and fell back into his chair. He looked...deflated. Which didn't give her as much of a sense of satisfaction as she thought it would. "I don't. But, like you said. It pays to have friends in high places. And try as you might, Shepard, one thing your actions have never been, is subtle."
The tension between them broke, and she laughed. "You're right on that. Can't deny that it gets the job done though."
"Maybe. But to give that kind of technology to Cerberus…" Anderson shook his head once more, exhaustion born of mental fatigue showing through in the pull of the lines around his eyes, making him look years older than he was. She felt a tiny twinge of guilt at the thought that she had done that to him. "I just can't believe that the solider I knew would make that call. You know what their agenda is as well as anyone, Shepard."
A shiver ran up her spine, undulating in time with the memory of the thresher maw his words conjured. "Better than anyone."
"Then how could you -"
"Come on, Anderson. You telling me that you'd look a gift-horse like that in the mouth and shove a nuke in it?"
"I'm a fan of history, Shepard. I tend to be overly cautious of gift-horses." She watched as he scrubbed a hand down his face, the action drawing the skin down in an unpleasant way. "The fact is that you handed over what could very well be the most significant technological find in recent history - that could result in some of the most significant advancements to weaponry that we have ever known - to a group of known terrorists. To a group known for conducting experiments on living, breathing, sentient beings. On you, for God's sake! How can you possibly justify that?"
Now it was her turn to beat a fist against the table; the datapad tumbled over the edge with the action. "Because this is bigger than all of that, Anderson! This isn't about some scared-as-shit recruit suffering PTSD. This isn't about dead scientists, or missing marines. It isn't about human supremacy; or fighting for controlling interest of the Citadel. Or any of that 'our guns are bigger than yours' bullshit that humans and turians and krogan and everyone else in the damn 'verse likes to thrown down over. At the end of the day, that's all bullshit. It. Doesn't. Matter. And Cerberus -" She scoffed, hating the fact that the words were coming out of her mouth, but feeling the truth of them down to her marrow. "And much as it makes my stomach turn, Cerberus gets that. It gets that this…"
She pushed out of her chair, gesturing to the wide expanse of nothing outside the viewing window, dotted with only the smallest blinking dots light years away - worlds and stars in multitudes, but so far removed as to seem nigh impossible to ever reach. Yet they had. And they did. And they would. So many possibilities out there, and all of it threatened by one common enemy that no one seemed to want to believe was coming.
"This is bigger than all the petty squabbles we like to invent for ourselves, Anderson. We don't have the luxury to debate morals when the universe is hanging in the balance. Decisions have to be made, and I'm not going to apologize for making them."
"But they aren't always your decisions to make, Shepard."
She wheeled back around from the window to face him, her voice rising with her conviction. "Yes. They. Are. Because I'm the only one willing to make them."
Anderson parted his lips to respond, but she cut him off. "The Council wanted a hero, Anderson. That was the mantle they sidled me with. Whether they want to admit it or not. And I'm doing my damn job. I died, and I am still doing my damn job. Whatever it takes. Even if that means teaming up with the Geth, or Cerberus, or utilizing Collector tech."
She scooped the datapad off the floor, and folded her body back into the chair, meeting his weary eyes again. "Whatever calls I have to make, I'm gonna make 'em, Anderson. Once the Reaper threat is dealt with, then the brass can do with me what they will. I'll happily leave the job of deciding whether or not my calls were the right ones to make to people far better suited to it than me. They can debate it all, years from now. Until their hearts are content, from high on their thrones of hypocrisy. They can feel free to shred my decisions and question my moral fiber, all the while benefiting from the choices I made. 'Cause they'll still be around to do so. That'll be my gift to them: the chance to live lives long and annoying enough to turn tales of me from hero to villain. And I won't even bother to file a complaint."
She punched a sequence into the digital read out built into the table, and pulled up the restaurant's menu; choosing to ignore Anderson's contemplative expression for the time being. "You asked me here to eat, didn't you? Let's order. I'm starving, and I hear they make an excellent falafel."
~End