Title: To the Stars
Fandom: Mass Effect
Categories: M, fShepard/Liara. Some sexual content, coarse language.
Disclaimer: Mass Effect and all characters, locations, etc. remain the property of BioWare. No copyright infringement is intended.
Summary: My attempt at giving Shepard and Liara a happy ending without contradicting too much of the canon 'ending'.

Even laying still, she hurt. The last thing she remembered was the flash of the Reaper's weapons, the last desperate moments crawling across the broken ground towards the conduit. The screams of the dying, the mechanical roar of the husks around them, the sounds of gunfire all around them as London burned.

Still, she tried to move. Shepard would never give up; neither would she. She'd give her last breath if it was needed to save her lover's home world. Slowly, she tried to rise to her feet-

"Doctor, the Asari's coming around!"

An unfamiliar voice, a human woman in an Alliance medic's uniform, stained with blood and dirt, an exhausted expression.

"Please don't move." The woman said. "You're lucky to be alive. We didn't expect you to wake up for another day or so. It's alright, Miss. You're safe now."

"Safe?" Liara whispered, not understanding. "I – I have to get back – we have to get to the Citadel-"

"It's over, Miss." The medic said, her eyes briefly flaring with a sudden joy. "The war is over, the Citadel… Shepard did it, she stopped them."

"We… won?" Liara breathed. "Shepard… where is she?"

The medic fell silent, but she could see the compassion in her expression as she gently held Liara's hands. She could feel sudden hot tears welling in her eyes, a cold emptiness inside her, the hope that had briefly flared in her heart extinguished. "Tell me." She said hollowly.

"I'm sorry." The medic said. "We- we still don't know, just that she was on the Citadel when it was destroyed... Nobody really knows what happened."

She can't be gone, Liara thought for a moment, remembering watching the Normandy fall in Alchera's orbit, how she'd brought her lover back from death itself. To have done all that and still lose her-

"I have to talk to – who's in charge, I need to see Anderson, or Hackett-" Liara demanded, trying to force herself upright, but the medic's hands held her down. Too weak to resist, she lay still again, fresh pains running down her body.

"I'll try and find someone who can bring you up to date, Miss." The medic told her. "But only if you cooperate and remain still. You've been through hell and too much exertion now won't help your recovery. To say nothing of the health of your baby-"

"Baby?" Liara whispered, the word seeming meaningless. She didn't care about some baby, she needed to find someone who knew where Shepard was-

A moment later, the meaning of the medic's words sunk in, and she fell silent, horror and despair mixing in her mind as she remembered her last night with Shepard, the deep melding as they shared their lives and hopes and dreams...

Not now, she thought. Not like this... not without her...

"You didn't know?" The medic asked gently. "I... I'm sorry, I thought Asari always knew. We found out when we were treating you..."

Liara barely heard the rest of the human woman's words, her mind still reeling, numbness overwhelming her. Tears flowed freely from her eyes, as she struggled to believe what the medic had told her.

"I'm sorry." The medic said eventually. "I- I have other patients. I'll try and find someone to see you..."

There's nobody I want to see, Liara thought bitterly. Except her.

[-]

She stared up at the Reaper ships, still silently hovering over London, frozen in the formations they'd taken in their final assault. Nothing the allied forces had done had been able to dislodge them. Mass effect fields surrounded each of them, shielding them with an impenetrable stasis. Nobody knew if they were truly inert, or if the minds of the Reapers still lingered within the craft, just waiting to once again rain death upon this world.

"We were firing enough artillery that it took our boys almost half an hour to realise they weren't firing back any more." Admiral Hackett said. "Then they bombarded them for another few hours, just in case. Have to assume shutting them down was what the Crucible did, but damned if anyone can work out what exactly happened to them."

"And it's the same all over the galaxy?" Liara asked eventually, staring up at the great black hulks. The city still bore the scars of the war; some had talked of abandoning London all together, turning it into a memorial for the millions dead. Smoke still dominated the skyline; clean-up crews were taking no risks when it came to disposing of the remains of the husk army. Incinerating them was seen as the only safe option, alongside the bodies of their victims. Nobody wanted to take any chances, not with the Reapers still casting their shadows over this broken world.

