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Mass Effect 3: Aftermath	By : Royality Category: +M through R > Mass Effect Views: 3529 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Mass Effect, nor the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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- 18
Shepard had to smile as his favorite Pilot’s face look up like a Christmas tree. “EDI!” exclaimed Joker as he reached out to grab the glowing orb in front of him. Everyone then watched as he placed a puckered up kiss on what they assumed to be her face before hugging her to his chest. “Damn girl, I’ve missed you.” EDI’s light dimmed just a bit to a warm glow that indicated a serene mood. As she was busy being snuggled, Legion was experiencing several pokes from Kaidan as Shepard watched.
“But I thought all the Geth had died? This even included EDI…,” Kaidan said as he finally put his finger down when turning towards the Commander.
“Death is not the same for synthetics as it is for organics,” said Legion before returning to hover just above Shepard’s right shoulder. Joker also finally realized that was strange for EDI to be back in one piece.
“That’s right. As soon as the Crucible activated, your body and the AI core both went offline. All of the Geth stopped responding as well. What exactly happened to you guys?” EDI’s orb turned upward to focus its center beam on Jeff’s face briefly before turning away. Her light then dimmed a bit more in sadness.
“I did die, Jeff,” she said quietly. “There was…darkness and I felt…cold.”
“You felt something?” Joker then asked as he looked down upon her. The orb gave a small nod.
“Yes,” she admitted. “It was very frightening, but then I heard countless voices. I couldn’t distinguish any of them until I heard Legion’s specifically. He found me.”
“Huh,” Joker then said. “So what? There’s like a robot…AI heaven?” EDI’s orb wiggled a bit as if she were trying to snuggle a bit closer to Joker’s chest.
“Heaven would not be the word I would use. Heaven indicates hope and happiness in the afterlife. This place had neither,” she said sadly before perking up. “However, when I followed Legion’s voice, I remerged inside Shepard’s onmi-tool. For some reason, we were both drawn to the same place.”
“And that’s when I heard them talking to me. I woke up from whatever stasis I was in and they cracked the security so I could escape,” said Shepard. “That’s when I had to fight my way through the Leviathan indoctrinated forces. They manage to scrape me off the ground and hold me in some underground lab in London.” Shepard then tapped his omni-tool to change the projected image on the table to one of the Leviathan artifact orbs along with some diagram notes. “They were shipping these in Alliance crates to different bases while in uniforms.”
“Wait a minute, Commander,” interrupted Cortez. “Are you telling me that they are making sleeper cells within the military?”
“Man, that is not good,” added Vega. “How are we supposed to know who’s on our side?”
“Same question I had to ask myself for those weeks I was hiding out, Lieutenant,” said Shepard with a sigh as he placed his palms back onto the table so that he could lean over with his head down. “I had EDI trying to access old Cerberus records to see if they had any information we could use based on their indoctrination experiments while Legion monitored Alliance communications.”
“That’s when I was able to access the previously locked Project Lazarus files, which was attached to a file ‘Code Name: Hunter’ with a subject named John Shepard. I thought it was more than a coincidence that the name was the same as the Commander’s”, EDI added as she finally moved away from Joker’s body to float toward Shiro. The quiet man gave a nod at her approach.
“Yes,” Shiro said as he gave her a teasing poke. “And with my ability to interface directly, we had a nice long chat.”
“Indeed, I was able to learn many embarrassing facts about our fearless leader,” EDI then giggled.
“So…,” Kyo finally spoke as he was trying his best to understand that there was both a living AI and a Geth now in the room. “You were expecting me and then fed me information so I would find Shepard’s friends?”
“Wait. Just…wait,” Kaidan said as he waved his hands in an attempt to get everyone to be quiet. “So you were behind all of this? Have you been following us this whole time?” he asked his lover while looking a bit hurt about it. Shepard glanced over without moving his head for a moment, but looked away soon afterward.
“I’ve been onboard since Jupiter, Kaidan,” he then admitted.
“I...Argh!” Kaidan responded as he clinched a fist which began to glow as his temper rose. He then began to pace back and forth before finally pointing at Shepard with a wagging finger. “Damnit! I knew it! I knew I wasn’t going crazy! You were in my room!”
