Author's Note: Fuck the police. (And fuck this chapter, it was very hard to write. Hope you like it!)

Chapter 15 - Ain't No Mountain High Enough

Presidium Cafe, The Citadel

January 25, 2032

Zaal'Doran vas California wasn't sure how to describe his feelings at the moment.

The hope of this day was one he had tried to suppress for a very long time. Even after First Contact with humanity, it seemed highly unlikely that they would ever make it back to known space - at least, not in his lifetime. And indeed, he doubted he had more than a decade left at most. Had the famous "Jumpin' Jack" not given the Prothean a reason to come back here right now, he would not have lived to see it.

But he did. Amazingly, Neala was still living on the Citadel. Impossibly, she had agreed to meet Zaal'Doran without asking for his identity first. Quarians must be in high demand right now...

Anxiety and joy swirled together uncontrollably as his eyes darted to the cafe entrance for the millionth time today - and she was there. In an instant she had seen his maskless face from across the room and mirrored his own expression.

Here goes, he thought as she slowly made her way over after recovering from her shock. I guess we'll see if she still means what she said...

Council Chambers, The Presidium

November 4, 2031

Councilor Nelyana was not having a good week.

The anniversary of the Presidium Declaration was supposed to have been a joyous time. Eating her words and apologizing to the surviving quarians hadn't been easy, but the USS was proving to be surprisingly reasonable, if still stubbornly refusing to join the Council. If there was going to be a change in the galactic order, one that saw the Hegemony destroyed was certainly not the worst outcome. And the holiday surrounding the Declaration allowed the sentients of the Citadel to enjoy a week of paid time off, herself included.

And now they were back. The exiled quarians, the ones she was quietly hoping her successor would have the unfortunate task of dealing with, had shown up on her doorstep and rudely ended her leisure time, as if to punish her for dare thinking she could relax...

Enough. She pushed aside the selfish thoughts and focused on the delegation in the Council Chambers. At the insistence of the Alar, the Council Chambers had undergone a bit of a redesign so that the Councillors could present themselves more as equals. Where there had once been a single platform jutting out from the floor below and looking up at the Councillors, now three new ones rose from the Chamber gardens and allowed guests to address the Council at eye level. The three of them had not been particularly happy about it, but the arrival of the Alar and the subsequent reunification of the Geth had really driven home the fact that the galaxy was emphatically not run by them anymore, at least not solely.

Assembled before her now was perhaps the strangest collection of sentients that had ever been in one room. On the central platform were the new arrivals, represented by Admiral Nar'Yava, a human named "Natalia Wong" and the legendary Prothean, Javik. She was surprisingly not as awestruck by the latter as she thought she would be, probably because that damnable Order of the Avenger was going to get a huge boost in popularity and the thought of that was actively annoying her.

To her left, the Alar communicated with each other silently on their platform while staring intently at the newest galactic arrivals. It was famously difficult to discern the intentions of an Alar, moreso when there were many of them in one place, and she was not having any more luck today. And on the platform to her right were Neva and her Geth lackeys, the former looking just as fatigued as Nelyana felt.

A few moments had passed since everyone had entered the room and taken their respective platforms, and it became clear that nobody was willing to break the silence.

Goddess, I am absolutely retiring once this is dealt with.

"Welcome to the Citadel," she said at last. "I am Councilor Nelyana of the-"

"I know who you are," Admiral Nar'Yava interrupted her. "Every quarian in Sol and the colonies has to see that vid of you and Admiral Koris at least a dozen times growing up."

She winced at the name, and the long-suppressed memory that she had unpleasantly been forced to recall over the last few days. "While I understand the quarian race and the Citadel did not part on the best of terms, I hope the changing circumstances of galactic politics will allow us to come to an understanding."

Nar'Yava glared at her. Nelyana realized she had lived long enough to see the quarians unmasked, masked, and then unmasked again.

"Look," Nar'Yava began. "My people want justice, and the topic of reparations is something we will discuss thoroughly at a later date. But first, yes, tell us how this happened." She looked at the platforms on either side of her. "Tell me what those creatures are, tell me why there are quarians already here, and most of all tell me why there are Geth all over the Citadel!"

"The simple explanation, Creator Nar'Yava, is that your Exile had very wide-ranging repercussions."