"From what we can tell." Hackett said quietly. His voice was pained; Liara couldn't blame him. The destruction of the relays had all but destroyed galactic civilization. Nobody knew if it had been a side-effect of the Crucible's activation, or some final revenge upon the younger races by the Reaper fleet. There was still communications – quantum entanglement devices still functioned, at least – but each of the worlds that had survived the Reaper genocide were now isolated, trapped by the tyrannies of distance. "Every Reaper in the galaxy shut down the moment the Citadel exploded. The husks died, the smaller destroyers became vulnerable… and the big cruisers remained frozen like this. I wish we knew why. I wish Shepard had time to tell us-"

He fell silent, looking back at Liara. She was still weak, but her doctors had given her permission to spend at least a few hours each day on her feet, and to meet with visitors. Admiral Hackett had been one of the first to arrive, to offer his condolences.

"I'm sure she had no other options." He said eventually.

She always found another option, Liara thought, a brief surge of anger that shocked her. Why couldn't she find one now?

"There's still a lot of colonies we haven't been able to make contact with." Hackett said. "Maybe there's still some working relays out there. Or maybe someone's got an idea for how to rebuild them. Restoring the Relay network will be a priority of the reconstruction. I promise, you and everyone else stranded here will make it home."

Home, Liara thought sadly, remembering Thessia as she'd last seen it, burning like Earth, like Palavan, like so many other worlds. The Protheans had broken the secrets of the Mass Relays, though it had taken centuries and come too late to save their empire. She was still young; even if it took centuries, she and her daughter might still be able to walk on Thessia's surface once again someday.

She wondered if it would be worth it, to see her home again. She didn't know if Thessia was home any more. For a little while at least, home had been with her, with Shepard. Her daughter would be born here, on Earth, on Shepard's world. Wasn't this her home now?

"Thank you." She said automatically. Despite her own apprehensions, she was touched by the human leader's determination to help the thousands of alien soldiers and civilians now trapped on Earth, so many despairing of ever seeing their homes or families.

"You take care of yourself, Ms. T'Soni." Hackett said quietly. There was a pain in his eyes as he looked at her. "We've lost too many good people in this war already."

She nodded, the two of them sharing a moment of silence as the weight of the losses each of them had experienced seemed to fill the room.

[-]

Time passed. The scars on Earth slowly healed. It was inspiring, in a way, to see every species that had fought for Earth now working alongside the humans to rebuild the shattered world. People that had been sworn enemies for generations now stood side by side to restore what the Reapers had destroyed. Turian and Krogan, Geth and Quarian, Rachni and Salarian, it was almost enough to give her hope again for the future.

"Heard you made it out of London alive." Wrex's booming voice echoed around the small apartment she now shared with two other Asari, fighter pilots from the Citadel fleet. Despite the rebuilding, Earth still struggled to house the millions of refugees from the fleet. So much of the planet had been devastated, entire cities razed to the ground, either by Reaper weapons or by the human resistance in a desperate scorched ground response to the invaders. Millions of humans now lived in refugee camps; these cramped few rooms shared with others were almost luxurious compared to many people's conditions.

"Figured you'd be too stubborn to die." Wrex said, the massive Krogan filling most of the room. "It's good to see you again."

"It's good to see you too, Wrex." She forced a smile. It was painful sometimes, to see her fellow survivors, to be reminded of what she'd lost – of who she'd lost. But it was also comforting, to know she still had friends, that life still went on.

"Scars look good on you." Wrex gestured. "You Asari always look too soft without a few battle trophies."

Liara ran her fingers down the rough scar that marred her cheek and ran down her neck and collarbone. They itched sometimes, late at night when all she could remember was the shrapnel cutting into her skin, the dull glow of the Reaper's weapons, the screams of the dying and her desperate efforts to stay close to Shepard…

"What's the news from Tuchanka?" She asked, forcing the memories aside.

"Good. Good." Wrex said, but his voice sounded flat. "The female clan leaders are holding things together. We weren't hit as hard as Earth was, and… well, we've got experience rebuilding from this sort of thing." He was silent for a long time, before finally speaking again. "The first clutches will hatch in the spring."

Liara saw the pain and anger in Wrex's eyes, that he wouldn't be there to see the first of the new generation of Krogan born, to hold in his hands the proof the genophage was truly cured. To work so hard, only to be denied the rewards of his efforts… her heart ached for the old Krogan warlord.

"I'm sorry." She said, her words sounding hollow even to herself.

"Hell, I'm not cut out to look after babies." Wrex said eventually. "Wait till they're grown up a bit, when they need someone to show them how to fight, that I can do. We'll have the relays back by then, I'm sure. Just you wait – I'll show you and your little one Tuchanka the way it was meant to be."