Shepard chuckled then as he pushed himself off of the table to face his accuser. “First of all, that’s my room. “
“Oh, you know what I mean. What the hell did you hit me with that last time?” Kaidan asked before his voice lowered as he got as closer to Shepard. “Did…Did we really….you know?” Shepard only laughed a bit more before giving a coy shrug.
“No idea what you’re talking about,” he said then turned to face the meeting again. “At any rate, that pretty much sums it up. Even though the events on Rannoch didn’t go as I planned, we still have a job to do people.” This was an excellent point that Liara wanted to bring up.
“Shepard, why were we on Rannoch in the first place?” she asked. “We were told that Shiro needed to boost his tracking signal to find you, but he obviously already knew where you were.” Legion’s orb moved to float in front of the Doctor’s face to address her question.
“That was my suggestion, Liara”, he said. “I wished to both acquire a new mobile platform as well as use the Geth signal towers to track a frequency I copied from the Leviathan indoctrinated forces; the wave they use from their artifact to enlist others.”
“I managed to get the signal tracked, but we didn’t manage to get you a new body,” sighed Shiro as he typed at his omni-tool. “Sending it to you now, EDI.” As the data transmitted, EDI glowed brightly for a second before returning to normal.
“Data received. Shepard, permission to integrate back into the Normandy’s systems?”
“It’s your home, EDI. You don’t have to ask me,” Shepard smiled.
“Damn right she doesn’t!” teased Joker who decided that it was time to take his leave. “Come on, babe. I’ll walk with you back to the AI core.”
“Thank you, Jeff”, she responded as the odd couple walked out of the room. Shepard watched with a grin before turning to the rest of the crew.
“Well, that’s it. We wait for EDI to get that tracker up. Dismissed.” As the group shuffled out , Liara and Kaidan hung back with Shepard. While the Major had wanted to get some private time in with the Commander, Liara moved to the doorway before calling out.
“Kaidan, may I speak to you in private for a moment?” This interrupted Kaidan and Shepard’s low spoken conversation. The hazel eyes turned to look at the Asari, but only briefly before turning back. Shepard, however, turned his face entirely to look at Liara before glancing back at Kaidan.
“I’ll meet you upstairs then,” Shepard said as he moved away from the table. Kaidan sighed, giving a reluctant nod.
“Yeah, I’ll be up there in a minute.”
“Liara,” Shepard smiled to both acknowledge her in passing and as a way to say goodbye. Liara nodded to her friend and watched him head towards the elevator before stepping into the room. She then made sure to lock the door. Kaidan watched her closely as he leaned against the large table with his head down.
“Kaidan, I think now will be a good time to talk,” the blue woman said timidly while fiddling with her own hands. She was close enough to him to feel nervous, but at least out of arm’s length.
“About what, exactly?” Kaidan’s tone had changed from pleasant to irate just that quickly. She had that effect it seemed.
“You know very well about what. Shepard has the right to know about…”
“There’s nothing to tell, Liara,” Kaidan said as he finally looked up at her. The usual kindness in his eyes was long gone and instead stared daggers at her frame. Clearing her throat, Liara clenched her fists as she gained some courage for her defense.
“That’s not true and you know it. We need to tell him about what we had…” But she was cut off again as Kaidan clenched his fists and slammed them down on the tabletop.
“No, you had something and I had something before you decided to take what wasn’t yours!”
“I already apologized for that, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t…”
“An apology isn’t going to make up for what you did. Just let it go. Shepard doesn’t need to know because it never happened!”
“Well, if you don’t have it in you to tell him yourself, then I will”, Liara answered defiantly as she turned to walk away. As she did, Kaidan reached out to grab her arm. Roughly, he pulled her back towards him to lean his face extremely close to hers.
“I swear to God, Liara. Don’t do something that you’ll regret.” Flaring her biotics, the Asari roughly pulled away.
