It's 3:21 AM. You really want me to insert a clever title?
“Few humans have,” Liara continued, and Shepard knew the grim smile that would quirk on her lips as she faced down the human in the hologram. He was shuffling and wringing his hands nervously, and Lyall suddenly felt as if the Noverian wind had swept into the room. “I’ll make it simple. Either you pay me, or I flay you alive.” There was a pause, and after the man gulped audibly, Liara’s voice came at him in a whiplash - bam, singularity. “With my mind.” She cut the comm and turned to sit back at her desk.
Whatever Lyall had been expecting, it wasn’t the familiar, girlish gasp that escaped the asari’s lips. In a few strides the two had closed the distance between them. Lyall rested her armored hands on Liara’s hips, and the asari’s knees nearly crumbled at how familiar and welcome the sensation was. Instead, she took the human woman’s face between her fingers, probing at her features gently with the pads of her fingertips.
Tali quietly sat and busied herself with looking out the window, giving the two their privacy. Garrus blinked hard, but didn’t look away, watching the two study each other warily. His mandibles flared slightly as the asari gently traced the line where Lyall’s scar used to be, marveling (like everyone else had) at how different the Commander looked without the violent slash marring her skin. Her blue fingers sifted into auburn hair as the two finally drew in for a kiss.
This was familiar, even though Liara’s frame was slimmer and too tense underneath her fingers. Lyall’s hands slipped around her lover’s hips and pulled her closer, the familiar tingle of biotics prickling at the base of her skull, giving her goosebumps. Now she was remembering tumbling through a dark world of relief and pleasure, skin on skin and two very different minds diving and swirling together, but too soon Liara was pulling away and Shepard felt reality start to prick at her senses. A little desperate for just a few more seconds of being someone else, she moved in for another kiss.
Garrus shifted, armored foot scraping against the floor, letting out a shaky breath. Liara pulled back, shaking her head slightly, the strained smile not reaching her eyes. It was then, as the asari untangled herself from the human’s grasp, that Lyall realized Liara was much paler. The freckles dotting her face were much more prominent now, and her eyes were wide not with naïveté, but strain. Lyall sat in front of Liara’s desk as the asari moved to her other old friends.
“My sources said…but…it’s so very good to see you all again,” the asari sighed, pulling Tali in for a well-received hug.
“You too. You look as beautiful as always,” Tali replied, patting Liara’s arm as she moved to Garrus. The turian shifted, unsure if he could bring himself to reciprocate the inevitable hug, and was secretly relieved when Liara simply grasped his talon and arm with both hands.
“Garrus. You look…” Liara tilted her head, then smiled gently. Garrus almost believed it. “…very different,” she finished.
“You do too.” There was a pause. “Uh, Tali was right though. Suits you. You seem to be doing well for yourself.”
“My thanks.” Liara inclined her head and swept towards her desk, biting back a frown as she saw Shepard’s stiff stance.
“You’re making death threats now?” Lyall asked. Sounds awfully familiar.
Liara folded her arms behind her back, looking out her vista view to the bustling streets below. “Ever since I helped you stop Saren, people have wanted to be my friend.” She glanced back, lips quirking upward wryly. “…or not be my enemy. I’ve set up a very respectable business on Illium as an information broker. It’s paid the bills since you-” She swallowed, and as she turned Lyall wondered if it was the orange glow of the sun or the fluorescent lights that gave Liara such a haunted gaze. The circles under her eyes were a vivid purple. “Well. For the past two years.” She sat, folding her hands in front of her and leaning forward slightly. “And now you’re back, gunning for the Collectors with Cerberus.”
“That’s not exactly public knowledge,” Tali piped up.
“Neither is Shepard being alive. Information is my business now.”
“I could use your help on this mission,” Lyall murmured.
“I can’t, Shepard.” Liara watched the life sag out of her Commander’s shoulders and something other than the numbness stirred. “I’m sorry. I have commitments here. Things I need to take care of.” Please understand-
No. Don’t. She’ll run off again, and di-
She’ll hate you if she finds out.
I-
“What kind of things?” Shepard leaned forward. “Are you in trouble?”
