#Ash - Ashley and ash from a fire (black like tar)

[bipanicoverthegravessiblings]

This fandom isn’t cringey enough

Warrior cats AU where Ashley and Andrew are the only survivors of a sickness that made a lot of the prey inedible/cats sick and now they’re on the run after eating a clanmate and killing the rest.

[badgersprite]

Fic: Desiderata (8/?)

Chapter Title: Reunion

Fandom: Mass Effect

Characters: Miranda, Samara, Oriana, Jacob, Jack

Pairing: Miranda/Samara very slow burn, friends to lovers

Story Rating: R

Warnings: This chapter confirms (and otherwise strongly suspects) some squadmate character deaths. This chapter also makes references to Miranda’s abusive childhood so as per usual that could potentially be triggering to some people.

Chapter Summary: In 2186, Miranda withdraws into herself after confirming what she already feared - that several of her former companions did not survive the battle for Earth. Just as it seems she’s at her lowest point, someone unexpected shows up at her door. In 2185, the Normandy continues its adventures after defeating the Collectors.

Author’s Note: I initially started writing this story right after Mass Effect 3 came out. Originally, it was sort of a channel for my anger towards the ending, although the story has since evolved beyond that into something constructive, positive and healing. But, as was suggested in the warning I put on the very first chapter, yes, this means that some characters did indeed die in the final battle of ME3, and you’re going to get confirmation of that in this chapter, as well as unconfirmed beliefs about the majority of other characters, and Miranda trying to cope with that. So, be warned. This chapter is probably the darkest one.

* * *

“Shepard?”

Miranda was running. Searching for her. Looking for her.

Had to reach her. Had to get to her. Had to find her before it was too late.

Couldn’t see. Could hardly move. The air was thick with clouds of black smoke, burning her lungs.

She was racing, yet moving so slowly. Every step seemed to take ten times longer than it should. Like wading through tar.

“Shepard! Where are you?”

Her own voice echoed in her ears, feet catching on the rubble and debris that littered the streets of London. Entire buildings had been reduced to cinders that still smouldered beneath her.

A hail of gunfire rained down around her from all angles. Body after body fell and faded to dust in every direction. But, somehow, even though it felt like the whole universe was stuck in slow-motion, Miranda kept running forward, persevering through all the death and destruction, even as blood began to pool at her feet.

The shadow of a mass relay loomed overhead, taking up the entire sky, blocking out the Sun. But that wasn’t what she was focused on.

She could see it ahead of her. The Conduit. That crater right beneath the Citadel.

Marauders marched right past her, as if they couldn’t even see her, firing indiscriminately into the crowds of soldiers Miranda left in her wake. A senseless massacre. A slaughter.

All species fought together. All creeds died together. Names Miranda would never even know.

A bellowing voice resonated in the emptiness. “I am krogan! Nothing can hurt me!”

In the black mist, she saw Grunt’s silhouette single-handedly fighting off what had to be a dozen husks with nothing but the strength of his fists. But every time he knocked one back, two more took its place. He fought valiantly, standing atop a pile of no fewer than a hundred enemy corpses, but with no ammunition left, he was quickly overwhelmed. He joined the growing army of shadows following in Miranda’s tracks.

The tide of blood rose to her ankles.

“Had to be me,” Mordin’s disembodied voice echoed in her ear as his ghost turned to ash in the peripheries of her vision, and scattered in the wind. “Someone else would have gotten it wrong.”

There was nothing Miranda could do. Couldn’t stop to save anyone. Couldn’t slow down. The crimson tide was rising, reaching her knees. Every movement became harder. Slower. Fighting the current. With every step she took, the Conduit seemed to be getting further away.

Had to get there.

Had to reach Shepard.

“Is that all you’ve got?” Zaeed emerged from the shadows, firing at the oncoming horde as his position was swiftly surrounded. He pulled the pin on a grenade. “Open wide, you ugly son of a bitch,” he said, charging at the nearest abomination, shoving the grenade in its face. The blast shattered the walls of the building Zaeed had been hiding in. It crumbled on top of him, and buried his enemies with him.

The blood was up to her waist. Miranda could no longer run. Each step she took was heavier than the last, physically dragging her feet through mud and blood. Ghostly fingers nipped at her heels beneath the surface, gradually getting closer, but not quite able to grab hold of her. She was just barely ahead.

“Do we deserve death?” A vision of Legion flashed before her eyes, vanishing into nothing as quickly as it had appeared. “Does this unit have a soul?”

As the thick blood came up to her chest, she had to swim, else risk succumbing to the shadows that threatened to swallow her. She dove forward into the sanguine sea, kicking her feet and powering through with her arms as hard and as fast as she could. But she was moving so slowly. At a glacial pace.

The harder she battled, the less ground she gained.

The shrieks of banshees pierced her ears as they waded past her, like she didn’t even exist.

A voice came over her comms. “What’s happening?” Miranda heard Kasumi say in her earpiece. “There’s something wrong with the mass relays. They’re--”

Her words were rendered silent when the mass relay exploded with devastating force in a blinding flash of light that ignited the atmosphere in a ring of fire. Miranda stopped long enough to shield her eyes.

When the bright light subsided, she glanced up just in time to see a field of debris spreading out from the epicentre, a blackness so thick that every patch of sky was covered in the wreckage.

Within seconds, the whole world was submerged in darkness.

Miranda shook herself from her daze. No. She couldn’t stop. She had to keep going. Had to reach Shepard. She kept swimming, drawn like a moth to that sole source of light that pierced the endless night.

Finally, at long last, the Conduit seemed to be getting closer. Two faint forms stood their ground against the piercing bright white, protecting the path.

“Go, Shepard!” Ashley Williams called out to her Commander, firing back at the army of the dead, whose fingers began to claw and grasp at Miranda’s body as she fought with all her might to elude their clutches. “We’ll cover you!”

Infrasound shook the ground beneath them. Darkness turned to crimson.

“Look out!” Javik tried to push Ashley out of the way, but it was too late.

The cruel eye of the Destroyer guarding the Conduit had seen them. Blinding red surrounded them both. And then they were gone. Vaporised in a flash.

Miranda didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop.

Nearly there.

She kicked harder, doing all she could to outpace the ghastly skeletal hands that threatened to drown her in their sacrifice.

She got closer.

She could see solid ground again.

As she neared her destination at long last, two figures came into view, battling in the black cloud before her, atop a small island in the red sea. Somehow, their actions were not slowed by the mist, but fast and graceful. A violent ballet. 

Kai Leng, and Thane.

Even though Thane was already dying, he was able to get the best of Kai Leng for a time, even throwing him off-balance with his biotics, but it wasn’t enough. Kai Leng cut him down, the blade in his hand slicing through Thane like butter.

Kai Leng turned to face Miranda. And, unlike all the others she’d passed to get here, his eyes locked directly with hers. He didn’t look through her. He saw her.

Before she could even react, those eyes were mere inches from her face. Her breath hitched as pain seared through her abdomen. She looked down, and saw that blade penetrating her stomach, her own blood now melding with the lake of ichor and viscera that surrounded her.

She gritted her teeth and raised her head once more. His cold face stared back, unmoving.

Miranda’s rage boiled over. With both hands, she reached out. Her thumbs covered his cybernetic eyes. And they sank in.

She pushed deeper and deeper. And as she slowly cracked his mask and crushed her fingers into his skull, the skin around her hands began to wither and burn, like her very anger was incinerating Kai Leng beneath her touch.

She squeezed her fists shut, and he evaporated into the aether beneath her.

Miranda clutched at her wounds and battled forward, scarcely able to keep her head above the rising tide.

Miranda didn’t know how she’d made it, but she was so close. There was just one figure left ahead of her. One shadow in the light. Staring into the Conduit.

“Shepard!” she called out again, resisting the whispers of the dead as they grew ever nearer.

The familiar figure raised her head.

“Don’t go in there!” Miranda warned her, a sense of overwhelming dread encompassing every fibre of her being. She knew what would happen. Had to stop it. “You can’t.”

As Miranda reached out, her wounds overcame her. The sanguine sea suddenly vanished without a trace, and she dropped like a stone, no longer suspended. She fell to the ground in pain, her fingers digging into the dirt.

Miranda hesitated as the army of shadows at her heels infringed on her vision, casting an impenetrable darkness upon her. She didn’t dare turn and look behind her. She knew what was there. Couldn’t face it. Couldn’t face them.

“Shepard!” she called again, begging to be heard in the deafening silence.

Shepard slowly turned. Miranda froze in terror as she was met with red eyes.

That wasn’t Shepard. Not anymore.

She heard the sound. That same, bone-rattling sound she had heard in that shuttle. Saw that same red flash as the Reaper’s gaze fixed upon her.

Only, this time, Miranda screamed as the beams incinerated her.

Miranda jolted upright, throwing her sheets off herself in panic, stopping only once she realised that there were no flames to put out. That she wasn’t back in that shuttle again.

Her heavy breathing slowly subsided. It was dark. Her head was throbbing.

She sighed and leaned forward, rubbing her palm against her forehead. Drops of sweat left strands of hair clinging to her scalp. Her sheets were soaked.

‘Just a dream’, right? That was what people would say, if she ever told anyone.

Unfortunately, like with all Miranda’s nightmares since the war ended, she couldn’t say that about them. Couldn’t brush them off as ‘just dreams’. Because they weren’t lies made up by her mind. She wished that they were, but they were the furthest thing from it.

If they weren’t so cuttingly true, they wouldn’t have haunted her so.

Groggily, she checked her clock. 3am. Roughly twelve hours since…

By sheer reflex, Miranda leaned over in time to grab the wastebin near her bed, just before she threw up. Nothing but liquid spilled out. Nothing but claret red.

The contents of her stomach were no mystery. The only reason Miranda had been able to fall asleep that night was because she’d downed an entire bottle of wine to get the images out of her mind. The thoughts. The knowledge. The stark fucking reality of her friends’ last moments. Hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it. Hadn’t been able to eat after...

Miranda gagged as she put the bin down, wiping her mouth. Obviously, it hadn’t helped her forget. What could?

God, her head hurt so fucking much. It felt like death itself had left its mark on her when it visited her in the night.

She didn’t even remember getting up and walking to the bathroom, only realising where she was when she flicked on the light, and saw herself in the mirror. The next thing she knew, the tap was on, and she was rinsing out her mouth, splashing some cool water on her face, to grant some relief from the heat in her cheeks.

She braced herself against the sink, and looked up. She’d almost stopped noticing the scarring on her own face by that point. Burn treatment and synthetic skin grafts had come a hell of a long way, even within the last fifty years. But, that said, Miranda’s treatment had been a wartime one. Not one designed for aesthetics. One applied by necessity, as a matter of urgency, after days without care.

But, in that moment, her visible scars didn’t make her think about herself. They made her think of someone else she knew, who had suffered a similar injury long before she met him. One whose facial scars had healed a lot better than Miranda’s ever would.

Zaeed.

Fuck, Zaeed.

And then the thoughts she’d been avoiding came flooding back. She was there in that room again. And he was lying there motionless in a plastic bag on a table.

She nearly retched again, saved only by the fact she had nothing left to throw up.

Dr. Michel had not understated her call. There were bodies. And pictures. Pictures from when they were found.

Both Grunt and Zaeed, Miranda had identified by sight. She would never repeat to anyone how they looked when she saw them. Couldn’t say it. Wasn’t for anyone else to know. Wasn’t fair that anyone should remember them like that.

At least they left enough behind to bury. None of the others were so lucky.

Well, it was possible Javik had. Miranda never saw Javik personally. Dr. Michel confirmed that he had been identified by a genetic sample. There was only one possible match for Prothean DNA. No visual ID necessary.

Ashley could only be identified by her dog tags. They hadn’t found anything else. Not yet, anyway. That close to the Conduit, chances were they never would.

Miranda had taken those tags with her, sealed in airtight plastic. Given her position, it was her responsibility to deliver them to her family. To be the bearer of the worst news they would ever hear.

Right now, the tags were sitting in a drawer in her desk. Miranda didn’t know how long it would be before she could bring herself to look at them again. To confront the thought of Ashley’s final moments. She knew she would have to. Very soon, much as she dreaded having to write that letter to her family.

The Williams family had already lost people to this war, hadn’t they? And now this.

As for Kasumi, that information had come from Bailey, by way of The Alliance. It turned out that The Alliance had known, or strongly suspected, her fate for a long time. But they had only just broken their silence, over two months later. Bailey had told her and Jacob the news as soon as he found out.

Some of the ships that worked on the Crucible had remained in close proximity to the mass relay, right up until the time it exploded. None of those ships were in one piece anymore. That included the ship Kasumi had been working on.

As far as anyone knew, she was still on that ship when it was lost. While they had spent some time accounting for people who had alighted onto different vessels in the intervening period between completing the Crucible and the destruction of the mass relays, there was no record of her leaving, and certainly no one had made contact with her since. Now that more than two months had passed, her status had officially been moved from MIA to KIA.

Even though Miranda hadn’t been confronted with physical evidence of Kasumi’s death the way she had for all the others, in a way, her fate might have been the worst to discover. Of all the people they hadn’t found, she was the one person that both she and Jacob had been confident would be fine, because she was nowhere near Earth. Nowhere near the Reapers. Literal lightyears away from any of the fighting. And yet…

Yeah. And fucking yet.

The tap kept running while Miranda stared hollowly ahead. Eventually, the noise spurred her from her trance, and she turned it off.

At what point was the grief supposed to set in, she wondered as she gazed blankly at her own reflection. Should she have been more upset than she was? She hadn’t cried for any of her fallen friends. Tears didn’t come naturally to Miranda. Not unless her sister was involved.

One thing that hadn’t left her mind was how...selfish some of her thoughts had been when she learned their fates. When Bailey had told her about Kasumi, Miranda had thought that the day had been bad enough before that, but to add that too, it was like the universe was actively conspiring to make this the worst day of her life.

Hers. The worst day of her life. The one who was alive. As if her friends hadn’t experienced far worse in their last moments than being fucking inconvenienced.

This wasn’t the normal way to react, was it? Wasn’t right. Why couldn’t Miranda just...mourn like other people did. It wasn’t like she didn’t care. She did care. Didn’t she? She would have been lying if she said she felt nothing - no impact whatsoever. If that were the case, those inescapable thoughts and images wouldn’t be permanently seared into her like open, festering wounds.

From the moment she’d seen the first body on that table, and recognised it as Zaeed, it was like the last light of hope inside her - a flame she hadn’t even known she had been holding onto - had been swiftly snuffed out.

Losing Shepard had been one thing, but now? They might as well give up any prospect that anyone actively serving aboard the SR-3 had survived the war.

Not only did they have confirmation that Ashley and Javik were gone, but they also had definitive proof that any ships that were anywhere near a mass relay when the Crucible fired had been obliterated in the subsequent blast, even in other systems far away.

The last time the Normandy had been picked up on any sensors was...approaching the Charon relay.

So, that was it.

They didn’t know that was what happened. But they knew, didn’t they? They had always known. They had just refused to believe it. They had hoped.

But hope was a frail thing, and reality didn’t suffer hope to live long.