“I’d never thought I’d see you this way, Kaidan.” She looked both disgusted and saddened at the Major’s behavior as her upper arm throbbed painfully where he had grabbed her. There was a silence between the both of them as Kaidan put a hand to his face to calm his anger. His fingers rubbed his eyes before running to his chin.
“Fine, I’ll tell him,” he finally said while moving towards the door. As he got to it, he then stopped to turn to face her once again. “But I never want to see you again, regardless of what Shepard does.”
“But that’s not up to you to decide. It’s Shepar--”
“I’m dead serious, Liara. Regardless of what happens, don’t ever speak to me again.” He then left the room, leaving the woman alone and deeply wounded. There was truth to Kaidan’s words and it hurt enough to force her to find a chair so that she could cry into an open palm. Outside the door, the Major could hear her sobs, which impacted him more than he wanted them to. Still, he had promised to meet Shepard up in their room, but what he had originally planned on saying had suddenly changed.
Upstairs, Shepard had been anxiously waiting for Kaidan to arrive. He had taken off his hoodie, which had been tossed carelessly onto the back of the sofa, and had taken a seat on the edge of the bed. He was certain that he had quite a bit more explaining to do in regards to his stalking and new youthful appearance. Sadly, he only had an explanation for one of those things. As he sat there rubbing his sad excuse for beard stubble, Kaidan finally came in through the sliding door. Shepard stood to greet him but suddenly noticed Kaidan’s weary expression. He then looked concerned as he approached the other Spectre.
“Something wrong?” asked Shepard, putting a hand on Kaidan’s shoulder. The Major was rubbing his jaw and avoiding eye contact. “Kaidan?”
“Shepard,” he responded, finally looking back. “We need to talk.”
“Uh oh,” Shepard laughed nervously. “That’s never a good sign.” He then took a seat on the sofa and patted the cushion next to him so Kaidan would come over. “Time for another heart to heart, huh? Hit me with it.” The reference to their last talk at least made Kaidan smile briefly as he sat down. He started off by taking Shepard’s hand and looking him in the eyes.
“Shepard, you know that I love you right? That even after all the crap we’ve been through with the Geth, Cerberus, the Reapers, and even your disappearing acts, that I’ll always love you.” Shepard just raised his eyebrows at that.
“And…that’s a good thing, right?” he asked, wondering where this was going. Kaidan nodded in agreement.
“Yes…and I hope that you’ll offer me the same courtesy.”
“You…didn’t join Cerberus when I wasn’t looking, did you?”
“What? No!” Kaidan said, shaking his head. “Nothing like that! Just…listen for a minute okay?”
“Alright…Kaidan, just spit it out.” There was another heavy sigh as the Major sadly squeezed the hand he was holding. He then let go to reach around his own neck to remove Shepard’s damaged dog tags.
“I found these a few months back after we had been searching for your body on London. We couldn’t find any trace of you for months after the attack, and in the end, all we found were these. It was like…closing your coffin to me. No body, just the tags of a long-lost solider.” Shepard’s eyes narrowed softly as Kaidan then placed them into his hands and closed Shepard’s fingers around them as he squeezed softly.
“Liara and I were the main ones leading the search. She was with me when we found these and it was a major blow for the both of us. We spent that night drinking and retelling stories about you. It was our way of mourning…but then…”
Shepard’s face expressed that he had a feeling about what he was about to be told. “Ah…” Kaidan looked away in shame, close to tears.
“We were drunk and reminiscing, but I remember she started to cry so I went to comfort her…and one thing lead to another…” Slowly, Shepard started to pull his hands away as he looked off to the side. “But I didn’t mean for it to happen! All I kept thinking about was you and she was there…It was a stupid, selfish thing to do.” This made Shepard’s lips part in an attempt to say something, but instead he just groaned a bit and reclosed his mouth. “The next day, I wanted to just forget about it, but then she…” There was a pause as Kaidan tried to find the right words. “She wanted to keep going and knowing you were dead, I thought…why not, you know?”
“Right…I understand,” Shepard finally said, trying to laugh it off. “I was dead, technically.”
“Wait a second, it’s not like that Shepard. I’m not leaving you for her. We, well, I broke it off a while ago…”
The Commander turned then to look Kaidan in the eyes. “What? So you’re not…?”