Liara shook her head. “No trouble.” She paused, choosing her next words carefully; treading a minefield. She’d done it before - literally - she could do it now. “But it’s been a long two years. I had to do things while you were gone. I have debts to repay.”
“What’s going on, Liara?” Lyall’s eyebrows furrowed. Even without her scar, the look was still vicious and intimidating. “Why can’t you just talk to me?” Her frustration slipped out, and something in Liara’s gut sparked.
“Don’t you think I want to, Lyall?”
“This is Illium,” Garrus pointed out. “Everything she says or does is probably being monitored.”
“She is a very influential person now, Shepard,” Tali agreed.
Shepard sighed.
“You may also want to tell Miss Goto that her camouflage is not necessary here.”
The window ledge shimmered, and Kasumi’s voice floated through the room. “Shep asked that I stay hidden and do some recon and backup. Besides, silent is the way to go.”
Liara raised an eyebrow and Shepard shook her head, resisting the urge to quirk a smile and roll her eyes.
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
(some exposition and sidequesting later…)
“Do you remember the Shadow Broker?”
“Of course.” Lyall settled back in her chair.
“Wrex kind of shot Fist in the face for him,” Tali reminded them wryly.
“Not to mention Barla Von made us feel like we needed a shower. A long, acidic shower,” Garrus added.
“With the data you got me, I may be able to find information caches on his agents.”
Lyall’s eyebrows furrowed again. “Are you working with him?”
“No.” Liara’s smile was poison. “Actually, I’m planning to kill him.”
Silence.
“You want to kill…the Shadow Broker,” Tali reiterated slowly. “I had information to discredit Saren Aterius-”
“Who nearly brought the Reapers down on us, in case you forgot,” Garrus added.
“-and he wouldn’t meet with me,” the quarian finished.
“You…do remember Saren, right?”
Liara arched an eyebrow at Garrus, who stared back at her, unimpressed and imposing. The former archaeologist didn’t flinch, then turned her attention back to Shepard. “We crossed paths not long after you died. Since then I’ve been working to take him down.” Her hand slammed to her desk, and the two at Shepard’s back jumped slightly. “With this data, I’m a step closer.”
“I’ve never seen you ready to execute someone in cold blood.” Lyall ignored the uneasiness chewing at her stomach. “What happened, Liara? What did the Shadow Broker do to you?”
The asari was silent, looking at her holographic interface thoughtfully before her lips moved. “I was on a job with a friend. The Shadow Broker caught us. My friend didn’t escape. I don’t know if he’s dead or being interrogated.” She looked up, locking eyes with Shepard. “I owe him my life. And I need to make the Shadow Broker pay for what he did.”
“You can’t come with me because you’re after the Shadow Broker?” Lyall sounded desperate and ridiculous, she knew she did, but she needed- “What if I help you find him?”
Liara shook her head, not meeting the human woman’s gaze. “The galaxy doesn’t work that way. I have to find leads, trace information. I need to work. I can’t do that on the Normandy.” Her voice changed, wistful, soft, and fleeting. “I wish I could.”
Shepard’s teeth ground together as she finally voiced her real opinion. No more beating around the bush. “You spent two years of your life hunting the Shadow Broker? Liara, that’s insane.”
The maiden was on her feet, leaning over the desk, biotics shimmering around her. Lyall didn’t flinch, even as Liara’s voice hit everyone in the room like a whiplash. It was grating, raw, and wounded. “You don’t know what he did. You couldn’t. You were gone!”
Tali’s filtered breath audibly hitched, and Garru’s mandibles clicked in the silence as he stared at the blank wall. Her friends’ silent agreements rendered the Commander mute, and her lips moved soundlessly.
“…and we all did what we had to after that,” Liara finished quietly. She wouldn’t let herself think of finding-or of Fer-or the funera- No. She turned toward the vista, and only Kasumi would see her fingering with a small lump under her dress. The cold chains and small engraved plate felt like fire on her skin.