The thing was, Miranda hadn’t experienced much that could be considered loss in her life. A person needed to get close to other people in order to lose them. And, until about a year ago, she’d never done that. Until The Normandy. But then she had. And, now, of all the people who had ever served on The Normandy, only five had survived. Miranda. Jacob. Jack. Samara. Wrex.

There was nobody else left to find. They were gone. They were dead.

And, this time, nobody would be coming back.

All told, it was the first time Miranda had been confronted with death in anything more than a purely detached or clinical way. Certainly the first time on this scale. She hadn’t known how she would feel about it - finding out that so many of her friends hadn’t made it. But she would have expected it to be different than this.

It wasn’t that it wasn’t affecting her. It clearly was. But...she didn’t feel hurt. She didn’t feel pain. She didn’t feel upset. She didn’t feel angry. She didn’t really feel anything in particular.

Mostly, she just felt...less. Like everything had been diminished somehow. Like all noise sounded a little quieter. Like all colours had dimmed a few shades duller. Like every sensation had been numbed. Like the tips of her fingers were further away from her body, and like nothing she reached out to grasp could ever really touch her. Like if someone pricked her skin right now, she wasn’t entirely sure she would even bleed.

It was almost like she was nothing more than a machine, and every person she cared about was a little switch inside her. In discovering their fates, Miranda didn’t grieve or mourn or wallow in sorrow. But rather it was like someone had simply gone inside that part of her brain and flipped all those switches from ‘alive’ to ‘dead’, and parts of her had just...powered down as a result.

What did it say about her that this was as strongly as she could feel about them at this moment?

Maybe she really was just as cold and borderline sociopathic as ever.

Maybe friendship hadn’t changed her at all from the person she was a year ago.

With those thoughts swirling through her mind, Miranda didn’t even notice the bathroom door had opened behind her until she heard a voice.

“Hey, Miss. Are you okay in here?” Jason asked. It took Miranda a few seconds to process his sounds as words, and his words as an actual question. “I saw the light on and heard the tap running for a whi--”

“I’m fine,” Miranda answered starkly, albeit on a delay.

“Are you sure?�� asked Jason. He knew what had she had gone through earlier. Not in precise details, no. But all the kids knew.

In all honesty, the thing that had prompted Miranda to go out and drink hadn’t been the deaths themselves, nor the sight of Zaeed and Grunt. Not initially. The thing that had driven her over that edge had been after she and Jacob, in loose terms, explained to the kids what had happened. That Jacob, Jack and Miranda had found out that several people close to them had died in the war.

They were shocked and saddened to hear it. They expressed their sympathies. A few of them, in fact every single one of the girls, wept when they found out.

It was at that moment that a sudden realisation had struck her. Jack’s students had been more upset when they heard the news that people Miranda knew had died - people they had never even met themselves - than Miranda had been to see them dead in front of her.

She hadn’t been able to be near them and their tears when that sank in. Couldn’t stand holding that mirror up to herself and confronting her reflection. Seeing how a normal human person should react when something like this happened to people they cared about, and comparing that to the blank void where her own emotional response should have been, but wasn’t.

“Miss?”

“I’m fine,” Miranda repeated herself.

She was always fine. Even when she wasn’t. That was the problem.

“I’m sorry to worry you.” Miranda straightened up (as best she could) and turned back to face him, her hand still on the sink. “None of you should be losing any sleep wondering if I’m okay. That’s not your responsibility. Nor should it be.”

He seemed confused by her response. “But I--”

“Don’t take that as a criticism. I know you mean well. And I appreciate that you care. That’s not me being sarcastic, I actually do. More than I let on. But you never need to waste any time worrying if I’m alright. I always am. And I’m always going to be,” Miranda said quietly.

Jason looked at her for a good, long moment. “...Miss, I’m not stupid. I know how much you drank tonight. I can see, and hear, how drunk you still are. And I know you probably woke up vomiting, and that’s why you’re here right now. And, from the short time I’ve known you, you don’t strike me as someone who makes a habit of this. So, respectfully, I don’t think you’re as ‘okay’ with everything as you seem to think you are,” he pointed out.

Miranda held his gaze for a moment. “...Go to sleep, Jason,” she told him.

“Sure. You probably won’t even remember this conversation in the morning,” Jason remarked, evidencing that he may have had a little too much experience dealing with drunk adults for a man so young.

“I remember most conversations,” Miranda muttered under her breath, looking at her reflection one final time, turning off the light as she left.

* * *

Miranda groaned heavily, the pulsing music of Afterlife doing her head in. The air stank of sex and sweat, like everyone in the club had gone three days without showering.

“I thought shore leave was supposed to be relaxing,” she muttered unhappily, leaning back against the bar.

“Would you prefer to go back to the ship?” Samara asked, needing to project her usually soft voice to be heard above the music.

“Yes!” Miranda answered bluntly, feeling utterly miserable in this place. “But, alas, that choice has been taken out of my hands.”

“It would appear so,” Samara commiserated. While she seemed to have a greater tolerance for the venue than Miranda, the expression on Samara’s face betrayed the fact that Afterlife was not exactly to her taste either. Or at least, it hadn’t been for several centuries.

After defeating the Collectors, the Normandy had limped back to Omega station held together with the engineering equivalent of double-sided tape and popsicle sticks and somehow hadn’t fallen apart in the FTL jump. They had no choice but to dock at Omega for urgent repairs. Since they couldn’t exactly fix the ship with everyone on board getting in the way, and given what they had all just survived, Shepard had seen fit to grant shore leave to anyone who wasn’t currently actively preventing the Normandy from collapsing in on itself.

Miranda had volunteered to stay back on the ship to help out, but Shepard had overruled her, ordering her to “please, for once in your life, take a fucking break”, in those exact words. She was officially banned from re-entering the ship until the repairs were complete. In fact, the only person who had been allowed to stay back on the ship despite a clear absence of engineering and technical skills was Kelly Chambers, for reasons Miranda neither fully grasped nor honestly cared to know.

Unfortunately, there was nowhere on Omega that was to Miranda’s liking. Afterlife was the least awful place by process of elimination given that, if nothing else, anybody who caused problems here would quickly find out what D.F.W.A. stood for, and why it was the one and only rule on Omega that anyone lived by.

Notwithstanding the above, Miranda had still known damn well that she wouldn’t enjoy her forced time off in this place. Accordingly, she had all but begged Samara to come and keep her sane in her misery, and she obliged. So far, even Samara had done little to improve Miranda’s state of mind, though. 

The Normandy crew were already getting too relaxed for Miranda’s liking, and this was evidence of it. Surely Shepard should have realised that, even if Miranda wasn’t holding a soldering iron, there were still a million other things she could have been doing that would have been a productive use of her time. For one thing, she could have been preparing for what to do if Cerberus came knocking, or comparing notes on the organisation with EDI...

“Well, in any event, I appreciate you keeping me company,” Miranda elected to break the silence, preferring not to think about Cerberus in a moment where she was powerless to do anything about them and whatever they had in store for her if and when they caught up to her. “I can't imagine it's easy for you to be here, after...” Miranda trailed off, wondering if perhaps she was erring by bringing Morinth up so directly.

“It is quite alright,” Samara assured her, appreciating her concern. “In truth, it has given me an opportunity to contemplate my own future, and where I am needed. I had not thought of it before, but I would consider returning to this place when Shepard no longer requires my service.”

“Not anytime soon, I hope. You can’t leave me with these people,” Miranda remarked in jest, earning a small smile. “Is there any particular reason why?” she inquired, curious.

“A simple one; I can think of few other places in the galaxy that could benefit more from the presence of a Justicar,” Samara pointed out.

“That's very noble of you,” Miranda commented, though she was sceptical as to the wisdom of that virtuous path. “But don't forget how that turned out for Garrus. Omega's gangs aren't going to let you waltz in and disrupt the way of things. And that includes our friend up there,” she said, nodding her head up towards Aria’s makeshift throne room on the upper floor. Being an asari, Aria wouldn’t be ignorant to precisely how zealous and unyielding Justicars were when it came to the enforcement of their Code.

“I do not fear death,” Samara contentedly replied, undeterred by the prospect of failing in her quest. Miranda frowned, but voiced no further objection.

“Alright, that's it. One of you had better order a drink. You've been standing there long enough,” the turian bartender gruffly grumbled, looking at them both over the bar while polishing a glass. “Since the old lady over here doesn’t strike me as a drinker, I'm guessing it's gotta be you, human.”

“I'd rather not,” Miranda declined.

“It wasn't a request,” said the bartender.

Miranda glanced at Samara and saw a small smirk creeping onto her lips. Miranda sighed, reluctantly conceding. “...Fine,” she acquiesced. “Just one.”

“Coming right up,” said the bartender, pouring her a fresh glass.

At that moment, another song came on. This one was particularly loud and intrusive. The pulsing bass shook the glasses other patrons had on the counter. Several of the other club goers nearby began dragging each out onto the floor to dance. Miranda did not share the sentiment, or the enthusiasm.

“Why does all club music sound exactly the bloody same?” Miranda complained, finding the repetitive droning rhythms and predictable chord progressions beyond irritating by that point. “These people wouldn’t know an interesting interval or a complex time signature if it slapped them in the face.”

“Perhaps we should endeavour to find somewhere more...quiet,” Samara suggested, pointing up towards the speaker that was right above them.

“Quiet? Here?” Miranda remarked, with a sceptical glance at their surroundings. Afterlife was hardly subdued. That being said, though, she would have been lying if she said she didn’t see the appeal of finding a more secluded corner of the nightclub. She sighed as she took her drink. “If we can find a free booth that doesn't have a stripper dancing on the table, that would be a start.”

That was easier said than done.

“I am certain that, if we ask for privacy, we will be granted it. Come, this way.” Despite her doubts, Miranda followed Samara’s lead, trailing her through the club, in search of somewhere to sit.

As they were walking, Miranda recognised a few familiar faces from The Normandy. Garrus, Thane and Zaeed had commandeered a booth, and Thane appeared to be the only one of them who wasn’t already three drinks in. She didn't particularly feel like joining them, though. Everyone else who wasn’t currently working on the ship must have been on a different floor of the club, or somewhere outside.

Much as Miranda had predicted, the only empty table they managed to find had a dancer on it, no doubt hoping to attract customers.

“I beg your pardon,” said Samara, approaching the young asari. “Would it trouble you if my friend and I had this table to ourselves?”

“Get lost, grandma!” the dancer rudely shot back, turning her head to see who had spoken to her. Instantly, she froze in fear, and turned about three shades paler. “Y-Y...J-Justicar...?” she stammered, recognising her armour immediately. “I...I am so sorry. Of course you can...Please. Please forgive me,” she implored her as she hastily climbed down to the floor, bowing her head in respectful deference before running off to get as far away from Samara as possible.

Samara sat down without an issue, gesturing for Miranda to do the same. Miranda arched an eyebrow, impressed. “She thought you were going to kill her.”

“From what I have gathered about Omega, it is not unlikely that she has done something that would warrant my intervention pursuant to The Code. If I confirmed this and took such action, and she did not voluntarily surrender herself to my custody, then yes, my presence here would result in her death,” Samara acknowledged, serene as always. “Fortunately for her, my oath to Commander Shepard compels me to refrain from acting as I normally would.”

“Where does The Code draw the line on what kinds of people it considers criminals?” Miranda asked, sliding into her seat across from Samara. “Drug users? Sex workers?”

Samara shook her head. “The Code does not criminalise addiction – although this does not mean addicts cannot be held accountable for crimes they commit in support of their addiction. As for 'sex workers' as you referred to them, asari cultures are not human cultures. Consorts hold a high status in our society, and it is normal for many if not most young asari to do as these women are doing in their maiden stage,” she reminded her, gesturing broadly at the asari dancers working throughout the club. “Many among my kind still find it perplexing that such things have ever been considered shameful by other species.”

“Do you share those views?” Miranda inquired. Her question earned a slightly confused look from Samara. “I don't mean to sound presumptuous but my own cultural biases mean that, when I think of ancient religious orders, I tend to associate such things with conservatism and chastity. I guess I kind of assumed you might not look too fondly on young asari wasting their youth dancing in bars.”

“Only in the sense that age has granted me the wisdom to look back on my younger years and consider what I could have done differently, and how much more I could have accomplished if my priorities were not so self-centred,” Samara answered sagely. “Were I asked for my advice, I would counsel them from the benefit of my experience to focus on what they find truly fulfilling in their lives. However, this is not a moral judgement, nor do I object to their choice to dance or take lovers freely. To do so would be very hypocritical of me. And it would be folly of me to assume that this is not their calling. If this is their path to inner fulfilment, then I would never seek to turn them from that.”

Miranda's lips quirked against the rim of her glass. “Are you saying this was you once? Giving people lap dances in bars?”

“No. I preferred adventure and violence,” said Samara, being frank about her past indiscretions. “Any time I spent in places such as this, or in the company of women like this, was merely as a customer. But I was not so radically different from those who work here now. My maiden stage was spent such that I cannot righteously criticise how another asari spends hers. The only reason I did not follow this path, aside from the fact that I am not a particularly gifted dancer, is that becoming a mercenary offered far more excitement and more opportunities to travel far and wide. I also found myself...drawn to certain types of people at that age. The same sort of people I found myself fighting beside.”

“Yeah, you mentioned that once before,” Miranda recalled, though it was no less incongruous to picture it now. It was pretty crazy to think that the types of people Samara used to sleep with as a young woman were now the very same people she hunted down without mercy as a matriarch. That raised a thought, and Miranda was never one to not speak her mind, even where it might have been advisable not to. “Don't answer this question if you don't want to, but did you take many lovers when you were younger?”

“That would depend upon what you define as 'many',” Samara replied.

“By your definition?” Miranda asked.

“Yes,” Samara answered plainly. “Have you?”

“Yes,” Miranda responded in kind. Though whether they had the same definition of ‘many’ was anybody’s guess. Probably not, given that Samara’s maiden stage alone could have lasted close to ten times as long as Miranda had been alive. “But I don't think I enjoyed mine as much as you enjoyed yours. Most of them were nothing to write home about. I don't even remember their names, nor do I care to.”

Samara tilted her head thoughtfully. “I remember some vividly, though not all. And of those I have fond memories of, I have not thought of most in a very long time.”

“Do you ever miss it?” Miranda wondered aloud, curious whether Samara would ever even consider one day laying down her armour and living as...well, anything other than a Justicar.

“I miss my innocence,” Samara confessed. “I miss how it felt to live free from any cares or concerns. I miss being able to dance with strangers, never knowing how it felt to bear the burden of responsibility. But if you are asking me if I would choose to walk that path again, the answer is no. I cannot. And I would not.”

“You can still dance with strangers if you want to, though,” Miranda wryly encouraged, taking a sip of her drink. “And, no, I don’t mean that euphemistically. Just dancing. Surely that’s not forbidden by The Code. Is it?”

“No, it is not. But those days are behind me, as are so many others, and I am content with that,” Samara smiled, a mysterious, ethereal smile. “Do you dance?”

“No.”

“Never?” Samara queried, her eyes sparkling under the lights.