"I'd like that." Liara smiled. It was strange to live in a world where Tuchanka was a symbol of hope. "I'm sure… I'm sure she'll want to see Tuchanka too."

"Hell, if she's Shepard's kid, she'll love it." Wrex grinned. A sad silence filled the room, as they both remembered the human warrior. Liara stared out the window, Wrex beside her, seeing the shooting stars still raining down over Earth, fragments of the Citadel and the thousands of ships lost in the battle. Enough debris had been kicked up by the war that the sunsets were still a spectacular shade of orange; some were predicting the debris would cause extreme weather changes for years to come. "Hell of a funeral pyre." Wrex said, gesturing at the burning fragments. "Can't think of a better tribute to her."

"The Reapers are still there." Liara said quietly.

"Yeah." Wrex said. "That's why I came here, actually. Humans are putting together a team to take another look at those things. Thought you might want to be part of it."

"Me?" Liara said. The great black shapes in the sky still horrified her each day; she wanted nothing to do with them ever again. She just wanted to remain here, raise her child when she came, help rebuild her adopted world, and forget about the monsters that had taken her lover from her.

"Those things travelled faster than any ship I've ever heard of, and they didn't use the relays." Wrex shrugged slowly. "I figure studying them's the best chance my troops have of getting home before they figure they're stuck here for life and some of them try and carve out their own empires here. I know, engineering isn't your thing, but you study old things for a living. Not a lot out there older than them."

Liara stared at the black silhouettes against the stars, still frozen in place. Gently, she rubbed her stomach, feeling the new life within her. If it was just her, she'd have nothing to do with the Reapers again. Earth was her home, as much as anywhere was home any more. The rest of the galaxy didn't matter anymore, not now Shepard was gone. But for Wrex, for all her surviving friends – for her daughter… if she could give them back the stars, it was worth a try.

"Alright." She said eventually.

[-]

It was strange, boarding a human dreadnought. Everywhere she looked, there were echoes of the Normandy, of Shepard. The Vesuvius wasn't as cramped as the Normandy had been, but it was still clearly a product of the same design ethics. Sometimes, when she woke up after fitful nights haunted by nightmares, it would take her a few minutes to remember she wasn't back on the original Normandy, hunting Saren alongside the human woman who had captured her heart.

She'd thought the pain of remembering she was gone would fade, but as time passed, it only seemed to grow. She couldn't escape being reminded of Shepard here; the humans around her seemed in awe of her past, of her achievements. A few, the first few days, had tried to ask her about Shepard, had tried to thank her for helping save the galaxy. It had taken all her effort not to hurl them across the room with biotic force, as the pain of remembering her overwhelmed her.

Now, at least, most of them left her alone. She spent her days pouring over the information the Alliance had accumulated about the Reaper ships, comparing it with the scant results coming in across the entanglement network from similar teams studying the Reapers at Palaven and Thessia, looking over her old records taken from the Prothean VI on Ilos. It occupied her time, at least, and gave her something to focus on other than her loss.

She rubbed her now-bulging stomach, and wondered how she'd cope when her daughter was born. What would she do if every time she looked at her child, all she could think of was the woman she'd lost?

"Doctor T'Soni?" The communications channel crackled to life. "Team five think they've found a weakness in the stasis field. Report to the conference room with your results. We're sending a team over."

"On my way." She said, forcing the grief aside once again. As long as there was a problem to solve, she might be able to keep functioning alone.

[-]

Waiting in the cramped shuttle seemed like an eternity.

"You're looking good." One said. Liara nodded slowly, a hollow feeling in her stomach as she remembered how she'd first met the dark-haired woman beside her. Handing over Shepard's body to Cerberus, the promise that they could restore her lover to life…

"You're sure this is a good idea you going over there? With the baby-" Miranda was cut off by the shuttle's third passenger.

"Shit, give her a break. She can take care of herself." Liara was glad for the unexpected support from Jack. It was strange seeing the savage-looking woman here, as part of this scientific project, but Liara had heard some of the other scientists assigned to the Vesuvius saying it was actually one of Jack's pupils from Grissom station who was officially part of the project. Jack had merely tagged along – by threatening a shuttle pilot until he let her come aboard, stubbornly refusing to let her students out of her sight, according to the rumours.

Liara managed a smile. It was strange to think of Jack so fiercely looking out for anyone's interests but her own. How times change…

"Besides, if there's anything still working on those things, we're all fucked anyway." Jack continued cheerfully.