Tali felt like she was hearing the news all over again, finally realizing that the woman who sat in front of her was the walking dead. Her eyes burned, and she blinked the tears back. Her small frame trembeled as a side-effect of the shock, but she remained quiet. Two years mourning, and moving on, and now, so quickly, she’d thrown her fleet away-
Garrus’s memory took him to the dark red of Omega, holed up in that godforsaken base with the ghosts of his crew for company and Death waiting as a mistress in the wings. Reload, sight, shoot, cover. Reload, sight, shoot, cover. Reload, sight, shoot, cover. When they get close enough, activate the bomb and send everything sky-high. Then buy Shepard a drink in Hell. Then a crimsonclad figure had vaulted over the barrier and his hollow heartbeat had stopped-
“Let’s not argue.” Liara’s quiet voice broke the smothering silence. “I don’t have enough friends left…to lose another.”
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
(even MORE sidequesting and exposition later~~)
Lyall palmed the door control. Like Kasumi had reported, Liara was just sitting there at her desk, calmly working like she hadn’t just discovered a groundbreaking lead. “Nyxeris had some interesting data hidden away,” she spoke, eyes never leaving the holographic interface. “Thank you, Shepard. I wouldn’t have caught her without you. I’m one step closer to the Shadow Broker, thanks to you.” She slid a card across the table, and Lyall sat and glanced at it. “Nyxeris was very well-compensated. You need it more than I do.”
“You have any trouble with her?” the Commander finally asked.
“She was very talented,” Liara admitted. “I imagine that had she been ordered to assassinate me, I’d never have seen her coming. But her barriers needed practice.” There was that smile again, grim and devoid of so much- “Practice, I’m afraid, she won’t be getting.”
How far you’ve come, Dr. T’soni… Garrus leaned against the wall, looking at the asari with newfound interest and respect. He’d always liked Liara, but…damn. Where was the bumbling maiden who gaped and babbled at Ilos? You’re a fine one to talk, Archangel.
“What’s the next step in your hunt?” Shepard was asking. She sounded so weary. The turian’s mandibles twitched.
“Now I gather information, peel away layers of lies, and shine light into the shadows. And when I find the Shadow Broker…” Liara’s eyes narrowed, her gaze almost maniacal, “I hit him with a biotic field so strong that what’s left of him won’t fit into a coffee cup.”
Enough of this. Lyall wanted to press her palms to her eyes, to shed her armor and sleep, to be anyone or anywhere but who and where she was right this fucking instant. “That anger can’t just be from what you’ve told me.” Liara visibly stiffened. “What else happened between you and the Shadow Broker?”
Today’s just full of these, Garrus thought as another silence blanketed the room. He could actually hear Kasumi’s cloaking device and Tali’s air filters whirring. I think I’ve fulfilled my awkward quota for the next five krogan lifetimes. Tali, in the meantime, leaned forward, curious.
She told Councilor Anderson there was no body, so how did Cerberus--? Did she--?
Liara stood, facing the window once more. This time, she gripped the sill tightly, fingers nearly turning white. “…did Cerberus ever tell you how they recovered your body?”
Oh, keelah se’lai…
No wonder I couldn’t get ahold of her.
Liara…what…
“I gave it to them.” The asari’s quiet voice sliced through the silence, and Lyall felt her brain give way. She could handle Saren, and the geth, and the Collectors. The thousands of disappearing and dead humans, the gang violence in her childhood, the Council’s disbelief, Akuze’s threshers, Udina’s hatred, Ashley’s scorn, Kaiden’s ghost, Joker’s guilt, her fifty dead marines, Chakwas’s loneliness, the dead Normandy, buried forever on a frozen world where she had landed and found her helmet in the wreckage, her helmet which had been attached to her head and should have been on her incinerated corpse oh god-
“I gave you to them, Shepard.”
There was a roaring in her ears. Shepard could barely hear Liara, let alone register her words. This…this…
“Because they said….they could rebuild you. And to do that, I had to take it from the Shadow Broker, who was going to sell your corpse to the Collectors.”
Lyall wanted to get to her feet, but instead stared at Liara’s back numbly. “Why didn’t you tell me about this before now?” Huh. She actually had the energy to sound insulted and accusing. Imagine that.