“I may have tried it once or twice.” Miranda shifted in her seat, averting her gaze. “...After I ran away from my father, I got a taste of freedom for the first time. So I did things he had never allowed me to do. Or tried to. Admittedly, I wasn’t very successful at it, and any desire to experiment and rebel was quickly outweighed by how much I like being in control of my faculties and how much I didn’t enjoy places like this, but...well, it was a phase nonetheless, I suppose.”

“You were with Cerberus at the time, were you not?” Samara asked, clarifying the time period.

“Yes but, as you may have noticed, they don't particularly care what you do in your personal life, as long as it doesn't interfere with your work,” Miranda explained. Cerberus had never imposed those kinds of rules upon her. They respected her and treated her like an adult. It was why it had been so hard for her to believe the worst about them, and sever her loyalties. “I was sixteen years old, with only a vague, malformed idea of what the world was like, what other girls my age were supposed to be like, and the experiences I was supposed to have had, together with a staunch determination to make up for lost time. And you should know when I set my mind to something, I don’t do it by halves.”

“And yet, in that time, you never danced with strangers?” said Samara.

“Mostly only in the euphemistic way,” Miranda replied. That was one thing that had never really changed, so much as she was simply more experienced, and had gotten more efficient about getting that itch scratched whenever she felt the need. “Let's just say I made some poor decisions in a short space of time, and it's not an aspect of my life I'm particularly proud of.”

“Many years have passed since then. You are older and wiser, but you are still young – too young to deprive yourself of such things. Perhaps this is not the place for you, but I know you enjoy music. You have told me as much. Surely there would be a place where even you would feel comfortable letting go and dancing freely. To do so would not mean you are repeating your past mistakes,” Samara advised.

“I know it wouldn’t,” Miranda acknowledged. She still didn't feel like it though. Plus, the concept of ‘letting go’ was about as antithetical to her entire existence as any concept could possibly be. “Tell you what, I'll dance when you dance. That's a promise.”

“Your promise sounds a great deal like an excuse,” Samara quipped.

Miranda smirked. “Nothing gets past you.”

* * *

Bailey had been surprised when Miranda showed up to work on Monday, less than a day after confirming the deaths of so many of her former comrades.

Before he had even opened his mouth to speak, Miranda had cut him off. “Whatever you’re going to say, don’t. Please, just...I need to be here. Please just let me work right now.”

To his credit, he had honoured her wishes, and that had been the end of any discussion about it.

Focusing on something else, anything else, had always been Miranda’s best and only coping mechanism. Her unyielding need to be productive, and to feel like she was in control of at least one aspect of her life even if everything else was falling apart around her, was a lifelong companion that never failed her.

There was no shortage of work to keep her busy. Some of the Alliance ships that had made the jump only a few lightyears away before the relays exploded had finally made their way back into the Sol system to study the wreckage of the Charon relay, and to begin working on reassembling and repairing it. They were in communication with other teams of varying sizes all over the galaxy.

The dextro races still stranded in the Sol system were starting to reach the point where food was becoming a concern. Several turians and quarians had already gone into cryostasis, and the number joining them was increasing day by day.

Of the levo races, more and more were settling into Earth in the expectation that their stay would be a long one. Many asari and salarians had joined with humans in moving out of cities into smaller towns and villages, working to restore infrastructure and agriculture, getting sorely needed supply lines up and running.

But London remained in tatters, still rebuilding. When any hospital had a shortage of beds or medicine or staff, Miranda knew about it. If there was a building that was possibly safe enough to move people into, Miranda knew about it. If a block didn’t have power or water, Miranda knew about it. If the black market jacked up the prices too much on luxury items, Miranda knew about it.

Bailey may have been the face of the operation, but she was his eyes and ears (well, technically only one of each), and she was the puppet master pulling the strings, making sure all resources and personnel were allocated precisely where they were needed. And if they didn’t have enough of either, she found them.

For as good of a distraction as all that work was, at the end of the day, she still needed to go home. And she still needed to deal with this.

She’d approached Wrex directly on Monday afternoon. They were in the same city, after all. There would have been no way to avoid speaking to him about it that wouldn’t have meant admitting to herself that she was deliberately putting it off. So she didn’t.

Miranda delivered the news to him personally, about everyone who had passed. As the leader of Grunt’s clan, he was the closest thing Grunt had to next of kin. It only seemed appropriate that Clan Urdnot should hear it from her first, and be given the right to decide how to honour their dead.

Miranda didn’t know Wrex well enough to be able to gauge his feelings on Grunt’s passing, or anyone else’s. And, whatever they were, Wrex certainly didn’t know Miranda well enough to show them around her. But he had expressed his brief thanks to her for informing him, respecting that she had taken her duties seriously and had the courtesy of bringing this to him face-to-face.

It was true that, as the highest ranking member of the Normandy left alive, she had big shoes to fill. And her job was far from done.

Unfortunately, Kasumi, Zaeed and Javik didn’t have any next-of-kin to inform. Not that Miranda had been able to track down, anyway.

Javik’s isolation went without saying. He was the sole survivor of a fifty thousand year old genocide. He was the one person who was never exaggerating when he said he was truly alone in the universe. Even if he had survived the war, who knew if Javik ever really intended to go on living? But, then, Miranda knew too little about him to speculate.

Kasumi, for as socially aware as she had been of everyone else aboard the Normandy, was a chronic self-isolator. She never truly got close to anybody, save for the love of her life who lived on only in the form of an implant inside her head. Miranda personally hadn’t even realised just how much of a distance she kept everybody else on the SR-2 at right up until that day when she’d looked around and suddenly realised that they were one head short because Kasumi had disappeared without a trace at the last place they docked.

If Zaeed had any friends or family who were still alive, he certainly hadn’t volunteered that information to anyone else aboard the Normandy. There were probably no shortage of people who he had met over his years, but, similarly to Kasumi, from all appearances it sounded like Zaeed would move on the moment it felt like he might be getting too attached. The terrible things he had seen wouldn’t allow him to settle down and live a normal life. He had probably always known deep down that he would die fighting in a war.

However, there was one among the confirmed dead who definitely did have a family. A family Miranda had already written to once before, to let them know she was searching. A family who it was now her responsibility to ensure those dog tags made it back home to.

Every single day, Miranda had sat down at her laptop with the intention of writing the letter nobody ever wanted to have to write. But the words just wouldn’t come. It was the one task that Miranda simply couldn’t seem to bring herself to start, let alone finish. And the screen would just stay blank until she inevitably convinced herself that tomorrow would be the day.

During the week, Miranda told herself it wasn’t her fault she wasn’t getting it done. She was busy with work. Clearly she wasn’t making progress because she didn’t have enough time to concentrate on doing this properly.

On Saturday, her reason for not getting it done was because she had helped Jack leave the field hospital and move in with Jacob in his apartment. Jack’s students had thrown an impromptu lunch to celebrate their teacher getting out of hospital, and as a courtesy Miranda had stayed for the whole thing.

Perhaps it should have said something about the state they were both in after learning what had become of so many mutual friends, and the extent to which Jack actually felt sorry for Miranda to have to be the one to identify what bodies there were, that, in those entire few hours they spent in each other’s proximity on that day, Jack didn’t insult Miranda even once.

Then Sunday came, a whole week since Ashley’s fate had been discovered, and Miranda didn’t have any excuses to put it off any longer.

Today had to be the day. There was no alternative.

And yet, despite not leaving her room even once that day, despite forcing herself to sit there until she finished this, she still hadn’t typed a single word.

Miranda had done a lot of things in her life that other people would probably class as difficult. Living with an abusive tyrant of a father. Pulling off countless life-threatening missions for Cerberus. Being captured and tortured by batarian slavers. Raising the fucking dead.

All of those things had been a cakewalk compared to writing to Ashley’s sisters.

She’d lost count of how long she’d been staring at that blank screen, or those dog tags, in the hopes that the words would just...come to her if she focused long enough. So far, it hadn’t worked. Any time Miranda thought of something to say, it just felt...wrong. Inadequate. Even if she couldn’t explain why.

At first, she didn’t know why she was finding this so bloody hard. After all, Miranda didn’t know Ashley particularly well. She’d only met her a handful of times, if that. She had no right to pretend otherwise.

But, then, it clicked.

In a way, the fact that she didn’t know Ashley at all was precisely what was making this so much worse. For one thing, if she had known her on a personal level, then no doubt she would have had no shortage of things she could say about her that would resonate with her family, to express understanding and sympathy for their loss. For another, and more significantly, because Miranda knew so little about Ashley, it meant that the only thing that she could focus on when thinking about her was the one thing she did know - that Ashley was a sister to three other sisters. And that they all loved each other dearly.

If there was one actual, honest to god human feeling Miranda knew all too well, it was the love she felt for her own sister. So, suffice it to say, she could relate.

And, although she’d never even seen a picture of Ashley’s sisters, every time the mere thought of them crossed her mind, all she pictured was Oriana.

This was one circumstance where Miranda didn’t have to fake empathy. For this, she had it in spades. It would have been easier to do this if she didn’t.

She knew what it would mean for them all to receive this letter. Because she understood better than anyone exactly how much it would have absolutely fucking destroyed her if she got the same letter. And it felt horribly, gut-wrenchingly cruel to be the one to write that letter, in full awareness of what it would do to those three sisters to receive it.

If that was what it was like for normal people to lose someone, then in a way Miranda felt lucky to be so numb to her own feelings compared to others. Maybe Kelly Chambers had been right when she speculated that becoming emotionally closed-off was as much a form of protection Miranda had developed to survive as it was something imposed upon her by her father whether she wanted it or not. It was certainly easier, and safer, to be cold on the inside, than to expose herself to a pain like Ashley’s sisters would feel when they learned the news.

Miranda wasn’t sure she would even have the emotional capacity to process losing Oriana, if the worst ever came to pass. It either would have broken her completely and caused her to jump off this mortal coil after her, or she would have withdrawn so much further into herself that she ceased to be recognisable as human. Maybe all of the above at once.

But Miranda wasn’t in that position. It seemed so strange to think about it. So many people had lost so much to this war. But not Miranda.

She was perhaps one of the people who least deserved to live, given her past allegiances to Cerberus, and given that she had never at any stage aspired or claimed to be, quote unquote, a ‘good person’. And yet, she was still there. Mostly in one piece. With three out of the grand total of five people she had ever truly cared about confirmed alive.

If anything, the fact that she had survived and others hadn’t was proof that the universe was not a fair place. There was no justice. No balance.

She knew it didn’t make any sense, and that it was impossible to trade her life for someone else’s, but she couldn’t help but think how much collectively happier more people would have been if Miranda had died and Ashley had lived. Or Shepard. Or most other members of the Normandy, really.

Oriana would have been the only person truly hurt by it, but even then she had lived nineteen years of her life perfectly fine, not even knowing Miranda existed. She’d only known about her for a year. She would have recovered eventually.

Speak of the devil, it was at that moment that a message popped up on Miranda’s screen. A message from Oriana.

“Hey, sis. What’s up? We haven’t talked in a few days. This a good time?”

It was true. This wasn’t the first text she had received from Oriana over the last few days, but Miranda hadn’t responded to any since she found out what happened to her comrades. Couldn’t bring herself to. Couldn’t bring herself to think about...precisely the sort of things she was thinking about right now.

It wasn’t that she couldn’t tell Oriana what had happened. What she was feeling. Of course she could have. She could have gone to Oriana about absolutely anything. On some level, that was all Miranda wanted to do. To talk to her. To feel a little less alone in that moment.

The problem was that Oriana would have listened to it all in a heartbeat. Every word. Without judgement. Without hesitation.

That wasn’t fair on her, and it wasn’t what Miranda wanted their relationship to be.

Oriana may have been the most well-adjusted person she knew, but she was still barely more than a kid. Only twenty years old. Still figuring things out. How was it fair for Miranda to burden her with all her problems, as if she could possibly know the answers, or the right things to say?

It was supposed to be the other way around. Miranda was supposed to be Oriana’s shoulder to cry on. Her protector. Her guide. Her big sister. Even if she wasn’t cut out to be any of those things. And she had foisted enough of her problems on Oriana already.

So she texted back.

With that, Miranda closed the messenger window, and switched back to the blank document. She’d been staring at it for so long without typing so much as a single word that she hadn’t even noticed the battery had almost drained down to zero. She reached down and plugged in the charger.

Just as she did that, another alert popped up on her screen. Message from Oriana.

“What do you get when a journalist cooks without reading a recipe?” Oriana asked. “Unconfirmed sauces.”

A small smile tugged at Miranda’s lips. Even if she was pushing Oriana away right now, it was comforting to know that Oriana would never take anything personally, and that she would be there waiting for her when she was ready to talk again.

With one last look at Ashley’s dog tags, Miranda began to type.

* * *

After finishing repairs to the Normandy, Commander Shepard seemed to have taken Miranda’s suggestion to heart. Or perhaps it was what she had always intended to do. They still had numerous leads on file that they never had the opportunity to investigate before the Collectors took them by surprise and attacked the crew. Why leave any of those assignments incomplete?

Miranda kept enough of an eye on things to know that, despite what had happened, The Illusive Man was still sending messages to Shepard (to which Shepard never responded) in an effort to cast himself in a good light. Evidently, Andrea was important enough to his plans that he considered it worth his while to continue trying to persuade her that they were on the same side. And maybe it was true that they were, at least where the Reapers were concerned.

By contrast, he had said nothing to Miranda whatsoever.

She knew what that meant.

Even if she came crawling back to Cerberus with a grovelling apology, which was never going to happen, she wouldn’t have been welcomed back anyway.

Despite now acting on their own, in a lot of ways, it was almost as if nothing had changed after defeating the Collectors. They knew the Reapers were out there, and the mutual intention of all concerned appeared to be that the best thing to do was carry on as usual in the hopes of finding out more about the impending threat, and hopefully to stop it from ever coming to fruition.

In fact, the only person who it seemed wasn’t exactly the same as before the Collector Base was Kelly Chambers. She had stopped making individual appointments with members of the crew (which Miranda knew from no longer getting any reports from her) and had been cut back to only light duties by Shepard. The last time Miranda had seen her, Kelly had jumped at the sound of the elevator doors opening behind her. Maybe that had something to do with it.

In any event, Miranda had concerned herself more with uncovering as much as she could about Cerberus’s true motives. Since Cerberus hadn’t made any effort to stop them from investigating any old leads so far, this certainly seemed like her best opportunity to take advantage of a position of relative safety and protection to arm herself with knowledge.

“Shepard, do you have a moment?” Miranda had begun, approaching Andrea after a meeting in the Briefing Room. Andrea had turned to face her, signalling for her to speak. “Do you remember that message you got from The Illusive Man last week, about the Overlord cell going off the grid without explanation on Aite?”

Shepard had sighed and rubbed her forehead. “You’re just not even hiding the fact that you read my emails anymore, are you?”

“No,” Miranda answered bluntly, but that wasn’t important right now. “I think we should investigate. The Illusive Man mentioned experimenting with highly volatile technology. It must be operationally sensitive, if he wouldn’t tell you anything more than that. Whatever the purpose of Project Overlord is, this is likely our only opportunity to learn about it. Cerberus will clean this up themselves if we don’t, and by then there’ll be nothing left.”