An ominous silence filled the shuttle as they slowly moved closer to the great immobile form of the Reaper warship.

"I haven't seen you since you came aboard." Miranda finally spoke again, breaking the oppressive silence. "I was worried-"

"I've been busy." Liara cut her off, but her warning tone wasn't enough to silence the human woman.

"Garrus told me you haven't spoken to him or the other Normandy crew either." Miranda said, her tone reproachful. Liara looked down at the floor. It was true, she'd ignored the repeated efforts by the Normandy survivors to contact her. Finding out the Normandy had survived the battle of Earth after all, that its crew had made it to the Arcturus System, it had lifted her spirits slightly. Knowing that Garrus and Tali and Joker and the other old friends still lived, that they'd made contact with the local human colony and used the Normandy's communications systems to help re-establish contact between some of the more isolated systems of the galaxy – it had been a great weight of her mind. But still, she couldn't bring herself to talk to any of them, to confirm what they all already suspected, that Shepard was dead, to see the grief in their eyes and hear their words of sympathy… It was something she still couldn't face.

"I've been busy." She said again flatly.

"Liara-" Miranda started, before Jack cut her off.

"Leave her alone, Miri. None of your business who she talks to."

Miranda looked as if she wanted to say more, but they were cut off by the pilots announcement.

"Deploying forward shield." He said. The plan was to use a modified shield generator to create a brief interruption in the stasis field around the Reaper, wide enough for the shuttle to pass through and reach the ship itself. "Reaching outer edge of the stasis field in three… two… one. We're inside."

The three women glanced at each other nervously, wondering what lurked on board the ancient warship, if they would finally discover what had really happened to the Reaper fleet when the Crucible had fired.

[-]

"This is Exploratory Team to Vesuvius. Reaper's just as dead inside as it is outside." Miranda reported. "Mass effect fields and the power systems are still operating at low levels, but that's about it. I don't…"

She glanced around the derelict Reaper. The metal corridors, the inhuman angles were enough to give her headaches, but she didn't sense the same oppressive iwrongness/i that had dominated the dead Reaper she'd explored in the Thorne system. The malign intelligence that had controlled this ship was gone.

"I can't put it into words." She said eventually. "It's like… like an AI after someone blasted its blue box. All the processing power, all the hardware's still there, but the mind… is gone. Vesuvius, we haven't completed our survey – but honestly, I think it's safe to start sending some of the other science teams over here."

"Taking that under advisement, Exploratory Team." The Vesuvius' captain said. "Report back when you've finished our survey. Vesuvius out."

"Shit." She heard Jack's voice a moment later, and she froze for a second. "That's disgusting."

"What is it?" She asked, rushing to meet the rest of the team.

"Processing centre." Jack said, kneeling down. "Guess this is where they made husks."

Liara barely heard the two women behind her as she stared at the bones scattered around the chamber, a few already surrounded by the sliver-blue mesh of Reaper implants. She wondered if these victims had known their fate as they died, if they'd seen the others being turned into hideous mockeries of life. The thought of how many had died in agony at the hands of the Reapers, the billions that died to create each of these ships, the trillions more exterminated each time the cycle of extinction had repeated itself. She stared at a skull, its empty eyes seeming to stare accusingly at her.

"Why?" She whispered. For a moment, she could almost imagine the skull was Shepards, and suddenly, in that moment, months of grief and anger overwhelmed her. "Why?" She screamed, unleashing a wave of biotic force that shattered the bones. "Why are they still here if she's gone?"

Beside her, Miranda and Jack could only watch in shock as she raged, electric blue energy surrounding her as she tried desperately to smash apart the metal of the Reaper's structure. "She died for what? So these things would stay here? So they could kill again? And again? And again? We fought them! She fought them! She fought them so hard! She gave everything to fight them! WHY ARE THEY STILL HERE?"

"Liara-" Miranda started, and Liara turned, her eyes glowing with biotic energy. Unthinkingly, she hurled a blast of energy at the human woman, who barely had time to duck before the blast would have obliterated her.

"You said you'd look after her! You promised you'd look after her!" Liara screamed. "Then you left her! You disappeared! I had to protect her instead, I had to look after her when it was late and she was tired from fighting everyone's battles and she couldn't rest. I tried! I tried to protect her! Goddess judge me, I swear I tried! All I wanted was to keep her safe… I wasn't strong enough. I wasn't fast enough…"

Liara collapsed, sobbing helplessly, the barriers around her fading. Wracking sobs echoed off the metal walls, grief and pain and anger consuming her.