“Because I screwed it up, Shepard. I barely escaped with my own life. And when I gave you to Cerberus…” Here she turned, leaning over the desk. You have to see, you have to understand, what I had to do for you, how I couldn’t-can’t-be without, why I was willing to risk you hating me, not because the galaxy needed you but because I’m selfish… “I told myself I was doing it for you, for a chance to bring you back. But I knew Cerberus would use you for their own business.”
“Like they did before.” Lyall’s voice was flat.
“And I let it happen. Because I couldn’t let you go.” Liara sat down, unable to bear the weight any more. “I’m sorry.”
Tali cradled her helmeted head in her hands, and Garrus simply stared at the two seated women. Kasumi swore she could feel herself choking on all the unspoken words and tumultuous emotions whipping around.
“You did the right thing, Liara,” Shepard said finally. All eyes turned toward her in disbelief. “My mission is important. I couldn’t do it if you hadn’t given me to Cerberus.”
Liara sagged slightly against the desk. When she spoke, her voice was composed. “Thank you.” She looked up, and in one instant looked so familiar and vulnerable but then it was gone. “I…I was afraid you would hate me. That’s why I must destroy the Shadow Broker. For what he did to my friend, and to you, and whatever he’s doing with the Collectors.”
“Be careful out there, Liara. Don’t turn into the thing you’re hunting.”
You have to know that I-you need to come with me-are we going to--?
“Says the dead Spectre working for Cerberus,” Liara responded dryly. It was cruel, and she knew it, but she had to dig under Lyall’s skin. “Don’t worry, Shepard. I’m not my mother. Everything I’m doing, I’m doing of my own free will…for better or for worse.”
I don’t deserve-and I can’t-and I want to believe it but-
“Of my own free will…” That’s what I was afraid of. Lyall stood, feeling the entire galaxy settle in on her bones. Now there was no hope, and nothing left to buffer that weight. Just the vast and empty space, the vacuum, cutting off her air, choking and demanding and deadly-
“I’ll talk to you later, Liara.”
The asari nodded, and it was all Shepard could do to force herself out of the office and return to the Normandy. Tali patted Liara’s hand gently before moving after her Commander, and Garrus held Liara’s gaze before turning and striding out. When the door hissed closed, the asari slumped against her desk and allowed herself to cry.
(Kasumi's in there because I love her to death).
Whatever Lyall had been expecting, it wasn’t the familiar, girlish gasp that escaped the asari’s lips. In a few strides the two had closed the distance between them. Lyall rested her armored hands on Liara’s hips, and the asari’s knees nearly crumbled at how familiar and welcome the sensation was. Instead, she took the human woman’s face between her fingers, probing at her features gently with the pads of her fingertips.
Tali quietly sat and busied herself with looking out the window, giving the two their privacy. Garrus blinked hard, but didn’t look away, watching the two study each other warily. His mandibles flared slightly as the asari gently traced the line where Lyall’s scar used to be, marveling (like everyone else had) at how different the Commander looked without the violent slash marring her skin. Her blue fingers sifted into auburn hair as the two finally drew in for a kiss.
This was familiar, even though Liara’s frame was slimmer and too tense underneath her fingers. Lyall’s hands slipped around her lover’s hips and pulled her closer, the familiar tingle of biotics prickling at the base of her skull, giving her goosebumps. Now she was remembering tumbling through a dark world of relief and pleasure, skin on skin and two very different minds diving and swirling together, but too soon Liara was pulling away and Shepard felt reality start to prick at her senses. A little desperate for just a few more seconds of being someone else, she moved in for another kiss.
Garrus shifted, armored foot scraping against the floor, letting out a shaky breath. Liara pulled back, shaking her head slightly, the strained smile not reaching her eyes. It was then, as the asari untangled herself from the human’s grasp, that Lyall realized Liara was much paler. The freckles dotting her face were much more prominent now, and her eyes were wide not with naïveté, but strain. Lyall sat in front of Liara’s desk as the asari moved to her other old friends.
“My sources said…but…it’s so very good to see you all again,” the asari sighed, pulling Tali in for a well-received hug.