“You don’t think we could be walking into a trap?” Shepard asked.

“Possible, but unlikely. The Illusive Man asked for our assistance on this before we found the Reaper IFF device. Setting a trap for us before we had the intention or the ability to assault the Collector Base would take a level of prescience that nobody is capable of,” Miranda said confidently, folding her arms across her chest. “He’s many things, Shepard, but even he can’t see the future.”

“Fair enough. You’ve convinced me,” Shepard replied. “I’ll bring Tali with us. She’ll make sense of any tech we come across, no matter how ‘experimental’ it is.”

Miranda nodded her head. That was a sound choice.

What they actually found at the heart of Atlas Station, Miranda could not possibly have predicted.

Please make it stop.

Miranda hadn’t even been able to speak when she saw him there. David Archer. A completely innocent, vulnerable man hooked up to machines by his own brother as part of some sick experiment to see if his gifted mind could, what? Control geth? That was the reasoning that justified that level of cruelty and abuse?

This was it, wasn’t it? The true face of Cerberus. What they did to people. So many had said that this was the reality, and yet Miranda hadn’t listened before.

Reading between the lines, there was no doubt The Illusive Man knew exactly what was being done on Aite. While he made sure to say he didn’t condone Dr. Archer’s actions, he seemed to know perfectly well that David’s “unique talents” had “provided a breakthrough”, and he made sure to mention that Shepard’s actions had set back their understanding of the geth several years.

The only good thing that had come out of this was knowing that David Archer would be well looked after at Grissom Academy. Well, that and it was reassuring to know that, whatever Cerberus might have planned to do with an army of geth under their control, those ideas would never come to fruition now.

Evidently, Shepard really had done the right thing by not sending Legion to be studied by Cerberus, if it would have helped them. In retrospect, Miranda had never been more relieved that someone hadn’t listened to her advice.

It just made her wonder what else she didn’t know.

The door to Miranda’s quarters slid open, and she glanced up. “Forgive my intrusion. Am I interrupting anything?” Samara asked, always a sound question to open with when it came to Miranda, especially when she was in her office.

“No,” Miranda answered honestly. Not a damn thing.

Samara was too tactful to say it, but of course she knew that the number of people Miranda reported to had decreased drastically in recent days, and her requirements to Shepard had already been discharged several hours ago.

Since Miranda hadn’t objected to her presence, Samara took that as a cue to step inside. “I have not seen you since you returned from Aite. Is all well?”

Miranda sighed, interlacing her fingers in front of her. “I honestly don’t know.”

The truth was, ever since she’d seen David Archer in that state, there had been this lingering sense of unease that Miranda hadn’t been able to shake. She had never been an expert at being able to put labels to her feelings. But if she had to choose a word to describe this one, it would be ‘unsettled’.

It wasn’t a pleasant feeling at all. It was as if her own skin was no longer sitting properly on her body. Like there was an inherent...discomfort, that was impossible to rectify. Like these unwelcome sensations and thoughts wouldn’t stop wriggling around beneath the surface, disturbing whatever they touched.

Had this been any regular day, Miranda would have just worked and avoided thinking about it until it went away. But that option wasn’t available to her anymore. Besides, something told her this malaise wouldn’t vanish so easily.

Then again, if there was anybody who she felt safe sharing her thoughts with, and who could help her make sense of them, it was the woman in front of her.

Not about to just leave her standing there by the door, Miranda got up from her desk and gestured for Samara to follow her further inside her quarters. “Sorry there’s not a lot of room, here,” Miranda remarked.

“It is quite alright,” Samara assured her.

“By all means, make yourself at home,” Miranda invited her, electing to sit cross-legged near the head of her bed, tacitly giving Samara permission to join her.

Samara followed her lead, perching on the far end of her bed, as if to signal that she was in no hurry to be anywhere else.

“Do you know what happened down there?” Miranda began.

“Yes.” Samara nodded her head. Even though Miranda rarely if ever observed her speaking to anyone else, word always somehow seemed to reach her about what transpired on any mission she wasn’t a part of.

It certainly made things easier not to have to explain it.

Maybe that was why Samara had come here in the first place.

“...I don’t think a single person I’ve met would ever accuse me of being in any way compassionate. Not even you, and you give me the benefit of the doubt far more than anyone else. But…” Miranda trailed off as she reflected on the days’ events, her voice steady despite the grisly subject matter. “Even in the name of science, how could anyone do that to their own brother?”

David Archer had been begging his brother to make it stop. Begging him. And all Gavin cared about was continuing the experiment.

Why? What was the fucking point of taking it that far?

“I do not know,” Samara answered honestly. “I cannot fathom it either.”

“I suppose that’s the thing. I can fathom it,” Miranda pointed out. She knew all too well that people like that did exist.

She’d been raised by one.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” Miranda shook her head, unable to even find the language to describe the uncomfortable twisting in her chest that came from thinking about David Archer, picturing him in that core with all those tubes sticking out of him. “Nothing normally ever...gets to me. Even things that probably should. I’ve always been like that. My whole life,

“Did you know, I don’t even remember crying as a child? At all?” Miranda asked. “Any time I ever came close to shedding a tear, my father made sure to ‘give me something to really cry about’. So perhaps I did do it more than I can recall, and I simply blocked those memories out. But I don’t think that’s the answer. I’ve always assumed that the reason I never cried was because I must have been...so isolated and neglected as a baby that one day I just stopped making any noise, because even then I must have known there was simply no point to it,

“So, if you ever pictured me being an emotional child, that’s not true. I’ve never known myself to be any different than the way I am now,” Miranda somewhat shamefully admitted. She’d never had the chance to be another way, from the moment she was brought into this world. “The one exception, the one thing that I can’t seem to stop from hitting me in whatever small, emotional part of me survived my childhood, is Oriana. Or anything that reminds me of her.”

“I see.” Samara needed no further explanation. Miranda may not have fully understood it herself, but to Samara, it made perfect sense. Why wouldn’t what Miranda saw down there on Aite remind her of her father, and make her think of her sister? “...May I ask, have you seen something like David Archer before?”

“Close enough,” Miranda said, the truth of those words leaving a bitter taste on her tongue. “Do you know, I’ve never told anyone about how I escaped from my father? I suppose you could’ve guessed. I’ve never had anyone to tell.”

Samara shifted, matching Miranda’s cross-legged position as she turned to face her, sitting opposite her. She didn’t even need to say anything. Her body language alone said that she was receptive to whatever Miranda felt comfortable sharing.

Miranda never allowed herself to look weak in front of anyone. To show vulnerability. Whenever she came close, she would brush it off with a deadpan quip or dry understatement, demonstrating that she was in total control.

Samara was the one exception to that. The one person she’d met who she trusted enough to reveal that flawed, softer side of herself around, and who had never judged her even slightly for her imperfections. Why Samara tolerated her at her worst, Miranda still didn’t know. But she always had, from day one.

Plus, Miranda knew better than anyone the grief Samara had somehow survived and how she had come to terms with the most intense sorrow imaginable. It was no wonder she was so understanding, given what she’d endured in her past.

So, for the first time in her life, Miranda began to tell her story.

“I always knew that I was an experiment, but I never really knew what that meant,” Miranda elected to start at the beginning. “My father said things, sure, but if you imagine anybody ever sat me down and explained to me my purpose, or the purpose of anything they put me through, then you’re sorely mistaken.”

“What were you told?” Samara prompted.

“The part about being genetically perfect. That I wasn’t the first he’d made, only the first he’d kept. And that my father wanted to create a dynasty - a great legacy that would ensure his name lived forever,” Miranda explained. “I always assumed that my father saw me as his heir. That he wanted me to be the perfect daughter. Someone he could trust to carry on his work long after he passed. It wasn’t until Niket put the thought in my head that I began to consider that I might be wrong - that maybe my father’s experiment wouldn’t end with me. If he ever did make another daughter, then I didn’t know what that meant for me, except that I knew it wouldn’t be good, and I may not be safe,

“So Niket and I began working on an escape plan. It took us the better part of two years to prepare. We had to get every detail exactly right, and we thought about every possible contingency. Niket already knew my father’s security systems intimately, so we knew what the weaknesses were there. Before he left, Niket gave me software I could use to hack into the camera system and make the monitors replay the feed from twenty-four hours ago. It would look like I was asleep in my bed, and any rooms I was actually in would look empty,

“We knew that most possible routes I could use to escape were patrolled by security at all hours. We actually had to scour the plans for the whole compound to find any potential ways out. The only option that presented any possibility was...well, perhaps I should go back a few steps.”

Not used to speaking this much without interruption, Miranda stopped briefly to make sure Samara wasn’t overwhelmed by the sheer amount of information being dumped on her all at once. But Samara’s position hadn’t changed at all. Her blue eyes had never left Miranda’s face, listening intently to her every word.

Miranda took that as implicit support to keep going.

“My father had a large research facility underground, beneath the estate, but I never saw most of it. Even when I started working in the lab, I was only ever allowed to enter certain rooms, and only under supervision. I assisted on some of my father’s research into gene editing, which is where most of the family money comes from. I was aware that there were some restricted projects that required special lab clearance, but that was the extent of my knowledge,

“Niket and I discovered from reviewing the plans that there were more levels to the lab than I would have expected. And, when you’re that far underground and working with potentially toxic chemicals, you need a very good ventilation system. We could see on the blueprints that there were air ducts that connected to the surface, which I could most likely fit through. Both ends of the air duct wouldn’t be patrolled by security, since they were only watched by cameras, which we already had a means to deal with. It seemed like my best option,

“Once everything was in motion, all I needed to do was steal an ID card from one of my father’s senior lab technicians, and memorise what passcode was used to enter the restricted part of the lab on the day I chose to escape. I don’t think I’m surprising you by saying that neither of those two things were a challenge for me. I even stole a gun to defend myself, just in case,

“It was exactly thirteen minutes past two in the morning when I got up and left my room. I knew that was the perfect time to leave, because there were the fewest people around, and I’d noticed that security tended to get tired and bored around that time and would start slacking off at their posts. I’d seen them sitting back in their chairs with their feet up watching TV to amuse themselves,

“Everything went precisely as I had planned it. I walked right across the entire house without anybody noticing I was there - which, however big you imagine the house I grew up in was, triple it and you’ll be closer. I got to the lab without incident, swiped the stolen card, entered the code for that day, and headed down to the restricted level where my designated escape point was.”

Miranda paused then. It was the first time she’d really, consciously thought about that day in a long time. And, certainly, it was the first time she’d ever spoken about it, beyond referencing it with flippant passing comments.

In the peripheries of her vision, she saw Samara shift closer. “May I?” 

Miranda glanced up at Samara’s voice, and found her making a subtle motion towards Miranda’s left hand, where it rested in her lap. Miranda hadn’t even really been conscious of it until that moment, but in hindsight she had been gesturing more with her right while she spoke.

Admittedly, Miranda was far from fluent when it came to reading unspoken body language. Even though she didn’t fully grasp what Samara meant, she trusted her enough to follow along with whatever she intended. Accordingly, Miranda turned her left hand over, such that her palm faced upwards.

Interpreting that as tacit consent, Samara reached across the small gap between them and clasped Miranda’s hand between both of her own. For as strong as their friendship had become, neither of them were exactly the touchy-feely type. Quite the opposite. So, to feel Samara gently holding her hand with such kindness, well...Miranda imagined this must have been how it felt for other people who weren’t generally so averse to physical contact to be hugged.

“You do not have to give voice to any of the thoughts on your mind if you do not wish to,” Samara reminded her, one of her thumbs softly tracing circles at the centre of Miranda’s palm. “But I am here to listen if you do.”

“I know you are. Thank you,” Miranda said sincerely.

With that, she continued, difficult as it was to revisit this part of her memory.

“I remember the doors to that level sliding open and...I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. This wasn’t just a lab. It was a cloning facility. My cloning facility. The place where I had come from. And I just...froze,

“I completely forgot why I was even there. All I saw were...tanks with embryos in various stages of development. Photographs of dissected failures detailing the mutations and cancerous growths caused by element zero exposure. Pages of speculation as to the errors in their altered genetic sequences which made them...unviable. And then there were images of me. Reports on my behaviour. My progress. With a list of ‘imperfections’ that needed improvement in further cycles.”

Samara was nothing if not masterful at maintaining a neutral expression, but even she could not hide the visibly pained look that crossed her face when she heard that. Words could not describe how much that moment must have not only hurt Miranda, but shattered her entire perception of reality.

“All that time, I truly thought the project had ended with me. But it hadn’t. My whole life, I had been living in that house, while beneath my very feet my father was actively working to ‘improve’ upon my genetic code for god knows how many years. And the only reason he hadn’t replaced me sooner was, ironically, because any time he had a viable embryo, his insistence on exposing them to element zero to replicate my biotic abilities resulted in death and deformity.”

Even though she was silent, hanging on Miranda’s every word, it was evident that Samara was shocked by what she was hearing. Stunned. She’d always believed Miranda when she said her father was a monster, but she’d obviously never suspected it went to this extent. That it was this systematic. This calculated. This callous. What sane person would even comprehend a mind capable of something like this, let alone be complicit in it?

“I don’t know when exactly my father started perceiving me as a failure. In retrospect, I’ve learned things that make me suspect it was probably day one. But that was the first inkling I ever had that I was only ever intended to be a prototype, and nothing more. A test. A proof of concept. A first fucking draft.”

Samara squeezed Miranda’s hand a little tighter, as if to express her sympathy, and her apologies, both for the fact that Miranda had ever had to go through something like this, and that Samara hadn’t understood her history sooner.

Miranda’s eyes drifted out of focus, before she even knew they had. She wasn’t in her quarters anymore. She was there. She was sixteen. She was in that lab. Standing in that door. Discovering the truth. She saw it so clearly, down to even the smallest detail. She could hear the hum of the refrigerator, and the whirring of the fan. She could even smell the exact cleaning agent the staff had used earlier that day to sterilise their hands before they entered the room.

“When that realisation hit me, I just...I just saw red. I thought fuck him. Fuck him. That everything he had put me through, everything I had done for him to meet his arbitrary and changeable standards of perfection, it had all been for nothing. Nothing I ever did could be good enough. He never cared. There was nothing I could possibly have done to live up to the unreachable bar he set for me, because he never truly intended for me to be ‘the one’ no matter how well I did. I had been set up to fail my whole life. And this was the proof. So I paid him back,

“I destroyed it,” Miranda said with cold fury, a mere fraction of the rage she had felt nearly twenty years ago. “Everything he had worked so hard on, everything that mattered to him more than me, I destroyed it. I overloaded every computer. I threw every freezer to the ground. I shot out every one of those tubes. I broke the sprinkler system, grabbed every flammable substance I could find, poured them all over everything, and ejected my thermal clip,

“The alarms went off when the fire started. I didn’t regret anything that I had done, but I had been so angry that I had completely blown any chance I had of a quiet escape. I knew I had to move quickly. So I headed for my exit. But, then, just as I reached the air vent, I heard this sound. And I stopped.”

