Prologue

The sun on Rannoch rose early in the summer seasons, but Tali'Zorah was up early to watch it, as she was every morning. Her bones ached now, and she had various auto-immune disorders that were eating away at her joints that made waking and moving painful these days. But it was worth it to see the sunrise. Even after all these years, Tali still felt joy watching her own sun come over the horizon.

This morning she was without her suit, and as such was watching the sunrise from indoors. She could go outside without her suit after years on Rannoch, but at her advanced age infections and allergic reactions were always a risk, so the cleaned air of her house was the only place she went suit-less regularly.

This morning was special though, and Tali was expecting a visitor. Something of a rarity these days, but she was looking forward to it.

Just as the rocks turned a bright orange, Tali's omnitool beeped. When she answered, a young, unsuited female appeared.

"Lady Tali'Zorah vas Normandy, it's me, Unna'Koris nar Zaal, from the University. I am not early am I?"

"No Unna'Koris, you are not. I was just watching the sunrise. I'll open the door for you."

After a moment Unna'Koris came out onto the patio, smelling slightly of the disinfectant spray most quarian's used so that face to face contact was not as risky. The youngster activated an audio capture program on her omnitool and sat down next to Tali.

"Thank you so much Lady Tali'Zorah, for giving me the opportunity to interview you like this. This will surely count as my pilgrimage service, I hope to earn the right to the name vas Qwib Qwib."

Tali smilled. Pilgrimage, and the name "vas Qwib Qwib" were conventions from back in the days of the migrant fleet. While every quarian now had the right to use the name "vas Rannoch" it had become something of a tradition to use the name of the last ship you had been posted on in the migrant fleet as your name. Though in Unna's case, it was the name of the ship her father, Zaal'Koris had been posted on. Like most quarians of her generation, Unna had been born on Rannoch.

"You are very welcome, Unna. But I must warn you as I did at your father's wake, this will not be a story of destroying geth or blowing up Reapers, though a few explosions may occur."

"Of course Lady Tali'Zorah. May I start the recording with that? Please, tell me what you did at the wake."

Tali smiled, and looked at the picture of the handsome human on the table beside her.

"For me, my story was never as our people saw it, the story of saving the galaxy, or even the story of reclaiming our homeworld. It was a love story."

Authors Note:

Welcome to Keelah Se'lai, the (increasingly AU) story of Tali's life. I'm Full-Paragon, and I want to thank you for taking the time to read this story. If you see something you like or don't like, please, drop me a review, I love to talk with my readers. But no matter what you do, I hope you enjoy this story.