“You too. You look as beautiful as always,” Tali replied, patting Liara’s arm as she moved to Garrus. The turian shifted, unsure if he could bring himself to reciprocate the inevitable hug, and was secretly relieved when Liara simply grasped his talon and arm with both hands.
“Garrus. You look…” Liara tilted her head, then smiled gently. Garrus almost believed it. “…very different,” she finished.
“You do too.” There was a pause. “Uh, Tali was right though. Suits you. You seem to be doing well for yourself.”
“My thanks.” Liara inclined her head and swept towards her desk, biting back a frown as she saw Shepard’s stiff stance.
“You’re making death threats now?” Lyall asked. Sounds awfully familiar.
Liara folded her arms behind her back, looking out her vista view to the bustling streets below. “Ever since I helped you stop Saren, people have wanted to be my friend.” She glanced back, lips quirking upward wryly. “…or not be my enemy. I’ve set up a very respectable business on Illium as an information broker. It’s paid the bills since you-” She swallowed, and as she turned Lyall wondered if it was the orange glow of the sun or the fluorescent lights that gave Liara such a haunted gaze. The circles under her eyes were a vivid purple. “Well. For the past two years.” She sat, folding her hands in front of her and leaning forward slightly. “And now you’re back, gunning for the Collectors with Cerberus.”
“That’s not exactly public knowledge,” Tali piped up.
“Neither is Shepard being alive. Information is my business now.”
“I could use your help on this mission,” Lyall murmured.
“I can’t, Shepard.” Liara watched the life sag out of her Commander’s shoulders and something other than the numbness stirred. “I’m sorry. I have commitments here. Things I need to take care of.” Please understand-
No. Don’t. She’ll run off again, and di-
She’ll hate you if she finds out.
I-
“What kind of things?” Shepard leaned forward. “Are you in trouble?”
Liara shook her head. “No trouble.” She paused, choosing her next words carefully; treading a minefield. She’d done it before - literally - she could do it now. “But it’s been a long two years. I had to do things while you were gone. I have debts to repay.”
“What’s going on, Liara?” Lyall’s eyebrows furrowed. Even without her scar, the look was still vicious and intimidating. “Why can’t you just talk to me?” Her frustration slipped out, and something in Liara’s gut sparked.
“Don’t you think I want to, Lyall?”
“This is Illium,” Garrus pointed out. “Everything she says or does is probably being monitored.”
“She is a very influential person now, Shepard,” Tali agreed.
Shepard sighed.
“You may also want to tell Miss Goto that her camouflage is not necessary here.”
The window ledge shimmered, and Kasumi’s voice floated through the room. “Shep asked that I stay hidden and do some recon and backup. Besides, silent is the way to go.”
Liara raised an eyebrow and Shepard shook her head, resisting the urge to quirk a smile and roll her eyes.
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
(some exposition and sidequesting later…)
“Do you remember the Shadow Broker?”
“Of course.” Lyall settled back in her chair.
“Wrex kind of shot Fist in the face for him,” Tali reminded them wryly.
“Not to mention Barla Von made us feel like we needed a shower. A long, acidic shower,” Garrus added.
“With the data you got me, I may be able to find information caches on his agents.”
Lyall’s eyebrows furrowed again. “Are you working with him?”
“No.” Liara’s smile was poison. “Actually, I’m planning to kill him.”
Silence.
“You want to kill…the Shadow Broker,” Tali reiterated slowly. “I had information to discredit Saren Aterius-”
“Who nearly brought the Reapers down on us, in case you forgot,” Garrus added.
“-and he wouldn’t meet with me,” the quarian finished.
“You…do remember Saren, right?”
Liara arched an eyebrow at Garrus, who stared back at her, unimpressed and imposing. The former archaeologist didn’t flinch, then turned her attention back to Shepard. “We crossed paths not long after you died. Since then I’ve been working to take him down.” Her hand slammed to her desk, and the two at Shepard’s back jumped slightly. “With this data, I’m a step closer.”
“I’ve never seen you ready to execute someone in cold blood.” Lyall ignored the uneasiness chewing at her stomach. “What happened, Liara? What did the Shadow Broker do to you?”