Miranda swallowed. Perfect memory was a curse as much as a blessing. She hadn’t relived this exact moment in years, yet she could still vividly remember every single detail as clearly as if this had happened ten minutes ago.

“I looked over and I saw this...incubator. I had thought it was empty, but...no. There was a child inside it. A seemingly newborn baby. Left alone in the dark, in this cold, sterile lab. Screaming and crying for attention that would never come.”

Miranda felt a sting in her eyes as she replayed those images in her mind.

“The first thing I felt was betrayal. This was my replacement. They hadn’t been able to improve upon my DNA yet, despite their best efforts, so they just made another one. And this was her. A genetic identical. A ‘do-over’. Well, actually, they made several. Like me, Ori was just the only one lucky enough to survive the element zero exposure - although, unlike me, she didn’t get biotics out of it,

“What did it say about my father that this was how I found her? She and I, we were the culmination of his life’s work. We should have been his most prized possessions. But then look at how he treated me my whole life. And he was already doing the same to her. The only reason she wasn’t dead was because there were machines there to perform the absolute bare minimum functions to keep her alive, so that she could be the next phase of the experiment,

“Neither of us had ever been, or would ever be daughters to him. My father wasn’t, and still isn’t capable of that. There is not a single shred of anything resembling love or kindness in Henry Lawson’s heart. He is devoid of anything right, or good, or redeeming--”

Miranda had to stop herself then, pulling both her hands away to wipe beneath her eyes. This was more raw than she had ever been with another person.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Please do not apologise,” Samara implored her, beyond moved by everything she had heard so far. She reached out, but stopped just short of touching Miranda’s cheek, as if uncertain whether she would want her to.

“I feel so stupid,” Miranda cursed herself. It didn’t happen very often, but she hated the way it felt when her eyes burned with tears. It was a horrible fucking feeling. An alien sensation. Like she was stricken with some disease. Or like something inside her was broken. How the fuck did anyone find this cathartic?

“You are not,” Samara assured her, holding Miranda’s gaze, letting both hands fall atop her knees, compelling Miranda to look at her, and be with her in that moment. “Need I remind you, I came to you. I have chosen to be here.”

“Why?” Miranda asked, still not understanding why Samara of all people deigned to put up with her when she was at her most useless and pathetic.

At that question, Samara’s stoic expression faltered. “...Do you have to ask this of me? Do you not know?” she said quietly, her voice barely louder than a whisper. It was almost as if it hurt her to think that, after all this time, Miranda still didn’t honestly believe deep down in her heart that Samara cared about her.

Upon hearing that in her voice, Miranda knew that question had been unfair. Samara deserved better than that. And, after all, didn’t Miranda already know the answer to that question? Samara was here for Miranda when she needed her for the exact same reason Miranda had been there for Samara in the past. 

Because she wanted to be.

Miranda took a moment, her thumb and forefinger running across her eyelids, and meeting at the bridge of her nose. “This is hard for me to talk about,” she confessed, her voice breaking, knowing she hadn’t even reached the most difficult part. She didn’t know if she would even be able to get through this.

“I understand,” said Samara, giving her as much time and space as she needed.

Miranda drew a deep breath, and willed herself to keep going, keeping her eyes closed beneath her fingers, unable to even look at Samara as she went on.

“So, as I was standing there, hearing glass explode around me in the flames, having only just discovered this baby even existed...I knew I didn’t have long, but I had to spare her from whatever came next. If I left her, she would die in the fire, or she would be deemed a ‘failure’ and be killed, or she would go through exactly the same thing that I had gone through with my father. None of those outcomes were acceptable. But I hadn’t planned for her. I couldn’t take her with me.”

Miranda hesitated, a single tear escaping and falling down her cheek.

“For a split-second, I thought...well, I have this thing in my hand, and the most merciful thing I could do for her is…quickly and painlessly…” Miranda couldn’t even say the words, “...And I really did think about it. I was going to...”

The fact that it had even crossed her mind, however briefly, was the one thing in Miranda’s life that she had never truly been able to forgive herself for, no matter how many years passed. It made her feel sick to her stomach.

Oriana didn’t even know. But Miranda would never be able to make that up to her.

Never.

“But I couldn’t.” Miranda shook her head, her breaths coming shallower. “I just couldn’t. Something inside of me just...physically wouldn’t let me. And I felt...I felt something I’d never felt before. A compulsion so powerful I’ve never felt it since. It was like my heart exploded in my chest. And I didn’t even have control over myself. The next thing I knew, I just put the gun away. And I took her,

“All I could think was, if I could just get her out of there, then she would have a chance at everything I never had. And the moment I had that thought, it was as if I didn’t have a choice. I had to do everything in my power to make that happen. It became the only thing that mattered to me, even more than my own life,

“So I opened the incubator, and wrapped her in my jacket. And the second I touched her, she just...looked at me, and she stopped crying.”

Miranda went silent for several, long seconds, fixed on the memory of the first time she’d seen her sister’s face. The first moment she felt that connection between them. A moment that changed her forever.

She exhaled, willing her voice to stop shaking. 

“I didn’t read anything into it. I assumed the reason she stopped was because she’d never felt a human touch before, and was just surprised, but...I said to her, ‘I’m going to get you out of here. You’ll be safe with me. I promise,’

“Just as soon as I took her, I heard voices behind me. I didn’t look back. I bashed open the grate and got inside the vent as quick as I could. None of my father’s men could follow me through a space that small. I don’t know how long I was in there. But it felt like an eternity. I don’t know how I didn’t fall,

“When I got to the surface, I remember seeing searchlights in the dark. Either they hadn’t figured out where I was, or they just hadn’t made it out of the lab in time to beat me there. I had a whole route memorised in my brain. You can’t even comprehend how big my father’s compound was. The gardens had an actual, literal maze as one of the features. I tried to hide from them in there,

“Amid all the people searching for me, I carelessly wandered into a trip beam for the outdoor alarm system at one point. Spotlights fixed on me immediately. That’s when I heard my father over the loudspeaker ordering his men to shoot me. And they were live rounds. I could tell. But, if nothing else, all that training made me a lot faster and more agile than any of his men. I shot a few rounds blindly behind me to force them to take cover. That must have worked. And I lost them again,

“The only way I could get outside the walls was through a drain. Believe me, a lot of water went into those gardens. I jumped into the drainage ditch, and the water went up to about here.” Miranda put one hand at the point where her hip became indistinguishable from her abdomen. “Niket had already loosened the grate for me ahead of time. All I had to do was move it. And...I was out,

“I have never in my life run as fast as I ran then. I knew they wouldn’t be far behind me. I could hear them. Including my father. Niket had left a skycar for me in a hidden location nearby, where nobody would ever find it by accident. I got in, and I put my sister down beside me, and I said to her, ‘If we get shot down, I just want you to know, I don’t regret trying to save you. These last few minutes have been more freedom than I’ve ever known in my whole life’,

“I can still hear the bullets bouncing off the hull as we flew away. But that was it. That was my last memory of home, and the last time I saw my father.”

Samara visibly held back her own emotions as Miranda recounted the most pivotal day of her life. Miranda had long intellectually understood that feeling what others felt was something that came naturally to empathetic people, and Samara (as composed as she was) was definitely that. If anything, that response meant more from her precisely because she was usually so stoic.

It seemed clear that her restraint, in this case, was not born out of any desire to hide what she was feeling, or any shame at being seen in such a state, but rather came purely because Miranda was her priority in that moment, and she did not wish to detract, however unintentionally, from her and her feelings.

“I know it cannot have been long before you were separated from your sister,” said Samara, her voice calm, level and soothing. Her unwavering demeanour was oddly comforting. “I am sorry. That must have been very difficult for you.”

“It was,” Miranda confirmed. “She had never been part of the plan. I didn’t even know she existed until I found her. I was supposed to be off world with my fake ID immediately. But, with her, I couldn’t do that. I had a little money, but not much, and everything can be traced with enough effort so I was scared to use what I had. Once that money ran out, I had no plan for how to feed her, or clothe her, or care for her. And I was afraid that asking for help would attract attention.”

For a short while, though, she had really tried. They may have been genetically twins, but Miranda was old enough to be her mother. Teen mothers may have been a rarity in the twenty-second century, but they were certainly not unheard of.

The only problem with that idea was that Miranda barely knew how to take care of herself in light of how she had been raised, let alone a baby.

She shivered as she thought on those days. “I remember, this one night, I had bought us a room in a hotel with these...ludicrous purple walls. We never stayed in the same place twice, but this room, I remember. Because, for whatever reason, that night she just...would not stop crying. And not just crying, she was bloody screaming her head off. And I didn’t know why. I didn’t know what I was doing wrong. Whatever I tried to calm her down...nothing worked. I didn’t know if she was sick and going to die, and I was terrified that people would come and take her away from me if they heard her screaming like that. And I just...for the first time I can remember, I broke down and bawled my fucking eyes out until the sun rose. Because that was the point where I realised I couldn’t do this,

“I knew that, even if I managed to get her off-world with me, my father wouldn’t stop looking for us on Earth. He would follow us. We would always be in danger. And I had no means to care for her. Even if I did, how could I work? Who would I leave her with? I didn’t know anyone I could trust,

“...Until I remembered this man my father had spoken to two years earlier, who was an affiliate of Cerberus. English expat named Alan. He had said The Illusive Man was looking for ‘exceptional individuals’ like me. They knew who I was, and what I was. And, even though my father donated to Cerberus, I knew they had never returned the favour - they never funded his cloning research, probably because he was always so cagey about sharing any data with them,

“I knew it was a risk, but I didn’t have anyone else to turn to. I remembered enough about Alan to know his name and what company he ran. And, because he remembered me too, I was able to get in contact with him. I told him that I wanted to offer my services to Cerberus, in exchange for them helping me get my sister off world. I said I wanted them to make her disappear, and put her safely into the hands of a normal, loving family. So long as they kept their end of that bargain, they would have my undivided loyalty. And that was all it took.”

And that promise was kept, along with everything Cerberus promised. Oriana grew up with some fine, spacer parents, who were coincidentally of Australian origin themselves. Miranda watched over her, and her brilliantly, boringly normal life, seeing her grow from a happy child into a smart, popular teenager, and a well-adjusted adult. It was why Miranda trusted Cerberus so much.

“The woman who took her from me was very nice about it. In truth, other than Niket, she was the first person I ever met who had been kind to me. But that...that was the first time in my life that I remember crying. Really crying. The day that it hit me that I wasn’t fit to take care of her, when I knew that I had to give her up.”

And, nineteen years later, Miranda had tears in her eyes when she finally met her sister again, speaking to her for the first time at Shepard’s urging on Illium. She wasn’t kidding when she said Oriana was the only thing that ever brought that out of her. Such raw, intense emotion. Such...humanity.

Miranda had gone to Oriana that day to let her know she was loved, and she had done exactly that, but she had received something so much greater in return.

For nineteen years, Miranda had known what it meant to love someone. But it wasn't until then, at the age of thirty-five, that she finally knew what it felt like to have someone out there in the galaxy who truly and unconditionally loved her back.

Holding Oriana as a child had given Miranda purpose. But holding her again all those years later as an adult had given Miranda something far greater.

Family.

“You may not have been ready to take care of a child then,” Samara began. “But you were certainly an excellent sister to her, as you have been ever since.”

Miranda’s lips couldn’t find the strength to quirk, not even into the faintest shadow of a smile. “Thank you,” she said. If doing right by Oriana was the one thing that she ever managed to do with her life, then it justified her entire existence.

Giving Oriana up was, unequivocally, the hardest thing Miranda had ever done, before or since. Experiencing unconditional love for the first time, only to be forced by circumstance to give it up a few short days later. And yet, at the same time, it had been the only thing she could do. Because the real, selfless love she felt for Oriana didn’t allow Miranda to do the selfish thing. Not when it came to her.

She sighed and rubbed one eye with the corresponding palm. “Ah, god, how long have I been rambling at you about this?”

“As long as you needed to,” Samara answered with unfeigned warmth and compassion. “I cannot stress how much I appreciate you speaking of this to me. I know it was not easy for you, and that you do not share your burdens with others lightly. Everything you have told me, I treat with the greatest respect.”

“I know you do,” said Miranda. Even on the pane of death, Samara would never divulge anything told to her in confidence. Nobody ever needed to doubt that.

“Do you feel better for having spoken of it?” Samara asked.

Miranda stopped for a moment. “...Strangely, yes,” she acknowledged.

In retrospect, it now made sense why the incident with the Archer brothers had been so...for lack of a better word, ‘triggering’ for those past traumatic events. And, for as much of an emotional rollercoaster as it had been to relive the most mentally scarring day of her life, at least she had gotten to the point in her story where she and Oriana got their happy ending, reunited at long last.

“Then I am glad,” said Samara. That was all she wanted to achieve by coming here as she had, if it had been at all possible to do so.

“You’re not going now, are you?” Miranda asked, audibly disappointed. After all, when Miranda entered a conversation with a specific purpose in mind, she would generally leave immediately after accomplishing that goal.

“No.” Samara shook her head, hoping she had not unintentionally conveyed that impression. “I will stay for as long as you would like me here.”

“Would you stay forever?” Miranda wearily remarked. Samara hesitated, as if caught off guard by that. “I’m joking,” Miranda told her, assuaging Samara’s fears that she had to answer that question seriously.

Samara uttered something that sounded faintly like a chuckle. “My offer remains,” she replied. It was funny how something as simple as that kind twinkle in Samara’s eye was enough to make Miranda feel so much less vulnerable, despite the fact that this was the most she’d ever let her guard down. Ever.

Miranda exhaled heavily, running both hands through her hair as she leaned back, her head hitting the pillow behind her. She had no idea that the simple act of talking could be so exhausting. But, then again, it did feel like she’d just run an obstacle course through every single emotion she’d ever felt in her entire life, so maybe that explained it. No wonder she needed a moment to recover.

She heard movement, and felt Samara shift off of the bed, moving to stand by the window, almost like she was keeping a vigil at her side.

“Miranda?” Samara broke the silence after a minute or two. Miranda moved one hand just enough to allow an eye to open. “I am proud of you.”

Miranda arched an eyebrow in questioning.

“Of the decisions you made then. Of the woman you are now. And that you were courageous enough to be so open with me,” Samara elaborated.

“...You know, I think that’s the first time anyone has ever said that to me,” Miranda commented. And, if anyone else had, then it hit differently coming from someone, firstly, whose opinion she held in such high esteem and, secondly, who she knew wouldn’t have said that unless she damn well meant it.

“Then those people were unworthy of you,” Samara responded with stark honesty, and a terseness to her tone that Miranda had never heard before.

With her half-open eye, Miranda silently studied Samara’s expression. It took a few seconds for her to recognise that unyielding flame she bore. Now that Miranda had finished speaking, Samara no longer simply felt sorry for what she had gone through. No. She was angry about it - angry that people had treated Miranda that way, livid that they had made her even for a second feel as though she were worthless, and furious that they had seen so little value in her that they were prepared to dispose of her like she wasn’t even a living being.

That, she could evidently not abide.