In the end, it was Jack who held her, her arms tight around her body as she sobbed, the slim woman carrying her back to the shuttle. Each time she thought the pain had passed, the smell and warmth of the human woman clutched against her reminded her of Shepard, and a fresh wave of grief overwhelmed her. Finally, Jack released her, and she lay still across the shuttle's floor.

"I'm sorry." She whispered, and Jack brushed against the fronds on her head, her touch surprisingly gentle, reminding her of her mother comforting her when she'd been a child and the other kids had taunted her for being pure-blood.

"Shit, we all feel like throwing Miri into a bulkhead sometimes." Jack said.

Finally, Liara laughed, the noise sounding more like a rough cough than anything else, but it was enough at least to finally take the edge of the grief.

"I should have been there." Miranda said quietly from the corner of the shuttle. "I'm sorry too."

[-]

"She really fucked things up, huh?"

Liara stared at Jack. It had been three days since they'd left the Reaper, long enough that the Alliance medical staff had finally decided they were free of any signs of indoctrination. Engineering teams, Quarians and Geth, were now inside the Reaper, mapping the seemingly endless corridors of the ship, looking for something new, some hint of usable technology that could be salvaged to rebuild civilization. Until new data became available, there wasn't much for Liara or the other members of the science team to do.

"Miranda?" She asked. Jack shook her head.

"Shepard. Blowing all that shit up and leaving us to pick up all the pieces."

Liara stared at Jack, stunned for a moment. Then, slowly, she nodded.

"Yes. She did." Liara finally said, some of the tension finally flowing out of her. Accepting that it wasn't just grief, but anger too, anger at Shepard for leaving her alone, for doing what she did without offering an explanation, an apology… or a goodbye.

"I wish I knew…" Liara said quietly. "I just wish I knew what happened. If there'd been another way."

"Fuck it." Jack said, pacing around the room. "It's done. We've just got to fix it. We can do that. We don't need the great Commander Shepard to solve every fucking problem in the galaxy. You and Miri will figure things out."

"Miri?" Liara smiled slightly. Jack had been calling Miranda that on the shuttle too. Even as isolated as she had been for most of her time on the Vesuvius, she'd heard rumours about the two women, but she'd dismissed them as just idle gossip. She raised an eyebrow. "What's going on with you two, anyway?"

Jack glared at her, the old fire in her eyes flickering again, before she sat down, slumping into a chair.

"Shit, I don't know." She said. "Back on the Normandy, during that Collector thing – she was a bitch, you know? But hell, Shepard was a bitch. I'm a bitch. I understood her then. Wanted to smash her face in sometimes, but I understood her."

"And now?" Liara asked.

"Her sister's still among the missing. Nobody's heard from Horizon since the relays blew." Jack said. "She just… there were kids on Grissom Station like her. They just… shut down unless you kept pushing them. Like they didn't remember they were still alive. I - fuck, I'm worried about her. What the hell is wrong with me?"

Liara was silent. Jack shook her head, before glaring back at her.

"So I gotta keep an eye on her, making sure she doesn't do anything stupid to herself." Jack said. "Remind her that there's still people who give a shit if she lives or dies. Not how I planned on spending my time once this Reaper shit was over. Doesn't give me any time to waste babysitting a depressed Asari either."

Liara looked at her, feeling like she'd been slapped. Jack glared at her again.

"Yeah, Shepard's dead." Jack said. "Yeah, it hurts. It hurts all of us. But you're tough enough to survive this. I'm not going to give you some crap pep talk about what Shepard would have wanted. You know what she would have wanted you to do, and sitting around crying all day isn't it. And, fuck it, even if it was, you've got a kid there waiting to be born, and she's going to need a mother.

So don't fuck this shit up for her, Liara, or I'll be back to kick your ass."

A hot tear ran down her cheek as she looked back at the tattooed woman, her tone so reminiscent of Shepard dressing down one of her crew. Slowly, she nodded.

"Yes sir." She muttered. Jack grinned.

"Shit, now we've got that out the way, let's get some drinks. Kid's going to be alright if you have a beer or two, right? Got a name picked yet?"

For the first time in months, Liara's smile was completely genuine. It was good to remember she still had friends – no matter how unexpected some of them were.

[-]

That night, she dreamed of Shepard. A gentle caress, a slow teasing finger down the length of her fronds, soft lips wrapping around her hard nipples. Rough hands across her swollen belly, a sense of joy at the sight of her surrounding them both.