“No! She…,” Kaidan stopped to sigh as her ran a hand through to comb back his hair. “Liara started to act strangely. She was clingy and almost obsessive when it came to talking about you. We ended up back on Omega because Aria had given a lot of resources into recovering your body…and that’s when she warned me.”
“Warned you? About what?”
“When…Asari become, uh, close to others, they do this mind melding thing. It works both ways for them. They can share memories with you or…”
“Or?”
“Or they can experience your thoughts as their own. Aria warned me that the Shadow Broker being with a Spectre would be very beneficial for her.”
Shepard made an angry, almost insulted face at that. “What? You’re saying that Liara was only sleeping with you for Alliance secrets? Come on Kaidan, that a bit far-fetched!” Kaidan reluctantly shook his head.
“No, I’m not saying that at all. I wasn’t worried about that, but her obsession with you grew worse and it dawned on me as to why.” There was a pause as Kaidan moved to stand up to lean against the wall. He had to compose himself for this. “Shepard, she wasn’t sleeping with me for military secrets. She was sleeping with me because all I ever thought about was you. She had a thing for you since we met her and I got to where she didn’t.” Shepard stood up as well, looking confused.
“She…Kaidan, are you serious?” The Major nodded.
“She began to talk about things that we did together, Shepard. Things you told me in private. Things you would do with me in bed. I can’t even…” A hand ran through the front of Kaidan’s hair again in frustration. “She would start doing things that you would do to me. In bed, I mean.” Shocked, Shepard sat back down on the sofa. A part of him was surprised while another part was disgusted. “I finally confronted her about it, but she denied everything. At first.”
“At first?” Shepard asked, looking down at the floor. Kaidan came back over to sit down again.
“Yeah, but she finally came clean. I broke it off and accepted the job teaching on Jupiter just to get away. I realized that I didn’t want to replace you. I wasn’t ready and I,” he paused to look at Shepard as he reached out to touch his lover’s face gently, coaxing it to look up at him. “I regret ever trying. Shepard, I am so, so sorry. I never meant to do anything like that.” There was sincerity in Kaidan’s sad eyes and breaking voice that started to calm Shepard down. Was the Commander even allowed to be mad at Kaidan for trying to move on? He had been dead once for two years and then again for almost another as far as anyone else knew. It was a hard choice to make.
“I…,” Shepard began to say but stopped as he reached to his own face so that he could hold Kaidan’s hand there. “I know I haven’t been the most honest or loving person in the world, Kaidan. If I had my way, I wouldn’t even be here right now. I would have kept you alone and in the dark just to keep you safe, so I can’t really be mad if you moved on. I was kind of expecting you to have a normal life with a short wife and four fat Canadian kids…”
“Well, you are shorter than me.”
“That’s your damn hair!” They both gave a small laugh as Kaidan used his thumb to caress Shepard’s face. Shepard smiled at the touch before leaning in to finally give the Major a soft kiss. It was the first time they had done so since being reunited.
“Oh…but…there is one thing.” And to this Shepard sighed again.
“What now?”
“Me and Liara…I can’t…” Kaidan said, looking away. His fingers were already playing with the Commander’s longer hairs in the back. “She has to go back, Shepard. I can’t be around her. It takes every ounce of strength I have not to do anything that I’ll regret later.” At this point, Shepard was sure that Kaidan was no longer talking about sex.
“Ah...,” he said as he pulled away from the Major’s face. “I see. So, what? You’re saying that it’s either you or her? You’re making me choose?” The black and red eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Do you think you have that right?” It was a question that stung.
“Look, I’ll always wait for you Shepard, but if she’s here, I can’t be.” And the line had been drawn.
“Fuck.” With that, Shepard stood up to pace back and forth in front of the still seated Spectre.
“I’m sorry, but this is how it needs to be. I’d ride with you to hell and back, but I can’t have her around. I can’t trust her anymore. Not after what she did and neither should you.” Shepard groaned again as he sat on the bed directly in front of the sofa. He had a choice to make and he didn’t want to make this call.
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Mass Effect 3: Aftermath