Had she not known the reason for it and so agreed with the sentiment, it would have been a little intimidating to see Samara so righteously pissed off, even if the average person might have only perceived her as her usual, guarded self. 

“That I ever dared compare you to the people in your father’s employ...” Samara trailed off, staring out into the void, her body tense. She hadn’t known Miranda’s full story at the time, but now that she did, she looked like she wanted to tear herself apart for letting those words leave her lips. “I apologise unreservedly.”

“You weren’t wrong, though,” Miranda acknowledged. When it came to Cerberus, she had been on the same path. She could have easily been complicit in the same, if not worse atrocities than were done to her as a child.

“No.” Samara turned to face her, stalwart conviction shining in her eyes. “I have never been more wrong. You are nothing like them. You are so far above them, and they are so far beneath you...the people who hurt you do not even deserve to breathe the same air as you,” Samara stated firmly, staring Miranda dead in her eyes, as if daring her to find a single shred of falsity or exaggeration in her gaze, because she knew that Miranda would find none. “I hope you know that.”

Miranda blinked, taken aback by the severity and seriousness of her response. Not having the strength to fight Samara on the validity of her past criticisms, which Miranda still thought were fair, all she said was, “Apology accepted.”

Satisfied with that answer, Samara folded her arms, and faced the void.

Miranda wouldn’t say it out loud, but it was weirdly kind of validating to see someone else react that way to her story. Whether it was intentional or not, it was almost like a reassuring acknowledgement in the back of her mind, saying, ‘See? You aren’t crazy, and you aren’t overreacting by not being able to let go of what your father did to you so many years ago. You actually are justified.’

Plus, on an entirely selfish level, part of her definitely enjoyed knowing that, in the very unlikely event Samara and Henry Lawson ever happened to cross paths after this day, Samara wouldn’t hesitate to fucking kill him.

* * *

It had been two weeks and a day since she identified the bodies. Writing to Ashley’s family and sending them the dog tags hadn’t been easy, but she’d done it. She’d personally given the letter to some contacts Jacob had within the Alliance from his days as a Corsair, so she knew it would get there.

She didn’t know when a response would come, but she wasn’t looking forward to it when it did.

Monday to Friday had been spent working, as usual. If nothing else, it was a reassuring constant.

Saturday, she had paid a visit to Jack. “What are we, fuckin’ wacky sitcom neighbours now?” Jack had complained when she showed up, signalling that things were back to whatever this new normal was between them.

Despite her initial reaction, Jack hadn’t otherwise objected to her presence. She actually felt up to going outside that day, to the extent that she was able to, so Miranda had walked with her and given her the lay of the land, including where her own apartment was. “If you ever want to stop by while I’m at work, feel free. I know your students usually visit you during that time, anyway, but--”

“Yeah. I get it. Thanks,” Jack brusquely cut her off. Even though they were so far sticking to their word to try and turn over a new leaf with each other, evidently she could still only take so much of Miranda being genuine towards her before it weirded her out.

Miranda didn’t feel the need to point it out but, for her own part, she had yet to be anything other than civil with Jack. It had not been fully reciprocated yet, but that was not unexpected.

Jack’s medical condition was an unusual one. Mainly because no human had ever suffered from it before. They actually had to go to the asari for aid to get insight on similar situations. Apparently it had been recorded within their species before that massive exertions of phenomenal biotic power in life-or-death situations could cause physical damage similar to what Jack had suffered, and it had been noted that such events could also cause a temporary ‘burnout’ of biotic abilities. Certainly, at the moment, Jack couldn’t so much as move a glass with her mind, nor was she to try to as the effort would only lead to migraine.

It was hard to put a timeline on it, but she was expected to be back to normal within a few months. Until then, she would have to take her headaches and fatigue day by day. Some days, she would barely have the strength to walk from one side of the apartment to the other. Other days, she would feel mostly fine.

On Sunday, Miranda had gone off to spend some time on her own. It turned out that her quiet spots where she hid at night when the tinnitus was too much to bear were just as isolated in the day as well. She tried to clear her mind, and not think about anything for a while, with limited success.

On Monday, it was back to work.

Oriana kept sending bad jokes as she thought of them over the course of the week. The latest one was, “How many colony developers does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Three. One to hold a committee meeting to decide whether screwing in a lightbulb is an efficient allocation of resources, one to raise rates on the colonists to fund the lightbulb replacement, and one to hire a private contractor to finally screw in the lightbulb five years after you needed it.” 

Obviously things were going well at her job.

Miranda appreciated every message she got from her, but she still hadn’t had the heart to respond. Not just yet. Oriana would be able to tell something was wrong if she talked to her in her current state, even via text. She would just know. She would sense it, no matter how many lightyears away she was. And it was better not to talk to her than risk burdening her with her current troubles.

Throughout it all, it wasn’t lost on Miranda that the students were, suffice it to say, aware that Miranda hadn’t been acting the same these past two weeks. She couldn’t really tell the difference from her own perspective. She always buried herself in work. And she was always always rather detached, serious and quiet. But, for whatever reason, the students somehow just seemed to know that dark cloud was there, hanging over her head.

Maybe she was acting just different enough that they could tell. Or maybe it was the fact that the deaths of her friends hadn’t changed her behaviour at all that caused them to be concerned about her.

They didn’t openly express any worry. But they weren’t treating her as they normally did. Weren’t teasing her, or prodding at her, or trying to get a rise out of her. They were being...polite and respectful.

Miranda would never have predicted it, nor would she admit it, but she had actually started to miss the former. Just a little bit.

It was pretty late by the time Miranda got home from work that day. It was now November, so it was getting dark early, and it was colder than Miranda preferred. She took off her scarf and put her keys down when she came inside.

“Pardon me, Miss?” Prangley began.

“Yes, Jason?” Miranda inquired, too preoccupied to notice the somewhat awkward manner in which Jack’s students were gathered together in the living area. Why was it so cold in there?

“We're, uh...we're not entirely sure,” he admitted with a shrug, glancing over his shoulder towards the balcony outside. “She wouldn't tell us anything. Just that she wanted to see you. I get the feeling we couldn't have kept her out if we tried.”

At that, Miranda blinked and glanced up, suddenly paying more attention. “She?” Miranda echoed. “Who are you talking about?”

Miranda didn’t know it, but to the kids, that reaction was the first glimpse of the Miranda they knew they'd been able to get out of her in two weeks.

“I don’t know, but it’s not often an asari matriarch drops in unannounced,” Reiley remarked, scratching the side of his head. Miranda’s heart stopped. She couldn’t believe her ears. It couldn’t be. “I hope this isn’t some kind of mix up. It’ll be pretty embarrassing if she's got the wrong address.”

Miranda didn’t even hear the rest of his comment, much less respond to it. She didn’t say so much as another word to her wards, taking hold of her cane and marching straight towards the balcony, needing to see if it was her.

As soon as she got close enough to see outside, there was no mistaking it. Samara stood there beyond the open doorway, hands clasped behind her back, her posture upright and rigid, staring out over the ruined city that lay before her.

The second she saw her, Miranda halted in her tracks, unable to take another step. It was as if time stood still. And yet her pulse was pounding so fast.

Sensing that she was being watched, Samara turned to look over her shoulder.

Their eyes met.

Miranda wasn’t sure whose breath caught first, hers or Samara’s. For a long moment, they both just stared, Miranda frozen by the doorway, Samara motionless on the balcony, both of them scarcely able to believe that this was no illusion.

Micro expressions flitted across pale blue features. The night concealed much, but Miranda could have sworn she saw Samara’s eyes glisten with unshed tears. 

“The last time I saw you...” Samara glanced down, unable to finish the thought. But, before long, a small smile unfolded across her lips. Miranda was there. Her fears had not come to pass. “...Truly, you never cease to amaze me.”

A faint laugh of astonishment and disbelief escaped Miranda as she stepped out onto the balcony, sliding the door shut behind her. “You don't call, you don't write,” she remarked, mostly in jest, moving to stand beside her in the cold night air, resting her arm on the railing. Honestly, Samara had been absent so long that Miranda had begun to suspect she would never return. “I suppose I did get your message, but you could at least have sent flowers.”

“My apologies,” said Samara, politely tilting her head in acknowledgement that the manner of her parting had been...less than ideal. “From what I have gathered, by the time you regained consciousness, I was already far from here. I could not linger when suffering was so widespread. The Code demanded that I go where I could assist. But I would not blame you if you do not forgive me for leaving,” she answered. She never made excuses, but those were her reasons.

“In light of the fact you saved my life, I think we can call it even,” Miranda commented, though her expression soon faltered, her features becoming a little more sombre and sincere. It had hurt for Samara to vanish as suddenly as she had, but it seemed so stupid to say that now that she was finally here.

She’d wanted this so badly for so long. It had almost driven her crazy at times, fixating on Samara’s absence as much as she had. And, now that she was here, she found it impossible to be angry with her, even if she ought to have been.

She was here. She was finally here. Not just in London, but here. With her. Where she should have been. And, even though there was about three feet of space between them, she was close enough that Miranda could have sworn she felt the warmth of Samara’s presence even through her jacket.

“You look well,” said Samara, genuinely glad to see the extent of her progress. Were it anyone other than Miranda she was speaking to, the rate at which she'd bounced back would have been astonishing, if not outright impossible.

Miranda snorted. “I look like I was nearly killed in a shuttle explosion. But I don't mind the scars, or the arm. Could have been a lot worse.” Miranda hesitated then, her fingers tensing around her cane as her tone turned serious. “I know I stopped breathing three times after you rescued me. If you hadn't...” She trailed off, not sure she wanted to reflect on just how close she'd come to death. There had been too much of that lately.

“Yes. I know. Far too well.” Miranda briefly glanced at her, and saw Samara staring ahead into the night, scant city lights reflecting against unfocused eyes. She seemed...preoccupied. Troubled, even. “The first time the medics told me you were not breathing was right as they took you out of my arms after I carried you to them. They revived you in the transport on the way to the hospital.”

“Mmm. Jacob told me about that after I woke up,” Miranda uttered in response. 

Come to think of it, until just now, it had never really occurred to her how Samara must have felt in that moment. For a while, at least, Samara might well have believed she had felt the last of Miranda’s life force slip away in her hands.

A secondary thought tiptoed into Miranda’s mind. Something else Jacob had told her in the same conversation that had never sat right with her.

“Did you really threaten doctors that you would consider it attempted murder if they took me off life support?” Miranda asked, audibly sceptical. She’d long since assumed it must have been some sort of misunderstanding or exaggeration on Jacob’s part. It didn’t strike her as something Samara would do.

Samara didn’t answer, nor did her expression change.

Miranda interpreted her silence. “You know what? Forget I asked,” she said, regretting even bringing it up. Of course Samara wouldn’t threaten doctors. The entire purpose of The Code was to protect innocent people, not harm them.

“They did discuss it with Jacob and myself. Your condition had barely changed for several days. And you were very ill. They had lost faith that there was any prospect that you...” Samara couldn’t seem to bring herself to say it. “It was after that conversation that I...recorded that message you saw. When I left, I did not think...I was not certain you would recover,” Samara confessed, with a heavy heart. There was no mistaking how much that dark thought must have plagued her in the intervening weeks. “Every day I spent elsewhere, I thought...”

“Thought what?” Miranda prompted when Samara trailed off.

Samara blinked out of her daze and shook her head, quickly banishing whatever imaginings had distracted her. “That is not important now. What matters is that you are alright. You survived where most would have perished, and for that I truly cannot express how thankful I am. Though it saddens me to learn the same cannot be said of some of our former comrades.”

“Mmm.” Miranda's gaze dropped to the ground, swallowing as she leaned on the bannister. “I can't say I didn't expect it. Surviving with all of us intact was never going to be an option. I'm not a believer in miracles, by any means, but we're lucky that even the four of us made it,” Miranda explained, sounding more like she was trying to convince herself than anything, unable to help but feel a pang in her chest at the knowledge that she wouldn't even get to bury most of them. They were all just...particles, somewhere in space. “I assume you know about Jack.”

“Jacob told me where I can find her. I intend to visit her later,” Samara confirmed. Miranda secretly hoped Samara didn't know everything - that she'd very nearly gotten Jack killed by not trusting her own judgement. She could never have forgiven herself if she had left her behind, trapped beneath that building. Especially knowing they would never find anyone else. “There are no others?”

“There's Wrex from the original Normandy. He made it out in one piece. You probably already knew that. But from our lot? No. Just you, Jacob, Jack and I,” Miranda answered, silently counting the missing among the fallen. “I, um...I found Zaeed and Grunt. Javik and Ashley Williams from the SR-3 as well,” she broke the news, unable to raise her head, their fates an uncomfortable burden to bear. “...I can take you to where they're buried, if you would like to pay your respects.”

Samara's face fell. It wasn't clear whether that was because she didn't know before Miranda told her, or because she felt a sense of shame and regret for leaving Miranda to shoulder that alone. “I will do that before I go.”

Miranda swallowed, brushing a stray lock of hair out of her eye. “One more thing. The ship where Kasumi was stationed to work on the Crucible...it didn't make it. It was too close to a relay, and...” She didn't finish that sentence, letting the implication speak for itself.

“...I am sorry to hear that,” Samara said honestly. Another life, another friend, confirmed lost. She paused, and glanced back at Miranda. “Are you alright?” 

“Yeah, I'm fine,” Miranda assured her, straightening up a little more.

Samara just stared at her, with silent compassion and understanding. Miranda didn't have to say anything. And Samara would never press her on it, respecting her space, but...she knew damn well that Miranda wasn't coping with this as well as she wanted everyone to think. Or even as well as she had no doubt tried to convince herself she was.

At that unspoken realisation, Miranda slumped forwards and uttered a humourless laugh, barely louder than a whisper, leaning more of her weight against the railing. “What can I say? Everyone's gone, Samara,” Miranda admitted, finally acknowledging it out loud. As much as she wanted to pretend the Normandy SR-3 was still out there somewhere, they would have heard from them by now if it was. Besides, finding Javik and Ashley had all but sealed it. She wasn't an idiot. She couldn't deny it forever. “Everyone's gone.”

“Not everyone,” Samara quietly replied, holding her gaze. “Not you.”

“I came pretty close,” Miranda murmured. The fact that she had lived where others died had been circling through her mind a lot lately, whether she wanted it to or not. Her survival in the war had come down to mere millimetres. If the bullet that hit her in the eye penetrated just a little deeper. If the red glare of the Reaper had moved just one degree counter-clockwise. If she’d landed on her neck when the shuttle crashed. If the infection had spread just a little further. If Samara had found her just a little later.

The truth was, Miranda hadn’t earned the right to be there in that moment anymore than the people who had perished. She didn’t deserve to live anymore than those who died. It had all come down to chance. Well, chance and genetic engineering, neither of which were her own doing. It was hard to feel like anything other than a thief, in a way - like, by avoiding what should have been certain death, she’d stolen time from others that didn’t truly belong to her.

“I keep thinking…” Miranda began, almost unconsciously seeking to give voice to thoughts she had never spoken aloud. She caught herself, hesitating, wondering whether it was too much to worry Samara with her morbid musings.