Her lover moved quickly now, her fingers pressing down, parting her thighs, her body growing wet with anticipation. The smell of arousal, the hot touch of human skin, the sense of her pressing deep inside her, one finger, then two, then a third as her thumb moved quickly, massaging the folds between her legs.

I love you, she heard the words, distorted as if from a great distance, and she reached out, longing to feel the human woman in her arms again, but finding only empty air.

Slowly, she opened her eyes, finding her bed empty once again. The sense of frustrated longing washed over her again, as it always did when she dreamed of Shepard, but now, at least, she felt she could overcome it.

Slowly, carefully, she rose to her feet, waddling as she tried to accommodate the swollen belly destroying her centre of balance. She stared at herself in her bathroom's mirror, her breasts and stomach swollen and purple, the freckles on her cheeks slowly fading as her skin darkened. The perfect image of a maiden Asari about to enter the matron stage.

Gently, she rubbed her belly, feeling the new life within her. "Good morning." She whispered. "I'm your mommy, and I'll look after you."

[-]

"No!" Liara shouted into the communicator. "That's not necessary, you can raise power levels another fifteen per cent without damaging the integrity of the field!"

"The Prothean conduit on Ilos used these power settings-" A human scientist said.

"Because they wanted to conceal their power emissions from the Reapers!" Liara said. "A higher power level is perfectly safe-"

"Liara, focus." Jack cut her off.

"I am focused!" Liara said, her eyes darting back and forth across the screens of data surrounding her. "With your settings, the probe will not reach the required velocity- gha!" A wave of pain ran through her, an agonizing blast through her abdomen.

"Forget about the stupid probe and push!" Jack shouted at her. Beside her, a flustered Asari midwife could only watch in confusion at the chaos in the medical bay, the tattooed human biotic screaming at her patient, the dark-haired human woman beside her holding her hand while data screens around them displayed constantly updated information from the science labs, the launch bay, a constant buzz of noise from communications channel open to the bridge, to Earth, to the science team on board the Reaper and their counterparts on Thessia and Rannoch. It felt more like a war room than a birth.

"Was it this crazy on the Normandy?" She quietly asked the Krogan standing guard by the door. It had taken all her efforts just to get past him, to convince him and her patient that someone with medical training should be present in this anarchy.

"This is pretty quiet." Wrex said. "Heh, you should have seen Shepard when she got fixed on an idea."

"T'soni-Doctor is correct, Earth control." A Geth's voice filtered through the channels. "We calculate optimum power levels at 14.82 per cent higher than current standard-"

"Miri, shut all this shit off!" Jack shouted. "Liara, just push and focus on the fucking baby. The eggheads in the science lab can handle their shit from here."

"I said I'm pushing!" Liara shouted back, sweat running down her face as she gasped for breath.

"Well push harder." Jack snapped back. "Shit, Liara, I'd think after ten months of this, you'd be trying a little harder to get the little bitch out."

Liara was about to respond with a string of obscenities of her own, when another wave of pain and nausea ran through her. "Goddess!" She screamed, as the data screens around her went dark.

"Almost there." The midwife said, finally moving forward to push Jack out the way. "I'll take it from here. Doctor, I can initiate a brief meld to ease the pain-"

"I'm fine." Liara said through gritted teeth. She felt like she was going to pass out, her body tearing itself apart, but she was determined to endure it. Just a little longer, she told herself-

"I can see a frond!" Miranda shouted, before a crash sounded outside, and alert lights began to flash, surrounding them all in a dull red glow.

"The hell?" Jack glanced around. "Ship's moving…"

Liara gasped for air. She almost asked Miranda to turn the screens back on, to find out what was happening, but all she could focus on was the pain. Just a few more moments…

"She's here!" The midwife said, the red pain slowly fading from her body.

"Congrats, Liara, it's a girl." Jack grinned. "What's her name?"

Liara blinked back tears as she was handed her child, the tiny blue baby blinking in confusion at its surroundings. Her heart ached as she saw the tiny curves of the fronds of the baby's skull, the faint dark freckles on the cheeks… and the dark eyes, the same brown depths she'd lost herself in so long ago on the Normandy. Shepard's child… my child, she thought, the thought overwhelming her.

"Hope." She whispered softly, as she held her baby in her arms. For a little while, at least, all was right with the galaxy.