The asari was silent, looking at her holographic interface thoughtfully before her lips moved. “I was on a job with a friend. The Shadow Broker caught us. My friend didn’t escape. I don’t know if he’s dead or being interrogated.” She looked up, locking eyes with Shepard. “I owe him my life. And I need to make the Shadow Broker pay for what he did.”
“You can’t come with me because you’re after the Shadow Broker?” Lyall sounded desperate and ridiculous, she knew she did, but she needed- “What if I help you find him?”
Liara shook her head, not meeting the human woman’s gaze. “The galaxy doesn’t work that way. I have to find leads, trace information. I need to work. I can’t do that on the Normandy.” Her voice changed, wistful, soft, and fleeting. “I wish I could.”
Shepard’s teeth ground together as she finally voiced her real opinion. No more beating around the bush. “You spent two years of your life hunting the Shadow Broker? Liara, that’s insane.”
The maiden was on her feet, leaning over the desk, biotics shimmering around her. Lyall didn’t flinch, even as Liara’s voice hit everyone in the room like a whiplash. It was grating, raw, and wounded. “You don’t know what he did. You couldn’t. You were gone!”
Tali’s filtered breath audibly hitched, and Garru’s mandibles clicked in the silence as he stared at the blank wall. Her friends’ silent agreements rendered the Commander mute, and her lips moved soundlessly.
“…and we all did what we had to after that,” Liara finished quietly. She wouldn’t let herself think of finding-or of Fer-or the funera- No. She turned toward the vista, and only Kasumi would see her fingering with a small lump under her dress. The cold chains and small engraved plate felt like fire on her skin.
Tali felt like she was hearing the news all over again, finally realizing that the woman who sat in front of her was the walking dead. Her eyes burned, and she blinked the tears back. Her small frame trembeled as a side-effect of the shock, but she remained quiet. Two years mourning, and moving on, and now, so quickly, she’d thrown her fleet away-
Garrus’s memory took him to the dark red of Omega, holed up in that godforsaken base with the ghosts of his crew for company and Death waiting as a mistress in the wings. Reload, sight, shoot, cover. Reload, sight, shoot, cover. Reload, sight, shoot, cover. When they get close enough, activate the bomb and send everything sky-high. Then buy Shepard a drink in Hell. Then a crimsonclad figure had vaulted over the barrier and his hollow heartbeat had stopped-
“Let’s not argue.” Liara’s quiet voice broke the smothering silence. “I don’t have enough friends left…to lose another.”
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
(even MORE sidequesting and exposition later~~)
Lyall palmed the door control. Like Kasumi had reported, Liara was just sitting there at her desk, calmly working like she hadn’t just discovered a groundbreaking lead. “Nyxeris had some interesting data hidden away,” she spoke, eyes never leaving the holographic interface. “Thank you, Shepard. I wouldn’t have caught her without you. I’m one step closer to the Shadow Broker, thanks to you.” She slid a card across the table, and Lyall sat and glanced at it. “Nyxeris was very well-compensated. You need it more than I do.”
“You have any trouble with her?” the Commander finally asked.
“She was very talented,” Liara admitted. “I imagine that had she been ordered to assassinate me, I’d never have seen her coming. But her barriers needed practice.” There was that smile again, grim and devoid of so much- “Practice, I’m afraid, she won’t be getting.”
How far you’ve come, Dr. T’soni… Garrus leaned against the wall, looking at the asari with newfound interest and respect. He’d always liked Liara, but…damn. Where was the bumbling maiden who gaped and babbled at Ilos? You’re a fine one to talk, Archangel.
“What’s the next step in your hunt?” Shepard was asking. She sounded so weary. The turian’s mandibles twitched.
“Now I gather information, peel away layers of lies, and shine light into the shadows. And when I find the Shadow Broker…” Liara’s eyes narrowed, her gaze almost maniacal, “I hit him with a biotic field so strong that what’s left of him won’t fit into a coffee cup.”