But, then, this was Samara. The one person she’d always been able to talk to honestly about anything. The person she’d opened up to about things she’d never told anyone else. The person who knew sides of her that nobody else knew, and probably never would. Not even Oriana.

She swallowed, and decided to continue.

“I keep thinking that I should be able to take the way I feel about losing everyone and channel it into...I don’t know, something fucking productive,” Miranda said, audibly frustrated with herself. “But there’s just...nothing. Nothing good is coming from this. There’s nothing I can do. And I can’t even see what it was all for. Did any of their deaths really matter? Did any of them truly die in a way that was ‘worth it’? Or is that just a comforting lie we tell ourselves?”

Samara considered her words for a long moment before breaking the silence.

“May I be honest with you?” Samara asked.

“Have you ever not been?” Miranda remarked in response. Samara didn’t reply to that. Assuming she was still waiting for her permission, Miranda eventually signalled for her to go ahead. After a few more seconds, Samara began to speak.

“In my own experience, the notion that grief can be transformed into something else - something that motivates you and drives you...that is a flagrant lie. It never happens,” Samara stated starkly. “Anger at losing someone, perhaps. A sense of injustice. Your love for that person. Even regret. But not grief. Even if channelled through some outlet, grief is never transformed into anything else. It remains as it is. An emptiness. A heavy hollowness. A missing piece that can never be replaced. A hole that never goes away, and never fully heals,” Samara spoke solemnly, her words carrying the weight of a long and painful life.

When Miranda looked at her then, she lost any semblance of the words she intended to say. In that achingly raw, real and honest moment, it was as if she was seeing Samara for the very first time. The warmth she felt from Samara’s proximity grew so hot that it began to burn. Everywhere that heat touched set Miranda's nerves on fire. Suddenly, it took great effort even to breathe.

Standing there in Samara's striking aura, it was as if that numbing sensation Miranda had carried with her recently - that diminishment - was not only stripped away, but flipped to its inverse. It was as if the world around her had never been so intensely tangible and corporeal as it was in that instant. Like she had never seen the colours and textures around her in such vivid detail. Like she was hearing sound at frequencies beyond the audible human range. Like she could feel the contours of every single atom and molecule beneath her fingertips.

And all because, for seemingly no reason at all, she had looked at Samara in a whole new light. Let her eye fall upon her in a way it had never gazed upon her before. And, now that she had, she was totally and utterly mesmerised by her.

“Forgive me,” Samara broke the silence.

Miranda shook her head, rattled by her thoughts and...whatever the hell it was about Samara in that moment that had left her temporarily spellbound. “What?”

“I know my words were not comforting,” Samara admitted. “For that, I apologise.”

“Oh.” A small smile crossed Miranda’s lips as she tried to hastily forget what had just happened and jump back onto the original train of the conversation, ignoring the flush of heat coursing through her veins. “No, actually. I’m glad you said it,” she quietly confessed. “In a weird way, it’s the first thing anybody’s said that’s made what I’ve been going through lately seem...normal.”

“It is. Whatever you are feeling, it is. There is no correct way to grieve,” Samara assured her. And she would know. “It may be futile to ask this of you, but please be gentler to yourself. Knowing you as I do, I have no doubt that you are doing the best you can given the circumstances. That is all anyone can ask of you.”

“Thank you,” said Miranda, not sure why she felt so on edge all of a sudden. She was never nervous around Samara. Or around anyone, for that matter. “Sorry for rambling at you about this. Ugh. I’m thirty-six years old and I sound like a child experiencing loss for the first time.”

“I did not lose anyone I truly cared about until I was over four hundred years old. When my mother died. So you are far ahead of me, if that is the measure,” Samara responded, putting matters into perspective. “Would that you were not. Inevitable though it may be, I would not wish loss upon anyone.”

Miranda swallowed heavily, keeping her gaze fixed on her fingers for a moment. She wasn’t sure how to respond to that. For a moment, she wasn’t sure if she remembered how to speak like a normal human person at all. What the hell was wrong with her all of a sudden? Why was she acting like this?

This was Samara. Samara. The one person she felt truly comfortable around, even at her very worst. So why did it feel like her skin could just jump clean off her body at any moment? Why did she already feel so naked and exposed?

“Jacob must have pointed you in my direction. He isn't joining us?” asked Miranda, electing to move to a lighter topic of conversation. Whatever was going on, she could at least have the decency to not let it affect her, or how she acted.

“I extended the offer, but he declined. He said he wished to respect our space and give us some time to speak privately, but I believe he finds the prospect of the two of us in each other's company rather disconcerting,” Samara answered. Her expression was always calm, collected and difficult to read, but Miranda interpreted that look as vague amusement.

“Sounds like him,” Miranda replied. Jacob may have been about the closest thing she’d ever had to a conventional best friend, but they were very different people. It made them a good team, but they also frustrated each other to no end at times.

“Whatever his reasons may have been, I am grateful for it,” Samara admitted, a fondness in her tone. So was Miranda. It gave them the chance to be alone, like they used to be. She'd missed that. Evidently, she wasn't the only one. “He also informed me that you contacted Falere on my behalf,” Samara continued, catching Miranda's eye. “I thank you.”

“I wouldn't have had to if you had just contacted her yourself,” Miranda pointed out. Sure, Samara had her Code to explain her actions, but in all seriousness at times it seemed more like a convenient justification for Samara's evasiveness than the definitive cause of it. Unless the Code had some rules against calls, texts and emails that Miranda didn’t know about.

Come to think of it, Samara’s disappearing act reminded Miranda of herself when she'd been on the run from Cerberus more than anything else.

“She’s probably still waiting to hear from you,” said Miranda, quietly searching for cues in Samara's unyielding exterior that would signal her intentions. “If you wanted to write to her, or even call her, I could easily arrange it,” she pointed out, subtly urging her to follow her heart and make contact with Falere, much as Shepard had done for Miranda when she'd rescued Oriana on Illium.

Samara bowed her head slightly, a momentary flash of sorrow creeping into her expression. “In time,” was all she said.

Miranda understood that sentiment. Or at least she thought she did. Their circumstances weren't entirely dissimilar. Both of them had only just reclaimed those relationships once thought lost forever; a chance at a new start with the one person they loved most. And self-deceit was the only thing keeping it from sinking in that it was entirely plausible that they might never be reunited. In spite of everything they'd fought for, in spite of outlasting all the odds, in spite of snatching victory from the jaws of defeat and saving the galaxy from annihilation, the one thing that they had nearly given their lives to protect might still be denied to them.

Their family.

If it weren't for the fact that Miranda refused to accept that possibility, it would have broken her heart. Never holding Oriana again. Never having that life together she'd worked so hard to make possible. Losing her would have drained her of everything she lived for.

So, yes, unless she was missing some important piece of the puzzle, Miranda knew all too well what Samara was feeling, and why talking to Falere was touching on too many raw, tumultuous emotions at that moment in time.

“Oh. I almost forgot,” Samara rather abruptly broke the silence, calling Miranda out of her thoughts. Samara extended her hand, holding out a small keychain shaped like Blasto the Hanar Spectre. “I promised to return this to you when next we met.”

Recognising it, Miranda couldn’t help but laugh. She’d completely forgotten about that before now. It was a cheap trinket she’d won at the arcade the last time she and Samara were on the Citadel together, when Shepard threw that party. That felt like a lifetime ago, even though it had only been three months.

“You do know that was a gift, right?” Miranda said through a chuckle.

Samara blinked, hesitant. “Justicars--”

“Eschew personal possessions. I know,” Miranda finished before Samara could. It was exactly what she’d told Miranda when she had first offered it to her. She thought they had resolved this dilemma the first time they had this conversation. “If your tenets require me to say that it’s still technically mine, then fine. It’s mine. But I insist that you hang onto it for me indefinitely. Does that work?”

“It…” Samara paused, evidently more than a little torn on the matter. Miranda would never understand how something so insignificant could be a breach of her Code. But, on the other hand, Miranda couldn’t fault Samara’s tireless dedication to her discipline. She didn’t cut corners. She didn’t cheat. She was who she was - what she had sworn to be. And that was nothing if not deeply admirable. “...I suppose that would be acceptable,” Samara eventually answered, with some slight hesitation, running her thumb over the keychain.

“I mean, unless you hate carrying that stupid thing around,” Miranda added offhandedly. She hadn’t considered that possibility.

“No,” Samara hastily assured her, not wishing to create that impression. “Of course I do not.”

Miranda couldn’t help but muster a smile at that response. Honestly, it was kind of incredible how a woman who was nearly a thousand years old, and who had experienced so much, could still have the capacity to demonstrate such pure, unfeigned innocence and earnestness. It wasn’t often that it showed, but Miranda had always liked that about Samara whenever it did.

“Then, please, keep it. Do this, in memory of when I still had both halves of my face,” Miranda remarked, mock-crossing herself, as if giving Samara her blessing. Samara stared at her blankly, caught in momentary shock. Miranda didn’t take long to realise why. “...Sorry. I forget you’re not used to seeing me like this. It’s fine. I’m in the ‘joking about it’ stage. Have been for a while, actually. You don’t need to…feel awkward about it.”

“No!” Samara interjected again, a little more urgently than the last time, loath to think that she had inadvertently hurt Miranda’s feelings, or made her self-conscious about her injuries. “That is not what…” Samara trailed off, pressing her hand to her forehead in annoyance at herself. “Forgive me. It appears that in this moment I can neither speak nor stay silent without making a fool of myself.”

“You could never appear foolish to me, Samara,” Miranda reassured her, speaking from the heart, so there could be no doubt she meant it.

Samara softened at that, glancing down at the trinket in her palm once more. “...I should not say it, but...in truth, this came to mean a great deal to me,” Samara quietly admitted, earning a raised eyebrow from Miranda. “Because you gave it to me,” Samara explained at her inquiring look. Miranda felt her pulse quicken at those words, the heat suddenly rushing to her cheeks. “It was all I had to remind me of you, when I did not know whether or not you would…”

Miranda couldn’t speak. Her mouth had gone dry. And her throat felt so tight all of a sudden. She had to turn away and cough to clear it.

Fortunately, Samara spoke again before she had to. “You are right. I will keep it. Even if it belongs to you, there is no reason I cannot carry this, if you wish it,” said Samara, mustering a smile as she closed her fingers around the keychain.

“Great. It’ll be our secret,” Miranda replied in a concerted effort to act normal despite feeling anything but, holding a finger to her lips.

Wait a second. Did her voice have a tremor in it, all of a sudden? God, she hoped not. What if Samara heard that? What on Earth was this? Was she sick or something and didn’t know it? Was that why she felt so off-kilter?

“Before either of us get carried away, I must let you know that my stay here will be short,” Samara rather sombrely confessed, aware it was not something Miranda would want to hear. “I do not wish to mislead you into believing otherwise.”

“You didn't; I suspected as much,” said Miranda. She would have been lying if she said it wasn’t disappointing. But at least she’d gotten to talk to her this time before Samara set off again, resuming her ceaseless quest to bring justice to the galaxy. That brought some amount of closure, if nothing else. “Where will you go? Come to think of it, where have you been?”

“Many places. Forgive me, I am not familiar with Earth's regions,” said Samara, powering up the omni-tool on her hand. “I have, however, found it helpful over my years to maintain a record of all my travels. You may be surprised how often it is necessary to know these things, and how easily one forgets,” she remarked with a small quirk of her lips that almost resembled a smirk, activating a holographic map that documented her travels.

“You're kidding.” Miranda stumbled backwards when the incalculably dense web of destinations formed over the hologram of Earth in front of her, her bad leg nearly giving out under her weight before she remembered to grab the railing to keep herself steady. “I'll be damned. You really did get the grand tour,” she commented, genuinely awed by how she'd managed to go literally all the way around the world in under three months. “How did you get to Dunedin?”

“On a ship, from the North Island of New Zealand,” Samara answered, her literalism containing no traces of irony. Miranda suspected Samara knew what she had meant, but was using that sneaky deadpan delivery of hers to play coy. 

“Keep saving those frequent flier miles and you could get back to Thessia at this rate,” Miranda offhandedly remarked. Samara gave her a slightly odd look.

If the Earth could have opened up and swallowed Miranda whole in that moment, she would have let it.

Miranda shook her head in embarrassment, regretting that stupid comment as soon as she had said it. Why did she try to be funny when she wasn’t? “Please remind me never to attempt to make jokes again. That was horrendous.” 

“It is quite alright,” Samara assured her, appreciating the intention, if nothing else. “It is good that you have maintained a sense of humour in these troubled times.”

“I...don't have one. Never have, never will,” Miranda awkwardly replied, letting go of her cane long enough to rub her neck. “But thank you for your tolerance.”

She couldn’t isolate what it was that was making her so anxious around Samara. This was the exact opposite of what it was ordinarily like - usually it put her so at ease just to be in her vicinity. Now, the mere act of existing in Samara’s proximity made her feel like she was tapdancing on hot coals, and they weren’t even standing that close. Inexplicable waves of heightened energy surged through her nervous system every time it felt like Samara shifted a little nearer. It made her heart race just to hear her voice, and to let each word she spoke wash over her.

Why was she feeling this way? What was she feeling?

Why hadn’t it gone away yet?

“For the most part, I have not found it difficult to acquire travel,” Samara explained. “I have found most people quite accommodating in light of these dark and troubled times. They do say adversity breeds camaraderie. And it would seem that quality is uniquely commonplace among your kind,” she said plainly, having developed a great affinity for the human species as a whole.

“Would it dim your view of humanity if I pointed out the locations where I think the Reapers' invasion actually caused several billion credits of improvement?” Miranda asked, hopeful that her dark quip would land that time. Perhaps she was imagining things, but she was pretty sure Samara cracked a smile at her dry remark, recognising the gallows' humour for what it was. Most of Samara’s facial expressions were extremely subtle at the best of times, though.

“The work you have done here is good,” Samara told her, looking out over the slowly recovering city once more. “Your ability and intellect have always been remarkable. Now that you have applied them to a more worthy cause than Cerberus, what you have accomplished is truly admirable,” she said, approving of Miranda's new direction in life. It pleased her to see she had found a path that seemed unlikely to ever put her in conflict with the Code.

“Yes. That's all true,” Miranda matter-of-factly replied, resting her hand on her cane once again. What could she say? Feigned humility had never suited her. “But I could always use help,” she said sincerely. “I could also use a friend. Are you sure I can't persuade you to stick around longer?”

They both knew the answer to that question already. But every part of Miranda really wanted to deny it.

“You cannot, though it is not for anything you lack. Quite the opposite,” Samara replied, earning a wrinkled brow. “Other cities on Earth do not have the benefit of your leadership and oversight. Any contributions I can provide will be limited here. My Code compels me to look for where aid is most needed.”

“...I see,” said Miranda. That explanation was fair enough, she supposed. So why did the thought of Samara's absence leave her feeling so hollow? Why did the thought of Samara going away again make her heart feel like it was contorting into a knot inside her chest? Why did it hurt so badly?

“We will have many chances to speak again before I depart. That would...” Samara paused, internally dismissing whatever she had been about to say. “For now, I fear I have lingered too long unannounced, and taken enough of your time. I can see you are responsible for many others. I would not keep you from it.”