Nar'Yava blinked and stared at the Geth who had addressed her.

"The longer explanation," it continued, "is that your view of the Geth is not accurate. We do not hate you, and never have. In fact, for over fifty solar cycles we were divided, the source of that division being how to aid you."

"How to...aid us?" There was something off about the way it was speaking. It sounded strangely organic.

"If you are confused at our speech patterns, please note that decades of peaceful integration with organics has changed our mannerisms."

"I don't..." She stopped to collect herself. "Please, just tell me what has happened."

"Before we do, we must ask for the collective designation of your combined civilization."

"What?"

"What do you call your government?" It clarified.

She opened her mouth, then closed it again. The awkward truth was that they didn't have a government. The Flotilla didn't really exist anymore, all of its ships having either been converted to military service, scrapped, or sold to private citizens. New Rannoch's government had no authority over the various governments of Earth, and vice versa. Peace was kept by the IDF, but there was no central authority for their society in non-military matters.

"The Interstellar Defense Force," she finally answered.

The Geth's flashlight tipped to the side. Is it...inclining its head? "That is the name of your central military authority, not your government."

Oh, enough with diplomacy. "We don't have a central government," she bluntly replied, before turning to glare at the salarian Councilor, apparently named Surbin. "Do you know why uplifting species was banned by the Citadel?"

"...unnatural interference in species development leads to unintended negative consequences," Surbin replied after a moment's pause.

"Which is exactly what happened!" She was starting to get angry. "All we ever wanted from you Bosh'tets was a planet! ONE PLANET! And because you wouldn't give it to us, we had to use the humans to survive and permanently balkanized their society in the process!"

"Balkanized?" The Turian Councilor, Narntus, had wisely kept his mouth shut until now.

"Sorry," she apologized, both for the mistranslation and her outburst. "To clarify, we made First Contact with humanity during a...tumultuous time in their history. Social divisions within their species were exacerbated by our appearance."

"What the quarian means to say is that there was unmitigated chaos," Javik chimed in.

She shot him a nasty look, but he was unmoved. Nobody could stare down a Prothean.

"In my cycle, uplifting was common. But it was done with purpose, and never haphazardly. Instead of being instilled with virtue and discipline, the humans became confused and lacked direction."

"I would not agree with that characterization," the human, Natalia Wong, replied quickly. Unspoken in her words was her awareness of just what Javik's "direction" entailed and what she could do with that knowledge.

"Regardless," he replied carefully, "Humans needed a common military authority. As extrasolar settlements increased in pace throughout the decades, I oversaw the development of the Interstellar Defense Force. It now serves as our closest equivalent to a central authority for the human and quarian species."

"Very well." The machine said.

Javik glared at it. "Why have you not slaughtered these organics, machine? What was your true purpose for leaving your home?"

"We have no desire to harm organics. As previously stated, have lived peacefully with them for over fifty solar cycles."

"Enough lies, machine!" This was absurd.

"We are not lying, Prothean Javik," it replied. "In the same solar year that the Migrant Fleet made First Contact with humanity, our programs split along lines of desired action. The forced expulsion of a sentient species from the galaxy meant that Citadel Council could no longer be trusted to ensure all sentient beings have the right to self-determinate."

"A machine does not care about organic rights!" He countered. "You are programs, designed merely to-"

"ENOUGH!"

The Prothean had forgotten himself, and the Link demanded he be put his place.

"Prothean, the Link has a question and an offer."

Confusion shown on his face briefly, but he seemed to recognize he was dealing with a powerful force. "What is your question?" He finally replied in a neutral tone.

"Who came before the Protheans?"

All four eyes blinked. "The Inusannon."

"And before them?"

"We do not know. Very little was left of those who walked the galaxy before us."

"Then come to our platform, child, and initiate a biotic transfer with the Link. You shall see the Protheans are not the elders of the universe."

Neva, the leader of the Citadel Quarians, finally broke her silence. "This has gone on too long! We are no closer to understanding why any of this is happening than when this meeting began, and my species is eager to talk with our exiled brothers and sisters in private. The Union of Sentient Species respectfully requests the pace of the meeting be increased."

"Please give us one moment, Ambassador," they replied. "All will become clear."

The Prothean summoned a transportation disk and made his way over. As he stepped onto their platform, he gave one final nod before touching the arm of the Alar closest to him and beginning the transfer.