Enough of this. Lyall wanted to press her palms to her eyes, to shed her armor and sleep, to be anyone or anywhere but who and where she was right this fucking instant. “That anger can’t just be from what you’ve told me.” Liara visibly stiffened. “What else happened between you and the Shadow Broker?”
Today’s just full of these, Garrus thought as another silence blanketed the room. He could actually hear Kasumi’s cloaking device and Tali’s air filters whirring. I think I’ve fulfilled my awkward quota for the next five krogan lifetimes. Tali, in the meantime, leaned forward, curious.
She told Councilor Anderson there was no body, so how did Cerberus--? Did she--?
Liara stood, facing the window once more. This time, she gripped the sill tightly, fingers nearly turning white. “…did Cerberus ever tell you how they recovered your body?”
Oh, keelah se’lai…
No wonder I couldn’t get ahold of her.
Liara…what…
“I gave it to them.” The asari’s quiet voice sliced through the silence, and Lyall felt her brain give way. She could handle Saren, and the geth, and the Collectors. The thousands of disappearing and dead humans, the gang violence in her childhood, the Council’s disbelief, Akuze’s threshers, Udina’s hatred, Ashley’s scorn, Kaiden’s ghost, Joker’s guilt, her fifty dead marines, Chakwas’s loneliness, the dead Normandy, buried forever on a frozen world where she had landed and found her helmet in the wreckage, her helmet which had been attached to her head and should have been on her incinerated corpse oh god-
“I gave you to them, Shepard.”
There was a roaring in her ears. Shepard could barely hear Liara, let alone register her words. This…this…
“Because they said….they could rebuild you. And to do that, I had to take it from the Shadow Broker, who was going to sell your corpse to the Collectors.”
Lyall wanted to get to her feet, but instead stared at Liara’s back numbly. “Why didn’t you tell me about this before now?” Huh. She actually had the energy to sound insulted and accusing. Imagine that.
“Because I screwed it up, Shepard. I barely escaped with my own life. And when I gave you to Cerberus…” Here she turned, leaning over the desk. You have to see, you have to understand, what I had to do for you, how I couldn’t-can’t-be without, why I was willing to risk you hating me, not because the galaxy needed you but because I’m selfish… “I told myself I was doing it for you, for a chance to bring you back. But I knew Cerberus would use you for their own business.”
“Like they did before.” Lyall’s voice was flat.
“And I let it happen. Because I couldn’t let you go.” Liara sat down, unable to bear the weight any more. “I’m sorry.”
Tali cradled her helmeted head in her hands, and Garrus simply stared at the two seated women. Kasumi swore she could feel herself choking on all the unspoken words and tumultuous emotions whipping around.
“You did the right thing, Liara,” Shepard said finally. All eyes turned toward her in disbelief. “My mission is important. I couldn’t do it if you hadn’t given me to Cerberus.”
Liara sagged slightly against the desk. When she spoke, her voice was composed. “Thank you.” She looked up, and in one instant looked so familiar and vulnerable but then it was gone. “I…I was afraid you would hate me. That’s why I must destroy the Shadow Broker. For what he did to my friend, and to you, and whatever he’s doing with the Collectors.”
“Be careful out there, Liara. Don’t turn into the thing you’re hunting.”
You have to know that I-you need to come with me-are we going to--?
“Says the dead Spectre working for Cerberus,” Liara responded dryly. It was cruel, and she knew it, but she had to dig under Lyall’s skin. “Don’t worry, Shepard. I’m not my mother. Everything I’m doing, I’m doing of my own free will…for better or for worse.”
I don’t deserve-and I can’t-and I want to believe it but-
“Of my own free will…” That’s what I was afraid of. Lyall stood, feeling the entire galaxy settle in on her bones. Now there was no hope, and nothing left to buffer that weight. Just the vast and empty space, the vacuum, cutting off her air, choking and demanding and deadly-
“I’ll talk to you later, Liara.”
The asari nodded, and it was all Shepard could do to force herself out of the office and return to the Normandy. Tali patted Liara’s hand gently before moving after her Commander, and Garrus held Liara’s gaze before turning and striding out. When the door hissed closed, the asari slumped against her desk and allowed herself to cry.
(Kasumi's in there because I love her to death).