For a split second, something surged inside Miranda – an intense emotional need she couldn't describe. But that ache in her heart couldn't go unspoken. She reached out to touch Samara's hand, covering it where it rested on the balcony, letting her cane fall from her grasp and clatter to the floor at her feet.

“Stay?” The word was softly spoken, a question that carried with it uncharacteristic vulnerability. “Please?” Miranda implored her.

“For how long?” Samara sought clarification, evidently unsure how to decipher Miranda's odd request. “Are you certain I would not be imposing?”

Miranda uttered something that amounted to a short, heavy-hearted laugh. “You know what I mean,” she said. She wasn’t talking about today. She wasn't asking for a few more hours, or even a few more days.

She didn’t want an end date at all.

Samara gazed at her for a long moment, her reserved expression as always difficult to decipher. Whatever her thoughts were, her features did not readily betray them. Miranda didn't know whether she gave the matter any consideration, or if her answer was already as clear as every rational part of her assumed it was. However, maybe it was just an illusion or a trick of the mind but...for a split-second, Miranda was sure that Samara looked conflicted. Even torn.

Samara withdrew her hand. With scarcely more than a thought, she drew Miranda's cane towards herself using her biotics, and extended it to Miranda.

“We each have a role to play in the aftermath of this war. These duties cannot be forsaken,” Samara spoke calmly, placing the walking stick in Miranda's grasp once more, and enclosing her palm around it. With her other hand, she reached out to cup Miranda's cheek, fingers softly brushing the scarred skin beneath her eye-patch. Miranda's breath caught at the contact. It was all she could do not to tremble beneath her touch as a tingling sensation flooded from Samara’s fingertips out to seemingly every single cell inside her body. “It grieves me that our paths do not align. Perhaps that will change in time.”

“...It's okay.” Miranda averted her gaze, willing her voice not to shake under Samara's gentle caress, unable to meet her stare, scarcely able to breathe. She knew little of what Samara's Code entailed, but still she regretted asking her to do something that would require deviating from it. That had been unworthy of her. Even if the non-Justicar part of Samara may have wanted to stay, what place of it was Miranda’s to put her in that difficult position? To ask her to turn away from her vows? “You don't need to explain. I understand responsibility better than most. However, I would like it if I saw you again sooner this time. Or if we stayed in touch while you were away,” she admitted, allowing herself that much.

Samara let her touch linger, grazing Miranda's damaged skin with such gentleness, never once breaking eye contact with her, even if it wasn’t returned. “As would I.”

Much as Miranda might have wanted to, she didn’t dare lift her head. Wasn’t sure she could handle it if she did. It felt like her entire being was disassembling under Samara’s fingertips. And, if Samara couldn’t feel her quivering, then it was a fucking miracle. Her heart was pounding like a drum, and her palm began to perspire against her cane, where it was covered beneath Samara’s left hand.

It wasn’t lost on Miranda that neither of them were the type of people who were entirely comfortable or natural around others. Even small gestures of physical affection were largely alien. They had never so much as hugged each other. A touch of hands here or there was the most they had ever...but that didn’t explain it either. Miranda hadn’t felt anything close to this the last time Samara gently clasped her hand. She’d never reacted this way around her before, or anyone.

Miranda had never felt anything remotely like this before. Ever.

What did it mean?

Miranda had to recoil from her touch just so she could breathe again. Samara didn't resist, nor seem offended, letting her hand fall from Miranda's cheek. “You take care of yourself out there, okay?” said Miranda, keeping her eye fixed anywhere but Samara, because she knew damn well by that point that she wouldn’t be able to control whatever it elicited in her to look at her in that moment. “And don't leave without saying goodbye this time.”

“I will try, on both accounts,” Samara replied, promising that much. “Farewell, Miranda.” Miranda didn't try to stop her, though she wasn't oblivious to the tension in her body as Samara passed her. The air had never felt so dense.

Miranda could feel from the sudden chill that filled the atmosphere in her absence that Samara had left, and only then did she dare to confirm it with a glance upwards, her gaze met by empty space where once she had stood.

Alone, Miranda finally released a deep exhale, that bizarre energy that had built up inside her at long last finding the space to wane, and subside, and work its way out of her, at least in part. She didn’t know how long she would need to linger out there to compose herself, but she felt no urge to hurry inside, despite the autumn air feeling bitterly cold having lost Samara’s warmth.

She didn’t even know where to start to untangle that messy jumble of unlabelled sensations and ambiguous emotions whose echoes still lingered inside her chest. She held her hand up to eye level and, sure enough, it was shaking. She clenched her fingers into a fist, which made that stop, at least.

She leaned against the railing and let her head fall into her hand. Miranda may have been comparatively unskilled when it came to deciphering even her own emotions, but she also wasn’t completely dimwitted, nor was she naïve. And the longer she stood out there, the more one possible answer for these nameless feelings began to emerge from recesses of her mind as the most obvious fit.

The thing was, she didn’t want that to be the answer. She wasn’t sure it made sense, or if it was even possible for her. And, if it was, then she had even bigger problems than she could have imagined. Because it could ruin everything.

Miranda’s hearing wasn’t quite good enough since the shuttle crash to notice the door sliding open behind her.

“So, Miss,” Seanne was the first of the students to ask, peering around the door to the balcony at the subtle urging of her brother. “Who was that?”

“A friend,” Miranda replied, staring out at the city, unmoving.

“A girlfriend?” Rodriguez said with a smirk.

“A friend,” Miranda repeated without inflection, as if reminding herself to remember that. Convincing herself not to dare begin to think otherwise.

“It's alright if she’s more than that,” Reiley teased. “Or if you've got a thing with Mr. Taylor. You can tell us, you know,” he prompted, grinning.

Miranda turned and arched her brow at them. “Have you got nothing better to do than gossip about my personal life?” she wondered aloud, beginning to understand the meaning of the old adage 'idle hands do the devil's work'.

“No. We really don't, no,” the group cheekily replied, happily falling back into the habit of having fun at the expense of their guardian now that it (hopefully) seemed like things were improving for her. With that, they closed the door and went back to report on her response to the others.

Miranda didn’t join them. Jack’s students were right, in a way, if they thought they’d perceived a sudden change in her mental state. For the first time in two weeks, Miranda wasn't being haunted by the dark spectre of death.

The problem was that now the only thing she could think about was Samara. And, the more she tried to reason herself into denying it, the louder that one increasingly isolated answer grew as it kept circling in her mind.

Somehow, someway, somewhere between all that time they’d spent together on the Normandy, and seeing Samara standing on that balcony again, and she didn’t know exactly when, where, why, or how it could possibly be true, but...

She’d fallen for Samara, hadn’t she?

She’d fallen for a woman she knew damn well could never love her back.

*    *    *

[theoldaeroplane]

monachopsis, n. — the subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place. A small series about two scouts.

BOOK III: WARNING & GOOD RIDDANCE & SOMEONE

READ PREVIOUS READ FROM THE BEGINNING

[———]

WARNING

When Ashley took off, Lorne had stayed frozen to the spot, startled. He had been anticipating needing to bully him into it. People would always surprise you.

In a flash, though, he was running after him, and the motion must have caught Salem’s eye. A heartbeat later and now Salem was running, too, making a wild break for it down the street. Salem was short, compared to his brother. And he couldn’t run worth a damn. Ashley caught up to him in seconds, with Lorne hot on his tail. Having caught up with him, though, he didn’t seem to know what to do next. It came down to Lorne scrambling ahead of them and blocking Salem’s path to bring the party to a halt.

There was a hoarse, ragged sound ripping the air up, Salem’s breathing. He was already on the defensive, bristling with his hands curled into fists in the dark, as he wheeled around to try and put his back to the chain-link fence they had stopped next to. And he was talking. “Don’t,” he was saying in a voice that was nothing at all like Ashley’s. “I’m giving you one warning, don’t—”

“Salem,” Ashley cut in again, through panting. “It’s, hey, we’re not—”

Whatever he was trying to say died in his throat, strangled out by a pained shout. Salem had whipped around, and as he did Lorne realized his hands were not merely fists. The dim light flashed off of something small and steely in his grip as he turned. “Fuck!” Ashley snarled, staggering back and clutching his arm. “Salem! It’s me!”

Nothing doing. It would appear Salem had something in common with Ash after all, because the moment Ash withdrew he had whirled back around and slashed his switchblade at Lorne. Lorne, at least, got out of the way in time.

Knives were a problem, but Lorne had not spent his time on BLU in vain. Salem and his switchblade were nothing compared to the RED spy and his balisong. He lashed out with one hand like a snake and got lucky, seizing Salem by the wrist. A twist and the blade clattered to the ground. Salem was silent, still breathing hard, and when Lorne got another look at him his face nothing short of terrified. “Hey,” he tried, loosening his grip enough to not hurt, “Salem, man, chill out, okay? We aren’t looking to hurt you but you gotta settle down.”

“Who the hell are you?” Salem snapped back, trying to wrench away. “How d’you know my name? Let me go!”

“I’m Lorne, I’m real cool and I wanna help you out. And I think you know that guy.” Lorne nodded in Ashley’s direction; Ashley was putting pressure on the messy slash in his forearm. “Or did we get the wrong Salem?”

Hesitantly, Salem turned to look. Lorne could feel it when his terror started to morph into shock. “What,” he started, and swallowed. Lorne let go of his wrist. “What the hell?”

Ashley glanced up at him, hunched over himself. “Um,” he started. “Hey. Hi. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

The silence was thicker than tar. Quietly, Lorne bent down and picked up the knife.

[———]

GOOD RIDDANCE

The reunion was … messy.

Some of it was what Lorne had expected, going off of what Ashley had told him: Salem demanding to know where he had gone, and what he was doing back here. Ashley answering, sheepishly, omitting plenty of detail. There was more silence than he had anticipated. Maybe Ashley’s way of not talking about anything was hereditary.

“So what do you want?” Salem said at last, curt and on edge. “I don’t have any money.”

“What? No, it’s—it’s not like that—”

“I don’t have drugs either.”

“It’s not like that!” Ashley repeated, a little more sharply. From where he had stopped to lean against the fence, Lorne watched him straighten up. “I just … I wanted to see you.”

Dead silence, again. Then: “You’re an awful liar.”

“Hey, kid, give him a break,” Lorne interjected. This won him a sullen glare. Lorne rolled his shoulders. “Look, you cut him and he’s still not trying to kick your ass. What’re you doin’ with a knife anyway?”

“It’s for in case I get jumped by crazy people. You know, like what just happened.”

Lorne exhaled, long and steady, out through his nostrils. This was maybe going to take some doing. “Okay, how about we start over?” he said, shaking out one hand and extending it. “I’ll go first. I’m Lorne, that’s Ashley, you’re Salem. We don’t want anything except to talk.”

He was answered with an even darker stare. Salem’s eyes flashed back to Ashley. “Maybe I don’t want to talk.”

“C’mon, you ain’t seen him in, what, like two years? There’s nothing you wanna say?”

Salem’s lip curled. “Yeah, okay. How about ‘good riddance’?”

It was almost imperceptible, the change that came over Ashley at this. He slouched by the faintest degree, casting his eyes aside. “Okay,” he said. “Okay, I get it. I’m—”

He was interrupted by the faint clatter of the chain-link fence as Lorne pushed himself off of it. “Kid. Look. Come over here a minute.”

It was an imperative, not a request. Lorne knew about making those, knew the right degree of iron to layer into his voice to hit the no-questions-asked quality it needed to move someone. Nevertheless he was still surprised when, after another long, black look at Ashley, Salem turned and followed Lorne across the street. Lorne looked behind him only once. Ash stood staring after them, every inch of him already defeated.

[———]

SOMEONE

Idiot, Ash tells himself. Of course something like this was going to happen.

He watches in stock-still silence as his brother and his partner leave him. His arm hurts like a bastard; it’s a shallow cut, but that doesn’t make it hurt much less. Seeking distraction he pulls his palm away from the gash, examining the blood smeared across it. In the dim light it is muddy and colorless, like tar or mud.

Of course Salem hadn’t wanted to see him. It wasn’t like Ashley had ever acted like he cared about him before he left. Casey probably would’ve been better received, he thinks bitterly, even though in the pit of his stomach he knows that’s garbage. Casey’s probably dead somewhere. Casey had been on more drugs than Ashley even knew the names of. And Casey had never liked either of them. Ash can count his pleasant memories with Casey on one hand; even Carver and Joan have more to their names than that.

He wonders when Salem began carrying a switchblade. He wonders if maybe he always has, and he just never noticed. It seems likely, but he isn’t sure. Salem had always been quiet and withdrawn; too girly, by Carver’s scathing approximation.

He risks a glance toward Lorne and Salem again. Salem has slouched back against a stop sign, and Lorne is half-perched on a fire hydrant, talking animatedly. He watches them, straining his ears to try and catch what they’re saying, until Salem glances his way. Ash rips his eyes away instantly, this time fully turning away.

This is all happening too fast. Everything has been happening too fast. Two months ago he hadn’t even known Lorne; he hadn’t had more than a shadow of a thought about Salem since he’d left home. He curls his fingers around the chain-link fence and presses his forehead to the wires, trying to understand what had happened. How Lorne had known there was more to him than what Ashley revealed, when even Ashley hadn’t known that. He doesn’t even remember what he used to do every day, before Lorne wedged himself into his life. It was like he hadn’t even been a real person.

He considers this, weighing his past even as he forces himself not to look behind him. No real answer comes to him, just a jumbled collection of memories he has a hard time piecing together, as if they belonged to someone else, and really, maybe they had. He wonders about that, about what it means. Maybe it doesn’t matter what or who he used to be. Maybe all that matters is that now he can be someone else. He thinks he could be okay with that. He already likes whoever he is now more than he liked the thing he had been before.

Good riddance indeed.

Carefully, he extricates himself from the chain-link fence and turns. The anxiety returns twofold when he sees Salem and Lorne crossing the street again. They come to a halt in front of them, and Lorne’s expression is unreadable. “Hey,” Ash says.

Lorne gives him a nod, glancing at Salem. Salem is shorter than Lorne, just barely, but the way he carries himself makes him look a great deal smaller. For the first time Ashley notices the shadows under his eyes, though his brother’s gaze is fixed on the concrete. “Hey, um,” Ash tries again. “Salem?”

Salem’s eyes flit up for just an instant. It’s long enough. “I’m sorry,” he says, the words clumsy in his mouth. “I … I haven’t been a very good brother, is what I mean. You, you don’t have to forgive me, or nothin’ like that. But, just, if you’ll let me—I want to try and make up for it, if you’d let me.”

He gets no answer, not at first, and looks up at Lorne in a mild panic. Lorne meets his gaze, brow knit. They are interrupted by the unmistakable sound of a sniffle. When Ash looks again, he finds Salem with grit teeth, pawing dampness from one eye. And, slowly, he nods. Ash bites his lip, looking again at Lorne. “What the hell did you say to him?”

“Wasn’t me, man,” Lorne says quietly, as he reaches down to carefully put his hand on Salem’s shoulder. “All I did was ask if he’d hear you out.”