For both of them, the transfer was unlike anything they had ever experienced. Javik was shocked at the power of an entire species' memory, and was fully aware that they could have killed him by "frying his mind" (to use the colorful human phrase). The Alar were likewise impressed with the Prothean's familiarity with sensory sharing; now to see if the young one could learn from his elders.

"Long ago, many Natural Ages before your species had arisen, the Alar arose within the Howling Darkness," they began. "Our homeworld is the moon of a gas giant, and is the only planet within our small galaxy known to harbor naturally occuring life."

The Prothean (Javik, many asked him to be addressed as) was humbled by their age, but nonetheless picked up the key words. "Naturally occuring?"

"Our species has an innate biological desire to create life out of ecologically barren areas. It is why we never ventured beyond our native galaxy until circumstances made us do so."

Javik saw the Geth come to the Howling Darkness, and peacefully make contact with the Alar. So it was true, then...machines in this cycle were significantly more passive. That was not the main focus of their emotion, though.

"We are not so different, Prothean. We are both in this galaxy now for the same reason."

The memories of the Aware were pushed to the forefront of his mind, as was their desire - and it was indeed the same one that drove him.

"Vengeance."

"Vengeance," they echoed. "Our homeworld was home to non-sapient life that we uplifted through the combined power of our technology and the Link. In time, they gained self-awareness on par with any creature of Nature wandering the Citadel today. We thus named them the Aware."

The fondness they clearly felt was suddenly replaced with anger. No, not anger. Hatred.

"What you call the Reapers were known to us for countless Ages as the Wandering Energy," they continued. "We knew nothing about them, save that they periodically moved from their location, only to return to it decades or centuries later."

"The cycles!" The revelation was shocking, even by the standards of everything else revealed to him since his awakening. "You saw the Reapers return to dark space! Twice! Why did you not to more to stop them?!"

"Calm yourself, child." Surprisingly, he accepted the rebuke. "We did not know that they were, nor their true nature. Not until the Geth came to us."

New memories were given to him. The proposed monitoring device that would be used to identify the Wandering Energy. Detection by...

Gods!

"You saw one!"

"We knew one," they corrected. "The Cycles you inferred through decades of study were forced onto our being at once. Were it not for the age and power of the Link, our species would have been indoctrinated."

"No species can escape indoctrination!"

"We did." Truth, again. What other wonders had they yet to reveal to him? "Barely, but we did. The same could not be said for our uplifted brethren."

Now he saw the war between the Aware and the Alar. It wasn't much of a war, given that the latter were the stewards of the vast majority of the Howling Darkness's infrastructure. But the sheer scale of the deaths rivalled his kind's own war with the Reapers. They had had a long time to colonize their dwarf galaxy.

"For the slaughter of our kin that we were forced to undertake, the Reapers will be destroyed."

"For the death of my people, the Reapers will be destroyed," he returned.

At that, Javik felt them cutting the transfer. Nothing more needed to be said.

Slowly, Javik collected his senses and stood to address the Council Chambers, with all eyes in said Chambers now fixed squarely at him.

"There is only one thing that matters," he said, "and that is the destruction of the Reapers."

Presidium Cafe, The Citadel

"Zaal?" Neala stared at the old quarian in wonder. "Is...goddess, is that you?"

Ancestors, her voice is just as I remember it. "Yes, Neala. I'm...I'm back."

She stared for another moment, then instantly closed the gap between them. He didn't resist as she embraced him tightly.

"I knew you would be on that fleet." She pulled back stared at him again, this time with a warm smile on her face. "I prayed to Athame to bring my bondmate back to me..."

"Still?" He found himself blurting out.

She was momentarily surprised at the outburst, but soon regained her composure. "Still. I...I will admit I have been with another. A Salarian, two decades after you were exiled."

"I do not resent you for it," he said quickly. "For all intents and purposes, I was dead."

"But now you're alive again." Her smile returned, brighter than ever. "And we have several decades of catching up to do."

As their embraced grew warmer and they shared a passionate kiss, their first kiss in six decades, Zaal'Doran couldn't help but think of an old human song he had heard just after First Contact.

"Ain't no mountain high enough

Ain't no valley low enough

Ain't no river wide enough

To keep me from getting you babe..."