[-]

Watching the records afterwards, Liara found herself still as confused as everyone else. Even knowing the test had been a success, her heart still stopped for a moment as she watched the crude Mass Relay in Earth orbit fire up, preparing to launch the tiny probe towards its counterpart at Thessia. Then, a moment after the relay flared with white energy, there was a sudden pulse of blue energy, and the Reaper craft beside it suddenly flared to life, the sinister dull lights scanning its surroundings.

"Same thing happened with every Reaper in the system. Our contacts on Rannoch, Palavan, Thessia, all reported the same thing." Hackett said. The old admiral looked exhausted, but the pain she'd seen in his eyes the last time they'd spoken had faded. She sat up in her bed, her baby still nestled sleeping in her arms as she studied the records. "That's when we got the transmission."

The transmission had been heard on every active communications system in the fleet. Just five words, their source still unknown.

"Shutting them down. Get clear." Liara repeated them. The meaning had proven clear enough; for a few moments, the Reaper ships had fallen silent again – long enough for the science teams to evacuate, long enough for the Alliance ships to move away from Harbinger and the other Reaper dreadnoughts. A minute later-

"The power cores of every one of those ships went critical." Hackett shook his head. "Their Mass effect fields shut down, and they just… collapsed in on themselves. All that's left of any of them is twisted metal now. It's like… like some mad biotic unleashed the mother of all singularities on every ship in the Reaper fleet simultaneously."

"Whoever sent the transmission…" Liara mused.

"…made sure none of our ships were close enough to be sucked in." Hackett finished. "But it's more than that. We'd have never been able to build a mass relay of our own without the data you and the other teams assembled based on our study of intact Reaper technology. I can't believe it was a coincidence that those ships self-destructed the moment they weren't needed any more."

"And the probe?" Liara asked.

"Arrived at Thessia half an hour after we launched it." Hackett said. "Not as good as the old relays – but it works. We can build a full sized device here and at Thessia, and then start sending out ships to assemble relays in the other star clusters. It's going to take a long time…"

"But we did it." Liara said quietly, holding her baby in her arms, feeling the child's heartbeat. By the time she was grown, a new relay network would be established. The worst of the destruction would finally be over. She sighed.

"Someone's looking out for us." She said eventually. Hackett nodded.

"Just wish I knew who or what it was." He said. "All I know is I feel a damn bit safer now those hulks are finally gone."

Liara nodded. She could feel fatigue overwhelming her. It had been a very long day. "Thank you." She said, not sure if she was thanking Hackett, or their mysterious protector… whoever that might be.

[-]

Liara watched out the ship's viewports, the sun rising over Earth. The blue of its oceans, the green and brown and red of the landscapes, the bright lights of the cities once again flickering to life, the fires brought by the Reapers and the dark stains of their ships now gone. In the corner of the room in her crib, little Hope slept, comfortably oblivious to all the pain the universe had suffered.

Between Earth and its moon, she saw the bright blue-white of the prototype Mass Relay, the silver shapes of the first ships arriving from Thessia, bringing much needed supplies and beginning the work of shuttling home the Asari soldiers trapped on Earth by the war. It had been a long time coming, but things were finally beginning to return to normal.

"You did it, Shepard." She whispered at the stars. "I just wish… I wish you could have seen it. I wish you could have known…"

"Liara, get your ass to the comm room now!" Jack's voice over the intercom interrupted her reflections. "Normandy's calling, you'd better pick up!"

"The baby-" Liara began.

"I'll watch her." Jack said. Her voice sounded strange, almost hysterical. Liara's blood froze, as she wondered what was wrong. For something to have happened to the Normandy survivors now, just when there was finally hope of bringing them home…

"Fuck, Liara, I'm going to rip those tentacles off your skull if you don't come see this!" Jack was still screaming into her omnitool as she burst into Liara's quarters. She looked up, staring at her with wild eyes blazing with… Liara wasn't sure. "Just get down there, alright?"

Rising to her feet, Liara all but broke into a run as she made her way through the Vesuvius' corridors. She hadn't had a chance to speak to the Normandy crew since the birth; she'd wanted a chance for things to calm down a little before speaking to them again. The last she'd spoken to any of them had been a few days before the relay test, appologsing for her long silence. Her heart sunk as she thought of them all – Tali, Joker, Garrus, Dr. Chakwas and the rest. She almost didn't want to know if something was wrong.

The human communications officer stepped aside as she entered the room, nodding quickly as she exited the room. The human officer almost looked as if she'd been crying…

"Normandy, this is Liara." She spoke into the headpiece. "Please respond."

"Liara." A familiar voice, hoarse with emotion answered as the image in front of her stabilized and the quantum connection was made.

"EDI?" Liara said, seeing the AI's robotic body. She frowned, noticing differences. The hair had changed from the solid helmet EDI always maintained, and the skin looked warmer, more human. There was something different about the way she stood; a more military bearing. "EDI?" she asked again.

"God, Liara." EDI – the woman who looked like EDI at least – spoke again, and Liara's heart stopped as she saw the woman's face shift, the metal skin altering slightly, her whole body growing leaner, more athletic. Barely believing, she watched as the woman's eyes darkened, a familiar shade of brown. "I missed you so much." The woman said, and Liara all but had to stop herself from leaping forward to embrace the holographic image.

"Shepard." She breathed. "How… is it really you?"

"Commander Shepard is occupying my mobile body." She heard EDI's normal voice in the background, coming from one of the Normandy's computer panels. "It is difficult to confirm – but yes, I believe it is her."

"Liara." Shepard said. "I… I'm so sorry I left you."

"How…?" Liara said, her mind whirring as she tried to understand.

"I…" Shepard was silent for a long time. Finally she spoke again. "The Catalyst… it… it let me control the Reapers. But I couldn't - I couldn't handle the power of the machine. It destroyed my body, but my mind survived. I… I stopped them all, sealed them in stasis so they couldn't hurt anyone again."

"But why are you here, now, then?" Liara said.

Shepard's face was one of pain. "I'm so sorry, Liara. I could have destroyed them immediately – but I didn't know what would happen, at first, and after that…

You don't know what it's like. You couldn't understand. To control them – to become part of them… I forgot who I was. I forgot what I was. All I remembered was that last thought, that I needed to stop them. For a long time, that's all that was left of me. Just that one thought, stop.

Then I saw you. On the Reaper. I felt those blasts of energy inside it. I… I remembered who I was. I remembered why I was doing what I was doing. You gave me that back, reminded me I was human. Reminded me why I wanted to stop them…"

Liara blinked back sudden tears as she heard Shepard's story, imagining what it must have been like, to be a disembodied consciousness like that, all her strength consumed by the effort of holding the Reaper fleet in check.

"And then… I saw what you were doing." Shepard lowered her head. "I could have let go immediately, but… you were so close. I couldn't… I couldn't take the stars from you. I had to hold on just a little longer."

"You made the right choice, Shepard." Liara said softly.

"When I let go, I only had a few moments." Shepard said. "EDI's body was based on Reaper technology, it was the only mind I knew of that could still host… what I've become. What's left of me."

"You're alive, Shepard." Liara said softly, remembering the fears her lover had confessed about her first resurrection, back on the Cerberus base. "That's all that matters to me."

There was a long silence, as the two women stared at each other. She's alive, Liara said, the reality of the situation still settling in. Right now, it still didn't seem real. Alive. Dozens of light-years away, but still… alive.

"There is…" Liara started hesitantly. "The Alliance is sending an engineering ship to Arcturus to assemble a new relay in your cluster. I… don't know when it launches, but I'm sure Hackett will make it a priority if I talk to him. With only conventional FTL, it will take…"

"Almost five years to get here." Shepard said softly. "I know."

"But it will get there." Liara said, her eyes blazing with hope. "Shepard. We will come for you. Both of us."

"Both?" Shepard frowned. Goddess, nobody's told her yet, Liara realised.

"Your daughter, Shepard." Liara said eventually. She laughed, tears of joy running down her face, as the truth finally sunk in. "We'll have lots of time to catch up..."

[-]

For the rest of her life, Liara would never forget that moment. Finally stepping off the Alliance shuttle, breathing clean air for the first time in years, the long voyage through the interstellar void finally over.

Seeing her lover standing there at the landing pad, a faint shimmer in her eyes, but nothing else betraying her synthetic nature. That same crooked smile that drove her wild, the same face and hair and body she'd fallen in love with. And finally, holding her in her arms, feeling her there, that final reassurance that, yes, this was real, not just another fantasy that would fade in the morning leaving only an emptiness in her heart.

"Mommy?" Hope said, the five year old girl staring curiously at the human woman.

"That's right, Hope." Liara said. "She's your mommy too. She's waited a long time to meet you."

"Hi." Shepard said, kneeling down in front of the young Asari. Hope hesitated a moment, then raced forward, wrapping her arms around Shepard, delighted to finally meet the parent Liara had spent so many nights telling her about.

Once again, tears blurred her vision. Her family was together at last.